April 29, 2015
(This is part
of a 365 project during my 70th year where I write and illustrate a blog on
each day's gift.)
It happened during a quiet moment. I was sitting on my porch with pollen raining down on the umbrella I was sitting under. Various neighborhood
birds forgot that I was a foreigner and they ventured to the nearby bird
feeders. (As I discovered later, I had another visitor too—a tick.) I was
alternating between reading Atul Gawande’s book, “Being Mortal,” and a
revealing interview with David Simon about the complex problem in Baltimore
that is coming to light.
A fluttering near my head caught my attention and I
was greeted by the first hummingbird of the season, a ruby-throated hummingbird.
It had been attracted to an orange object near me and then it flew away
disappointed, for sure. But not for long. I knew that migrating hummingbirds
return to Maryland in April and I had been so distracted lately that I forgot
to put the feeder out for the new season. I immediately went into the house,
mixed one cup of water with ¼ cup of sugar, and poured it into the feeder,
which I then hung outside in its regular spot.
It took no longer than two minutes until a couple
of hummingbirds discovered it. Since they live about four years, I think these
returned to my porch from last year. I
love to watch these bee-sized birds that beat their wings around 55 times per
second and can fly 25 miles per hour—right, left, up, down, backwards and even
upside down.
It makes me speculate that if humans were as
flexible in their thinking as hummingbirds are in their flight, maybe we would
be able to solve many more problems than we do now.
My
gift today is a hummingbird.
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You can find links to my other posts on this project here:
http://bjschupp.blogspot.com/2014/12/365-gifts.html
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