I’m sitting on my patio on this second day of summer. The previous evening, the sky remained a dusky rose until after 9 pm. This morning I washed my floors and scrubbed the tiles with vinegar. Now I am admiring my plants, a garden that includes a flowering begonia that I bought years ago, and a luxurious spider plant that reaches toward the sky vibrant with new offshoots. The rest gather around like a tutu-skirt celebrating the new arrivals. My daughter gave me the original spider when she was in pre-school and it has proliferated ever since. Hovering amid the spider’s protection is a flowering maple that startled me after first seeing its perfectly veined orange and red blossoms that appear like tiny Chinese pagodas or lights strung along the backyard of some holiday barbecue. The aloe plant captures sunlight in its uppermost leaves as they sparkle a brighter green. Chimes hang above my tomatoes and play variations upon the passing breeze. But what I am actually watching from my patio are birds that fly back and forth into a vent built for some purpose I have yet to discern. Hidden from predators, each year it provides a nesting place. The baby bird’s chirp endlessly. Parents swoop back and forth with edibles.
I’m trying to decide upon the species—if they are juncos or a nuthatch–to get a quick look at the shape of their tails, are they square or forked, cheeks white or black? But they don’t stay still long enough for me to get a look, pitch something quickly into the nest and defy my ability to categorize them. My cat also watches them. On many afternoons, I observed him siting on the railing and hoping for a slip up, a quick dip his way. After weeks of patience, today he is less assured, less poised as a predator, calling with a mournful meow, and somersaulting several times on his back, maybe hoping to charm the birds into flying into his open mouth. They don’t. He loses interest and goes to sleep. Another bird, this one a song sparrow, bounces on the trampoline of a fragile branch. Everything makes its own place, no unrealistic expectations. It feels so peaceful this morning. Everyone is watching each other and staying quiet, me with my can of sparkling water, an iPad, the birds, my cat, my plants. And neighbors who gather outside my window getting ready to hike up Leona Canyon Creek in this era of the pandemic.