Nesting Season: Taking Time to Take Care

Kale going to seed

Early mornings are my favorite time here on the farm.  The silence wraps around me like a warm hug, while the occasional chirps, chips, and trills make me smile.  It's Saturday; and this is the first Saturday in a month that I've been able to sleep in a bit, then wander from window to window, peering out at the flowers and the birds and the waving grass.

A flash of color on the back porch catches my eye:  a mockingbird.  Their reputation for just plain meanness is well-justified and there's one sitting in a basket on the second shelf of a baker's rack.  It's within a yard of the back door and I peer at it, my movement flushing the ornery bird.  As I look closer at the basket, the scraggly collection of twigs poking out of it tells me it contains a nest.  If there are no eggs in it, I think I might move it or even destroy it.  It's been hard enough to live with nesting pairs of amiable barn swallows on top of the porch's ceiling fan for two seasons; I just don't think I could live with protective mama and papa mockingbird dive-bombing me every time I step out of the back door.  Besides, nestlings and fledglings are tasty spring treats for snakes, and I do not want to remind them that my porch is a source of fast food.

After a lifetime of proclaiming I can't draw,
I've determined to learn.  Here
is a drawing of a houseplace
in northern Mississippi.

Enough of today's existential crisis, and back to my reverie.  The to-do list is long today, and I know I'll not finish it since it begins with capping strawberries to freeze and make preserves.  Strawberries fresh from Brownlee Farms is a special spring treat, and I expect to gobble as much as I preserve!  Two flats should keep me busy, don't you think?

I so enjoy the drifts of red clover along the highway!

With the busy schedule we have had, the kitchen table has become the "go through later" repository.  Since it's piled so high that things are now sliding off (sadly, this is not an exaggeration), I think "later" has arrived, so I can do that while "occasionally stirring" the strawberry preserves.  Actually, I need to organize the whole house, which has suffered from our "drop it and run" schedule of the last month:  perhaps after planting season, but before the weeding really ramps up.

There's always so much to do, that I can neglect to take time to just be.  I am too busy to stop and enjoy the fresh spring breeze cooling my sun-warmed face.  I am too busy to snuggle up next to a warm dragon while he snores.  I am . . . tired.

So, the breeze beckons, the songbirds sing, and the dragon drowses:  it's time to go enjoy them.

Barn swallows are tolerable, but mockingbirds?

How are you living your Savory life?

Nancy