Sometimes, when trying to write a blog post, the first words can be the most difficult to come but that’s only because I head into something not having any real idea about what I want to say. The two previous entries were about our approach to the Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge and our time amongst the birds and other creatures. Today, we’ll be heading home, but before we start on that leg of our weekend journey, we’re obviously right back where we were yesterday.
Nothing here is exactly the way it was, ever. If only we could understand that the sky, clouds, light, temperature, and the configuration of all things are in constant motion, never duplicating what was, maybe we’d break out of the lament of perceived routines required to participate with the machine of making money.
Maybe birds, too, wonder why they have to continuously return to bodies of water where they have to float in an icy bed, get up at the break of dawn, and fly to yet another location to find food, only to do it all over again. Then, after months of this routine, they have to fly over 3,500 miles (5,600km) to the Arctic, where within 5 miles of water, they establish another home base and keep up the grind of sleep, fly, eat, fly, sleep as though it was the worst job ever.
Things aren’t all bad as a bird, well, except for those situations where a hunter might shoot you, a wolf or coyote could eat you, or maybe a fox or owl could steal your child while it’s still an egg, but other than that things are pretty good. The average snow goose has the best views ever for sunrise and sunset; they poop at will with no need or concern for what’s below, they fly for free to any damn place they want, and if they spot some food, they swoop in to eat without a thought of cost. If they are lucky, they’ll experience up to 20 years of this carefree life of flying over half the planet pooping, eating, and breeding while we idiot bipeds below grimace at our stupid life choices and servitude at some meaningless task that barely affords us the opportunity to sleep under a roof and poop in a toilet.
I’d probably not enjoy being plucked out of the purple and red waters of dawn on some winter day by the nearby eagle looking to make a meal of something, but I would like to know the freedom to paddle across the surface of a lake or pond and fish for grasses and worms in the muck before taking flight to skim above the surface of calm waters and finally settling down to float under the noonday sun.
To some very small degree, Caroline and I are fortunate enough to live like birds, albeit flightless ones. That’s right, at least as far as I’m concerned, I poop where it occurs to me, which includes while driving around or standing here taking photos of flocks of geese under the morning sky. While I eschew worms and grasses, I’m not beyond hotdogs and kimchi. Our migration instincts toss us west to east, sometimes north, rarely south, but we are open to planetary exploration. Caroline may have been born with eggs but we’ve chosen not to fertilize them so foxes and owls do not become pests in our desires for a good life.
Regarding our limitation of not being able to take spontaneous flight, we do own a Kia Niro that allows us to jump in and race over the surface of the earth, which might be equated to something akin to chicken-like behavior as they, too, are denied flight although they are birds. Then again, they’d never be able to control the steering wheel or reach the gas pedal, so maybe that was a bad analogy.
Thinking again about my poor metaphor disguised as an analogy, I have to consider that my reader might think this is a silly exercise, but how many of them have allowed their children to believe reindeer take flight, pulling a fat man and sled to millions of homes to drop presents under a dead tree decorated with festive and expensive ornamentation? So, you cynics out there, how about you try to read my nonsense as ornaments upon my writing where, without much left to share about the joys of birdwatching on a cold winter day with gorgeous skies, I reach for the absurd instead of sharing how we tucked in around the tree and television for cookies as we watched Miracle on 34th Street for the 23rd time.
Speaking of Miracle on 34th Street, did you know that Richard Attenborough, who played Kris Kringle in that 1947 film, was the older brother of Sir David Attenborough, who might have provided his voice-over talent to these very geese at some time in their lives? Don’t forget that geese can live 20 years covering a vast area of our planet, so what I’m suggesting isn’t totally impossible, though possibly improbable.
With all the birds gone, we, too, were ready to make ourselves gone.
After the obligatory stop at El Camino Family Restaurant for yet more steak Tampico and the ladies ordering Egg Mexicanos for the umpteenth time, we were ready to head down the long road towards home somewhere out there in the distance.
Regarding our reading of Lord of Dark Places by Hal Bennett that we started on Christmas Eve, well, we finished it all right, or should I say it finished us.