Thanks Giving

I wrote this post last Sunday.




I'm at my mom's house in Murphys, a small town in the sierra foothills. It's so cold here. I'm sitting downstairs in a nightgown borrowed from my sister. She said she bought it on sale when I asked what would possess her to buy a nightgown with sleeves like this? I could have recycled rain in those sleeves.


Last night we went out to dinner with mom and Adam. I spotted a small bird in the shrub outside the door when walking to the car. I thought the bird was fake, one of those birds made out of styrofoam and feathers you'd buy at Michael's. But it's real. I think he forgot to fly south for the winter. He sat on that branch all night. The temperature dropped to the 20s, maybe high teens. I woke up several times worrying about this tiny bird though I knew I couldn't intervene. Part of me wanted to find a shoe box, decorate it, put some kleenex inside and try to feed the bird from an eye-dropper like I attempted to do as a little kid when I found an ailing animal. 


In the earliest cold hours of the morning he was still there, stiff in the branch. Then when the sun rose, he took flight, I'm hoping for some place warmer.