Pain, Loss, Hope, and the Chokecherry Birds

Photo copyright Aji, 2015; all rights reserved.

What a day.

I awakened to ice everywhere this morning. Last night's snow switched to rain shortly after it started, and the predicted 8-12" storm didn't even materialize on the peaks.

By ten o'clock, the temperature had risen so fast that the ice was already water.

It seems a perfect metaphor for the wild swings that have punctuated this day.

I looked at the news even before I made coffee. The death toll in Nepal was grim then; now, it's over 4,300 and climbing.

By the end of the day, when I was finally indoors, for the most part, I watched in horror as events unfolded, as they say, in Baltimore — "events" that were no such thing, but were, rather, wholly engineered by paramilitarized police spoiling for an excuse to engage in uncontrolled mob behavior against a Black community that has been suffocating beneath their combat boots for generations and more. And I see, in allegedly liberal spaces, white people continuing to prattle on at me about how terrible it all is, echoing the unadulterated racism of Wolf Blitzer, et al. placing the blame once again on the victims in service of white demands for a hollow and soulless "respectability."

I have wept several times today.

I have also had two moments of joy.

One occurred even as I was watching Baltimore's suffering. I received a message from a young woman. Her late father was a Native artist; we have one of his pieces for sale. Googling his name, she came across one of my posts; the price was out of range, but that's remediable, and we rapidly reached an agreement. The details aren't important to anyone else, other than to say that it was clear to all of us that this was meant to be. We are in the process of sending that piece of art home to be reunited with the artist's daughter, in his memory.

The second occurred earlier in the day, and it was perhaps a harbinger of what was to come, of the connection made: The chokecherry birds, those who break the food open with their beaks, the evening grosbeaks returned en masse. The young parents have already had their first brood, it seems, and they are old enough to fly. They brought the whole family to see us, with a stop at the feeder and in the aspens just outside the window. The one above stayed there for 20 minutes or more, fully aware that I was walking around below, photographing him, talking softly to him, and he obligingly turned this way and that, posing and hopping and dancing and flitting, giving me nearly 50 shots (some bad, some ordinary, and a few very, very clear). 

They say that yellow is the color of hope. It's appeared twice to me today, once in the warm golden color of a piece of art, and once in the yellow-orange feathers of a new family of visitors.

I hope it's a sign, not just for us, but for everyone.

All content, including photos and text, are copyright Aji, 2015; all rights reserved. Nothing herein may used or reproduced in any form without the express written permission of the owner.