Ordinary Beauty as seen by Leila Anasazi

I made some signs today while we were walking to the Ballard Market. I’m
not trying to say anything by these, I’m just sayin’.

I’m telling you, this man has an eye and a touch. See what he can do with humble carrots? He can work such magic on your portrait, too. Or, you could purchase one of the magnificent works he has already captured.

Little Brown Bird goes free.

She’d spent a couple of days/nights in the cage. It was killing me to have her confined, but she was so weak initially and if she was loose, death-by-raccoon, or cat, was certain.

But yesterday morning she was lively. Chirping (for the first time) and leaping back and forth and back and forth from one perch to the other, and then onto the top wires of the cage.

It was clearly time to let her have bigger options.

So we waited until the sun was a little higher in the sky and the world was a little warmer, and then took her cage to the deck, opened the door, and thought Good Thoughts.

In seconds she was out. And, off.

No flying really, mostly hopping about. We kept “encouraging” her to fly, by moving close to her and hoping she’d take flight from a little fright. But, no.

Her friends came to visit–the dozen or more other house sparrows that live here–and they all pecked at the ground. When one thing or another startled them, they swoosh off together, but Little Brown Bird just lingered, hopping about on the ground.

“Well,” we told ourselves, “she’s certainly happier roaming free for now. She’d probably rather a short life free than a long life in a cage.”

Later in the day she sort of took flight now and again. No grand soars, but small journeys of 3-foot height and length. We decided we’d try and capture her again later and let her spend one more night in the safety of the cage. But when “later” arrived and we tried to net her, she escaped us. With a tiny soar she took cover in the thick laurel bush, and we admitted again that she was likely happier free than captured.

We hoped she might find a safe and warm sleeping place, and went about our evening.

I am happy to report that she did make it through the night, and while she’s still not flying really, she looks quite content (and sweet) hopping amongst her friends.

Just poking around looking for more ways to spend less money. Today’s chore will be finding a lower premium for our auto insurance (while maintaining high quality claims coverage). But in the meantime, stumbled upon this site of folks passionate about stretching fuel results in their automobiles and this collection of tips for increasing MPG.

Kim and Lucy were over to the house last night, and we had an amazing meal–which deliciously accommodated all our menu proclivities: no wheat, garlic, onion, beets, beans, or spicy-hot items.

Herb-rubbed blackened salmon, heirloom tomatoes with a fennel-thyme sauce, good ole rice, and then vanilla bean ice cream which appeared out of nowhere (from the ice cream making machine that Kim set up outside on our deck, and which churned while we were dining on dinner).

Some people have a beautiful intercourse with food–their fingers stroke the ingredients and food yields beneath their hands, becoming something more under their touch. Kim has this gift (so does our dear friend, Tiberio. I do not.)

I love when people come and cook in my kitchen. I watch their dances and magic gestures. Sure, as someone who does not cook, of course I rhapsodize about those who can, but there are those who have love affairs with food, and it is a joy to watch them at play/work.

Kim and Lucy are available to bring such joy to you (and your guests). Drop me a comment if you want to get in touch, and watch for their website to spring up: Four & Twenty Blackbirds.

Little Brown Bird is in a cage. I am NOT happy about this.

I am so unhappy about this. I’m not certain how well I will sleep tonight. But it was cage, or certain death. So, she’s in a cage.

Before the cage, she was sunning on the deck, until a raccoon came prowling, then pouncing. Human intervention interrupted another episode of Discovery Channel Live, and Little Brown Bird was spared.

Now she sleeps here in a cage in the office. She is snuggled atop a bit of nest that I found on the ground a week ago and she breathes large breaths, her head tucked beneath a wing and her tail sweeping the air with each breath she takes in.

I look forward to a “pet” bird, one who will come to me and eat from my hand (as she has already), and yet this is all wrong.

I grapple.

More Little Brown Bird.

Little Brown Bird is still around.

This morning she hops onto the deck and searches for water. The recent torrential rains have left nice levels of rain water in several pots and urns. But the vessels are too intricate or deep for her to reach the pools and she finally submits to drinking from the cloisonné bowl I’ve filled for her.

Then she hops back down and nestles in beside a warm chunk of Missouri limestone at the base of the the plum tree, soaking the sun’s sustenance. I think I’ll follow her lead and take my coffee onto the patio.

This little bird has been lingering about my back deck all day. She ate bread crumbs from my hand and hops haltingly here and there. She curls up in curve of the cowboy boot that is airing out in the sun and her eyes become smaller and smaller but I don’t believe she sleeps.

She hops down to the ground beneath the cherry tree and joins the other little brown birds in their pecking at the ground. But when they fly away, she hops back up onto the deck.

Of course, something is awry. Her back end looks mangled, and it was only a few moments before she appeared on the deck that I saw a Coopers Hawk sitting quietly near the bird feeder. There’s also a new smear on the dining room window–the tell-tale dust of a small bird splat left after someone has flown into the glass.

There’s nothing I can do to help this small bird. All my efforts toward assisting–of course–freak her and she wastes whatever energy she has to hop or fly away.

Just yesterday I heard one of those bird splats, the distinctive thuNK that reverberates in the house. A moment or two later I peeked out the window and saw a raccoon making a meal from the kamikaze bird. The Discovery Channel live in my backyard.

So, I am feeling protective of today’s little brown bird. And I am wanting to make it all better.

Each of my efforts to protect the bird go awry. And finally I admit that this little bird might just want to curl up and die. And there’s not a damn thing that I can, or ought to, do about it.