For the Birds

Had the day off, mowed the lawn.
I may enjoy mowing the lawn more than I should; I do it because it relaxes me.
I was in the company of avian wonders; flight and fancy flittered about.
The bold color of the male American goldfinches invoked the yellow shadings another, more domesticated cousin. Their flight pattern is so familiar to me, with their wavelike path through the sky; little peaks and valleys of starts and stops; sprinters in the air. The bawdy red of the cardinals in the lilac, their crowns erect and their dark masks hiding the darting eyes. The audacity of the mockingbird never ceases to make me laugh; the calls and cries of noises around them replayed out their beaks, their bravado in protecting both territory and offspring.
For a few minutes I literally stopped what I was doing to look up in wonder at a red shouldered hawk soaring circles above me; close enough that the plumage was in detail. The blue jays, the finches, the LBJs (technical term for Little Brown Jobbies...mostly sparrows) , the mourning doves, the ruby throated hummingbirds that make traversing the yard dangerous at times, the swallows feeding at dusk--these matter to me. Exactly why I am not sure, but there is a strange and overwhelming peace that comes from the day to day of these creatures.
And the mysterious Siamese cat that hid in the tall grass and watched my every move, even as my riding mower got closer than most pets would allow. She did nothing but stare at me, and crouch when I got too close. I don't liked to be watched like that; sometimes it feels they know something.
Then my cousin and his dog came over and the dog spent half the time happily licking my foot. Sometimes I just love the stupid simplicity of dogs.