Eye Contact with a Treetop Bird
The building where I work is level with the street; the main quad is two floors down.
There are lifts inside, but I prefer to walk down, enjoying the last bit of fresh air and a final admiring glance at the now generously snow-topped North Shore mountains. (Stubbornly, it refused to snow for the Olympics, saving the white stuff till later.)
Just after a rosy sunrise, I started down the first flight of cement stairs. My eye was drawn by the lovely mass of pink blossoms in a cherry tree that grows in the quad and rises beside the stairs.
Then I saw the movement. A tiny grey-brown bird had turned his head to look. Perched in the cherry tree not three feet in front of me, he put his head on the side and blinked his bright eyes.
What a wonderful way to start the day.
There are lifts inside, but I prefer to walk down, enjoying the last bit of fresh air and a final admiring glance at the now generously snow-topped North Shore mountains. (Stubbornly, it refused to snow for the Olympics, saving the white stuff till later.)
Just after a rosy sunrise, I started down the first flight of cement stairs. My eye was drawn by the lovely mass of pink blossoms in a cherry tree that grows in the quad and rises beside the stairs.
Then I saw the movement. A tiny grey-brown bird had turned his head to look. Perched in the cherry tree not three feet in front of me, he put his head on the side and blinked his bright eyes.
What a wonderful way to start the day.