Decompressed

Well....the 24th.  I have been saturated with traffic near the mall and the stupidity of humans. So today on the eve of Christmas, I allowed myself time with nature, just to decompress. The abnormal warmness was perfect as I slid the screen door open, shuffled a few chairs over and set my hot water upon one, and plunked down on the other with my bins in hand; with just the gentle sprinkle of rain falling off leaves to more leaves to listen to, and the scuttling of birds from branch to feeder to ground, with no true purpose. 

Nature....it has no falsities.... birds and squirrels exist within that truth. There are no locked doors to pound on when you forget the key, ...no car doors to slam, nor buildings sheltered from weather. Birds exist from branch to branch with the freedom to experience the pureness of nature.

So I decompressed. It took me 20 minutes of stillness before I began to feel 'at one' with my surroundings. No phone, no data, no man-made anomalies to disturb my meditation within nature. I remember listening to the great singer James Taylor speaking to today's society and the lack of time to be creative. People are so busy with so many distractions that boredom isn't allowed to set in. And without boredom and stillness, humans become lost and uncreative.

So I sat....and watched and became bored. I was first drawn to the Junco's. They were dispersed around my line of sight with some being in a bush near me, others underneath the feeder taking advantage of seeds casually dropped by house finches and yet, other juncos took root outside of my yard pecking away at the ground. So, why there? Why do they not take advantage of the easy food underneath the seeders as others do?

A lonely dove on the ground, noticed my eyes and took shelter by facing the other way. Like a small child, if it can't see me, than obviously I can't see it. So the dove just walked away in confidence, still obvious but hidden.

The local American Tree Sparrow was perched on the feeder. Today I would give it the award for the bird most likely to 'stay perched' . This one sparrow just sat staring at the feed, not eating, just staring. I think I have seen that same bird in my yard prior....a statue; no movement and no reason why it doesn't want to move. I looked away to grab my hot water, and in that brief time, the birds seems to have reset it's course and woken up enough to disappear. For it was gone. 

I noticed a tufted tit-mouse on the black sunflower seeds. Now, in past times I have taken careful notes on the actions of these birds. They grab a seed and take off to a near branch that has a crook in it and hold it down while they remove the seed. But this one tit-mouse took off to one branch....thought about it, and moved to another branch, then another, then another and lastly one more before I lost sight of it. Branch, to branch to branch and branch and at least one more. Why expend that effort for one seed? Why was one branch any less better than another? 

The squirrel's are easy to lose sight of as well. I watched one on the ground as it became a bit disturbed and climbed up a trunk. From there it flew from branch to twig, to clump of leaves...to another tree and then another until it was out of my yard, my sight. Why? What disturbance would have caused this much sudden rush of energy and to lose track of it's stash of ground acorns? I am not sure....

But there I sat.....after about 70 minutes of being on watch, all birds...all squirrels just left. No sign of life, but just a blustery wind and the constant drip of rain. Yet I stayed on for another 50 minutes...two full hours all told. Like all meditation of sorts...one walks away being fresh and open with a blank slate of mind. Not a bad day.......