PEA RIDGE — The bird’s nest on the front porch of the office was set for failure the very first day the parent birds started building it. This spring has been so windy, I don’t know how it stayed put on the tiny ledge where it sits, but it did.
The mother bird sat all day in the nest, the father bird brought her food. I suppose he’s lucky she isn’t picky about what she eats - you did not want to be around my best friend when she was pregnant and screaming for Jimmy John’s.
Her husband’s life would have been easier if she ate whatever he had just eaten.
But, thankfully, we’re not birds because that’s gross and Jimmy John’s makes some delicious sandwiches.
I could tell the eggs hatched because those little furry things liked to talk. Icould barely see their little spiky-haired heads and yellow beaks sticking out above the top of the nest when the mother and father would bring them food. I wonder what they did in there all day, not big enough to fly or play or anything, just to eat and chirp and grow.
By the end of last week, their whole heads and more stuck out of the nest and they started to attempt to flap their wings. The chowtime chirping got louder, and we hoped they’d survive. This, of course, left me petrified I would come upthe steps one morning and see a little birdy body on the porch after it tried to leave home before it was ready.
I wanted to stay here and watch after them - I have known them since birth after all.
Today I am watching as the mother and father bird both bring food back and there isn’t room in the nest, or on the ledge even, for everyone. The four young birds are walking all over each other in their tiny little apartment, trying to stretch their wings and move around and eat the most to grow the biggest. When they are all standing and moving around, it’s hard to even tell which is the mother and which are the babies.
The brave one is trying to step out of the nest, wings outstretched, and I’m sitting at the window withteeth clenched and saying aloud “no, not yet!” I can’t imagine how something that just last week was so small could possibly be ready to fly. I stress at the thought of their little wings getting big enough to carry them.
I will miss their chirping, telling me to look outside and see them growing. I want to tell them they might think they are big enough to leave the nest, but they still have some fuzz on their heads and the world is a harsh place, especially when you’re young with fuzz on your head.
◊◊◊
Cassi Lapp is the news clerk/staff writer of The Times of Northeast Benton County. A Colorado native, Lapp graduated from the University of Arkansas. She can be reached at clapp@ nwaonline.com.
Opinion, Pages 4 on 05/19/2010