But Whyyy?
Me, forty-one, walking with Theo, four, and we are in the totally age-appropriate rut of why, and but whyyy, and I am not at all annoyed, just enjoying the moment because he is, barring a medical miracle, my last progeny, and he will never be four again and one really can’t bank on grandkids because...
Humminbirds
My grandfather and I sit in the August sun, on the back porch of the house he built himself, watching ruby-throated hummingbirds hover like living jewels near the plastic feeder. The glass of molasses-sweet tea he poured weeps cold and wet in my hand. “Them humminbirds really do sing. Says they don’t in bird books,”...
Ornithology
We’re walking to school and Claire is naming the birds. There’s a chickadee, she says. And that one is a nuthatch. I think that one could be a flicker. She’s usually right, though even when she is not, I don’t correct her. Dad, is that a pileated woodpecker? She’s holding on to the index finger of my left hand –...
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