bird_bath ovenbird It’s the kind of afternoon that makes people reckless with delight. The sun is warm enough for skirts and t-shirts. There’s a breeze that feels like a horse’s nose nudging your hand, velvet and searching and gentle. It’s the kind of day that suggests you open the windows for the first time to let in the lilacs. In my energized glee I thought to attend to the garden and I was feeling a bubbling generosity that prompted me to buy presents for the birds. So I stopped on my way home from work and picked up a bird bath and a solar powered fountain and I set them up right away and the fountain started burbling in the joyful way that fountains do, and my yard filled with the music of trickling water. I went inside where I could monitor the fountain from my desk that overlooks the yard and waited for the birds to arrive in droves, full of gratitude for my thoughtfulness, ready to grace me with their frivolity. I’ve been sitting here an hour and have not seen a single bird. A junco even watched me set the whole contraption up, and I was sure she would be enticed by the literal SPA I just installed in the garden, but so far there’s not even a hint of interest. I would be entranced enough by a single bumblebee perching on my carefully selected rocks, but even they are passing by without a second glance. I know that I must be patient. I scroll through the platitudes that come to the surface: “Rome wasn’t built in a day”, and “if you build it they will come,” and “a watched pot never boils,” and “good things come to those who wait.” And I stare out the window and feel the spring air pouring in to greet me. I hear the song sparrows singing in the new leaves of the cherry tree, and I find that there’s a bright drop of contentedness, spreading like ink in water, right at the very center of my chest. The bird bath remains empty, but even the possibility of birds makes me smile. The act of invitation is enough to feel that we are connected—the door is wide open and I watch to see who will be first across the threshold. 260420 what's it to you? who go blather from