Without Birdsong the Universe Would Collapse
Ann Litts , where I live here on the Great Plains of Turtle Island it is hideously and forlornly flat. For most of my life I have lived near or on mountains and to have been living in such a profoundly flat place — not a mountain or even hill in sight — for the past seven years is, for me, a point of discomfort, of unease. I feel like I’m in a rowboat out in the middle of the ocean with the exact same horizon in every direction. I’m surprised that I have not gone clinically cuckoo.
I think the main thing that has held back the men in white coats is the birds. Apparently, this flat wasteland is on the migratory flight path of countless birds. Seriously, I’m not sure I’ve ever lived anywhere with a greater variety of birds. Being a bona fide bird freak, as opposed to a certified ornithologist, I am living in a bird paradise…. almost!
Sadly, in the seven years I’ve been stuck here I have not seen one single solitary hummingbird. Not one. Apparently, they don’t come through here.
Back when I lived in the Great American Southwest Desert I always grew crown of thorn cacti on my windowsills. I’m a bit of a cactus freak as well as a bird freak. Those delightful cacti put out little bright red flowers for most of the year. Those flowers attracted hummingbirds, which in the aforementioned desert are as numerous as ants at a Fourth of July picnic. The hummingbirds would helicopter towards the flowers only to stop a few inches away when they realized there was a pane of glass separating them from the flowers. That was probably rather cruel of me but I thrilled in standing just inside the window watching the hummingbirds hover in stationary flight just a couple of feet in front of my face. Gosh, they are such incredible dynamos of energy. I always wished I could invite the hummingbirds into my home without also inviting all the bugs in.
I miss the hummingbirds.
As far as birds and springtime go, most people think that springtime shows up and then all the birds show up. I have often wondered if it might not be the other way around. Is it really the warmth and new growth that attracts the birds? Or do the birds show up first and it’s their life-inspiring birdsong that awakens all the plants?
Back when my daughter was a wee little girl I told her that springtime never happened until the birds showed up. Birds would congregate in a tree and sing and sing and sing and this woke the tree up from its winter slumber. Hearing the birds and feeling their vibration in its branches, the tree would wake up and start putting out its springtime foliage. Without the birds, the trees would just keep on sleeping.
Can you imagine being a tree and never, ever, ever having any birds land on your branches to sing? If you were a tree and never had any birds on your branches would you lose the will to live? If I were a tree I would want my branches to be filled with birds all the time. The vibrations would encourage me to love life and to grow ever more branches to hold ever more birds. And can you imagine being a bird without any trees to hang out in? Personally, I feel that humans have yet to truly understand the life-affirming symbiotic relationship between trees and birds.
Anyway, my daughter surely remembers little of the crazy things I told her when she was a wee one. I doubt that she remembers or understands the many times I told her that, “Without birdsong the universe would collapse.” For decades I’ve been telling that to anyone and everyone who would listen but I’m not sure anyone has ever understood or appreciated it. I may be halfway crazy but I am thoroughly convinced of it.
