The First Robin

The weather for the past few days has been grey, damp, and dreary. Even Stumpy only made a few forays into the backyard this morning. He and Daggy have been sleeping at the foot of the bed pretty much all day.

It is times like this I turn to cleaning. UGH! Looking out my back study door en route to shake out the dust mop early this afternoon, I spotted the first Robin of the year. The pictures I took were of a bird that would not face me, making it hard to make out the red breast. A few hours later a Robin with a brilliant red breast was in the birdbath facing me. Fortunately I left the camera within reach and was able to snap this picture. Before I could click another, a squirrel jumped out of the holly hedge scaring off this most welcome sign of spring. There is so much life going on in that yard. Between the cats, squirrels, birds, and bugs there is a constant cycle of living going on.

I remember back to when I was waiting for my transfer south living with my best friend Joe. It was a dreary Sunday afternoon in January of 1998, the BBC radio program “My Word” was playing on my car radio. I had made a trip to Canandaigua to check out the antique shops and was on my way home. Ann Scott James, one of my favourite panelists on the show, recited this bit of Shelly: “Oh, blow west wind, (pronounced “wind” as in wind a clock) If winter comes, Can Spring be far behind?”

That quote has always stuck with me as the hope of spring peeping through a long cold winter. This winter has been the coldest and gloomiest I have experienced since moving south. These first robins are my inspiration of the spring that is just around the corner. I’ll have to put out seed for them and be sure the bird bath is kept full. It is very shallow: it does not take much for the birds to splash a good deal of the water out.

Here is my robin enjoying a bath in the "Flintstones" birdbath. That birdbath was my moving south present to me in 1998. It was crarved from three pieces of limestone by a retired stone cutter in Wiarton, Ontario, Canada. True to form it weighs a ton! Just perfect for my yard. The flagstone it is resting on was pulled from a polluted creek behind the ruin of an old paper mill. To the left of the birdbath is Daggys dirtpile!