(I've been trying to write about the world for weeks and I'm still struggling to find the words, but currently, this is it.)
One June I discovered them. About nine feet high, our deck looks out over our backyard, more of a balcony. Walking along the deck to our back door, I was startled by a robin that flew from what seemed like directly under me. Looking downward through the narrow gaps in the floorboards, I glimpsed movement. Startled, there were three newly hatched, featherless, and blind baby robins in a nest just centimeters from my feet, their mouths open, silent.
Anyone arriving at our back door would be unaware their feet walked over a nest. It made sense to be excited by this discovery, by this intimate window into nature, but those three robins troubled me.
Master nest builders for millennia before me, who am I to question the bird's nest, its design, its location, its anything? But there was a better choice. That fragile, hidden nest rattled me: why would a bird construct a nest it should know is unsafe? What prompted this mistake? Were resources scarce? Did some other danger prevent the bird from choosing a better location? Or was this something I couldn't fathom? Whatever the reason, I couldn't shake my doubt for those birds' safety.
That feeling is the feeling I'm feeling: confusion and an unsettledness. And that nest is the current state of the world.
I don't want to sound irrational. All over the world, (despite the news), parties continue to be planned, pregnancies are announced, concerts continue...plus, at the moment, my own little nest seems secure: we're healthy, we're finding meaning in new work, we're preparing for Christmas and a holiday, we're reading compelling books, savoring chocolate, playing Dutch Blitz and laughing with dear friends, and enjoying our grandchildren and yet... there's something else in the ellipses... something like those birds once under my deck.
I don't aim to ruminate, or dampen spirits...but those birds...it feels like we're those birds.... One day they were gone: did they survive?
Perhaps though, there is another perspective to consider? Robins don't exist if they don't take risks. Nor do we. Why continue building a shaky nest? Because the risk is worth it, friends. Perhaps that's a lesson to live by in this shaky world. Whatever risks we face, we face them until one day we can, hopefully, fly away and build anew, more sturdy than now.
