Flap, Flap. Beat, Beat.

Our little bird friends are back. Working furiously on nests tucked up in the corners of our front porch... perched carefully on top of pillars around the front of the house.

I assume they must be cardinals, and I have seen at least two families making preparations for winter... going and returning multiple times throughout the day with a strangely hypnotic and comforting rhythm.

Rather than being frustrated or worried about these intended winter sanctuaries, I am rather happy they've decided to return. I always look forward to seeing the little baby birds in the spring... their little scrawny heads wobbily and hungry with eyes shut and beaks wide, innocently open to the world as they wait for mommy to return with food.

I will miss this cycle and proximity to nature and her heartbeat. Perhaps it will simply mean I must look more mindfully from a new location in order to catch these small, daily miracles of life.

The Messenger

Yesterday I saw a cardinal fly past our back door and land on the little peaked roof above the entrance to the basement. He was perhaps 3 feet away from me, and so I got to see his bright red body very clearly.

He was quick and alert. Sharply sweeping his head side to side to check out the yard, note the location of the various cardinals and other birds nearby, and determine which spot he'd like to fly to next.

And within only a few seconds he was off - zipping over to our neighbor's yard... on with his day with lightening celerity and a seemingly clear agenda.

Confident and staccato, charismatic and proud, keenly aware of his handsomeness as he brashly announced the arrival of Spring - without even knowing he was doing so.

A little red flash of brilliance on a bitterly frigid day

Maybe cardinals were created to remind us that virbrant, colorful, quick, and playful beauty is possible in the midst of cold, nasty, SAD-prone, seemingly-unending winter weather. To encourage us to hold on a bit longer for the blessed arrival of spring... to coax a small smile from under coats-buttoned-to-chins and scarves wrapped tightly around necks to close out the icy, scratching fingers of Midwestern windchill factors. To remind us color is possible - bright like finger paint primary red - and the dull, achy, damp, plodding, grey sighs of February will soon enough come to an end.

Maybe.