Perfect day today for porch pondering, cool and cloudy, slight breeze wafting. The sun just parted a big pile of cumulus clouds and the blue sky showed his face. You can feel a slight change in the temperature with that one little window of sunshine open. The breeze is too soft to rustle the scuppernong leaves or ping the wind chimes together. The birds are singing loudly, so happy this morning. No sounds in the yard except the bird symphony. These are my favorite moments as the world stretches and comes alive. I’d love to travel out west to the prairie and watch and feel the earth waking with the sun rising over the mountains in the distance.

I’m reading a small devotional book on grief and healing. The author wrote that her sixteen year old daughter remarked casually one day, “I wouldn’t mind dying young. I’ve had a full life.” Her daughter was killed in a horse riding accident a few months later. She thought back and wondered if subconsciously her daughter knew her death was eminent. I don’t know but I do remember several of Rosie’s friends saying Rosie dropped by to tell them bye when she went back to college that Saturday afternoon before her death early Sunday morning. Did she know? Don’t know. I’ll never forget that beautiful smile when she left, though. Maybe that was a gift for me. A happy memory of our last moment.

So quiet here while I eat my bagel. The bird feeders are full of cardinals. I’ve never seen so many birds visit the bird bath to drink. Guess we really need rain to replenish their water sources. A big wood thrush sat on the edge of the bird bath and stayed a long time. He usually bathes and splashes half the water out. Today he just enjoyed a cool drink. When he jumped off a fat dove was waddling by and he pecked it on the head several times. Must have been the dove I call “Dum Dum” cause he just sat there and let the wood thrush peck on him. Couldn’t help but laugh. Must not have hurt much.

The fighting finches just arrived. Their raucous fighting always starts a new movement in the bird symphony. It disturbs the peace for a while till they settle down. Don’t know how they can clean a feeder out so quickly. How they eat when they are constantly fighting each other for the perches. A brown headed cowbird with its mate tried to get on that feeder but finally settled for the seeds that have been raked out on the ground.

My nephew brought over a trap for Grandpaw raccoon, thank goodness. Grandpaw has a great snack of fresh, fluffy marshmallows with a little cat food chaser thrown in. Hope he finds the accommodations to his liking. Bye, Bye! Gonna catch your harem, too. No more bird seed for you! Happy trails!

I’m thinking a wren might be my new favorite bird. I love their curiosity and how they investigate their surroundings. I left the car windows open when I was getting groceries out of the car and one got in the car. I watched him checking things just a like a new driver following the steps of driver’s ed. One sat on the top of a rear tire and a little small one sat on the steering wheel. Did my best to try and photograph them but they moved before I got close enough.

I can hear the first raindrops slapping the red clay tile on the porch. The drops are making little polka dot patterns on the tile. The rain is not heavy enough to wet a whole square. The storms around us are cooling the breeze and making the morning so pleasant.

I read this quote by Waldo Ralph Emerson today and I love it. He wrote, “The sky is the daily bread of the eyes.” Mother Nature begins the day waking the earth with golden fingers of sunshine and puts the day to bed with a glorious sunset painting saturated in rosy hues. Most of us sleep through sunrise and have come in the house for the night when the sun sets but that doesn’t stop Mother Nature from painting the skies with color. I thinks she’s painting for Mother Earth, giving her a morning and evening gift.

If you didn’t sit outside after supper you missed a perfect twilight. The air was so cool and the breeze soft and heavenly. Strong enough the move the paddles on the wind chimes but not strong enough to strike the pipes.

Truman Capote captured my day perfectly when he wrote, “A beautiful day with the buoyancy of a bird.” I’ve enjoyed the blessings today of the green earth with warm sunshine and cool breezes.

“Enjoy your life today because yesterday has gone and tomorrow may never come,” —Alan Coren