Bird Watch

Little sweetheart, I've been seeing more and more birds these last few months. 

I think maybe the reduction in air traffic has been a boon for them. A couple of weeks ago I saw a cardinal. I always thought of cardinals as winter birds and regardless of the season, I'd never seen a cardinal in the city. The first time was over by the dog run in Riverside Park near the 86th Street Gardens. I was so excited, I stopped a random passerby just to tell her. Maybe a week later, I saw another, or perhaps the same one, at the drinking fountain by the playground at the W83rd entrance. Then, a week after that, I saw two! 

I was crossing through that little common square between four apartment buildings just north of Lincoln Center, that kind of "quad" between Amsterdam and West End, and I heard a bird singing just spectacularly. I looked up and it was a cardinal, a male like the other(s) I had seen up in the W80's, but then I saw the object of his affection - a female cardinal, her colors more muted and grey but still with red highlights. 

Every time I pass any of these spots, now, I look for them. Since your ascension, little sweetheart, I often find comfort in birdsong and the sighting of the little guys. I feel a sense of closeness to you somehow. 

I think I told you in these very pages that story about how a few years ago, I went out into the hall and was startled to find the prettiest little bird, a finch, I think, sitting quite calmly, like a sentinel, atop the crash bar of the emergency exit to the roof. It turns out he'd escaped from Angelo's apartment on the second floor - he has several little birds and often lets them of out their cages to fly around his apartment at will! Somehow, this little guy got loose and flew to the highest point he could find indoors. Before we knew who he belonged to, my neighbor Eric rescued him and then got a little birdcage and gave him to me, because he has a cat that would be far too curious. I had the little guy for about a day until we discovered that he belonged to Angelo and I took him in his cage back downstairs to his home. 

But before I did, that night when we still didn't know where he belonged and I had him for safe keeping, I fed him and gave him water and talked to him and showed him your picture - I told him all about you, how much I love you and how we all miss you so very much and that this is your home, so that he would know. I wanted this little bird to know about you. 

It seemed very important, little sweetheart. And it feels very nice today, on this rainy Sunday afternoon, to remember it all. How I love you! Forever. Forever.