Spring So Soon?

My first cup of coffee is sipped while I look out my kitchen window. It looks out upon my neighbor’s front yard and several houses beyond. Today I was saddened to see the old man, my age, angrily snap open his walker as he stepped from the back seat of the red car that just pulled in. This is the first time he appeared in the past several days. I wondered if and/or where he was. He was obviously toothless, so I assumed he had recently had his teeth pulled. All of them? Mind boggling. I self-consciously gritted my enameled set – grateful I still had most of my own. Why would he not? Lifestyle? Habits? I never smoked. I imbibe alcohol occasionally. I brush sometimes with Pepsodent (you wonder where the yellow went, when you brush your teeth with Pepsodent) or Clean Mint Crest (eliminates plaque). Well his appearance settled a bleakness over the day. I made toast and poured another cup of coffee. I hoped for better things. Then the impossible happened. I am dreaming, I thought. A pair of robins flew past my window into the hazel tree and continued across the yard. Robins! January 16. How can that be? The ground is thawed so I suppose they can find insects, worms, under the grass. They won’t eat seeds, bird feeders they will not visit ever. So they must find insects in the soil. I hope their instincts have not abandoned them. But at this early date, will they make known their territory and scope out a nest site? I cut off the long Hazel branch they nested on in years past. I watched the disbelief of red squirrels when they came to reach heights above the Hazel branch and found it missing. They still have a habit of leaping to a young English Walnut tree, then over to a Red Maple and cautiously move down to the ground and dig for nuts they buried long ago. I am encouraged that the soil is warm and loose for insects that are still comatose in the barely-above freezing temperatures of the past week. Well perhaps they are not so unmoving. How could a bird detect the worm if it was as still as roots or twigs? Birds cannot smell. They only breathe through those holes we think of as nostrils. I did not linger to see if this pair found food. My knowledge of birds tells me that they are here to stay. What a happy day! Spring may not hang in there every day but the poem about birds fluffing up and finding food is encouraging. They will not leave for the south until next fall.
Naomi Sherer