I Have Become a Person Who Loves Birds

I used to be cool. Or… cool enough? Nowadays I interrupt conversations to say things like:

"Look! A hawk!" or "I think that's a finch." I don't know when this happened.

Front yard robin eggs

One day I was a relatively normal-ish person and the next I was standing at the back window for fifteen minutes because a cardinal landed in the yard.

I have opinions about crows and leave eggs in my yard for them. I root for the neighborhood rabbit and I know where a family of turkeys lives.

We have a robin’s nest with three blue eggs in our front yard. I am obviously obsessed and go outside multiple times a day as if the eggs will get up and reshuffle themselves.

I don't understand this version of myself and I didn't choose this! It simply arrived one day, alongside my appreciation for good gardening gloves and comfortable walking shoes.

I think loving birds is one of the first signs that you're becoming a real adult, not because birds themselves are particularly exciting, but because you finally slow down enough to notice them. You start paying attention and you realize the world has been quietly putting on a little show for you this entire time.

And somehow, that's enough! Still, I regret to inform everyone that if you get into my car, there is a high probability that I will point at the sky and say, "Woah, look at that one!"