9 April 2026 Thursday 

--crows, robin, mourning doves, house sparrows,
black-capped chickadees 
(and ducks & canada geese at the river)

sat in the hammock and read in the front/side
yard after work today while e moved rocks 
around. there's a majestic spruce (norwegian?)
of enormous stature in the neighbor's yard, it
towers over us. i looked up at it as a wind
stirred through it, and felt like i was 
underwater looking up through seaweed. i saw
the huge robin up in the branches there.

one of the male house sparrows with his fine
black mask came quite near us, perched on a 
stone near one of the garden beds. a female
swooped down and landed on a young maple near
him, and then they both lit away.

heard the mourning doves hoo-hooing before i saw 
them, then three of them (usually i've seen them
in a pair!) flew up past the power lines. 

i saw a crow on the neighbors roof, then he flew
off to join a few friends in the tall trees across 
the street. there's a large nature reserve park 
right by our house, but not the entrance--rather,
a steep decline that leads down to the stream at the 
bottom of what becomes more and more of a canyon as 
you follow the trails away from our area. 

i love crows. there's a photo of me as a baby 
with a crow nearby. my mother has told me that the
crow used to come visit me every day as i crawled
around the yard. i would really love to befriend
one again someday. 

while walking by the river in a different part of
town, i saw canada geese paddling, and ducks 
flying from one bank to another. 

oh and saw a black-capped chickadee up in the 
kingly spruce, and also at the feeder doing the
usual gymnastics.