A Pin on the Map

Beloved:

    My hummingbird feeders positively buzz with business from daylight to dusk.  Seems like they’d be on their way south by now but at least two dozen were swarming my deck this morning.  They are also really fat, fatter than they’ve been all summer, and so I did a bit of reading.

    Turns out, these most likely aren’t my usual friends at all, but rather migrants headed south from Canada whose journey started weeks ago.  I like thinking they started out at my friend Takouhi’s house in Montreal.  They fly twenty miles a day.  This time next week they’ll be across the Ohio River, maybe slurping juice from my friend Gwenie’s feeders in Louisville and a month after that then another friend, Charlotte, can feed them from her Atlanta deck.  

    I love, love, love imagining my porch is a pin on the tiny mental maps which guide their routes in spring and fall.  The article says if I don’t put out feeders next year I’ll probably be erased from their memory and they won’t even stop by in 2019.  But if I keep my feeders out I’ll remain on their routes their whole lifetimes, maybe their children’s too.  All for the price of sugar water and two mason jars.  So much amazingness right outside my window!

    While the air is shimmery fall in Indiana, friends and neighbors in other states are still sweeping up and counting blessings after recent hurricanes.  My daughter is headed back to school safe and sound after evacuating Savannah for Atlanta several days ago.  I’m grateful to friends who took her in without a second thought.  I look forward to being with you again this Sunday morning.