A Mockingbird

We - my mom, aunt, grandma, and I - were lazing on the dock this past weekend and enjoying the sweet rareness of the moment, both the unusually warm March weather and all of us girls sitting together at one time, when our easy chat was interrupted by the charming twitter of a bird sitting in the tree nearby. We listened for a few moments as his tune changed from high-pitched chirps to throaty warbles and back to sweet tweets again. It was quite a marvelous composition.

While none of us are exactly bird experts, we decided that this little Beethoven was definitely a mockingbird. Craning my neck around and straining my eyes to pick out movement in the still leafless branches, I saw him, a bland-colored little thing without any impressive features to match his loud voice. At first, I was sure he couldn't be the one because he sat so still even as his volume grew and his notes swelled. However, my grandma was sure that he was indeed the grand vocalist. He entertained us for quite some time, his melody as fickle as the chilly wind, before flying off to another perch across the lake.

I think that he's come to stay in our niche of the lake though. Several times since his first performance I've heard him singing, and just this morning I noticed him courageously fighting a pair of blue jays for the bird house in our backyard.

Before I met this little fellow, I had always been befuddled by authors who praised mockingbirds in their stories. Little did I know that these most ingenious little birds could sing in such interesting ways. I even feel inspired by Jerry Spinelli's book Love, Stargirl to put out an orange slice for the mockingbird and encourage him to stay.

A mockingbird sings for someone special, a soul mate placed in the world that can only be found by singing his inner most song, a lover not yet met that will fall so in love with his song she never leaves. Sing on, sing on, oh mockingbird.