Birding while bummed
aka celebrating what there is to celebrate
I’ve been decompressing from the latest 19 Voices in Solidarity show, and decompressing in general, by spending a lot of time with birds this past week. There’s a lot of fledging going on here in Alameda at the moment: Least Terns (an endangered species1) on the old Naval base, and Peregrine Falcons (a threatened species) on the bridge and the thriving, if not-really-native/borderline invasive Wild Turkeys who continue to colonize the island (I came home last night to a couple of hens shepherding five little turkeys down the sidewalk).
All the avian activity has been a great diversion from the disappointment of last week’s vote on the big bill (which has nothing to do with beauty that I can tell), the tragic news out of Texas, and the implications of both. All of which were a big comedown from the show, which was, as hoped, a happy, inspiring, heartwarming few hours of music. Each performer really showed up with material that met the moment, and we raised a chunk of change for the ACLU. All good things.
Then the ugly realities of our national moment intruded anew. Humans. We have such potential and we can be so disappointing.
So birds. On Friday, we got up and rode our bikes down to see how the fledging falcons were faring with their newfound wing power. There was a Fourth of July 5k happening on the other end of the island, and staging for the annual parade — Alameda has the country's longest at 3.3 miles — was in full force on the East End, but the bike path was still fairly quiet.
I love being out in the morning— the early summer light, the cool air on my face, the quiet whir of bike wheels. Kwame loaded a tripod and video camera into his panniers (we’ve also been collecting more footage for future ‘Flight Lessons’ shows); I’ve found that a musette bag works great for my binoculars. When we arrived, the two young falcons were mid-span, catching the first rays of sun, occasionally flapping their wings. Below them, the Cal rowing team was just beginning their paces. Brown Pelicans flew high above the bridge towers, and a steady if intermittent succession of Snowy Egret, Great Egret, Great Blue Heron and Black-crowned Night Heron flew up the estuary en route to the day's fishing grounds. My kind of parade.
Nonetheless, we rode home through the six-block, 4th of July Parade staging area, viewing the parade in freeze-frame reverse. "This feels like the opening sequence of a Robert Altman movie!" Kwame said over his shoulder as we rolled past rainbow Pride floats and a Whale Boat on a flatbed truck; a row of vintage VW Bugs decorated in ribbons; High School and military marching bands; little girls in tutus; All Rise Alameda with their very welcome 'No Kings Since 1776'; a cargo bike brigade; a grizzled-looking rock group tuning on the back of a flatbed truck, and more than one religious or church group. That was the extent of the holiday commemoration for us (so we were a bit stunned at getting stuck in fireworks-viewing traffic while trying to get to a friends birthday party!).
"I don't think people have a clue," another friend texted me as we discussed weekend plans and our lack of appetite for celebrating the holiday.
It is all hard to fathom even if you have a clue. So for the moment its deep breaths and bike rides and birds… and celebrating one’s friends when you can. Four different friends celebrated their latest trip around the sun this weekend (albeit, I only managed to attend half of those gatherings!) and, like watching the young birds taking their first flight, it felt good and easy and right — another exercise in hope — to cheer them on.
Save the Endangered Species Act, Endangered Species Coalition https://www.endangered.org/protecting-the-endangered-species-act/