transitional nesting

If I can stop one heart from breaking, I shall not live in vain.
If I can ease one life the aching,
or cool one pain,
or help one fainting Robin unto his nest again…
I shall not live in vain
Emily Dickinson

(a quickly snapped photo while mom was out worming / Julie Cook / 2017)

We live in a continuum of both space and time.

As in….
according to Wikipedia for those of us dummies in anything having to do with physics…
as well as in keeping things in a nice simple nutshell:
Space-time is a mathematical model that joins space and time into a single idea
called a continuum.
This four-dimensional continuum is known as Minkowski space.

Combining these two ideas helped cosmology to understand how the universe
works on the big level (e.g. galaxies) and small level (e.g. atoms).

However in my little corner of the world….
this continuum business simply means that there is a constant forward motion of
ever quickening momentum moving hurdling toward some yet unforeseen future…

Take for example the above image of bug eyed baby robins.

On April 14th, I shared a photograph of a nest with 4 beautiful blue robin eggs
looking ever so hopeful as one had the makings of what looked to be a bit of cracking.

Next on April 23rd I shared the shot of a mom robin’s head peering out over the top of
the same nest as she sat intently vigilant.

Today on April 29th I’m sharing an image of the same nest,
the same blue eggs which are now buggy eyed,
downy tufted little robins to be.

My husband and I were a bit fearful that this particular Mrs. Robin may have had a
bum batch of eggs as she has been sitting for quite sometime…
longer then the bluebirds sat.

He had surmised that she looked to be young robin whose time
of motherhood was maybe a bit overstretched, with this being her first clutch of eggs…
but she fooled us, proving she did know what she was doing…as we now have 4
alienesque little heads bobbing up and down in anticipation of a juicy worm.

And as my thoughts are now focused on nests and the comings and goings from such…
I am thinking of my own family’s current revolving door of a nest.

There has been a frantic frenzy taking place at Dad’s this past week.
There have been nurses, caregivers, security system guys, Xfinity guys, phone guys,
me, my son, Gloria’s two children and two grandchildren, her daughter-n-law,
with boxes, bubble wrap, moving blankets, newspaper…
as Gloria, and her time in the house, is currently being purged.

She moves today to North Carolina to be with her daughter.
However…all of that being said, they are known to butt heads…
so we shall see how long NC lasts.

My son already has gallons of paint at the ready.
One of the caregivers is coming next week for the refrigerator and couch.
The Kidney foundation will be coming for some remaining things.
My cousin is coming tomorrow to look over my brother’s old train set down
in the basement.
As Dad had told me, just before he died, to look in the attic for some things that were Mom’s.
All the while as I bundle up books, videos, DVDs, glasses, clothes, sheets, towels….
all for the Goodwill….

For 55 years Dad called this house home.
As the time has now come to pass occupancy over to a new generation…
As we soon look for a different set of movers to be bringing in
my son and his wife’s possessions…

And so with everyone coming and going, I thought it appropriate to add a link to a
previous post written in 2013…
a post which was the harbinger for the transition that has lead us to today…

That being…if a door could talk…

https://cookiecrumbstoliveby.wordpress.com/2013/10/24/if-a-door-could-talk/

Be a good egg

“It may be hard for an egg to turn into a bird: it would be a jolly sight harder for it to learn to fly while remaining an egg. We are like eggs at present. And you cannot go on indefinitely being just an ordinary, decent egg. We must be hatched or go bad.”
C. S. Lewis

Two choices. Neither easy.

The whole hatching experience, not an easy ordeal. Stuck inside a tight fitting enclosure. No room, no where to move. Slowly but surely chipping away at the all encompassing shell. Little by little, first perhaps a beak, maybe a leg, or wing. Tiring and exhausting. Stopping, resting, chipping some more. Feeling wet and sticky, uncomfortable. Rolling about, can’t make the whole shell to be still. Cramped, claustrophobic, got to get out!!

Or…

Or perhaps just give up before even trying. It’s simply too much. I can’t do it. There is no way. I don’t have the strength. I have no help. There is a time limit. I can’t do this in such short time. It’s too heavy, too laborious. I’m a bit warm but surely this is better in here than out there. I’ll just sit here, and give in. This is easier. I can’t…

Mr. Lewis is right. We have two choices. Either we go through the tough hatching, the preparing, the studies, the training, the learning, the growing, the working, the struggles, the sorrow, the pain,… until we are finally to “the other side” or we remain inactive, frozen in time, stuck, in inertia–no growth, no gain, no hope.

Life is not easy. It requires so much of us. There is a great deal of pain, sorrow, frustration. The wonder of whether or not it is actually all worth it.
Ask any older individual who has perhaps lived through a great depression, a world war, that gave way to a police action, that gave way to another war, and another war, and another war…..who has watched a country rive in growing pains, watched loved ones come an go, wealth come and go, etc… and they will tell you that it has been a good life. What seemed or seems so daunting at the time, taken little by little, step by step, suddenly becomes the past, something we survived and are now the better for.

Two choices. To just sit with inactivity, watching life pass you by or either working at what you must do to forge a life for yourself and for those you love. Inactivity leads to atrophy and eventually death. Small strides of effort lead to accomplishments and growth. No one says any of it will be easy but they will tell you that it was and is well worth it. You decide.