I'm like a bird

Our house was previously owned by a childless (oh my god. maybe the house is making me infertile!) older couple who gardened like it was their job.

Then, the husband got sick and died and the wife got dementia and let everything in the yard go to crap. We've been in the house almost 4 years now and it is a constant battle to keep invasive vegetation from taking over. I am not a gardener! I'm more a concrete jungle kind of gal, and I have absolutely no base knowledge of anything plant related. Seriously. I got The Idiot's Guide to Gardening and it's too fucking advanced for me. There are days when I stare out at the yard, in my gardening get-up, trying to figure out what the hell to do, and what tool to use to do it, and then I go inside and fix myself a nice cocktail. Or three.


Anyway, Hubby and I have this week off because we really need some time away from work, and we really really need to tackle some serious house projects, including the yard. (And what are we doing this fine morning? I'm writing and he's sleeping. Productive indeed.) He got started on Saturday while I was at work and took down a rotting, swaying pergola attached to our garage that had probably been up since the dawn of time.

I didn't know he was going to do it, and if I had, I probably would have convinced him not to. I know that it really needed to come down before it collapsed onto the dogs. I get it.

But it had become the perfect nesting place for some birds. They constructed a nest under the overhang from the garage. They made a home there last summer, and we watched them raise their babies and taunt our dogs, who really haven't figured out that they can't fly, and will never be able to jump high enough to snag a critter that can. And then the birds came back this year.

Hubby was worried because the thing was so damned rickety, and the dogs were trying to climb it to get to it's residents. So he took the pergola down, and the little nest with it.

There were two eggs in that nest.

And now the momma bird sits on my garage, staring at the spot where her nest used to be, looking for her soon to be babies. She makes me so sad, that poor little momma, because I get it. I know what it's like to do everything right, and lose your babies anyway.

Maybe I'm anthropomorphizing. Maybe I'm just looking for an excuse to avoid being outside and doing yardwork. But still, whenever I see her, my heart aches.