Outdoor Living

I'm not sure how I deleted the entire post I was almost done with ... but I did. Here's my best attempt at recreating it:

Unlike my Little Dog, I love birds.

While she enjoys nothing better than to dart around screaming ferociously about the audacity of their very existence with the fervor of a religious zealot, I'm content to sit quietly and watch as they do their birdy things.

However, most of the time I'm outside, there's a couple of dogs who expect to be by my side ... a fact that hasn't gone without notice in the bird community.

For ages now, I've wanted a birdbath. I'm pretty sure it dates back to one fateful walk in Inwood Hill Park (a miraculous place, which happens to be home to the only remaining natural forest in all of New York City). The dogs and I were finishing up our hike, and we'd come out of the woods on the north side of the park by the soccer fields.

As I walked, I happened to glance over to a nook between the trees and the brush on the steep incline of one of the many rocky cliffs that makes up that wondrous place. There, a tiny waterfall created by a recent rainfall had a miniature lagoon collecting at its base, and in that pool played several little birds.

I stood, somewhat rapt, watching as those little flyers splashed the water up onto their backs then shook their feathers and primped and preened. It was such a delightful sight, and one I was allowed to quietly enjoy as Little Dog hadn't yet discovered her deep loathing of everything that resembles birdkind.

Inwood Hill is partly responsible for my intense need to have my own yard, so it stands to reason that the root of my birdbath longing would also originate there.

When I moved, I started shopping the birdbath aisles, looking for just the right thing. I also began checking out feeders, figuring I could set up a little birdie bar and grille in my backyard. There were a couple of K-Mart spectaculars that caught my eye -- one an "antique stone" (or regular cement) number with a lion head on the back (I really liked that one) and the other the standard mosaic fare. However, I couldn't ever find myself justifying the expense.

But this weekend, at that Bargain Barn (seriously, the Bargain Barn ... a.k.a. the "K-Marts North" a.k.a. "my favorite store ever") I found my bird feeder:

I brought it home and Matt helped me hang it in the tree right next to my patio. He and my dad sat and shook their heads as I tried time after time to talk birds into going to it and having a snack. I couldn't understand why they didn't all flock their immediately.

A tip on the bag of seed said that water draws the birds, so by Monday when still no birds had come to the feast, I decided fate had intervened to tell me it was time to get my long-desired birdbath.

As the Bargain Barn didn't have any birdbaths, I had to turn to another delightful staple of my rural northern Michigan town, a new store called Family Farm and Home. I'd been in there a couple of weeks ago and seen a birdbath I didn't really care for, but for only $12. I figured it had to be worth it if only the birds would come take their lunch break in my yard.

When I got to the Farm store, I couldn't find the birdbath I didn't really like, but this one, which I think is awesome, was there for only $11.19:

It's like old-timey metal, but in plastic form. It looks really good until you get up close and see the old-timey metal colored brush strokes. But that kind of thing doesn't bother me.

I bought it on Monday, and by Tuesday morning there was a bird-bash going on at my patio. Birds were snarfing down the seed at the feeder, splashing around in the bath and primping and preening on every available perch.