A few weeks ago, we had a beautiful mother robin make a nest right in our windowsill in perfect view for us to see from the comforts of our living room. It was the perfect spot for us to see all of the daily happenings… and brought a lot of joy to our household when we would sit and watch this new life unfold.
We watched intently as the mama bird would make the nest; flying back and forth and back and forth with little bits of twig and twine and whatever else she could gather in her wee beak. It was amazing to watch this perfectly round nest come together in less than 24 hours.
After a few days of this perfect little nest sitting in plain view, we awoke one morning to a teeny, tiny, little, blue egg. Just one. One little egg that might have been mistaken for a chocolate mini egg it was so small…
We were all so excited. I have seen a nest before but never in a prime location like this and I was excited for my girls to get a ‘birds eye view’ so to speak, of this whole scenario unfolding. It was like watching animal kingdom up close.
A few days after the nest had been built we awoke to two little eggs… not just one, but two now… the excitement was real.. and then on day three there were three eggs.
I had no idea that mama robins didn’t lay all of their eggs at once so I took to google to look into this.
Female robins lay only one egg per day and typically lay three or four total. Even more interesting they raise up to three or more broods a year. That’s one busy mama bird.
In between laying these eggs the mama bird would fly off and eat worms which apparently help to get the next egg out. She would return to the nest and sit on the eggs when she could. We loved watching her… but so did our dog.
Many times, when he would jump up for a peak, the mama bird would flutter away, afraid of his big, wet nose pressing on the windowsill… but she would always return.
Her work was not done.
On day four we all rushed to the window to see if there was going to be a fourth egg, but no luck. Three. Just three perfectly shaped, bright blue eggs that were growing each day.
We tried to give the mama some space and didn’t peak in as often, but we did notice on day six that the mama was not sitting on the eggs as much.
“Probably busy doing all the things that mamas need to do to get ready for new babies,” I told the girls, as I looked back on my last days of pregnancy and all of the running around I did in preparation of this new little human soon arriving to change our lives forever.
I wondered if birds felt that too.
That sixth night, while we sat and ate dinner, I saw a dark shadow flutter by the windowsill and my stomach immediately filled with dread.
Like that awful mom intuition that kicks in when we have a bad feeling about something.
I felt that pit.
I put down my fork and rushed to the window to see the large flapping wings of a big, black crow and a nest that was now housing only two perfect, little blue eggs.
No longer three, just two.
My daughters rushed over with me and began to cry.
We had all become so invested in this new little family… that was literally growing before our eyes.
We all so desperately wanted to see the whole thing unfold.
We wanted to see the little eggs grow and hatch. To see the mama feed them worms and watch them learn to fly, eventually leaving the nest.
We wanted a happy ending.
Like we all often do, but sadly life had other plans.
While this mama bird was living her worst moment ever, one big, black crow was eating the best meal of his life.
It didn’t seem fair.
By the time our dinner had finished, there were no eggs left in the nest.
It was empty.
We didn’t see that big, black crow sweep in and take the other two, but we are sure it happened quickly once he found them unguarded.
I admit I got teary too.
That poor mama bird; all that work only to have all that lost.
But I remembered my research… she would do this two or three times a year… so as devastating as it was to me, for her, it was a way of life and she would fly on, make a new nest and lay more eggs.
This was Spring for her. She still had work to do.
It was hard to explain this to my girls, but after a short explanation on the evolution of life and the powers of mother nature, they wiped their tears and skipped away to play Barbies.
I didn’t.
I had to sit for a minute.
Sometimes I care too much and these things hit me too hard.
I’m empathic, or maybe weird.
After all they are just little eggs that mean nothing to me. I think I knew deep down inside that this would have been too good to be true as the nest was built in plain view of every flying predator and sadly ‘shit happens.’
But that’s the thing.
As women, we are so often faced with so much hardship and difficulty and then expected to just fly along and roll with the blow we’ve been dealt.
We don’t get much time to wallow or cry or grieve.
We do what we have to do to keep everyone else going.
Why? Because we have no other choice.
This little mama bird lesson was a wake-up call to me. A reminder that life can change in an instant. Something too good to be true, can be taken away in a second so we need to take those broken wings and learn to fly again.
Yes, I’m now singing Mr. Mister “Broken Wings” in my head, but truthfully shit happens to everyone.
We all fall down.
The lessons come in getting back up …and moving on.
I’ve been knocked down a time or two during this pandemic and truthfully am just finding my wings again.
Not sure where they will take me, but hoping they soar.
So the moral of this story is be a mama bird.
From the time she built that perfect, little nest alone, to laying three perfect, little eggs to flying away from an empty nest with nothing to show for all of her hard work… her wings never broke… she flew away and carried on.
Grieve what was, look forward to the future and never doubt if you will soar.
It’s Spring. New hope, new goals, new wishes… we’ve got this!
@half_full_most_days