ODE TO A HUMMINGBIRD

Although Fall doesn't officially begin until late September, I'm one of those people who wants expects the weather to start turning cooler and more autumnal as soon as Labor Day gets itself over with. It's not that I don't like the Summer. I actually really like Summer.  My birthday is in the Summer, vacations usually happen in the Summer, and I like getting more freckles and making s'mores and longer daylight and all of those things. I just don't like Summer when it means 90+ degree weather ALL THE TIME. It's kind of hard to do summery things outside and enjoy them when twenty minutes outside of air conditioning makes you feel and look like you've ben stuck in a damp plastic bag and left on a dashboard. And then when you feel like that EVERY SINGLE DAY for THREE MONTHS, is it that surprising that you're kind of done with it? And possibly developing a very real case of Summer S.A.D? (I don't really think I have this, but there were a few days this Summer when I was like, I HAVE SAD. EVERYONE I HAVE SAD.) 

So right now, as it's still getting into the 90s every day and I have a closet full of sweaters itching to be worn (there's a striped one that is getting particularly eager--I have to shake him off in the mornings), I'm just a little very done. Very, very done. I sincerely hope I have emphasized this enough. I can keep emphasizing if you need me to. I minored in Emphasis. 

But I digress.

A week or so ago (or probably like six or seven weeks ago because this year is flying past me), I was looking out of our kitchen window when a hummingbird descended from a tree up above and zipped down to hover right beyond the window and stare at me. The moment didn't last long--within a few beats he had zoomed back up and over the tree out of sight. But it made me pause, if only for another moment, and think about how fantastic it was. I've always loved hummingbirds. I love how you see them so rarely, so when they do edge into your peripheral vision it's always exciting and fleeting and magical--the way they beat their wings so fast and cut through the air like some otherworldly UFOs. Encountering one is special. 

I also recently learned that a group of hummingbirds is called a charm or a glittering. 

A CHARM. 

A GLITTERING.

I swear I didn't make this up. A group of hummingbirds seen together at once is so special and so unusual and so magical that the grand namer of animal groups (Dave) decided to call them a charm (or a glittering). Which perfectly fits with how I feel when I see just one on its own, and of course how I felt that day when that tiny, jewel of a hummingbird deigned to visit me down below outside my window. Charmed. 

Which brings me to the end of the sidewalk of my thoughts. Day-to-day life is muddy and messy, often arduous, and full of days just hot enough to make you want to throw things. And that isn't going to change. Fall will come, yes, but afterward will be a Winter you at first embrace then quickly denounce once the Christmas tree is taken down. There will always be something, every day, that you could choose to allow to bother you and get you down. Maybe even multiple somethings--waiting to frustrate and disturb and upset around every corner. But there are also charms of hummingbirds waiting around the next, or perhaps even just one on its own, flying down to hover outside your window to remind you that they exist. To remind you that there is beauty and joy and goodness to find just as much as there are things to complain about. 

Sometimes it's just a glittering on the edge of a regular humdrum day, other times it's overflowing right in front of you, but it's always there. And it always will be. 

And that isn't going to change.