Chirp chirp

“Is that a robin?” asked my friend anxiously yesterday morning, as she looked out my front window, jumping onto the couch to get a better view.
“Where?” I asked.
“Over there,” she pointed. “On the roof?”
Why, yes. Yes it is.
“I have to call my dad,” she said, going for her cell phone.
It seems she and him had a little competition going...who would spot the first robin?

This discovery is not taken lightly here in Minnesota. The orange-bellied bird is an harbinger of spring. Robin sighting = melting snow = ice scraper removed from car = mittens packed away = windows open = Minnesotans becoming human once more.

Come to find out though that robins actually don’t go very far in the winter. I hadn’t really put much thought into it, but I think I assumed they were like geese (those nasty, hissing, poop-making creatures). That they flew away during the hellish winter and then came back right about now. But nope. They’re around. They just don’t go about hopping from yard to yard. Rather, they congregate, sticking close together, not traveling too far from homes.

Like us! I mean, I saw all these strangers hopping about from yard to yard yesterday. Turns out, they’re my neighbors!