The past couple of days I’ve really hunkered down and worked on the yard. I’ve got some HUGE stick piles waiting for the tree service to haul away should they ever decide to bless me with their presence. I’ve been mowing as I go, working around the big limbs that are down, and just trying to make some headway where I can.
Last night I stopped for awhile to cool down and I grabbed a sugar-free grape popsicle out of the freezer. Grace and Petee knew what was coming and they were out the door in a heartbeat, waiting for me at the bottom of the steps to claim their portion of the treat. We sat down around the bottom step and I began to soften up the frozen concoction, licking away to my heart’s content as the two pugs danced for treats at my feet.
And that’s when I saw him…
He landed on the orange oriole feeder with great aplumb. He leaned over and began to dip his little black head into the small cups of grape jelly that lined the feeder. I caught a glimpse of him out of my left peripheral vision and almost dropped the popsicle right then and there. He was bright orange and black – the Halloween costume of all halloween costumes - and he was GORGEOUS.
I began wildly breaking off pieces of popsicle to keep the dogs quiet as I glanced over in his general direction. It really WAS a Baltimore Oriole eating out of my feeder – not a mistaken cardinal in harsh sunlight or some big grackle eating everything in sight. I hadn’t wasted all that money on an oriole feeder after all – a real live oriole was actually eating from it! And what a bird he was!
I looked down to hand the pugs a last bite of popsicle and when I looked back up, he was gone. I thought about how I had been graced by God with enough money to buy a box of popsicles for me, Gracie and Petee to enjoy and the oriole had been graced by God to have found his way to a house who understood the importance of refilling little tiny cups that held a half-teaspoon of grape jelly each so he could have a treat as well.
We all had our daily bread for another day; today’s bread just happened to be grape-flavored.
