A Minor Thrasher 2: Love in the Leaf Litter

The morning I wrote the first part in this series was total avian chaos. A knock-down, drag-out battle of horny solo a cappella impersonation acts. The next morning was eerily calm. Sure, we had the normal cheerful spring dawn song of the diverse bird species in this region, but I had so acclimated to the thrasher’s dominance of it, the absence almost felt like silence.

It was about midday, as I was resting by the campfire, that I saw him. Saw him — not heard him! He had been so loud for so long, but almost impossible to lay eyes on.

He landed on a brush pile, not more than 15 feet from where I sat — paused briefly — and then disappeared into the pine and cedar branches where I heard his familiar collection of phrases rise softly from the tangled vegetation.

I crept over slowly, quietly as I could with my cane, and I took the video embedded in this post. You'll see I first caught one bird foraging under the brush, and then my attention was grabbed by the sound of a second, sifting through the litter nearby.

Dude found his mate! And they settled so close to camp! Yay tick control!

Maybe this series will be more than two parts — but who knows? Birds can be very private people.

I wrote the first part as an analogy of one of my favorite poems. Nature replied with live-action poetry before my eyes.

What had been a raw and wild cry of desire and desperation into the ether — attracting intense rivalry, stress, and din — had settled into a whisper of quiet romance.

The skills he carefully learned and honed just to find her. The song he practiced and performed with everything in his whole being is now a tender refrain for her alone.

"Bow-chicka-wow-wow"

A moment of awe and appreciation of that beauty before I relate the lives of birds back to my life experiences.

Like the narcissistic creature I am.

It's been a few days now, and I hear his song occasionally, but the absence of the intensity is noticeable in a way that made me reflect on what I wrote.

I gave some examples of things that were said that were shaming when I was an overwhelmed mother of young children. I missed one:

"You'll miss them when they're grown and gone!"

Of course I covered "Children are a blessing, you should be grateful" — which is in the same food group of mommy guilt, but a slightly different flavor.

What I had in mind was the particular sting of someone who had suffered pregnancy loss or infertility, who seemed to take my struggles personally. I can sympathize with this. Believe it or not, I've also struggled with pregnancy loss and infertility.

Everyone's experience is unique, and everyone's pain is valid. It can be quite hard to hear someone complain about a problem you'd give anything to have. But the problem you are perceiving is not as you would experience it; it's something that is theirs alone. 

The "You'll miss them" crowd is usually empty nesters. Honestly, they annoy me much more — increasingly so the further I've come on my motherhood journey and now being an early empty nester of sorts myself.

Both of these statements are a kind of emotional competitiveness. "Hey, wait, you can't hurt more than me! I'd give anything to be in your position. How selfish of you to ask for empathy when I'm in such greater need!"

As if understanding and love were a pie to be carefully and justly divided.

Competitiveness always rubs me the wrong way. I am very much not a competitive person.

It's usually very easy for me to concede the race — just let the competitive person enjoy their victory and go find someone kinder to confide in. And sometimes that's the kindest thing for me to do for them and myself.  At least I think so....

Someone who is still hurting from their pregnancy loss is not the shoulder to cry on about being sleep-deprived with a newborn. I wouldn't seek them out for that, but when I was public with my struggles, they occasionally volunteered themselves to shame me.

Of course that wasn't the intention. I had hurt them inadvertently, and they spoke from that hurt and returned it in kind.

It happens.

The empty nesters, though, shame themselves in shaming me — and that is a double blow to an empathetic person.

They're not only saying, "You are wrong to have these feelings," they are also saying, "I have deep regret about having feelings in my past that I can never change, so I'm going to try and change you instead."

The competitiveness falls flat, because I've already felt the pain they're expressing — as well as the pain I'm in the midst of.

If you saw me at a moment, I had an infant strapped to my back, pushing a toddler in a stroller, with two preschoolers running circles around me — yes, I am abundantly blessed in that moment with the presence of children.

They are physically present as they are — but even then — I've lost them a thousand times.

Each one of those babies once slept in my arms, nourished from my body, gifted me with their very first smiles and giggles.

Those days pass in the blink of an eye, and they never come back.

That baby is gone to me forever, replaced by a new creature — no less spectacular and fascinating, but no longer the same experience.

There is very real grief in this and also joy and pride.

The problem, I think, is in putting value judgment on emotion in the first place.

It's not wrong in itself to feel anger, sadness, envy.

It's the behaviors that sometimes rise from these emotions that need control — not the emotions themselves, and not the perceived source of those emotions.

Behavior often born of a drive to control something far beyond our control.

Whether that be a newborn’s sleep schedule, or the melancholy that comes with an overwhelming rush of postpartum hormones.

I don't regret having unpleasant thoughts and emotions in my days in the childbearing trenches.

I deeply regret the times it got the better of me, and I mistreated those innocent ones.

The drive to conquer the "bad" feelings caused me to lash out at what my altered mind was identifying as the source.

It took me decades just to start to really understand what it took to manage my own behavior — how could I demand the same from someone so new to this world? In doing so, I built the same kind of obstacles in them that have made it so hard for me.

A Minor Bird

"I have wished a bird would fly away,

And not sing by my house all day;

Have clapped my hands at him from the door

When it seemed as if I could bear no more.

The fault must partly have been in me.

The bird was not to blame for his key.

And of course there must be something wrong

In wanting to silence any song."

— Robert Frost

We clapped our hands from the door — at the weight of motherhood. In the moment and then at the memory.

My kids are physically distant from me now. They are each thriving in their own way, becoming the people they feel most comfortable being. Making their own poetry of this complex life.

I want to witness and experience more of that beauty for what it is in the now.

My babies are long gone. Sweet and fading memories.

The emotional rollercoasters, the intensity of it all. The peak life moments of love and closeness and understanding that are matchless in any other experience.

I love that I had those moments. I do not wish to go back. I wish for more of the experience of knowing these amazing people as they are now.

The bird will fly away. What remains is what we make of the memory — and how that shapes how we receive the next song.

I can hear the other birdsongs more clearly now without the male thrasher drowning them out — and maybe, if I’m lucky, I’ll get to witness more of the quiet wonder that unfolds next for the happy couple.