Speaker 1: The bird feeder. Arthur fills his bird feeder every morning
Speaker 1: at seven o'clock. He has done this for eleven years,
Speaker 1: ever since his wife passed and the house became too quiet.
Speaker 1: The feeder hangs from a hook on the porch, a
Speaker 1: wooden platform with a roof painted green, though the paint
Speaker 1: has worn away in patches, and the wood underneath is
Speaker 1: silver with age. He fills it with sunflower seats, not
Speaker 1: the cheap mix with the filler grain that the birds
Speaker 1: sort through and discard. The good stuff, black oil sunflower seeds,
Speaker 1: the kind that cardinals love and chickadees love most. He
Speaker 1: buys them in forty pound bags from the farm supply
Speaker 1: store and keeps them in a metal trash can by
Speaker 1: the back door. The lid waited with a brick to
Speaker 1: keep the squirrels out. At seven o'clock, Arthur steps onto
Speaker 1: the porch. The air is cool, the sky is just
Speaker 1: turning light. He scoops the seeds into the feeder, one cup,
Speaker 1: two cups, three. He checks the water in the stone
Speaker 1: basin on the railing. He brushes away the husks from yesterday.
Speaker 1: Then he sits in his rocking chair with his coffee
Speaker 1: and waits The birds come at seven twelve, not seven eleven,
Speaker 1: not seven thirteen, seven twelve. Arthur has been washing enough
Speaker 1: to know their schedules as well as he knows his own.
Speaker 1: The first to arrive is always the chickadee. Arthur calls
Speaker 1: him the scout. He is small and quick, with a
Speaker 1: black cap and a white face. He lands on the feeder,
Speaker 1: grabs a single seed, and flies away. He does this
Speaker 1: three times. Then he returns to the maple tree and
Speaker 1: calls to the others the all clear signal the feeder
Speaker 1: is safe. The cardinals come next. The male is bright red,
Speaker 1: the color of a fire engine, the color of a sunset.
Speaker 1: Arthur calls him the Gentleman. He is cautious. He sits
Speaker 1: on the railing and looks at the feeder for a
Speaker 1: long time before he lands. He eats slowly, cracking each
Speaker 1: seed with care, his black mask giving him the look
Speaker 1: of a bandit. At a formal dinner, his mate comes
Speaker 1: with him. Arthur calls her the Lady. She is brown,
Speaker 1: with orange on her wings and beak, beautiful in a
Speaker 1: quiet way. She eats while the Gentleman watches. He always
Speaker 1: lets her eat first. Arthur respects this about him The
Speaker 1: blue jays arrive at seven twenty. They are loud, they
Speaker 1: are pushy. Arthur calls them the committee because they argue
Speaker 1: about everything. They argue about who gets to eat first.
Speaker 1: They argue about which side of the feeder is better.
Speaker 1: They argue about the squirrels. They argue about the weather.
Speaker 1: They arrive squawking and leave squawking, and the porch sounds
Speaker 1: like a board meeting that has gone on too long.
Speaker 1: Arthur does not mind. He likes the Committee. They make
Speaker 1: him laugh. The new thatch comes at seven point thirty.
Speaker 1: Arthur calls him the upside down one, because that is
Speaker 1: what he is. He walks head first down the trunk
Speaker 1: of the maple tree, which is not how most birds walk.
Speaker 1: He lands on the feeder and eats with his head tilted,
Speaker 1: as if the world looks different from an angle, and
Speaker 1: he prefers it that way. The woodpecker comes at seven forty.
Speaker 1: Arthur calls him the doctor because of the way he
Speaker 1: taps on the maple tree, methodical and precise, as if
Speaker 1: he is checking for a heartbeat. He is a downy woodpecker,
Speaker 1: small and black and white, with a red patch on
Speaker 1: the back of his head. He does not eat from
Speaker 1: the feeder. He eats from the suet cage that Arthur
Speaker 1: hangs from the hook below. He clings to the wire
Speaker 1: mesh and pecks, his body perfectly still except for his head.
Speaker 1: The mourning doves come last. Arthur calls them the quiet ones.
Speaker 1: They sit on the railing and coo a low, sad,
Speaker 1: beautiful sound that makes the morning feel deeper than it is.
Speaker 1: They eat the seeds that the other birds have knocked
Speaker 1: to the floor. They are not picky, they are grateful.
Speaker 1: Arthur watches them all. He has given them names, not
Speaker 1: because they are pets, but because they are neighbors. He
Speaker 1: has watched their children grow up. He has watched the
Speaker 1: gentleman teach his son to crack seeds. He has watched
Speaker 1: the lady build a nest in the maple tree, weaving
Speaker 1: grass and twigs with her beak. He has watched the
Speaker 1: scout lead a new group of chickadees to the feeder
Speaker 1: for the first time, showing them the ropes. He knows
Speaker 1: their arguments and their alliances. He knows that the committee
Speaker 1: will chase the squirrels away from the feeder, but only
Speaker 1: if the gentleman is not nearby. Because the gentleman does
Speaker 1: not tolerate bullying. He knows that the upside down one
Speaker 1: will eat alone, always alone, and that this is not
Speaker 1: sadness but preference. He knows that the quiet ones will
Speaker 1: sit together on the railing, shoulder to shoulder, and that
Speaker 1: their cooing is not grief but conversation. Arthur has learned
Speaker 1: something from watching the birds. He has learned that a
Speaker 1: life can be small and still be full. He has
Speaker 1: learned that routine is not the same as emptiness. He
Speaker 1: has learned that the world is full of small dramas,
Speaker 1: and small joys, and small kindnesses if you sit still
Speaker 1: long enough to see them. At eight o'clock, Arthur goes inside.
Speaker 1: He washes his coffee cup, He dries it with a towel.
Speaker 1: He puts it back on the hook. The birds have
Speaker 1: had their breakfast. The feeder is half empty. The porch
Speaker 1: is quiet again, except for the faint sound of wings
Speaker 1: in the maple tree. Arthur does not need much. He
Speaker 1: has his house, he has his porch, He has his birds,
Speaker 1: He has his coffee. He has the morning, every morning,
Speaker 1: the same and not the same, the light changing with
Speaker 1: the seasons, the birds coming and going, the feeder being
Speaker 1: filled and emptied and filled again. Some people might look
Speaker 1: at Arthur's life and see loneliness. They would be wrong.
Speaker 1: Arthur is alone, but he is not lonely. He has
Speaker 1: the scout and the gentleman, and the lady, and the committee,
Speaker 1: and the upside down one, and the doctor and the
Speaker 1: quiet ones. He has the sound of wings. He has
Speaker 1: the crack of sunflower seeds. He has the coop of
Speaker 1: mourning doves. In the early morning light and every evening,
Speaker 1: when the birds have gone to roost and the feeder
Speaker 1: is empty and the porch is quiet, Arthur sits in
Speaker 1: his rocking chair and listens to the silence. It is
Speaker 1: not the silence of absence. It is the silence of
Speaker 1: a day that has been lived, a day that was
Speaker 1: full of small things, a day that mattered. He sleeps well,
Speaker 1: he always has. The birds will come again at seven twelve,
Speaker 1: The feeder will be full, the morning will be waiting,
Speaker 1: and Arthur will be there in his rocking chair with
Speaker 1: his coffee, watching the world wake up, one small bird
Speaker 1: at a time.