Photo by Donald Healy on Unsplash
My spouse and I live in a log cabin on some acreage. We have all kinds of birds that visit… from hummingbirds, towhees, rose-breasted grosbeaks, gold and house finches to cardinals, multiple sparrows, blue jays, cowbirds, and grackles. And we have lots of robins.
Last year I wondered where all the robins were. It was a very wet year and our ground has an abundance of big, fat, juicy worms. But the robins chose to be other places than the yard around our house. And I wondered why they weren’t around. This year is a different story.
We have a pair of robins that desperately want to build a nest on the rafters of our front porch. This is less than ideal, mostly because robins get aggressive and will dive bomb you if you get too close to their nests, which is undesirable for everyone involved.
However, after a week of sweeping the rafters clean from straw and hay, we have come to an understanding that the reality that I would choose (no robins nesting on our porch) isn’t going to be what actually happens. So we (the humans) compromised. We put various bricks, lawn candles, gallon jugs, and coffee cans on the rafters where we didn’t want the birds nesting. But we did leave them room to build on the far end of the porch, away from our walkway.
Sometimes I need to be reminded that resisting reality is both a waste of time and exhausting. I can only imagine how much time and energy I would need to put in, daily, to keep the robins at bay. I’d rather be focusing my energy and time on my clients and new projects. So I brainstorm options, make a new choice based on the available options, and let the outcome be what it may.
Stay curious friends!
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