for the birds

K has some potted plants hanging out on our balcony, and a bird built a nest in one of them. As much as I want to peek at the babies and squeal happily, I try to refrain from doing so, because I don’t want the mother bird to get freaked out and abandon them. But on Saturday, I could not resist taking a look, especially because I wanted to try to get a picture of them.

So I went out on the balcony, pulled a chair over, and stood on it to peek inside the potted plant. There were three of them, and because they had already gotten over that hideous, featherless stage where they look like tiny scrotums with eyes, they were very cute indeed. They were covered in gray down, and their beady black eyes looked up at me. Peeping, they shrank against each other, and they looked so terrified that my heart squeezed up guiltily. Not wishing to traumatize them any further, I quickly stepped down and went back inside, gently shutting the door.

Then I realized that I had my hair up in mismatched clips, and I was wearing only a New York Giants shirt and pink panties.

Good thing none of my neighbors saw me; those birdies wouldn’t have been the only living creatures traumatized that day.