Right about now, we could use some tropics. Don’t you think? No more slush. No more snow. Nothing grey, just for a little while. Feathers, and sun-flushed colors, and the feeling of flight. Just for a little while.
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Archive for January, 2009
happy squirrel appreciation day!
January 21, 2009
January 21 marks the ninth annual Squirrel Appreciation Day. We here in Nightingale Square—by which I mean me, the cats, and the squirrels. Due to their long-standing feud over sunflower seed access rights, the pigeons were considered biased witnesses and were not polled—are big fans of the squirrel, and we hope you are too. Or at least that you, like us—and this time, I mean the pigeons too!—enjoy any excuse for a party.
Might we suggest:
- Stroll through a virtual gallery of squirrel art from some of the great naturalist illustrators. Don’t miss this image, depicting a squirrel in company with cat and rabbit, from the astonishing 12th century Aberdeen Bestiary.
- Throw a squirrel soiree. Mix up a pitcher of chocolate squirrel cocktails, and decorate with these charming squirrel favors. And also? Invite me, so I can ogle your mad crafty skills. I’ll bring candy. We’ll watch squirrel videos, possibly involving waterskiing. It’ll be great. I’ll wear a fancy hat, and I swear, I won’t bring along any of these damn squirr—oh. Right. Um… how about we move along to another bullet point right about now? Like this one:
- Make a donation to your local wildlife rehabilitation center, which helps injured or orphaned squirrels a second chance.
- Spread the word by sending this e-card, or perhaps this one instead. It may be intended as a mediatation on differences of faith and the marginalization of cultures even within a society that purportedly celebrates diversity, but I think it works.
american bison, humboldt park
January 21, 2009
Lions and bison and bulls—oh, my.
The lions: Sculptor Edward Kemeys (1843-1907) is best known in this city by his twin lion statues, trademark guardians of the Art Institute of Chicago.
The bison: Kemeys produced the two above, for the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition in Jackson Park. After the fair they were placed overlooking the entrance to Garfield Park, on the city’s west side.
The bulls: Humboldt Park’s formal gardens, meanwhile, were guarded by two other statues also created for the world’s fair: a pair of bulls by sculptors French & Potter. In 1915, the bulls were taken from their display and exchanged for the bison of Garfield Park, which still stand in their place.
Oh, my. Why the switch? No documentation remains to explain it. But I love these craggy buffalo, love their vast weight which you can sense from just a touch, and the rich-veined metal of their hide.
I think of bison as stolid, massive animals. Bronze statues, too: defined to my mind by their massy wholeness, their solid single-pieced scale. Yet these two are defined by details, by hairs and sinews. Energy sparks from their frantic-furred haunches, and runs into the earth down legs lean as bone. They are all movement, a million little directions. Not single, whole and weighty, not unmoving. Not at all.
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In my last post about Humboldt Park, a handful of photos after a morning there, I was struck by how every photo shared a sense of texture. A raveling net of stems, a chapped lake, a thousand crackling leaves. And these bison have it too, the whole park’s wildfire energy, its crackle and flicker and restlessness. I love that, unlike a museum, the park is a place where I can walk right up to these sculptures and touch them, warm or cold as the air around us, and rippling with this unquiet history. |
the daily pigeon: friday
January 16, 2009
Wood-pigeons cooed there, stock-doves nestled there.
My trees were full on songs and flowers and fruit,
their branches spread a city to the air.
-Christina Rosetti
the daily pigeon: thursday
January 15, 2009
I mean, it is an extraordinary thing that a large proportion of your country and my country, of the citizens, never see a wild creature from dawn ’til dusk, unless it’s a pigeon, which isn’t really wild, which might come and settle near them.
-David Attenborough
the daily pigeon: wednesday
January 14, 2009
They wait, each like a wooden decoy
or soft like a pigeon or
a sweet snug duck:
until one moves, moves that dart-beak
breaking over.
-Anne Sexton, “Torn Down from Glory Daily”
the daily pigeon: tuesday
January 13, 2009
If only I could nudge you from this sleep,
My maimed darling, my skittery pigeon.
Over this damp grave I speak the words of my love.
-Theodore Roethke, “Elegy for Jane”
the daily pigeon: monday
January 12, 2009
Inspired by yesterday’s rhapsody on my neighborly birds, we’re declaring this official Pigeon Week! Watch for a new little moment from the life of the local pigeons every day this week. And, in honor of Pigeon Week, go out and kiss a pigeon today!*
*We in no way encourage the kissing of pigeons. Seriously, now. It’s unsanitary, it’s dangerous, and they just don’t seem to like it very much at all.
pigeon 101
January 11, 2009Frankly, I’m shocked. I’m downright shocked that I haven’t told you all about the pigeons before now.
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For any nature-gawker rooted in a city, pigeons form the bulk of the wildlife on offer any given day. We’ve peeked at pigeons by the fireside and pigeons close to home, but these few glimpses don’t convey how central Columba livia is to the pattern of my days.
It started with the garden. This summer I packed my tiny balcony with containers sprouting peppers, strawberries, herbs and a trellis of scarlet runner beans. That’s when the neighborhood pigeons got curious about the goings-on here on the third floor. Every lazy weekend morning, I could look forward to regular neighborly visits from inquisitive birds, nestling comfortably down in my planters, crushing my lettuce plants under soft slaty bellies, pecking about for any promising seedy snacks. We got accustomed to each other’s company, out there in the shade of the runner bean vines. |
Now that it’s winter, and the windows are shut fast, the pigeons are often my only brush with the natural world. More: on a silent heavy-snowed morning, their soft thrumming calls can be the only sound I hear for hours. More: they know when I wake up, and my first step toward the window is hailed with tiny storms and feathers, as the flock descends from watchful perches on the roof to my balcony. When I open the window to scatter breakfast handfuls, they hop onto the sill, and would happily amble inside if I let them for a self-serve breakfast buffet.
They are still common, of course, still often underfoot, still easy to overlook. But I’ve also discovered that they look rather endearing with snow piled on their heads. That their eyes are an orange of unsettling intensity. That some are the colors of an heirloom cameo, soft sepia beneath a bone-bright filigree. That I’m a pushover and could easily bankrupt myself catering to their insatiable appetites, and those of their rivals the squirrels.
