Les Beaux Oiseaux

Les Beaux Oiseaux. The Beautiful Birds. Ornithology. One of my favorite things. The scientific study of birds. For me, it’s really just a love of watching birds. It is quietly meditative to observe them eat, fly, splash in a birdbath, groom. Serene, artless and calming.

When I was in college majoring in Biology and minoring in English (not a popular choice in the Biology Department, but perfect for me), I needed a zoology credit. Choosing Ornithology was a decision that became a lifelong pleasure.

For the final exam we met the professor in a cemetery at dawn. Not as strange as it seems. Far from being a creepy, dark place full of ghosts, it was radiant and green and full of light and life. Vast stretches of grassy slopes, lakes and huge, ancient trees gave it a mystical quality. The birds were up early, singing their hearts out and swooping from branch to headstone, to branch. Herons stood on one leg and dipped their bills to drink from the still, glassy water’s surface. It was not easy to find everything the professor pointed out, but it was fascinating to try.

Not too long ago I found a wonderful free App called Merlin Bird ID from the Cornell Lab, a research and conservation organization that allows you to identify birds in the field by entering size, color, location, etc. Wonderful.

I’m truly a nerd at heart and I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Painted Bunting- Davesgarden.com

I know, right?

And...

Photography by Achmad Munasit aka "asit"

THE GOOD HOUSE- JUNE 2018 BOOK SELECTION

Sixty-year-old Hildy Good is the most successful real estate agent in Wendover, Massachusetts. She is a mother, a grandmother and has a reputation for being a witch. She claims it’s only her acute observational skills, but she is in fact a descendent of Goody Good, a woman accused and hung at Salem.

Hildy is the narrator of The Good House by Ann Leary and makes a laconic, dry, funny observer of the characters in her town. She is also a raging, secret alcoholic in complete denial. At the insistence of her daughters, she once entered rehab, but has since fallen off the wagon and it’s beginning to show.

Affairs, parents coping with difficult children, eccentric townspeople and a nostalgic look back at a summer romance entertain and intrigue but we know a serious fall is coming. This is an excellent view of the mind of an alcoholic. Entertaining, sad, informative.