IT WAS OF THAT NATURE

Late yesterday afternoon I was out watering the garden under a fine blue sky when I sensed a great rejoicing above me, a non-stop exaltation coming from the direction of heaven. I looked up and beheld in all that broad clear blue a single barn swallow, just one little swallow way up there, filling all that sky with happiness, chattersinging nonstop while looping and curlicueing in wide curves as though doing some ecstatic skywriting, executing aerodynamic maneuvers that made the Blue Angels look like kindergarten, and he just went on and on, rollicking and singing at the top of his talent, though there were no other swallows around.

Now I don't profess to know all that much about bird emotion, but I do know happiness when I see it, and this was a whole skyful of joy, emanating from one little aerodynamically perfect back and white feathered creature who was using every aerial broadcasting skill at his command to let the world know just how he felt; he was way happier than any lark I ever heard. Just goes to show how mood can change a whole environment.

He wasn't hunting for his dinner, he wasn't calling for a mate, he wasn't fending off intruders into his territory, he was all alone in his glee, frolicking, swooping and singing excitedly all over the sky for no reason that I could see; the only thing I could think he was singing about with such passion would have to be something like "I found a wife! We built a nest! My wife just laid two eggs! Two eggs! Two beautiful eggs!" It was of that nature.