Afternoon Surprise...Worry Therapy
Around noon it was raining.
The sidewalk was wet.
The afternoon had all the ingredients to be duck weather.
My response after lunch was grab a book.
Did I mention the wind was blowing? From the northwest, it gusted over 20 mph.
For a human, the afternoon weather looked like-hood up, back to the wind.
Then the sun came out.
The clouds began to break up.
First, the clouds drew my eyes to the heavens.
My book could wait.
It came to mind to sit on the deck…with a cup of coffee.
Sunshine on cumulus…in a northwest wind=beauty.
My first response was, this is nice. The sunshine warmed my face.
The clouds made rapid passage to the south.
Cloud watching produced another outcome.
A timeless event in nature was occurring overhead.
Migration.
Hawks…
The hawks came first. These ducks were a bonus.
My coffee cup was small.
By the time it was empty, more than 2 dozen hawks had flown overhead.
That’s less than 20 minutes.
Cold coffee has no taste bud appeal.
Know what else? That is a lot of hawks!
The hawks soared. There was little need for beating of wings.
The wind was just right.
At times there were two and three hawks circling and soaring…all south bound.
Ever watched a soaring hawk?
It is silent.
The cloud ceiling that day was 4,900 feet.
The hawks were just under a mile high.
There was mystery.
Where had they come from?
Where would they be at sunset?
What did hawk eyes see from that elevation?
How did the wind at 4,000 feet sound?
The hawks were my afternoon surprise.
Still see them, still remember the awe.
Hawks on the wing…in the fall.
This is a gull…hawks, ducks and gulls all were taking advantage of the north west wind.
There were ducks and gulls too.
Migration.
Beauty, Mystery, Delight.
Think I’ll call it “Worry Therapy.”
What if I’d stayed inside?
This little story has a greater meaning. Things in nature always bring us to God. Migration is a part of an eternal reality. God is in control of all things. Jesus, the Son of God, provided us with a significant reason to watch birds…He knows we worry. Worry is part of reality on this earth. Here is what Jesus said about birds…
“Therefore, I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life? ... Matthew 6:25-34
Broad wing hawks, on an afternoon soar to the south…one of my favorite nature events.