I‘m writing the blog from my kitchen table and I can hear some baby birds bleeting. There are three of them, maybe four. I noticed the first one sitting on the wheel of my wheelbarrow while I was stacking wood.

Here’s a picture:

They’re small and pathetic and as cute as cartoon characters and likely soon to die. If their mother doesn’t come for them in the next hour or so, there’s very little hope for them apart from our feeding them cat food with a dropper, and there are three of them. 

Life in the country is often very cruel. I think we will try to take care of them because it seems right, but the fact that it’s a question speaks to how many birds I’ve buried. I should keep a running tally, even if I begin one or two dozen behind the actual number.

It’s a curious question of where kindness rubs up against inconvenience. There’s a limit to all of it, of course. I stopped stacking wood and brought the dog in because I thought it might be keeping their mother away, but I’ve got family visiting and that is likely to result in us not gathering them up and taking care of them as quickly as we might otherwise. 

Though, as I write this, perhaps we’ll make it a family affair, gathering up the birds and giving them water and what not. 

We’ll see what wins, convenience or conscience.