The Nest

Hey, I suppose you know that thing, when suddenly, something happens, and it makes you remember something in the past. Well, I just got the thing and it makes me remember that fateful day, when everything begins. I know some of the others don’t put all the starting things at the same place as me, but I don’t care. For me, everything kind of really started on the day of our wedding. Before that, it was just, like … a project in preparation. Lots of numbers, papers, drawings, ideas, but nothing solid, nothing true. Not like the day we all married and then built our nest. That was real, solid.

When I first arrived here, we weren’t so many. I came alone, as you know. I couldn’t stay where I lived and I was following the air flows under my wings, when I saw that willow tree, his leaves, covering a chunk of a small pond. But that’s not what attracts me in the first place, it was his shape. I spent a lot of time thinking about why it was shaped like that.

Try to imagine, the large trunk of an old willow, a weeping one. Then, around three to five metres high, picture it broke, like if something cut through its core on a long, almost vertical, tear. Maybe some lighting, or maybe his own weight broke him apart.

But it didn’t kill him! That’s what’s important here. A new limb started to sprout from the tear and that gives him that strange shape, like a Y of sort. With one limb of the Y being what’s left of the wounded brown trunk, and the other one being the new limb, full of green, sprouting to the sky. That’s where we built our nest by the way, in that space in the middle. It needed a lot of works because it has to be somewhat big enough for all of us but we did it anyway in the end.

So, I was passing by when I saw that tree. I went easy on my wings, losing altitude until I landed on one of those things, you know them, right? Half wood but without the bark, half metal, smelling funny, mostly in shades of green or brown, human-made. There are often some of them under big trees.

So I rested on one of those, watching the strange tree when a local put its bird feet next to mine. One of those sparrow. A plain, common, sparrow, like there are tons of them. Chirping, he right away started to tell me his life from the egg to the moment he saw me a few minutes ago.

You could think it will take some days, maybe a few hours at least to do that, but I assure you, with sparrows, it’s nothing that long.

I was still watching the tree when he ended his story. So I took a look at the bird, wondering why he told me all that. See? I couldn’t care less in fact. So why?

And well, he told me why, and it took him a lot more time to say that than his autobiography from before. Typical of sparrows, especially when I could summarise it in two sentences: ‘I spent all my life here and you’re not from here, told us your story and what you saw!’

I had questions of my own, so I used the situation to ask them away and soon, another sparrow came to join us, then another, and another until there was a small flock all around me, all chirping about my journeys without end. I felt obliged to tell them a bit you see. And that’s how I came here.

After that, you know how the others came, one by one, or in a small flock. But the wedding day! We were all here, on the top of the willow. Some, like the ostrich or the … thing, couldn’t climb up there so they stayed on the ground or in the water like the duck, but never mind, we were all there!

Louise and Noah, the two ravens, Lena and Chloe, the azure tit, Tiago the common black bird, Nora, Bastien and David the chaffinches, Julian and Julian the twin duck. And yes, it’s already hard to differentiate twins but if they got the same names on the top of that… Alexis and Paul, the harrier, always in competition with each other. Samuel, the robin. The flock of pigeons, always looking dumb. Emma and Jena the owls and the last, Leandro, the … thing. I absolutely not know what IT is, but IT is here, and IT is probably a bird, probably. Well, IT looks more like it than the ostrich; at least IT could fly, a bit, somehow (we finally learned what IT was, IT is a rooster.). Oh, and Ellie, the ostrich, and me, of course.

Under the sun, rejoicing about the coming of the new year after the cold season we were all united, singing the same song, and to hell if it were mostly hurting our ears than anything.

After that, in a same voice, we pronounced our vows, even if some of the pigeons needed someone to remind them of what they have to say.

The last thing we did that day was to build the basement of our future nest, the symbolism of our common will to live together, even if some couldn’t physically get up there or inside it.

It was magnificent, magic even. Twenty-four (almost) birds of all horizons, promising to share the same future altogether. Gorgeous … and then, the ravens started singing about love, and that’s what ended the party.

Why? Have you ever heard a raven sing? Well, try it for yourself! You’ll know why, then.

And that was the start of everything, a life-changing event. Without that, I’m sure, most of us wouldn’t have seen the end of that peculiar winter. So much happened! Our union could have shattered so many times, but we stayed proud, strong, united together in adversity, and at the end, we all prevailed!