empty nest

For a few weeks now Hannah has been watching a nestful of robins grow, and yesterday they all flew away. Today was her first glance at the empty nest, and I could see her disappointment. Tonight when she went to bed she expressed how much she missed her little birds.

For these past few weeks she has been watching those birds, checking on them, making sure their momma came back...The first thing she'd ask for in the morning was to check on the birds. Every day she'd peek, multiple times, just to make sure they were ok. She'd report on their growth, and tell me how they were feeling. These last couple of days she came to the conclusion that they must feel pretty squashed in that tiny nest. They were "hers" for a time, and now they've all flown away.

Holding her as she cried, I thought of how our lives are full of these kinds of experiences, full of gain and loss, of meeting and parting. I thought of how soon enough my little wee one will leave this nest and fly on her own, and about how I will grieve that day just as Hannah grieved this one. I thought of how, one day, my tired body will no longer be able to keep up this home we live in and I will leave it for the last time. I thought of past friendships that I KNEW would last forever but didn't, not because they weren't good but because their time was past.

I can think of many things that I consider mine that really aren't...Things that I tend to, that I care for, that I check on daily. And some day, perhaps sooner than later, the fact that they are not mine will be made clear because they will be gone. But like Hannah's birds, the time we have with these things of worth in our lives are made all the sweeter by the knowledge that they will not be with us forever...Perhaps it's even the prospect of the loss that makes having something even more intense and powerful and meaningful. 

On the far brighter side, we know that these losses and partings are followed by greater joys, and by the wisdom that comes from the experiences we have. I read something recently that suggested that the memory of something is worth just as much as the experience itself, and it continues to influence us, and change us. Tomorrow Hannah looks forward to watching for her birds - not in the nest but in tree branches and on the lawn, searching out their own food and enjoying their new freedom.