In Love with Scruffy (and no, I’m not talking about Scot) (Ruby)

I’m a city girl. I know this because I grew up right outside of Manhattan and then in North London and this lifestyle fit like a glove. I never yearned for large fields or a barn…or quiet, at least not the “countryside” version of quiet. Many of my weekends as a child were spent tooling around beneath sky scraping towers, at museums, speeding here & there in taxis, getting street food from vendors and strawberries dipped in chocolate in lovely restaurants. And then I started to watch those people and realized I was addicted to a backdrop that simply doesn’t exist along a country path, a pulse that has to do with changes in scenery, fashion, stories, menus, ideas…and lots of windows to look into….

I have never cared much for “nature”; although I loved playing outside as much as the next kid, I liked clothes and restaurants better, wallpaper patterns better than sunsets, pretty teacups more than flowers, and later, the colors of my lipsticks better than a rainbow.

So when I developed an obsessive interest in the bird’s nest that appeared in the crook of a downspout outside our bathroom window several weeks ago, it was a little unusual. Any nest is a little miracle, as far as I’m concerned, where artistry meets necessity…the perfect mix of intuition and studied orchestration with a random outcome. No cookie-cutter nests…at least this much I have appreciated about them.

But this nest was a PARTY NEST, adorned with a lavender ribbon along its topmost edge that cascaded down in a perfectly twirled corkscrew, the kind of ribbon that my mother pulled against the edge of her scissors to tie and pretty-up our presents. Then I saw the larger than life mother Robin fly into the nest and sit quietly amidst the twigs and “decor”.

My real name is Robin. People have said “where’s Batman?”; people have sung “Rockin’ Robin..tweet-tweet-tweet” (back when “Tweet” was a chirp, not a cyber-obsession); people have called out “Hey! Robin-Red-Breast!” I was partial to the Batman connection.

…until I saw that Robin sitting on her be-ribboned tuffett. Every morning I summonsed my kids, my husband…anyone I could get to come quietly and look at that SWEET ‘lil nest, hoping to see a baby bird soon. I took pictures, tried to draw it, kept waiting for those babies, wished I could see over the top and into the nest to look at the eggs but our view from the window was too low. Finally, the silhouettes of a few eensie-weenise beeks stretched up from that nest, anticipating something yummy, and you’d think I’d won the lottery: THE BABIES ARE HERE!!!!

We kept watching as longer beeks showed, always pointing straight up like little tweezers, and then those scrawny baby bird faces. I only counted three at any given time but there could have been more. I had to laugh at that lavender party ribbon, adorning the nest not unlike the balloons and festivity that welcome home human babies with “It’s a GIRL!” / It’s a BOY!”

Then, this last Tuesday morning, I called Bowie in to the bathroom to see how fat and fuzzy the babies were – all three were puffing up over the rim of the nest like a top heavy soufflé, and we agreed that the nest was way too small to hold them any longer.

That afternoon I noticed a scruffy, tousled bird sitting on the wide railing of our deck. I immediately thought it was a sickly bird but realized, looking closer, that it was one of the baby Robins…the scruffiness was just the still-fuzzy baby feathers. I shriek-whispered to Scot to QUICKLY come see him but Scot could have taken all the time in the world to get there; that bird sat in the exact spot on that railing for what seemed like hours before suddenly the Mother-Robin (or Father?) came swooping down and stood next to Scruffy and stuffed one plump worm into his throat…then quickly flew off again.

See, this is where I became completely mesmerized – I totally thought that when birds left their nests, that was it…I had never expected that Mom & Dad stayed in the picture…not even for a moment. I started looking it up…googled it, called my own mother (“mother-of-Robin” vs. “Mother-Robin”), wanting to know how long the parents would care for their little ones??????? Anyway, this completely messed up my Tuesday afternoon because I had to just STAND in my kitchen, watching Scruffy. I couldn’t find the information I wanted anywhere and my Mom was thinking that the parents DON’T typically stick around but I had proof; for the next several hours, the Mother Robin (I thought it was the Dad at first because the breast was so red…then I found out that the Dads have just a darker grayish head than the Moms, not a different breast color but I wasn’t looking at head-color at the time…so now I don’t know who it was but let’s assume Mom) would show up just when I was starting to lose my patience and getting ready to go out there with my own worm to cram down his throat. That baby was so laid-back…he just stood there and stood there, then he’d stretch way out to one side or the other with his long bony leg, then throw his wings to the left, wings to the right, stretch the right leg, bend over and look at his toes (talons?) and in my mind, I went straight to Fusion Pilates/Yoga style training, but that bird was more likely just trying to figure out what to do with all that stuff, all his BIRD GEAR… and flying did not come to mind, apparently. Robin-Mom came several times with another juicy tid-bit, then a sibling showed up and stood right next to Scruffy and they both just stood there with blank expressions (which is kind of bird-ish but I say that in a nice way).

I was FALLING in LOVE….with the whole thing, the Mother Bird, the babies, their Party Nest (which I had ALWAYS loved)…even the worms were looking kind of cute…

…which is a good thing since I couldn’t accomplish a thing; I had to just stay by my window and witness all that NATURE, the superior parenting style of the Mama-Bird, promising to return with more snacks, never really losing sight of her babies. At one point the Mom started to hop away along the flat railing where she had kept coming with their food and the Brother bird immediately started speed-hopping after her; you could just hear the bird-words: “Don’t Leave Meeeeeeeee!!” and that sibling was gone…who knows where, but he followed his Mom away from the safety of the railing where they had clearly been asked to stay put and not take candy from strangers. Scruffy was left alone again, to wait for another plate of hors d’oeuvres to be passed. And the whole time, I was translating this in human terms and justifying the crazy variables that make some kids run into the adventure, some follow you, some wait patiently for whatever comes their way…

On Wednesday, Scruffy was still sitting close to the same spot on the railing…a little further down, showing his sense of adventure atop some raggedy vines that wind around the railing. After about another hour, he tried out his wings and shot straight up to the top of the vines several yards away…but couldn’t quite balance and with a clumsy fluttering of his wings he went crashing down to what seemed like the pavement of our driveway and I had an ill feeling that told me he was dead, damaged, or at least stunned.

He was fine. He had hopped into the lattice at the end of the railing, standing as still as a statue. I took a picture without making a sound (these pictures are all of him…hopefully I didn’t freak him out).


Yesterday, I looked many times for those Robins and never saw one which made me really sad. I missed them (seriously, am I talking about missing a bird in my yard?). I kept talking out loud to them: “Oh, Birdie….where the HELL are you?! Come back Birdie!” I kept going to the bathroom window and looking at the empty nest the way I look at the kids bedrooms when they have gone to sleep-away camp for a week…the worst, empty, missing feeling. I also get this feeling after my Mom has visited me and has left a ½ used Sweet ‘n Low packet on the kitchen counter…little reminders that they are GONE…I hate that!

This morning I am rejoicing again because Scruffy was back in the lattice…standing absolutely still. Not a flyer yet…how cute is that? I am compelled to call my friend who is an avid bird watcher and find out more about all of this…suddenly fascinated. I wanted to see if the Robin-Mother is still feeding him or if /when he’ll take care of himself? Where did his brother go? Were there any other babies…..? I read that about half don’t make it….which makes me love Scruffy even more.

Time out – gotta’ run to the window and check on him quick…

I’m back. He’s gone.

: (

Ruby