Birdwatching

I am lucky enough to have three windows above my desk and luckier still to have a cottonwood tree beyond them. On sunny days, when I should be working, I am often lured into birdwatching.

I have seen flickers, woodpeckers — even an oriole — and a dozen other kinds I couldn’t name. A flock of cedar waxwings spent one fall afternoon sleeping there, then lit out the next morning, never to return. Last week, seven goldfinches mobbed the thistle feeder.

“Wow!” I e-mailed a friend in Chicago. “There are seven goldfinches here right now!”

“You’re hoarding,” he replied. “I’ve only ever seen a goldfinch in a book.”

I’m on the phone with my boss, who is recounting our production schedule when I blurt out, “There’s this amazing gray bird on the tree! It looks like it has fur!”

I have a reputation among my colleagues for these feats-of-nature outbursts. I was on a conference call once with a dozen people when my (then) three-year-old stormed into my office and shouted, “Mama, Mama! The butterflies have hatched!”

The speakerphone went silent. I swallowed hard. I’d only been at this job for a few months, the editor’s first experiment hiring a writer in a different city. They only knew me by phone — and now, apparently, by butterflies.

The phone stayed silent. I squeaked out: “I’m so glad you could all join us for the birth.”

They laughed, and the meeting went on, and someone told me later that the whole thing made me seem more real to them, more than a voice on the conference room phone. Butterflies and birds (and three-year-olds) humanize us.

Paying attention makes the birds seem more human, too. I got a pair of binoculars this winter, and took them to the Mississippi River to watch for eagles. It’s funny how an eagle seems to have a personality when you can see its face.

The best part about watching birds through the window is that the birds don’t know I’m there. When I bike, a wren — who seems to have a yellow spot above her tail, but I can’t be sure — keeps 10 feet ahead of me, hopping to the next branch just as I get close enough to maybe see that yellow spot. If she visits my tree, though, she has no idea I’m there.

With their guard down, birds eat, preen, and nap without worrying that I might hurt them. There’s even a squirrel that hangs out there, pressing his body flat against the branch when it is cold or he is tired, scootching his butt back into a crook to steady himself for grooming. I hate squirrels — technically, I’m afraid of them — but this guy cracks me up. My window keeps me safe from him and him from me.

But safety is arbitrary. Last spring, a baby cardinal was attacked by one of the neighbor’s cats. These cats ravage my garden and stalk the birds. The cardinal was hopping and squawking and his tiny distress became my crusade. I chased off the cat with some harsh words and a loud stick, but the bird struggled into the lilac thicket and went silent. I called the nature center to ask how to help. By the time they called back, I had resumed work, the cat had returned, and the cardinal was a memory and a few stray feathers.

Later, in the fall, I opened the birdhouse to discover a tangle of sticks with one frail, orange feather at the edge. The baby had flown about 15 feet.

In spring, I take a troop of Girl Scouts to help with bird banding at the nature center. We watch the spotters put up nets as fine as spider silk, then bring the frightened birds in cotton bags to John, who bands them. One girl gets to squeeze the pliers to tighten the aluminum band; another gets to hold the bird, palm flat, as it gets its bearings and flies away. My hand itches for a turn too: Imagine holding a live, wild bird, even for a fleeting second. Birds are sharper and quicker than they seem, a fragment of weight and motion belied by their important bright colors.

I don’t classify the birds in my cottonwood tree beyond counting the crowd at the thistle feeder, or noticing who seems new. I’m not even very good about keeping the feeder full. But when I get around to it, the birds return, our faith in each other like opposite sides of the glass in the three windows above my desk, looking out on a cottonwood tree.