Morning on the Connecticut, by Jim Alberghini
Welcome to “Dear Daybreak”, a weekly Daybreak column. It features short vignettes about life in the Upper Valley: an encounter, a wry exchange, a poem or anecdote or reflection… Anything that happened in this region or relates to it and that might strike us all as interesting or funny or poignant.
Want to submit your own Dear Daybreak item? Just go here!
Dear Daybreak:
Mud Season in Vermont
Tire treads
Dish up
Brown treacle
Like maple syrup
Overboiled
Trickling over my shoe
As I tip toe
From path to car
Across dirty snow
Piled high with black crystals’
Sediment & seep of winter
So slow to melt
As the ground heaves
Up in its springtime gasp
A gulp of gutteral glop
My foot sinks
Suction grips
Out come bare toes
With a pop
A shoe and sock gone
My sole goes cold
Groaning, wet
Shivering digits turn blue
Sluicing through
Mudbound furrows
Of dank mudrows
The devil’s finest
Baked Alaska
A rich meringue
Colossus of heaving earth
Served up underfoot
— by Dave Celone
Dear Daybreak:
My husband’s instructions were clear. Don’t forget. Feed them!
I watched him drive off and waved, then shrugged my shoulders and went back into the warm house, one step removed from my new chore: bird detail for several weeks while Mike and our dog were away.
It had been a long-standing bone of contention between us, beginning years back.
“Mike, they’re rodents with fluffy tails.” He’d just hung a new feeder in a grouping of trees visible through the kitchen window. And of course, the first ones to arrive were the squirrels.
“They’re comical,” Mike defended, “And....”
I could hear his famous line coming and decided to finish the sentence for him. “I know. I know. They need to eat too.” I couldn’t help but follow it up. “You realize they’re glorified rats.”
He knew to walk away, but I could swear whenever he went out to the feeders, he’d throw additional seeds their way.
Mike was an animal enthusiast from his early years. He started his college career with intentions of studying veterinary medicine. Life had other plans, and he found himself instead back in the Northeast majoring in education. But animals continued to be his first love.
Then he experienced a health crisis which he happily survived, and it confirmed for him his strong belief in karma. Mike imagined the universe was behind the scenes, somehow orchestrating his good fortune with his good deeds—a convincing example of reaping what you sow. Sowing, in his case, was pounds of sunflower seeds.
So, on the coldest, stormiest days of winter before the morning coffee had even been set to brew, Mike was out there, shoveling snow. A path to the house? Car? No. A landing pad under the feeders so peanuts and cracked corn were available to all ground foragers along with hanging suet and wired cylinders chock full of black sunflower seeds.
If I complained about cost, his comeback was always the same.
“Once you start, you can’t stop.”
“You’ll have us eating peanut butter sandwiches for the rest of the winter,” I moaned. And as soon as the words were out of my mouth, I knew he’d share his with the squirrels. My turn to walk away.
With bear warnings taken right out of the Fish & Wildlife playbook, the feeders were still the first up and last down. I’d finally given up. But then came the day when it was my turn.
Mid-winter was not a good time to stop or ignore Mike’s mission. While I didn’t go as far as shoveling around feeding stations, I’d get out there to fill the receptacles and sprinkle a few seeds around. My first customers were always squirrels. I could count the nuthatches on one hand.
It was then they showed up. Ten. I counted. Ten turkeys. As soon as I was out the door, they scattered. I would trudge my way up to the hummock of trees past the yard where the evergreen canopy protected the ground below from too much snow. I’d spot them off to the right, nestled between the trees, waiting.
When temperatures fell into the single digits for days, I’d find myself watching for them. I became convinced that in their turkey minds I was a shrouded specter in my long black coat carrying the bright orange bucket that provided the necessary sustenance to get them through to the next day.
And when their numbers went from ten to nine and then to eight, I became the worried hen, knowing that winter in the wild could be cruel. But miraculously, all ten reappeared. I’d count them daily, breathing a sigh of relief. I’d find myself going to the feed store every couple of days to keep the bucket full, even buying the occasional bag of coarse corn. What was happening to me?
Well, what was happening to me, was starting to happen to them. At first when I’d go out, they would immediately run or fly off in another direction. Then they’d stay put and only scatter a bit—eventually waiting and moving only enough to create a path for me. Finally, they took to running toward me, arm-distance, as I’d throw the seeds. I started calling them my ‘girls,’ but I realized there were toms in this group too. The other day, several were displaying their wide fan-of-feathers, and their heads had turned a brilliant shade of blue. I learned it could be a sign of fear or connected to mating season— definitely, the latter. Hard to believe with snow still on the ground, but spring and crocuses were soon to follow.
Once Mike and our dog were home, the turkeys stopped coming out during feeding, only when his truck was gone and the dog was with him. I’m not sure he entirely believed my story.
After all, once upon a time, I was the turkey grump, complaining about their poop, which was the size of a small dog’s, and their insatiable appetites. And I don’t even like turkey at Thanksgiving. But there I was, both a turkey admirer and follower.
During those weeks, I discovered that they’re gorgeous birds. Sometimes, I’d linger in the hummock stand and watch them. Their feathers were distinctive, with patterns ranging from brown and black striations on their tails to contrasting bar-like arrangements of white and black on wing feathers. And what might look like a big brown bird was far from it. The morning sun at just the right angle illuminated a bird that possessed a metallic bronze sheen, showcasing undercurrents of deep red, iridescent greens, and the most compelling azure blues.
One day in late winter as Mike was staring out the kitchen window toward the feeders he said, “You know, I’ve been thinking about using a leaf blower.”
I immediately thought cabin fever had set in. “What are you talking about? There’s still a ton of snow out there.”
He shook his head, like I was the crazy one. “It would be great for blowing away all the shelled seeds and turkey mess.” If he was looking for the same lightbulb to go off in my head, it didn’t.
At that moment I realized my budding bird relationship was quite different from my husband’s. No life-long love or life-altering event, mine developed as a favor to the birds on the coldest of winter days—something more akin to, “We’re in this together.”
Somewhere along the way I found that I was usually the one walking up the back hill with a bucket in my hand. And sometimes when I was up there, surrounded by my new-found flock of big birds, I talked to them. Mostly, I explained to them about paying it forward. Once this snow melts, guys and girls, it’s payback time. I encourage you to get back here after those chicks are hatched and eat your fill of ticks. Believe me, there’s plenty to go around. Heck, I may even throw some sunflower seeds your way for good measure.
— Lyn Ujlaky, Thetford
