Life goes on in a sensible way...

I'm still getting over all the snake-stuff that's been happening around here lately. I told my cousin F in NY that I feel like I'm living in the middle of that old TV show called "Wild Kingdom."

The adult birds who lost their four babies to the snake last week have finally stopped circling the nest in the far corner corner of the back porch. They are still here in the yard and on the porch, sometimes sitting on the blades of the ceiling fan outside closest to their nest. I thought the mama bird would lay more eggs because she would sit in the nest from time to time. Maybe she's not ready to do that yet, but nor is she ready to just leave the porch and fly elsewhere.

There is a nest on top of one of the kitchen windows..... just built a couple of weeks ago, and another set of barn swallows had worked very hard to get the nest built 'just so' on top of the window moulding. The mama bird had laid her eggs, and during the time she sat on the eggs, she got used to my husband and I as we walked in and out of the kitchen door. I think the birds get to recognize who comes and goes in this house, because before too long, the mama bird didn't even leave her nest when we opened the door and walked onto the porch.

I noticed that the mother bird was flying back and forth to the nest all morning long today, so I went out there with the binoculars. Just as I thought-- there were three little baby birds peeking their heads over the side of the nest, waiting for the mama bird to come feed them. The babies are so tiny, but their beaks are so very yellow that it's easy to see them. Hopefully, this family of barn swallow babies won't be destroyed by another snake.

No matter when I go outside now, I'm constantly looking down on the grass and around the flowerbeds. I have my boots on when I'm out there... no more sandals, no more flat shoes for walking around the property. I was very lucky that day when I had to jump over the copperhead that was so close to my feet outside the chicken coop. Our neighbor J told us that copperheads move very slowly, especially after they've eaten. Well..... I don't care what the snake-rules are.... who knows if we'll come across a copperhead that's faster than most.

Sleeping has been the pits lately...... my imagination can just run far ahead of me, and not in a rational way. Not only am I looking for snakes outside in the yard, but now I'm looking into corners of cupboards and closets. Just in case, mind you.... just in case.

But on the bright side.... there are new baby birds in the nest over the kitchen window.... mama bird is flying back and forth feeding them.... papa bird guards the nest.... we have so many barn swallows flying around the house that it looks like a bird sanctuary out there on any given day. Life does indeed go on.

Sanctuary. This property always seemed to be just that very thing.... a sanctuary. But with all the wildlife sightings lately.... the foxes who walk along the road in the middle of the day, the coyotes who howl at night, the snakes that slither along in the grass and manage to hoist themselves up the porch columns, raccoons that can kill a cat and destroy a vegetable garden, hawks that can swoop down and pick up a chicken as easily as a bird can catch a bug....... it's no longer such a sanctuary. It's more like a war-zone studded with obstacles and booby-traps and things that go bump in the night.

And each one of those bumps will take away another hour of sleep. I thought (as I always do with a house that I love) that I would be here forever and ever, taking my last breath under this roof. I told my husband the other day that I no longer believe that. The house is beautiful... it's a dream Victorian that makes our furniture look as if it has all been here since the house was built over a hundred years ago. But the property.... as beautiful as it is, it's becoming a nightmare filled with creatures and critters that are beyond what I can handle on any given blessed day.

My husband's mother always said 'No matter what happens, life goes on in a sensible way.'

Life does indeed go on. I'm sitting here waiting for the 'sensible' part.