The Big Yard: Notes from a Pajama Birdwatcher

December 21, 2022

I live my life as though everything that happens has a purpose—whether I believe it or not.

Last Saturday, dozens of people gathered at Richard Shelton’s home in Tucson to remember him.  Just friends and food and tears.  No speeches.  In preparation, my wife arranged photos of him and his family with twinkle lights and candles, setting out his scrapbooks and pages of poetry. I filled the house with aromas of vegetarian chili and mulled cider, a la Dick Shelton.  I baked his favorite blackberry pie, using my recipe from our many writing excursions to Yachats, Oregon.  I’m sure he was smiling at my own touch of flare. 

Covid mulled cider.

My secret ingredient for vegetarian chili is bacon fat.  Just kidding!  The recipe came from Alison Deming, who suggested I use only the best chile powder from Chimayo, New Mexico.

And then they arrived, his long history of people—students from 47 years of teaching and coworkers from the university, fellow writers and poets.  Alison Deming, who told me, “I had so much to say to you and now there are no words” as she hugged me and our tears came.  Rick Taylor, who drove from his home in the Chiricahua Mountains, and told stories of javelina and coati and how Dick saved his writing degree.  And my workshop of amazing writers.  And Will Clipman and Ila Abernathy with her La Indita tamales, and Tyler Meier and Bob Houston, whom Dick hired at the University in 1973.  While Tyler, Bob, and I discussed the Richard Shelton Writing Fellowship for prisoners, Tom Cobb signed a copy of his book Shavetail for me with the words “He will be with us forever.”

This is what I needed, so many of his friends said to me at the end.  I said nothing, thinking I could become his words: “If I stay here long enough, I will learn the art of silence.”

Pine Siskin

         

Male Cassin’s Finch

 On this cold-silent morning, among the pine siskins and Cassin’s finches, a single, winter-feathered American goldfinch sings thin, wiry notes from the elderberry tree.  This is only the third time in 14 years the species has visited the yard. While they are common in gardens and orchards and fields across most of the country, we mostly see their smaller, western cousin, the lesser goldfinch.

Rick Taylor, in Birds of Arizona, says they’re uncommon in winter and that most Arizona birds arrive here, as this one has, in nonbreeding plumage.

It is a gift with purpose on this solstice day with a frost-glazed sunrise.

An American Goldfinch fluffs its feathers on a 25-degree morning.

A regular visitor to the yard all year, the Lesser Goldfinch.

On rare occasions, our third goldfinch, Lawrence’s Goldfinch, will visit the yard in winter.

Thanks for supporting the Big Yard. More to come as I approach a new birding milestone… 1000 continuous days of eBird!