Just Sitting

I find it hard to just sit and do nothing.  It seems to go against my Puritan work ethic.  When I sit on my deck, I see all of the weeds that should be pulled.  However, today is a holiday so I can justify just sitting.  (But obviously I am writing.)

I am sitting in the shade with my feet up at the edge of our deck.  It is sunny, about 80° F and a gentle breeze washes over me and rustles the leaves in the trees above me.  Mercifully, there are no power tools running in my neighborhood right now.  But the birds—there are so many birds.  The tules that that grow in the stream in front of me harbor a myriad of Red-wing Blackbirds, including young ones chirping in nests.  Red-shafted Flickers rest in the branches of a nearby maple tree.  A nest of young Starlings is hidden in a hole in our half-rotten cottonwood tree to my right.  Perhaps resting in the middle of the day, and currently unseen and not heard, are other residents such as ducks and geese.

I can hear some traffic noise in the distance and an occasional airplane overhead, but otherwise, bird songs dominate.  Peaceful.  Just sitting here.  Listening. . .