Day 114

April 24, 2021

A very eventful Saturday

Three 10 and 11 year olds were playing on the escalator, daring the electric steps to grab their bright lilac and yellow crocs as they pushed their feet up to the side of the sliding stairway.  Grabbing the moving handrail they were swinging back and forth.  She kept herself from employing her teacher voice demanding that they not screw around on the contraption.  She was afraid to watch them get hurt, but also realized she was a stranger.

Twenty minutes later she looked up and saw a baby stroller flip pover frontwards a two year old strapped in a stroller bouncing from his father's hands.  The realization that she was watching a baby be killed was immediate and she ducked and yelled causing her niece to look, too.  It was over in seconds.  The year old screamed followed by the parents pulling him out of the stroller.

There was no blood not hit mark on his head.  Her niece teared up in relief.  The stroller had taken two rolls down to the bottom of the stairway but had protected the child from head trauma.  Nothing seemed to be bleeding.  Mom and Dad held him close looking again and again at his forehead.

She had watched a trauma, but not a death, saved by some act of grace.  Everyone around who watched was traumatized.  She might yell at the next group of children fooling around on an escalator.  Divine intervention does not happen that often. 

Driving to Holyoke and going to the mall was too much today and if it weren't for the joy of seeing Sarah and Billie I would be freaked that I did it.

But I got to hug them and I love them so much.

But I had to take my ride and cool my nervous system down.  What a beautiful ride.  It was 71 at the rookery at 4:15 sunny and still.  Every nest has birds sitting on eggs in it.  I think I found a couple of other nests too, but I don't know what bird they belong to.  I have to find that nest identification guide.

Today's bird list: house sparrow, Cooper's hawk, vultures, osprey, red tailed hawk,, chickens and a baby something (what would have already hatched?), red winged black bird, Canada geese, common merganser, herons, and cardinal.  

 And the swing must come down.