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I have to admit to letting my mood get away from me today. I let the whole pain and the bum leg just get to me. I was positively down in the dumps, nervous and unsettled, then I saw something flash by the office windows. I went to the windows and found that we had barn swallows. I’ve always loved swallows don’t know why. I have no happy childhood stories. In fact, I don’t remember ever seeing one for real until I was a teenager, and that was because a friend’s barn had a nest. But I’ve loved them since the first time I saw them dive through the air, that cobalt blue back shining in the sunlight, the breast flashing white and red (the red of a Robin’s breast not Cardinal red), that forked tail, all of it whirling and diving in the air twisting on some invisible point. When I was younger I wanted a barn that had swallows in it, but as I grew older and less enchanted with farm living, I just wanted a yard where swallows would nest. I didn’t hold much hope out, we have no gazebo, or shed, nothing that would typically attract them for nesting, but today they whirled past the windows. I watched them dive and dart, skimming above the grass for insects, speeding up to the sky to rush and circle back. There were two of them, dipping and skimming over the water garden and the clover-rich grass. We are insecticide and herbicide free in our yard which gives us a much richer variety of plants and animals. Jon joined me to watch them do their aerobatics, then we noticed that they kept darting down towards the ground. Swallows don’t like the ground except to collect mud for their nests, or water to drink, and bath in, so why were they landing on things? They landed on the roof of the solarium, the Shepard’s crook with it’s hummingbird feeder, the patio, but all that to flutter under the eaves again and again. They flew so close to the window we were standing in front of that if the glass hadn’t been there I could have stroked them as they flew past. We went to a different window and found that they were doing what I’d hoped, investigating nesting sights. I told Jon, "If they put mud on anything it’s a good sign." They put mud on top of one of the lights over the solarium door. They also bathed in the stream and sat on the roof edge and groomed. We watched them flutter and play for a couple fo hours, then as darkness began to fall they were gone. I hope they come back tomorrow, and I hope we have the odd problem of not using that door for the duration of nesting season. Barn swallows without a barn would be so terribly cool.

My bad mood vanished under the flight of swallows and the hope that they’ll be back tomorrow.

Maybe I’m not the only writer that liked swallows.