Raul Ascunce
This morning, the wife and I decided to take a walk in one of our community’s most beautiful wooded parks. While I am always up for the opportunity to commune with nature, being married to a bird watcher makes it a challenge to “stroll” through the woods.
“Honey,” I said as we arrived at the park, “just take in a big old inhale of that delicious scent of earthy outdoorsiness. Doesn’t it wake up every olfactory cell lining the ciliated walls of your sniffer?”
“I will wake up my nose hairs in a minute, dear,” she said fumbling with her phone. “First I have to get up this new app I heard about for birders. It’s called, ‘Let’s give them something to squawk about’.”
“Wait a minute, isn’t that a Bonnie Raitt song?”
“No, it’s an app that identifies bird songs. As we walk through the woods, it records bird songs and the picture of the respective bird will show up on my screen.”
“That’s awesome, dear,” I said. “There truly is an app for everything.”
Conversely to the wife, while she is looking skyward for flying feathered singers, I am fascinated by the things I see on the ground. For example, the first thing I saw this morning was a snake.
“SNAKE!” I called out.
“Shush,” the wife said. “I am recording bird songs.”
“Well, snakes don’t sing as far as I know, so I thought I would call it to your attention before you stepped on it.”
“OMG! There’s a red-eyed vireo in the area. I have never seen one before. I would just die if I saw a red-eyed vireo right now.”
“Well,” I said, “I kind of hope you don’t see one. I mean we’re in the middle of the woods and at my ripe old age, I don’t feel quite equipped to flip you over my shoulder and carry you out. So for God’s sakes if you see a red-eyed vireo, don’t look. Better yet, maybe you should just turn off that app before something bad happens.”
“Looky here,” the wife said showing me her phone, “there’s a titmouse and just now a white-breasted nuthatch.”
Naturally, given the prominent anatomical nomenclature of her bird subjects, I made an inappropriate comment not suitable for publication.
“Oh, will you grow up?” the wife said. “These are beautiful creatures that do not need to be objectified by your inappropriate comments. May I remind you that this app is recording right now, your comments included?”
“Sorry,” I said. “In the future I will try to be more mature.”
So we stood there in the middle of the woods, she peering through binoculars trying to find those well-endowed birds up in the tree branches, while I quietly looked downward for something interesting to look at.
Suddenly, her phone alerted her to a new bird, “A blue-footed booby? That can’t be. They are indigenous to the Galapagos Islands.”
“What was the name of that bird again?” I said trying to contain my snorts.
“A blue-footed booby.”
“Buuuuuwwaaaahahahaha!” I said. “I mean, will you look at that fungus.”
Maturity is so overrated.
Raul Ascunce is a freelance columnist for the Sentinel-Tribune. He may be contacted at [email protected].
