I try at the start of every column to clearly state my parameters and the extent of the domain specific knowledge into which I tap.
If I write about politics, I don’t claim to be an investigative journalist. If it’s diets, I acknowledge the information that is found through the serendipity technique. That way I avoid contention, confrontation or refutation that is vicarious.
Where are we going this week? A miracle I experienced in this period leading to the great event in my faith-orientation, Christmas.
Everybody celebrates it, because it doesn’t have to be faith-specific. It’s like Labarang. You just get into the vibe and live out the joy of religious ritual and spiritual reassurances like the family that we all are.
Going into my garage to activate the switch for the borehole water for my pool, I sang the familiar song (semi-carol) called The Twelve Days of Christmas.
On the first day of Christmas, my true love sent to me/a partridge in a pear-tree./The second day of Christmas/my true love sent to me/two turtle doves, and/a partridge in a pear tree.
Imagine my surprise when, peering through the window to see if the hose was directing the water towards the pool, I espied, in a branch in the vine outside my garage, two pure-white eggs. So pure white, they were almost translucent. And they lay on a very rudimentary, almost crude collection of random twigs no larger than a conservative saucer.
I was fascinated, but smart enough to back off. I watched for the next few days, seeing the mother sitting in the nest, at other times absent.
Now this is where my serendipity non-scientific techniques kicked in. I consulted a colleague. We have been feeding birds outside our separate homes for years and observing pecking-order, gluttony, territorial imperatives, gang fights, the lot.
With her knowledge, which I sent her via social media, we decided this was the nest of the smaller wild pigeons that frequented our homes. There were muscular ones who were dominant, and this variety which were as gregarious about eating off my lawn, but much smaller.
For the purists, my friend and I decided my little “mother” was a turtle dove (we call them “torties” in Afrikaans.)
And lo and behold, after another few days, there were two slightly damp-looking little nestlings on this precarious perch. Again, I established the mother was always there, except when she would just leave. I discovered her mate sat a little distance away and warned her of impending danger.
As I am writing this column, these nestlings (they will be called “fledglings” when they start to fly), almost doubled in size by the day. They have been sitting quietly in that fragile perch, imitating the famous ying-yang mode. And there wasn’t an iota of spare space.
Yet they sat there unmoving, waiting out the time when their bird-programmed genes will direct their development, and I will have two extra birds to feed in the morning.
I found the perfect conflation between what I hear, see and read playing out the miracle of creation and selectivity of the species.
I did not need anything more than seeing how my reading the words in a book became a reality in my life-experience and taught me the humility, and yet the power, that comes from acknowledging our Creator.
If you thought I would write something memorable, spectacular and vastly erudite for my pre-Yule column, you are quite right. I just did. I hope those little guys make it.
Joy to the world. And a Merry Christmas to everyone.
* Alex Tabisher.
** The views expressed here are not necessarily those of Independent Media.
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