Where Did All The Birds Go?
A coworker and I recently struck up a conversation with a local landscaper about what I can only describe as the “sense” of nature. More specifically, how little of it he saw, smelled, or heard. “Where did all the birds go? Where are all the bugs?”, but I subconsciously wrote this off as alarmism. As schools open up, I’m spending more time in public places. While walking around, appreciating the scenery, I remembered what the landscaper said. I thought back to my earliest memories of the outdoors. I would wake up to the songs of countless birds from the woods behind our house. I’d run outside after sundown to catch fireflies. These aren’t supposed to be fleeting memories though, right? When I was a child, fireflies were as much a part of night as the moon itself. With or without us, they glow. The birds would still chirp, and the bees would still make honey. This is the exact moment that I felt something missing. I stopped walking for a moment to concentrate.................It was the silence.
