Leave It To A Bird

  Every now and again, a person needs to step back and take a breather from what he is doing.  Things can come to a grinding halt if they begin to feel overwhelming.  Remodeling is a lot like that.  What starts as a minor touch up of paint soon becomes an entirely consuming ordeal.  My situation started when the siding was being replaced near the front door.  Son asked if I was particularly "attached" to the windows or could he remove them.  They were rotted from exposure to hurricanes and the high humidity found on the Bayou.  Once the windows were removed, it led to the door being ousted as well.  Then, the whole shebang of redoing the inside was set in motion.  For the past two weeks, I have spent every waking hour, it seems, on the top of a ten foot tall step ladder.  You do what you have to do.  This morning, however, I needed a break!  I just could go no more.  So, I took a hike to gather the thoughts.

  As I sat on the pier at daybreak, I had the revelation that I was doing it again.  I was "playing it safe" and trying to satisfy everyone else's idea of what is acceptable.  I figured that if I am going to be happy, I need to step out of that safe zone and do what makes me happy.  That is easier said than done, though, and I needed some reassurance that my decision was the right one.  Just at that moment, a heron flew in to sit with me on the pier.  I had been photographing the bird as it sat on my brother's pier and never expected the bird to come so near.  So...the bird and I sat just a foot apart enjoying the dawn of a new day and a new experience.  Neither of us made an effort to move or to acknowledge the other.  We just sat. 

  Was the bird telling me that my decision was correct?  Was it trying to tell me I was ok just being me?  Hey, if you ask for a sign, you take whatever you get.  In my mind, the bird was definitely an omen that things were right with the world.  Now...back to work.