At gate C22 in the Portland airport a man in a broad-band leather hat kissed a woman arriving from Orange County. They kissed and kissed and kissed. Long after the other passengers clicked the handles of their carry-ons and wheeled briskly toward short-term parking, the couple stood there, arms wrapped around each other like he’d just staggered off the boat at Ellis Island, like she’d been released at last from ICU, snapped out of a coma, survived bone cancer, made it down from Annapurna in only the clothes she was wearing.
Neither of them was young. His beard was gray. She carried a few extra pounds you could imagine her saying she had to lose. But they kissed lavish kisses like the ocean in the early morning, the way it gathers and swells, sucking each rock under, swallowing it again and again. We were all watching— passengers waiting for the delayed flight to San Jose, the stewardesses, the pilots, the aproned woman icing Cinnabons, the man selling sunglasses. We couldn’t look away. We could taste the kisses crushed in our mouths.
But the best part was his face. When he drew back and looked at her, his smile soft with wonder, almost as though he were a mother still open from giving birth, as your mother must have looked at you, no matter what happened after—if she beat you or left you or you’re lonely now—you once lay there, the vernix not yet wiped off, and someone gazed at you as if you were the first sunrise seen from the Earth. The whole wing of the airport hushed, all of us trying to slip into that woman’s middle-aged body, her plaid Bermuda shorts, sleeveless blouse, glasses, little gold hoop earrings, tilting our heads up.
Last weekend I took a bird walk in one of the regional parks. For a long time, I didn’t see any birds, just heard a lot, most of which I could not recognise by sound.
The one I really wanted to identify was one with an ascending, echo-y, electronic-sounding song ending in a weird trill. It sounded like a video game sound effect, not a bird. But there were several of whatever that bird was, and I couldn’t see any of them. I did eventually get a glimpse of one, though not enough to identify it, but as I was leaving I asked a woman with binoculars and she told me what it was.
So, @lies, if you didn’t already watch the video, can you guess what it was just from my description? Then listen to the video (if you haven’t already) to confirm! (Note: you may have to turn up the volume quite a bit to hear it well. Also, there may be other birds’ sounds mixed in.)
Anyone else reading this who is not a birdwatcher, you should also listen to it, because the birdsong is really weird and does not sound like it occurs in nature.
[I will post (or more likely reblog) the answer to this quiz later! Pretty sure it’ll be a reblog, as @lies probably has it covered.]
Fun quiz! I put my guess in the replies before listening, then listened to confirm. I remember the first time I heard that bird, and how I simply had to get a look to figure out what was making that amazing sound. Your ability to describe the song so succinctly and identifiably is a tribute to your skill.
Something this reminds me of: we just resumed in-person outings of our local birdwatching group yesterday, and one of the participants showed me the latest update to the Merlin bird ID app, which has added live vocalization identification. You activate the sound ID mode, hold up your phone, and it tells you what it’s hearing.
It’s really good. Apparently it suggests incorrect birds a small percentage of the time, and it doesn’t cover all species, but from the quick demo I was impressed. I’m pretty sure it would have identified this bird for you.
Because of my weird obsession with county birding I know most of vocalizations I hear already, at least when I’m birding in my usual stomping grounds. But I don’t have to travel far to start hearing things I can’t identify, so I can see myself getting a lot of use out of it on the road.
“No one answered. The noon-bell rang. Still no one spoke. Frodo glanced at all the faces, but they were not turned to him. All the Council sat with downcast eyes, as if in deep thought. A great dread fell on him, as if he was awaiting the pronouncement of some doom that he had long foreseen and vainly hoped might after all never be spoken. An overwhelming longing to rest and remain at peace by Bilbo’s side in Rivendell filled all his heart. At last with an effort he spoke, and wondered to hear his own words, as if some other will was using his small voice. `I will take the Ring,’ he said, `though I do not know the way.’ Elrond raised his eyes and looked at him, and Frodo felt his heart pierced by the sudden keenness of the glance. `If I understand aright all that I have heard,’ he said, `I think that this task is appointed for you, Frodo; and that if you do not find a way, no one will. This is the hour of the Shire-folk, when they arise from their quiet fields to shake the towers and counsels of the Great. Who of all the Wise could have foreseen it? Or, if they are wise, why should they expect to know it, until the hour has struck?”
— Frodo accepting the Quest to destroy the Ring after Bilbo denied it. Fellowship of the Ring, Book II The Council of Elrond.
Make me choose: Anonymous asked Moulin Rouge! or Romeo + Juliet?
All my life you made believe I was only worth what someone would pay for me! But Christian loves me. He loves me. He loves me, Harold. And that is worth everything.
