Our grill likes to act up, particularly during times of Mercury in retrograde, or when we are having guests over for the first time in well over a year. Or in the case of this incident, when both are coinciding in tumultuous fashion. After 2020, Andy and I can roll with the punches, but even this one threw us for a doozy that required a quick decision to be made – a decision with no easy or guaranteed happy ending.
My parents, Aunt Elaine, my brother and his fiancee, and my niece and nephew were due for a family barbecue on one of the hottest days of the year thus far, and Andy was about to begin the grilling. We hadn’t had this much family over since the days prior to COVID, and we were giddy with the reunion. Elaine had just returned from a winter in Florida, so it was doubly exciting, and having the twins over was a much-missed treat, especially when they’re growing up so quickly.
I was finishing the preparatory work on a quinoa salad when Andy came in and motioned for me to follow him, saying we had to make a quick decision. It was his serious voice, and he was keeping it low which meant that no one could know something. He brought me over to the grill, and when he lifted the side cover to the secondary grill section a magnificent but wholly unwelcome finch place stood, encasing five little eggs. The main grill had already been lit and was quickly heating up, so I advised that we take it out and put it on the ground until we finished cooking.
After debunking the theory that once you disrupt or touch a bird’s nest the parents won’t return a couple of years ago, I wasn’t bothered by moving it – but both of us realized it couldn’t stay there or we’d never be able to grill this season. We did the next best thing, not unlike how we handled this robin’s nest mishap previously, and placed it in the crux of a nearby Seven Sons’ flower tree.
The next day I was conferring with a cardinal about the finch situation as she chirped in the nearby thuja hedge, before we were rudely interrupted by a squirrel. Andy picked up the conversation later in the day – he says the cardinal chirped a bit at him then sang him a little song – a message from his mother that we had done all we could do for the finches.
