A charm. A charm!

In the midst of a work call, a series of insistent flutterings just out the window caught my eye. I wasn't wearing my glasses, so I squinted to be sure it wasn't just leaves quaking from the blustery cold that settled in earlier this week. There it was again! 

Still hammering out bits of this and that on the phone, I walked across the room for a closer view. A bitty, pocket-size bird perched, then flew, then returned to the wispy branches of the river birch. Behind it, a second one jitterbugged among the waving twigs. It made me smile to think they'd found a reason to drop by, whoever they were.

Later, returning from a few errands in town, the approach of my car flushed out another fifty or more of the tiny beings and provided a clear enough view for me to identify them: goldfinches, with less vibrant winter plumage.

Photo by Aaron J. Hill from Pexels.com

For most of the day, the sun had chosen to stay in, perhaps hunkered into her warm bed, sipping hot tea and reading a juicy novel. But here, at day's end, her silken-red night clothes peeped out from beneath the gray cloud cover, igniting the sky. And now, these miniature friends gathered in proximity, nipping a few more seeds from the brown bodies of native asters before darkness closed in.

I learned online that a flock of goldfinches is called a charm. A charm! And, it felt just like that. Like pixies had sifted magic into the air to summon a country dance. Suddenly, I was swirling in a room full of wild companions: sun and clouds, birds, and seeds, colors, seasons…and me.

I managed to catch a handful of enchantment and am winging it across the skies to you, in hopes it will land in the places you most need it in the days ahead.

~Elizabeth