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Just thought I’d post this short tale before heading offline and on vacation.

For the last few days, a Chiffchaff has been calling from a group of tall trees in our new garden. It’s the first I’ve heard for many weeks. The last one I saw I spied through a cellar window. He or she was foraging in one of the sitting areas we have outside and there we were, nose-to-beak so to speak, with only a pane of glass separating us. Helpfully, I could see the Chiffchaff but the Chiffchaff couldn’t see me.

Early this week, I was sitting on a bench outside in the sunshine smoking a cigarette, having promised my partner that our new home will be smoke free. Looking up at a first-floor window, I noticed what I thought was a House sparrow—a spatz is the local term—hunting for insects. Then it came down, bounced off the plane tree and landed on the cobbles, right at my feet.

It was a Chiffchaff.

He or she simply sat there immobilised, and I realised that what I had thought was hunting was actually something like a spasm following a collision with that window. There were no cats around, but for safety’s sake, I picked the bird up; easily, which is rarely a good sign. I cupped it in my hands and walked around to the back of the house to call my partner, but she didn’t hear me through her office window.

I kept the bird in my hands, but opened them occasionally. It made no attempt to ‘escape’, and once or twice opened and closed its beak (again, rarely a good sign, I thought). Then, as I opened my hands for, perhaps, the fourth or fifth time, the bird flew adeptly a few meters to a rose standard, and perched on the lowest branch. Seconds later, it left.

Now, in my small, simple, ideal world, I tell myself that the Chiffchaff calling from the trees is that very same bird. And I think how very fortunate it was to have landed right at my feet. And while I know that smoking is very bad for one’s health, I can see that—if one’s a Chiffchaff—it can be quite useful at times.

All the best –

Dave