Scott McClanahan

It happened over at my Grandma Ruby’s house.  It was a Sunday afternoon and we were all sitting around on the porch, and my Mother said she wanted to show me something.

I was probably only three or four, so I followed behind her white dress to the side of the house and I asked, “What is it Mommy?  What is it?”

She stopped at these old grapevines and pointed at the vines.  Then she picked me up and let me look down at it.  It was a twisted mess of twigs and vines.

“It’s a birds nest,” she said, holding me up and letting me look down into the nest.  “WHOOA,” I said, looking at the baby blue robin eggs just resting there…1…2…3…4…5…just like that.

“Now don’t touch them now Scott.  You don’t ever want to touch an egg because the mommy’ll leave the babies.  So all you can do is look at them, but you can’t touch.”

So I shook my head “yes” and she let me look a little longer before she dropped me down.  And then I couldn’t see any of the baby bird eggs anymore.