Song Lines
For much of the night, a lone mocking bird has been throwing his heart to the sky on the wings of his song. I imagine his poignant pauses are to invite a reply from the love he seeks. While there are many birds squawking, I hear mostly mockers with some crows and seagulls which chime-in near sunrise at Pismo’s North Beach, I sense that our lone guy’s love, so far, is unrequited. But, oh, how he tries to woo the lady birds!
Mockers are adept at copy-catting sounds from the environment. When I was a kid growing up in the hills of Echo Park, one of those cocky white-wing-tipped gray birds mastered the particular jingle of our Irish Setter Mike’s tags against his collar and neck. My brother and I were fooled, on more than one occasion, into opening the back-door for Mike, only to discover a curious Mike-mocking bird at the top of the acacia tree across from our glass bedroom door. Mike would be curled in the kitchen on the radiant-heat-warmed cement floor - waiting for breakfast, and oblivious to the drama outside the door.
This morning, lying in my sleeping bag in the mist-drippy tent, next to my beloved, who miraculously is still sleeping, I listen intently to this Central Coast mocker and discover that he too is an adept copy-catter! I hear, in his song-phrases, the croak of frogs, the sound of a phone ringing, and a wolf-whistle!
Fifteen years ago, I read Song Lines (published 1987) by Bruce Chatwin. In it, he describes how the aboriginals of Australia’s Outback establish property ownership by singing the landscape. The idea is that each family clan creates a song which names the features of the land on which they live - "from the bilabong to the out-cropping of rock that looks like a nose..." It is understood that you “own”, or have use of what you lay claim to in your song lines.
I’m speculating that mockers may, in a similar way, “own” whatever they can sing. This morning, I believe this love-sick-mocker I've been listening to all night has some big real-estate holdings - all the way from the marshy inlet where the frogs live, past fifty or so camp sites, where he may, indeed, have heard wolf-whistles, and all the way to the camp host’s huge twinkle-light-lit residential motor palace where the phone sounds exactly the way the mocker has foretold it. I heard the phone when I walked by the motor home last night!
Which ever lucky lady bird is attracted to this fellow, she will surely swoon over his eighteen different tunes! We’ll call him “PM” for Prolific Mocker AND because he sings all night long!
Good thing there’s some strong coffee ahead this morning!
First Camping Trip for D Who is Three
What a privilege to accompany our granddaughter on her first beach camp-out! Her aunt, our younger daughter, moved to California’s middle coast last fall, and lives within walking distance of the very campground where our whole family spent several summers camping when the girls were seven and ten to ages eleven and fourteen. For D's spring break, my husband and I drove from the south, D and her mom from the north. Here we are - middle coast camping!
Because she was a willing scout, and made a reservation for us ahead of our arrival at Pismo’s North Beach State Campground, we got the best site of all, and only had to show up and set up!
D’s eyes glowed when she saw where she and her mama were going to sleep - in Auntie Sid’s BIG tent with their very own sleeping bags and cushy-brought-from-home mattress topper. Gran’Pun and I slept in our standard-issue, tried-for-decades-yet-true pup-tent. We’re thinking that, after two nights of folding up like pretzels to get in and out of it, we may be ready for an up-grade next camping trip, to a tent in which we can stand up. (Maybe middle-sixties-bodies don’t bend the way they used to do.) Definitely, the thirty-seven year old foam mattress needs replacing! Auntie Sid joins us in the afternoons, but leaves after dinner to complete her work and sleep at home.
Our first night here, after downing with delight a delicious dinner, we walked over the dunes and through the trees to the beach in time to watch some crazy kids brave the icy waves, and see the seagulls, ducks and fleet-footed sand-pipers catch their evening meals.
Pismo is famous for its clams. There are also dozens of dollars in the sand. D, her mama, Auntie Sid, Gran’ Pun and I collected several bits of sea-offerings - some broken; some intact. It’s amazing how wet shells that look so very beautiful in the rosy glow of sunset, lose their luster when they dry out. Still, the razor clams and mussels on the picnic table this morning remind us of the fun we’ve had playing wheel-barrow, running, jumping sea-weed “rope”, making moats and maybe a sand turret or two, walking and talking and flying a kite! Gran’ Pun and Miss D did many magic tricks. She and I danced a pre-bed crazed tarantella on the soggy foggy meadow - she in her pink skeleton pajamas.
Recognizing Orion and the Big Dipper always creates wonder - as do the sparks from the crackling dry wood as they ascend from the fire into the black velvet night. A song or two with the old guitar and some improvised rhythm instruments on the second night end when the mist becomes a steady drizzle. Our last morning here, we dodge the rain drops by having breakfast OUT at Huckleberry’s Restaurant, and, after the sun comes out, we attend a Shell Beach community Easter EGG-STRAVAGANZA - a fitting end to this quality-time-camping adventure.
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