Watching Birds

I had a wreck of a day with an amazingly beautiful moment in the middle.

First of all, I didn't sleep well. Then I woke up with a headache from too much wine at dinner last night. Then I had my last inburgering appointment. Then I went to work feeling tired, sick and uninterested. It was a long five hours.

When I got home, I made a cup of tea and looked out the back window. The sky was a really beautiful blue with giant clouds and the sun going down behind it. I stepped outside to stand and be still for a moment. I've long felt like one of the most beautiful things about Amsterdam was the sky. In the fall, I called my friend, Venessa, and said, "Look out the window. The sky is amazing." The whole thing was hot pink for about twenty minutes. Several people in my bus were mezmerized. So this afternoon, I was glad to look at these beautifully sculpted clouds with a brilliant blue background. It's been very gray lately.

Then I noticed birds. They were flying in big clouds. They switched directions and flew out of view. There didn't seem to be a real leader. They were acting as a group. Then I saw another group and another. There were hundereds of birds in the sky flying in constantly changing shapes, changing groups and merging.

Eventually, several of the groups came together and a giant mass of birds were flying in a big, dark cloud. It wasn't just a flat shape. It was more spherical and there were waves in the mass. It stayed together for almost a minute. Then it dipersed and they continued flying in smaller groups.

I thought that it might be interesting to be a bird for a while. The constantly having to look for food and living in a nest isn't appealing, but flying like that, riding the current and making sharp turns in mid-air would be fun for a late afternoon.

Before long, I had to get ready to go to class. I managed to sit through, and participate in class. I haven't done a lick of homework in the last two weeks. This week I'll study. Class is much more fun when I've studied.

And I need to get some sleep.