My brother Tim Salwey, used his carpentry skills to assemble a variety of cedar bird houses per my request. He hammered and nailed together several Bluebird houses, a Wren house, a Kestrel nesting box, a bat house and a duck nesting box. Thanks to Tim for personally delivering the projects.  He recommended I paint the top of the cedar roofs to prevent them from decaying. I promptly found a can of white exterior latex barn paint and left the houses to dry in the Spring rays of sun. The next day I moved the houses to the inside of our screened in porch. I had them all lined up and placed so noone would step on them. I heard the door slam and knew our pal Ed Patzie was present. I make my way to the door and hear an, “Eh!” He’s excitedly discussing the smooth wire fencing project that’s been transpiring over the past week. Hawken is pretending he’s Joe the John Deere tractor/train engineer on Porcupine Hill. He’s hooked up a wagon filled with a wrench, 2 un-used 6 cc syringes, my belt, plastic play kid thermometer and small building blocks. He’s just a peddling the tractor rattling down the hallway and he’s saying, “Toot Toot! I’m Joe the Engineer!” Patzie is oblivious to all this as he’s getting directions from Tom on fencing post placement.  Tom is trying to not step outside in bare feet on the cold concrete porch. I’m throwing a load of laundry in the washing machine and we’re also making breakfast. Patzie pauses and notices all the bird houses on the porch. “What kind of house is that one?” he asks. “Patzie that’s a bat house.” “You mean those things that fly around..that kind of a bat?” I could see the look of wonderment that passed across his face.

 It’s only fitting to hang a bat house on the east side of the home barn. We love bats for they feast on mosquitos and our lil’ Engineer Joe, also happens to tell us he’s a fruit bat that hangs upside down and eats grapes, every evening while we all do dishes. Then he promptly opens up an un-used tiny cupboard and looks for the worms to feed the bats. Life is good when we just settle into being, instead of thinking we’re better or worse than anyone else.

We’re watching for bats and listening for the sweet serenade of the Peeps!

Sue Roskos