The Little Peepers Have Gone

For the last couple of months, a family of wrens has been living in the garage, in a basket I had hung on the pegboard by my worktable. When the garage door was open, I would see a wren flying furiously in and out with sticks and leaves and I became concerned that if the little thing was building a nest, he or she would be trapped in there one night and die.

So, I began leaving the door open every chance I got.

The former tenant of my house had cut a hole in the garage door and installed a room air conditioner, presumably because it appeared he had lifted weights in the garage and needed the cooler air. I can live without it – even in the 90-degree Florida heat it is still cool enough for me to work in there.

So, the air conditioner was removed, leaving a "window" in the door, which I hoped the wrens would see as an invite to come in and out that way instead of through the main door.

Like magic, it worked.

So, whenever I could, I relished working in the garage, just so that I could listen to the little ones peep and chirp and I could hear the mama and papa wren coming in and out, scolding me the whole time for having the PBS station on too loud.

This morning, I went out to the garage about 3 a.m., having had another bout of insomnia. I heard fierce noise from the little ones, and somehow found comfort in their indignant peeps. I went back to sleep for another couple of hours, went back out to the garage, and heard nothing.

Nothing.

I immediately panicked. Had a snake gotten to them? Had they fallen out of the nest and were trapped amongst my many paintbrushes and tin cans? What if a cat had gotten in somehow?

I waited.

Nothing. No mama or papa wren came flying through the hole in the door with a random cricket or beetle.

So, I got the stepladder out and checked the nest. They were all gone. Sadly, I poked around in the nest a bit. There was a used dryer sheet, twigs and bits of leaves, an old grocery receipt, some bits of twine I had cut for my tomato plants and a feather. One single feather.

I took the feather and placed it in my small cigar box of keepsake items, which include an arrowhead my father found for me on our property in the Hammock, near Silver Springs, some pieces of quartz, old keys and a moon shell.

I'm gonna miss those little guys. But, I'll leave the nest there and perhaps, next year, I'll see mama wren again, and she can start scolding me all over again, and I can hear those little peeps overhead on a quiet spring night.