Let All Who Are Hungry...

I've been a "bird feeder" going way back. I was in a market yesterday that had a table in the corner that had on it a variety of boxes of food items that were past their sell by date and that were being offered at rock bottom prices. There were some cereal products on the table and I bought some of the boxes for 30 cents each to use to feed the birds with. I wasn't quite sure if imitation Fruit Loops were going to appeal but I knew the others would.

Well, those boxes got emptied all over a raised planter in the back yard. Some of the oatmeal type products were broadcast on the lawn. And I'm laughing at who is taking advantage of the smorgasbord I provided.

Right now there are three squirrels that are having a field day outside. One of them is basically rolling around in the cereal piles and then stuffing himself with a few big bites. The others are foregoing the calisthenics and are just digging in. There's a small group of birds sitting on the fence, staring at the yard. They are not unlike people at a buffet who look over all the choices before starting to load plates.

I may not be able to single handedly solve the problem of world hunger, but I can take care of things in my small corner of the world. I consider feeding the small creatures that inhabit my yard as a perfectly wonderful exchange: I feed them, something that doesn't take hours of my time, and they give me hours of enjoyable viewing time. There are no roses out there now to stop and smell, but viewing the wildlife serves just as well. And here's a valuable lesson that I learned: the world won't/doesn't come to an end if you take a few moments out of a busy day to do nothing but sit, watch and appreciate the wonders of nature.