For the last two summers there has been a hummingbird that I see from the bathroom window every morning. The window is a floor above the garden so I look down onto a patio, and the string lights that crisscross, out into the yard with all the flowers. The hummingbird comes from the trees, dives into the sage, and then lands on the string lights, monitoring his territory. I know it’s a male because he is bright with iridescent flashes of pink and green. We have a lot of hummingbirds in the yard, and I have learned that they are very territorial, so I know that this small friend I see every morning is not there just to great me with joy each morning, he is primarily there to watch his territory and chase off intruders. Nonetheless, I take the joy each day.

There were a couple of weeks in late spring when I did not see him and I feared he was gone, but then one morning he was right there, buzzing the window, then the yard, then resting on the wire. Maybe it is not the same bird, maybe it is the next generation. I read that hummingbirds live three to five years in the wild so I have been enjoying the idea that it is the same little friend, thinking we have a few more years of this watching the yard together. But this morning there was a hummingbird dead on the patio. I was overcome with sadness and fear that it was my friend who died. When I collected the bird the colors looked like a female, they were more muted, but still this creature was no more and that too made me sad.

I was away for a month and while I was gone one of the chickens became ill. I have had chickens for many years now so I know this happens, but the person taking care of the house was new to chicken illness and it was hard. It is hard, every time. When I got home I did what needed to be done but I didn’t like it, I never like it, I never don’t feel sad that someone else I knew was gone. The other chickens handled it much better, they always do. Her closest friend was a little out of sorts for a day and then got on with being a chicken and started to buddy up with someone else in the flock.

Every new thing that happens in the world means that something is changing, and change often means a loss of what we know. That is just how it works. Every time we grow we leave behind a little of who we were so we can make room for who we are becoming. Every thing we love, that we are comfortable with, that we expect to be there is going to change in some way, at some point. This does not mean we should not love, this does not mean we should not care, or allow ourselves to be connected. It is just a reminder that those moments are precious and are not promised.

The chicken who is gone was a good chicken (they aren’t all); she was friendly and social and cared about the other birds in the flock. She had wanted to be a mom which was not an option so she would take care of any of the younger hens that came into the community. They all have a little bit of her with them. The hummingbird that is gone may be the bird I feel like I know, but it is certainly a bird that shared this garden with me, with others, and the changing colors of the nasturtiums from year to year will remind me of the way they create something new and beautiful just in how they live.

And I suppose that it is the lesson I am thinking about as I think about these losses: am I loving the people around me who need to be loved? Am I adding little bit of color to the garden in which I live? Can I allow the loss that comes in the change to make me sad, and to open my eyes to the joy in the space that has now been opened?