Red-Winged Blackbirds

Every so often I catch a glimpse of my childhood in the rear view mirror.

Wait. Stop. I don't really talk like that. Okay, start over.

Yesterday I was driving to my parents' house after work and saw a Red-Winged Blackbird and it made me happy. Why? Well, because when my family first moved into the house that I still lived in until very recently, there were a lot of empty lots in the subdivision. Actually, we were only the tenth house to be built, and now the place has its own zip code and Starbuck's. Okay, not really, but trust me, it's huge. So in these empty lots, my brother and neighbors and I used to play, building forts, climbing in dirt piles when houses would begin to be built, etc. We thought of these empty lots as extensions of our own yards. We referred to the two lots next to my house as "the field." It was great. Anyway, if you know anything about Red-Winged Blackbirds, you know that they don't build nests in trees, but in open, grassy areas. So as you can imagine, when our neighborhood was still in its development phase, there were tons of these birds living in all the empty lots. Moving there was the first time I had ever seen these birds before and I thought they were so beautiful - mostly black, but with patches of THE brightest red (and bits of white) on their wing joints. I loved them. However, slowly but surely, as the neighborhood grew, and the empty lots grew fewer and farther between, the Red-Winged Blackbirds started to migrate away from our community, to the places where they could still have the open fields that they so loved. Being a kid, I was probably too preoccupied with school and friends to really notice that they were leaving, but when I would occasionally see one, it would remind me just how many there used to be. And then, after a while, I didn't see them at all anymore. The area that I grew up in has changed so much since my family moved there, it is nearly unrecognizeable. When we built our house, we were out in the middle of nowhere. It was unincorporated, and the nearest main road was about two miles away, and was an empty two-lane highway connecting our town with the next one to the north. Traffic lights were unheard of unless you were actually IN town. In between the main road and our neighborhood was a sod farm, a creek, trees, and the occasional farm house. There were birds and animals and you really felt like you were out in the country. This is the reason my parents chose the place, as a matter of fact. And now? The two miles on the "country road" between the main road and our subdivision is solid houses. The speed limit has gone from an un-posted 55 to 35 mph. That former two-lane main highway I mentioned is now four lanes with a light every quarter-mile or so, McDonald's, Jewel, Target, Starbuck's, Kohl's, a thousand banks and gas stations ... and no trees. No cornfields. The unincorporated area in between towns has become a town in and of itself. There is no open road at all between our town and the next one to the north. You can't tell where one ends and the next one begins. I guess I shouldn't be surprised at all this. All in the name of progress, right? But do we really need another Target or Best Buy? Why wasn't it good enough to drive the extra 20 minutes to get to the one they built just down the road a few years before? That's the thing that I will never understand about suburban sprawl, or whatever you want to call it. I grew up in the middle of nowhere and had to drive at least 20 minutes to get anywhere! Heck, my high school friends never even wanted to come to my house because they said it was in "Iowa." So I drove everywhere. I'm used to it. I'm used to it taking time to get places. I feel guilty taking my car somewhere if it takes less than 5 minutes to get there. Am I the only one? Am I the only one who doesn't find it necessary to have a drug store 10 feet from my front door in order to live comfortably?

Ahh, I didn't particularly intend to go on and on like that, but I just got some thoughts into my head that wanted to come out I guess. But anyway, yesterday I was driving out to my parents' house and I saw a Red-Winged Blackbird in a grassy area between the main road and an on-ramp onto the highway. It was just a small area that hadn't been landscaped and still had the native grasses in it. It was only one bird, and as I sat at the stoplight, I just watched the bird going about its business and remembered how I used to do the exact same thing from my living room window. It brought a smile to my face, but also made me wonder if I am the only one who misses the Red-Winged Blackbirds. Probably not, but sometimes it feels like it.