“Let’s All Sing Like the Birdies Sing” – that was the name of a record album my folks gave me as a gift one year. They were into classy music – Frank Sinatra, Ella, Duke Ellington, Benny Goodman, Glenn Miller, etc etc etc – and NOT into this particular musician but they gave it to me anyway. Mitch Miller. Yes. Mitch Miller. Now Mitch Miller was really quite an accomplished musician, but those of my generation only really know of him from Sing Along with Mitch, which was a TV variety show in the early 60’s, which was not really considered classy. Entertaining, yes. 60’s TV, yes. My grandparents loved it, but then they also loved Lawrence Welk. (I did too. Just shut up. The Lennon Sisters? I wanted to BE one.)
I still have the children’s album. A little internet spying tells me the song was from Disney’s Enchanted Tiki Room which opened in 1963. I remember these lyrics because I did, indeed, love my Mitch Miller album and sang along with Mitch:
Let’s all sing like the birdies sing,
Tweet, tweet tweet, tweet tweet.
Let’s all sing like the birdies sing,
Sweet, sweet sweet, sweet sweet.
Let’s all warble like nightingales,
Give your throat a treat.
Take your time from the birds,
Now you all know the words,
Tweet, tweet tweet, tweet tweet.
Which brings me to the computer this morning. The canyon is ALIVE with birds – maybe it’s because it’s been warm and the doors are open, but I swear it has been noisier out there in the past two weeks. Non stop tweet tweet tweet tweet tweet. My favorite sound in the entire world – see: story of Joe’s birth, where I was supposed to be pushing, it was 5 a.m. and I could hear the city birds tweeting. I commented on that, demanding everything stop and commanding everyone to listen to the birds, while they were yelling at me to “PUSH!” How many moms got to give birth to their first child while listening to their favorite sound in the world? It was special.
But I’m babbling. It’s my blog. I get to do that.
This morning I also saw one of my favorite sights – a hawk circling, circling, circling over the canyon. If he’s close enough this sends Ed the Dog into a frenzy – oh if he could only fly, he’d get that sucker…but no need; the next thing I see is swallows chasing the hawk, diving at his wing feathers and slowly they work him away from their territory and presumably their nest. I just love watching that process. What amazes me is you’d think the hawk could just turn around and growl at them or something, but no…he just keeps circling, pretty much ignoring their panic until they feel confident that he’s moved out of their danger zone and they return to their nest.
So, hang in there, East Coast, spring will come again. I know it doesn’t seem like California has seasons, but we really do, the animals know it and settle down for the winter. The flowering bushes remain in bloom but the daffodils have only come up this week. (I know, I know, it’s February, but it’s been a year since they’ve been up!) Things are back in full spring swing – we’re hearing coyote pups again and baby bunnies practice standing stock still when we come upon them on our morning walk. The jasmine is back in bloom in the backyard – all of a sudden the air is heady with flowery aromas.
Sweet, sweet, sweet, sweet, sweet.
Bonus: This isn’t Mitch Miller, but really, isn’t this a great happy song? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NVme82oYH-g
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