If there was one word that seems to describe my life right now, it would be mourning dove madness. Oh wait, that’s three words isn’t it? Shows you just how dovey I am over doves! Consider the following:
- The first thing I hear each mourning is some wacked-out mourning dove in the tree behind us, cooing endlessly. Obviously lost in a state of lovey-doveyness.
- How can I forget that house in New Orleans Dollar Bill’s cousin Rock showed me with the mourning dove nest in the ceiling fan?
- This past Sunday on the golf course, one of my wayward drives finds a group of trees. Reaching over to pick up my ball, I find myself staring straight at a mourning dove nest not three feet off the ground, two young-uns staring peacefully back at me! Way cool.
- Sitting out on the patio with my mourning coffee yesterday, a dove lands on the wall and sits here contentedly until I leave, whereupon he (or she) departs with a flutter.
- I’m walking into work this mourning and what dovetails into my stroll from my car? You guessed it: a mourning dove cooing in the tree above me.
Tonight, sitting in my car outside a store while waiting for Tracey to pick up a few things, I’m looking out my sunroof at a blazing blue sky. What appears on the store’s roof in front of me? That’s right, a mourning dove. And it gets me to thinking: what it is about Arizona that causes the mourning dove to thrive so here? I mean, it’s not as if there’s a huge amount of trees or woodlands, that’s for sure. And, it’s not the real estate or the jobs - they’re no fools, they won’t touch construction. And then I say to the dove: “perhaps like everyone else you’ve come here to get away from the crazy Californians. Good luck, them loons are everywhere!”
It sits.
I watch.
It walks back and forth.
I watch some more.
It coos a few times.
“I’m still here”, says I to the dove.
The dove could care less.
Whoa. Just then a second dove appears. We’re no longer alone.
Now my interest is piqued.
The doves just sit there, staring at each other.
Me, I’m staring too - at them.
Uh oh. We’ve got action.
The second dove starts fluttering his/her wings.
The other responds in kind.
Now they slowly start circling each other, fluttering their wings some more.
Hey, I’m no fool, I’ve watched a couple-two-three National Geographic specials in my life, so I know what’s coming…
(Kids, block your eyes.)
The second dove mounts the first for several seconds, then hops off.
The female dove stares at her new mate, as if to say, “that’s all ya got?”
“Yep”, the male appears to be saying. He’s done like dinner.
After a minute of just hanging around, the male takes off.
A minute later, the female follows.
Ain’t love grand?
Now, I’m no believer in coincidence, and I certainly can’t predict the future, but something tells me this was a sign that sometime soon our backyard will once again be in lockdown, on yet another mourning dove maternity watch.
I can feel it in my bones.
