It's a tough world out there

Last Thursday after school, my daughter noticed this. She was pretty upset and called me over, before I even made it into the garage.


There is a robin's nest in our burning bush next to the garage. Whenever we go outside, we see a large robin fly out of the bush, so one day while weeding that area, I searched around and found the nest. The last time I was out there, I found 2 eggs in the nest.

At first I thought that perhaps it had hatched, but I didn't hear any noises. So I checked the nest... and found this.


Apparently a brown-headed cowbird has invaded our robin's space. They push out an egg and replace it with one of their own. I've heard of this, but have never had a nest that was in a place where I could actually see it. It will be interesting to watch what happens.

And a little sad too... that broken eggshell on the stones below the nest lies there as a reminder of the one that was replaced. It's sad to think that something can be that easily replaced. That the robin will just continue to monitor its nest, not realizing that its baby is smashed on the rocks below.

Lately I feel like that broken egg. Replaced... far too easily... my feelings smashed without regard.

My best friend for a number of years has been a single male. About a year ago he began dating someone. I hoped that when this time came, he'd still find a way for me to be a part of his life. That whoever else became part of his life would become a part of mine too. But because she couldn't handle him having contact with me, he let her believe that we don't have contact any more. He had to sneak any phone calls or text messages that he made to me. Which obviously weren't very frequent or in-depth, because he just doesn't have the time away from her to be able to share anything of importance with me.

What's left now feels mostly superficial. Just a broken eggshell and some splatted goo that the ants are crawling over.

And I just wanna smack that cowbird egg into oblivion.