Page 23 - Abacoa Community News - March '25

Abacoa, Page 23

Book Review from page 22

• and even the splendid presentation of this initial edition
from the publisher, Knopf, with a hardcover binding that is
slightly flexible and the book’s overall stunning design.
In 2016, unhappy and uncomfortable with the national
and international news swirling around her and everyone
else—and having always been aware of what she refers to
as her lifelong “obsession” with birds —Amy Tan decided
to focus inward, studying the natural life within her own
backyard, and to keep a personal journal of that experience.
She took drawing lessons to brush up on the art skills she
had already demonstrated at a very young age.
After an excellent and informative foreword by
renowned ornithologist David Allen Sibley, who explains intentionally rough drawings accompanied by handwritten A month later, on Oct. 24, 2021, a bomb cyclone arrived
why birdwatching has become such a popular activity notes that are equally interesting and which point out in the Bay Area. As Amy Tan notes—here again I am quoting
throughout the U.S., followed by the author’s preface in unusual facts worth knowing that she has either sketched, just brief excerpts from her wonderful description of the
which she describes a childhood and personal life interests or less often photographed then sketched, while observing event:
that have led to this new book, the first entry in the the birds’ actions. “It hurled serial storms and produced an atmospheric
Chronicles is dated Sept. 16, 2017; the last is dated Dec. The range of emotions engendered by these experiences river that dropped a thirty-minute deluge. We, the denizens
15, 2022. is exemplified by two examples that I will touch on very who had been saving shower water to wash bird poop off the
That is a period of just over five years in which Amy briefly here. Most of the text has been omitted for lack of porch were happy to be waterlogged … But as I watched the
Tan, and we readers along with her, learn so much and feel space and replaced with ellipses (…). Here is the first, dated large limbs or our oak trees swaying, I imagined the birds in
so much as she not only watches the many species of birds Sept. 26, 2021, a situation in which a young, inexperienced those trees being whipsawed and flung into the storm. Where
that visit her backyard, but often becomes a part of their Cooper’s Hawk flying over Tan’s backyard had spotted do they go to stay dry when the rain is blasting sideways?
lives—feeding them, sometimes holding them, protecting three cage feeders and done a fast dive intending to pluck “As if in answer, two pygmy nuthatches flew into the
them whenever possible from predators, trying to outsmart a songbird from its perch as an easy meal, not realizing covered porch off my office, shook themselves off, and sat on
the agile and determined squirrels who want their portions that the birds were safe inside the metal feeders. It crashed top of a cage feeder a couple of inches apart. Most people
of the seeds meant for the birds—and each day learning into one of the feeders, injured a wing and Amy Tan, after would agree that the pygmy nuthatch is one of the cutest
something wonderfully new which she shares with us: frantic efforts to free and release her, rushed the hawk to a birds on earth. They look and sound like squeaky toys. I
their individual personalities, her avian friends’ food likes wildlife center to try to have the bird healed. assumed they would eat a few suet balls for fortitude and
and dislikes, fears or willingness to be approached, mating “She received a total of three months of incredible care. head for a heavily leafed hiding spot. But after five minutes,
habits, parenting skills, dominance traits, aggression or But she was still not flying symmetrically. A few days after they were still there …
shyness—and so much more. that report, I received a voicemail message from the medical “They did not go into the feeders to eat. They simply
Throughout the period covered in these pages Tan learned director, asking that I return her call. I knew by her soft, watched the rain from their spectator seats. The smaller
to identify 62 different kinds of birds that visited her backyard consoling tone that the news would not be good. I spared nuthatch scooted closer to the bigger one. The bigger one
and lists them at the back of the book in such categories as: her the difficulty of telling me and left a voicemail message, then allopreened the smaller one, poking and picking at its
corvids, doves and pigeons, finches, nuthatches, raptors, saying I appreciated all that they had done. I knew that if feathers. I assumed they were adults, a mated pair, since
sparrows (which alone covers 10 species), thrushes, warblers, (the hawk) could not fly well enough to find food, she would the season for fledglings was long over. For thirty minutes
woodpeckers and other songbirds. slowly starve in the wild … I understood why it was more the two nuthatches sat close together like lovers on a porch
Some visit her regularly throughout the year. Others humane to euthanize her, and I was grateful that they would swing, watching the rain as I watched them.”
obey their ancient instincts and migrate thousands of miles do it in the kindest way possible. These offer just a bare hint of the information and
around the globe as the seasons change, returning the same “After I left the message, I cried. I tried to draw her experiences awaiting you in the almost 300 pages of this
time each year to a warm welcome at Tan’s backyard. portrait. But I could not capture her spirit. I could not book, so deserving of its recent honors. Experience it for
We learn about them not only through her Chronicle’s capture the way she must have felt within I briefly held her yourself.
fascinating and informative text but also from some of the in my arms and told her I was sorry.”