Learning Bird Calls with Grandpa

My grandfather can identify about two hundred birds by their songs alone. Last summer, he decided to teach me.

We'd sit on his porch at dawn, coffee for him, cocoa for me even though I'm nineteen, and he'd stop mid-sentence and say, "Hear that? That's a wood thrush." It sounded like a flute. "That's a cardinal. He's saying 'cheer, cheer, cheer.'" "That one's a catbird. He's a show-off."

By August I could recognize twelve. He made me a little notebook with drawings of each one. I've taken it back to college with me. Walking across campus, I stop sometimes when I hear a robin, and I think of his porch and his coffee and his gentle voice.

He called last week to tell me he heard an oriole. We talked about it for twenty minutes. I've never been happier to discuss a bird.