Finding Harmony in Nature's Rhythms

What lessons can a vibrant Northern Cardinal teach us about resilience and balance in the midst of winter's grasp? Step into a world where nature's quiet rhythms offer profound insights, as we explore the cardinal's story from Gail Boss's "All Creation Waits." This episode of the Create Harmony podcast, hosted by Sally Burlington, invites you to pause and reflect amidst the holiday hustle and bustle. 

Join us as we unravel the cardinal’s meticulous balancing act between storing just the right amount of fat to survive the cold while staying nimble enough to evade predators. As the cardinal navigates this delicate dance, it becomes a powerful symbol of mindful living. Let this tale inspire you to find your own balance this holiday season. 

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Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:03

Hey there, you've joined in the Create Harmony podcast, and this is a place where we spend time talking about those everyday joys and abundant blessings that we sometimes forget about, when take for granted and they're overlooked. We set our rhythms with the rhythms of nature and celebrate the changes that each season brings. So I'm your host, sally Burlington, and this is episode 103. If you've been following along, we've been using a book called All Creation Waits by Gail Boss. The concept here is an in-our-outside world. Our lists are long, our lives are loud and busy, lots of holiday music, lots of packages, lots of shopping, lots of parties and wonderful great things, but it's a little bit hard to center ourselves amongst that landscape, and so we are taking a page from nature and looking out into nature, because at this time of year nature is more quiet and more subtle and more dormant, and we are just using that as a source of inspiration. So we've been through some stories about some creatures from nature that were in the book All Creation Waits. We've been through the honeybee, the chipmunk, the red fox, and today we are going to hear a story about the Northern Cardinal. So I'd like for you to pay attention to what jumps out at you and think about how this can inspire you as you journey through your holiday season. So here's our story.

Speaker 1: 1:38

Iron gray clouds weight the pond and field Beyond them. The thicket and naked trees endure the day. Heavy my head bows, I watch my boots trudge. Then my head snaps up and left my eyes snagged and carried by a scarlet flame lilting through the tall weeds till it lights, setting asway the leggy skeleton of a thistle and rides when nearly all the world tamps down its color. This male cardinal flares an extravagant gesture, considering the hawk whose dark eye snaps to him faster than mine. His brilliance shouts his unshakable expectation of spring. In spring he will court. The redder his plumage, the more ardently females will fly to him. So in the fall, when growing the feathers he'll wear in the courting season, he fed himself almost exclusively fruits like dogwood berries, wild grapes and multiflora rose hips, fruits that saturate him in scarlet.

Speaker 1: 2:46

Extravagant, yes, but not reckless. To bring his flame through months of cold that strip the world to the bone. He must give deep attention to his body. The flight that caught my eye and heart was no joyride, swaying on this thistle stalk. He did not sing, not in winter. Flying singing, these burn energy and use him up. Clothed in the color of passionate abandon, he is in truth a conserver, asking of every action. Does it have a purpose? Does it repay what it costs To fuel his life?

Speaker 1: 3:27

Winter leaves him only seeds. As the cold sharpens, he needs more seeds to fuel his furnace to its 105 degree Fahrenheit survival heat, just when other seed eaters also need more and snow is apt to cover the uneaten seeds. So in late fall and early winter he chooses to eat more than he needs, but exactingly. He knows he soon must wear a reserve of fat or he'll freeze. Too little fat and he will fall. But too much fat and he will also fall.

Speaker 1: 4:03

Fat slows him down, Fat slurs his dart and weave and the hawk watching the open fields of wheat and grain, watching the backyard feeders, dives quick and clean. So each day the cardinal weighs his reserve. He senses precisely how much fat is spread beneath his thin skin. Also, he takes a measure of his temperature and the length of day, sensing how much winter remains. He places all he knows in a finely felt balance which tells him how much he must eat to add an exact excrement of fat. An exact excrement of fat by fractions of grams. He grows himself so that he is weightiest exactly when winter is most harsh and food meager. He aims for a scalpel's edge, just heavy enough each week of intensifying cold to fuel his purposes, just light enough to whisk away should talons fall from the sky.

Speaker 1: 5:04

The cardinal holds on as the thistle slows its sway. Maybe he's weighing himself, noting how far the stalk is dipped when he landed, how fast it bounces back. If he can navigate the narrow path between too thick and too thin, too much and too little, he'll arrive at his long expected spring. He'll blaze out then and dazzle, hobbling, flitting, cavorting, singing. What cheer, what cheer, what cheer. That is our nature story for today, and I think that's important to remember. To eat just the right amount to stay exactly where you need to be during this holiday season. I'm sure there were lots of you that were inspired by that, so hopefully you'll come back next week as we turn to another wildlife creature and consider how nature responds to this time of year. And until next time, peace, thank you.