Northern Flicker
Knock Knock Knocking
...........if you ever hear someone calling out, "Hey, You"
Photo and story are by Vicki Kell
We are neighbours to these woodpeckers year-round.
Our house is in the Avalon region of Newfoundland, in the town of Cupids.
Our home is vinyl sided and wood trimmed.
These little devils love to put holes in our wood trim, trying to build a nest.
The majority of their diet though, is insects.
Knock , knock, knocking.
First, imagine your sleeping and dream of a knock.
Incorporate the knock into a sweet violin melody and go back into slumber.
Knock, knock, knocking.
It startles you. You come awake.
This time you notice the calling of the sweet sun.
With pauses, sometimes long pauses in between knocks.
The house has cooled down over night.
You feel like you should get up and put a log on the fire to keep warm.
Instead, you choose to stay in the warm, under your covers .
Cozy, you fall back asleep again.
Knock, knock, knocking!
There it is again, and now, I'm fit to be tied.
I'm ticked.
I'm up now for sure because I feel hurried.
To get out of bed, open my window and yell out! "Hey, you! "
I sound like my mother.
Mom, would yell out our front door,
calling me home from the park for supper; four blocks away.
Ironic.
Completely different ideas but a similar emotion is evoked.
The dreaded sound of these woodpeckers, is like
my Mom calling out to me to come home
or worse come inside when I was a kid.
I loved being outside in nature, it was hard to get me indoors.
Her teachings come to my mind.
To appreciate what I have and see the good in every circumstance.
Loving those people who put up with our annoyances everyday.
Everytime a woodpecker comes knockin in NL ,
I consider it a blessing.
I make a super homemade suet and give him seed year round.
I am thankful
for my parents, living in NL
and for all creatures great and small
who I am neighbours to.
