Yesterday, a hummingbird dive-bombed me, flew around my head several times, then hovered right in front of me, as if to announce herself. Of course, I couldn’t get my camera ready in time to take a closeup shot (though I did snap the one above of her or one of her compatriots sipping nectar last week).

Hummingbirds aren’t the only animals who are becoming nonchalant about my presence. A six-point buck was grazing in my backyard this morning shortly after dawn. Foxes trot through the tall grass that needs mowing as if they owned the place. A few weeks ago, there was a tree frog in the wind chimes; his croaks were highly amplified.

But the birds are on a completely different scale. Because I’ve been working outside on the glass-topped table all summer they have begun to treat me like part of the furniture. They flit, they flutter, they feed. They completely ignore me. 

Because they do, I can observe their tiniest rustlings, the way a slender stem bends with their weight, or the chirps and peeps of goldfinches, cardinals and chickadees as they congregate around the feeder and gone-to-seed coneflowers. 

Amidst all this bounty, my task is simple: I sit and take it in. I am, after all, just part of the furniture.