Like It or Not, Family Is Up With the Birds

In our house, there are only a few hours that can be counted on for quiet--usually it’s 1 a.m. before everyone in the family has gone to bed, and the first to arise is up at 5 a.m. That’s about it. Four hours of everyone’s-safe, all’s-right-with-the-world time. Recently, however, even that has gone to the birds.

Not the dogs, the birds.

Some happy chirpers are either completely disoriented now that we’re in Daylight Saving Time, or they’re new to this Corona del Mar neighborhood. We’ve never had night-singing nesters here before. One bird begins about the stroke of midnight, just as I’m falling asleep in my book. His (or her) call is very distinctive--three cheeps, then a trill, four chirps and a whistle. Then it repeats, but before the repetition is complete, another warbler joins in, then another. Sounds like a quartet. But what they’re singing is no lullaby. Too upbeat and shrill, almost jazzy, like the Four Freshmen.

It was about midnight one day when my husband came upstairs brandishing a high-beam flashlight, determined to flush out the birds by spotlight from our balcony. I was a little surprised that he was so hostile. The nocturnal choir and he are really birds of a feather. His own activities in the wee hours are legendary in this neighborhood, ranging from vacuuming the garage at 4 a.m. to doing yard work by battery-operated lantern at night. Nonetheless, he was determined, scanning the trees with the light from top to bottom as if he was painting a fence.

“If I can find those birds, I’ll. . . . “

“You’ll what, dear?” I asked pleasantly.

I was feeling more cheerful than usual for that time of night. Thanks to the birds, I’d been able to stay awake long enough to watch Johnny Carson. The young woman America knows as Bill Cosby’s “TV wife” was on. Listening to her had been worth the loss of sleep.

“What on earth is Dad doing?” asked our 18-year-old, sticking his head in the bedroom door to say good night.

“Looking for those birds,” I answered.

“Serves him right,” he said, shutting the door loudly.

I’m not sure if he was referring to the birds or his father, but I didn’t ask. This particular son doesn’t have much of a sense of humor.

There’s also an owl who lives in the big pine out back. But his soft, low “Whooo?” has always been pleasant company in a mystical sort of way. Friend owl is easy to find with the flashlight, but the jazz chorus, still chirping away full throttle, was not to be seen. Its members were either too small or too smart. Exasperated, my husband gave up and fell in bed, resorting to medically approved earplugs to drown out the noise. I lay back and drifted off counting . . . three cheeps, then a trill, four chirps, then a whistle, three cheeps, then a trill. . . .

It seemed like only a few seconds before I was awake again. It was 5:30 a.m., and the high school golf team was gathering downstairs for an early match. I drifted in and out of sleep, half-way hearing the heavy footsteps of teen-age PGA hopefuls, hoarse stage whispers urging, “Hurry up!” and honks out in front announcing arrivals and departures.

Later, at a more reasonable hour, now dressed and combed for work, I walked out on the driveway. My new neighbor, driving by, paused and rolled down her car window. She didn’t look herself--no make-up, a little disheveled, one child in the back seat obviously late for school. “We’re running a little behind today,” she explained. “Haven’t slept very well the last few nights.”

“Me too--the birds. . . .”

Ordinarily a mild-manner woman, she exclaimed, “The birds! I feel like we live in a damn aviary!”

“Three cheeps, then a trill, four chirps, then a whistle?”

“That’s it,” she cried, then grinned and waved goodby.

My husband wandered out just as the man next door pulled out of his driveway for work. “Is it my imagination or does Herb look as tired as we do?” he asked.

It’s hard to say, but my guess is that our nightly chorus has been singing to nearly a sell-out crowd.