Received - One Hummingbird

I was literally writing a post that started "Please, hummingbirds.  Please stop your boycott of my yard.  

We don't know what we did wrong.  We miss you.  Please forgive us if we did something wrong.  We miss you.

We lovingly prepared our yard for you.  

Cupheas in their customary pot are blooming strongly.  The fuschias await you.  We have other delights.  Where are you, though?  You should have been here by now. We are worried."

The hummers normally show up the first week in May.  We had our feeder out around May 3.  A woman in our area had seen them already on Mother's Day.  Nada for us.  

So I started to blog this post outside on my laptop as a last resort.

No kidding, as I was typing these words, I heard a sound - a familiar sound.  A sound of wings.

A female ruby-throated hummingbird was visiting my cupheas. (Sorry for the blurriness in these photos).

Hummingbird, don't fly away fly away, I mentally begged as I wrestled my iPhone out of my pocket.  I didn't want to scare it off.

I didn't scare it, surprisingly.

This is our fourth year feeding the birds.  I admire hummingbirds, these tiny jewels of the sky, so.  They bring so much joy to me, not that I don't like the Northern Cardinals, house finches, hairy and downy woodpeckers, and others that visit our feeders. (Even - ahem - the common grackles and European starlings. Well, maybe not so much, but they have their place in our ecology.)

I was starting to lose faith.

But now, received - one hummingbird.

Thank you.

Please come back again soon.