Twittering

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Nowadays, most everybody seems to be a-twitter about twittering with tweets covering the airways. But that is the twitter of smart phones and computers; and the result is ~ at a maximum of 140 characters for a tweet ~ quickly readable. As such, quick messages can spread at incredible speed. Some of them are quite meaningful. Some set up appointments. And any number of them just tell your friends what you are doing, hearing, or watching at that very instant.
And then there is the phenomenon of re-tweeting. Of repeating a message you received to your friends, or as it says on the page: to your followers.
It is something that is ongoing 24/7 it seems...

When you look up the words ‘twitter’ or ‘tweet’ in a dictionary that is slightly older than just a couple of years ~ the meaning of those words refer to something heard rather that read...
And while it can ~ or perhaps could ~ be used to describe people chatting with each other; in its purest meaning it is all about birds.
Birds that are tweeting in and twittering...

I was pondering all of this as I noticed that as soon as the snow started to melt, the birds came out again. To find food, yes. But also to start singing about the approach of Spring.
And while at first it was just one or two birds I heard twittering high up in the trees ~ pretty soon they could be heard everywhere!

The funny thing is also that in just a couple of days they seem to have changed their tunes as well. At first it was just the joy of the changing weather. Then the twittering became more solid, as if all the birds agree that Spring is approaching fast now. And just the other day it changed again into the unmistaken song that signifies the borders of their respective territories. A twittered song that comes with the arguments and fights as the birds start to protect that area they consider their own ~ at least throughout the upcoming Spring...

The birds around my house hardly ever look ahead further than the next season.
Perhaps because life is dangerous ~ even in the city. Or maybe it is just that they only tend to focus at the things that really matter to them. A change in seasons brings a change in what food they can find and where to find it. And of course as Spring is approaching, being a bird one has to get ready to start a family. So creating the space or territory, building the nest...
In their lives those are truly important, meaningful things worth twittering about...
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