It's morning. I was just coming back from my morning prayer walk by the sea [Lake St.Clare] when I heard a jack-hammer sound high up on a wooden light pole. I looked hard and could just make out a mother and father woodpecker next to their summer home's hole they had built [pecked out] a few years back. How interesting that they did not go to a new location; no, this was there home by the sea, and they liked it just that way. It was hard to see them at first because their color blends in with this ancient light post. But I could see one move; the other remained so still facing the hole. Then I thought they had 5 sparrows watching them peck away; but these were not sparrows. They were baby woodpeckers who when able to fly, do not fly away but remain as a Woodpecker Family. They were small but very energetic in their flying around. Then what was the father woodpecker's pecking like a jack hammer all about? The pole resonated the pecking much better than a tree would because it was like a sounding board much like a guitar helps the strings to sing out in wood-sounds that delight us all. This father woodpecker was instructing his youngin's how to peck! It was too early for him to be calling all of them to dinner. They were watching him like little students.
You know: every day nature teaches us about life: Here is a lesson in family life. Mom and Dad woodpecker are not divorced. They have not gone after new lovers. They are not out of the home working on successful woodpecker careers. No. These are stay-at-home Mom and Dad woodpeckers. If you look at the enthusiam of the youngin's; if you look at the joy of the Mom and Dad woodpecker who stay so close to their beautiful little ones who can fly away but do not because they too have a sense of family life. No. These little woodpeckers are home-schooled. All of this is to each you and me what true happiness is: love of each other at home.
Love, Pio
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