I know it will seem a bit odd, like a guy dressed in jeans, Pendleton wool shirt and a Stetson hat listening to Mozart. But I can’t help it; my favourite spring pastimes are bird watching and bear hunting. I guess you could call me oxymoronic, a word I concocted to describe myself as a character of contradictions. But to me, bear hunting and bird watching are completely compatible. I always do them together. And so early one May morning, I found myself sleuthing around the edge of one of my favourite meadows, bird-watching binoculars slung around my neck and bear-hunting cannon slung over my shoulder.

“What on earth was that?” said my son Halden. He had his head sucked into his shirt collar like a turtle.

“I am not sure,” I said. I was in the act of desperately trying to collect my thoughts along with a spilled glass of shiraz and a particularly good bit of sharp cheese that was scattered all over the deck. I carefully raised my head to peer over the railing of the sundeck just in time to watch the author of our dive-bombing pull off an unbelievable aerobatic manoeuvre. He veered right and then left before bashing a wee sparrow to the ground. Instantly swooping up, down, and around in helicopter-like fashion, he grabbed the stunned sparrow with his talons and proceeded to wherever he was holding his dinner party. We had just been had by the grim reaper of the bird feeder.

[caption id="attachment_2979" align="alignnone" width="445" caption="illustration by Barry Falls"][/caption]

A year or so ago, as in-country missionaries, Linda, Chelsea, Bud the Lab and I were asked to do two weeks of mission deputation to parts of Ontario. Our task was to share our mission work with the church and to promote Presbyterians Sharing. Not being one who relishes anything that smacks of a boondoggle in the name of Christ, I found the deputation tour ended up being a real eye-opener. I thought it might be time, in an attempt at being prophetic, to share my journal entry upon our return.

“Oh my goodness!” exclaimed Chelsea. My eyelids slammed open with such speed and force that they momentarily shifted my eyebrows high enough up my balding pate to qualify them as hair implants. I looked across the bed at Linda, who was desperately trying to get her eyes open and free herself from Bud's embrace so she could run into the living room to see what on earth was the matter. Both Linda and I were trying to speedshift our minds through every possible emergency that could happen in and outside of our house. And then Chelsea continued: “What's a moose doing in our back yard?”

Moments later the four of us were peering out of our picture window through the soft winter light of dawn at a large cow moose. Obviously heavy in calf, she was standing in the middle of a grove of Saskatoon berry bushes just a few metres from our deck. Bud uttered a low guttural Lab opinion concerning the propriety of the situation. “Shut up, Bud,” I said. “You'll spook that old swamp donkey and we are not through spying on her yet.”

I got the call on Monday. She said her husband had passed away a couple of days before and she couldn't find a preacher to come out to her rural community to do the funeral. Her sister-in-law had told her about me.

Saturday found me and Larri in the local Legion set up on a stage opposite the bar. As a troubadour for the Lord, most often it's just me and my guitar representing Christ and his church in these rural, remote Cariboo communities. There was a sizeable crowd out, about 150, a good portion of the surrounding community. I had worked hard over the past days travelling out to the community, getting to know the deceased, his family and some of his friends, and developing the service. In true Presbyterian fashion though, most of my efforts had gone into my sermon. I was convinced that my exposition of the biblical text was just what everyone needed to hear. And so Larri and I launched into the first hymn, country style.

“How come you're eating two bowls?” Linda scowled at me over the top of her half-reading glasses. “You don't usually eat even one full bowl of my pea soup.”

"That loony chick ain't going to make it!" I said to Linda. It was a cold November day and I was watching a particularly small teenage loon out of our front room window. It had been born late in the spring; hence its diminished size and my concern.