It has been a beautiful Indian Summer this year. The summer does not want to leave, a choice we fully agree with.
When we have barbeques outside, the boys go out to the chestnut in the orchard and set up the portable grill on wheels, and start the fire. They love to do this. They both feel grown up, especially Gabriel, for whom it is a great honor, and he takes it seriously. I taught them over time, and I can trust them to start these little fires.
So grandmothers: don't worry. :-)
Well, just the other day when we sent the boys off on their mission, they came running back to the kitchen, all out of breath.
"There is a baby owl in the garden!"
"A baby owl? In a tree?"
"No, on the ground!"
And with that we were all off, to investigate in more depth this most unexpected turn of events. An owl on the ground? Poor thing.
Sure enough, there was an owl, leaning up against the stone wall in the garden. He seemed very tired, very dizzy. It seemed as if was having trouble staying awake. He was swaying back and forth.
Natalya and I don't really know what baby owls are supposed to look like up close, but this little one did not look well.
Questions flew in all directions, most emanating from the boys, but we parents were not too swift with the answers.
Now I did know that we have an owl in our little "masion de gardien" house, a little old stone "dependance" building, with an open window at the top. I have seen that owl a few times, at night, alight without a noise from the window ledge. His whiteness always startles me in the black surroundings.
We figured that this little baby was hers, and that this baby was either pushed out, or fell out, of that window. Moreover, where we found him leaning against that wall is a good fifty meters from the window. But he must have walked there, because he clearly couldn't fly. He could barely stand, as I said.
Natalya knows many people in the village, and called up a Mom (of the cutest little girl I believe I have ever seen), because this Mom is crazy about taking care of animals. This turned out to be the perfect idea, because this Mom came over in five minutes flat. Her little daughter, Lola, came with her, and Lola petted the owl for a long time, along with Maxime and Gabriel. In the end, they took the owl away, and took care of it for a few days. They even had a giant cage, which was perfect. They fed and gave the owl water from a syringe, and by Day Three he was transformed. Bright, energetic. They left the cage open, and the window, too, and when they returned a few hours later, the owl had flown away.
