Odette's barnWhen I am in Estampes, I can time my days to Odette’s movement: 8 in the morning she lets out the chickens, and the sheep, gives water to the rabbits. 7 At night and she’s back again, watering, feeding, bringing in her creatures for the night. On this evening as I follow her through the routine, I’m paying particular attention. I’m in charge of all of this the next morning as Odette has an early doctor’s appointment. Odette has rarely left her animals to anyone so I want to get it right. Water for the rabbits; don’t forget to shut the barn door behind the sheep. It’s all very simple, but I feel like I’m being entrusted with the most important job.
As we step into the barn to put down hay for the sheep, a barn swallow swoops through the open door. Swallows, with their white bellies and long forked tails are obvious all day long as they wing about chattering in elegant loops and dives. Inside the dark barn a dozen mud-formed nests cling to the wooden rafters. Strings of straw dangle from cobwebs nearby in this nearly abandoned barn. The space between nest and the ceiling is narrow—just enough for a swallow head.
young barn swallows“The swallows, they always return on March 20,” Odette tells me. A person of daily rhythms keeps track of the larger rhythms of the world around her. “The 20th, maybe to the 23rd, but always in March. Usually the 20th. I’ve noticed that.” I nod. “Oui, the vingt Mars,” Odette repeats. “But the swallows aren’t doing well.” She points to the ground. “Look.” At the tip of her toe rest two dead swallows, their small bodies crumpled on the cement floor of the barn.
She can’t explain it, but the swallows are dying. She’s not the only one to notice this. Genevieve, the local baker, tells me she doesn’t see swallows anymore. There are ten swallows in the village, Claude tells me. They all guess at what is wrong: the fertilizers on the fields, perhaps. They all shrug: who knows. There are a lot of mysteries in the farming life. This is one more.
Odette and I look about the barn. Under two nests are bird droppings, a sign that someone has taken up residence. “Maybe there will be young,” she says, hopeful.
The next morning as I quietly go about playing farmer, then I check on the nests. There’s a swallow on one, her body covering the opening of the mud structure. When I look closely, I see a little beak poking out the side. I slide the barn door shut, leaving her to her swallow business.
Eight days later I look out the window of my bedroom and see two swallows on the phone line and another stuck to the side of the house, clinging awkwardly to the stucco surface. I pull out my binoculars to look more closely because though the swallows fly over the house during the day, they have never stopped in for a visit like this. And I see that they do not have the long tail streamers of the adult male and female barn swallow. They have shorter tails. But really, it’s not this detail that lets me know they are juvenile birds. They all look a bit lost, a bit goofy, a bit young. When a car drives by they turn their wide eyed heads in unison to see what it is. When a larger bird flies overhead they look up to see what is going on in this huge world beyond the dark of the nest and the barn. The young birds are not afraid of me as I take their photos. They look on, a bit bemused, as they learn how to be swallows.
Through the day, they use our courtyard as a place to hang out, to practice flying and to beg for food. From time to time an adult swoops in and satisfies that need, but most of the time they are on their own.
Later that night, I return to the barn and tell Odette about the baby swallows. The news cheers her. I peer in at the nests and see that the young have all returned to the safety of the barn for the night.
young swallows on a wireThe next day, the swallows are back. As I sit at the dining room table writing I can hear their chatter as they swoop through the courtyard. And then I hear a flutter above my head—swallows doing laps in the dining room! I look over just on time to see two swallows fly out the door. They left quickly, but really they are welcome anytime.