The Hummingbirds' Gift: Wonder, Beauty, and Renewal on Wings
Written and Narrated By: Sy Montgomery
Length: 2 hrs and 5 mins
Brave little creatures! Brave, brave little guys!
I dunno how she does it, but Sy Montgomery manages to pack a whole lotta love into everything she writes. After her heartfelt treatise on loving despite the pain (How to Be a Good Creature), I full-well expected The Hummingbirds’ Gift to be, well, a tad FRAUGHT with fear and loss looming, ever nearer, closer, then closer as a person becomes attached.
This little beauty of an audiobook, written and published previously as a lengthy essay, does indeed get thaaat close to p’raps breaking the listener’s heart. After all, what could be more fragile than a baby hummingbird with its need to be fed every. single. twenty minutes. A tad life-altering? You bet. A tad life-changing? Yes, ultimately there is that as well.
Montgomery brings her usual blend of detached seeker (Constantly bringing the natural world and its inhabitants into public awareness) and oh sooo attached carer (She joins noted specialist Brenda Sherburn in a quest to keep two teeeny little baby hummingbirds alive). Montgomery doesn’t know if she will be able to manage it, but Sherburn is a powerhouse, has the heart of an empath even as she clinically offers knowledge and advice. Sherburn is THE Go-To and is in top form as she guides Montgomery.
What I appreciate most about Montgomery is just how vulnerable she LETS herself be: She knows love comes with risks, yet time and time again, she opens herself to the possible, the inevitable. And here she follows all the steps, learns so much, then offers just the gentlest of nudges: After so many difficulties with the tiny fellows (Think infestation of mites, a dangerous lack of appetite, you name it…), she hints: Let’s name them.
Trust me: Once you’ve named a person (Whilst non-human, animals are people too!)? S/he is in your life and in your heart for good. It’s a tricky step, but The Hummingbirds’ Gift is all about Opening The Heart even as it seeks to inform us about the science of care, the loss of habitat, the newfangled methods of creating small havens of respite that are adapted with global climate change in mind. But the science, the detached seeker never overwhelms, just gently educates us to the point where, dang it all! we care.
Through this all is Montgomery’s narration of her own work, and once again, I was struck by just how warm her voice is. This is a woman who infuses her words with love and tenderness and sensitivity. I must admit, however, that at times I felt as tho’ she was “nudging” me: Do you feel love yet? FEEL IT NOW… I never appreciate that, but the text calls for caring, so despite my aversion to feeling manipulated by a narrator, I must admit that my li’l ol’ heart did indeed FEEL everything she was nudging me to feel. So there’s that. I am susceptible to Pokes For Compassion.
Mostly? I remembered the hummingbird Big Sis just cared for. A lost soul flying too close to a skylight, trying to get out. She rescued it, set up breathing space as it recuperated, and then she lovingly watched as it flew back into the wild, joining a fellow hummingbird in flight. AWEsome.
May we all be so good, so kind, so open to The Least Of His Creatures…
As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.