Welcome to Jessica's Bedtime Meditations.
Are you ready to tell your body that it's time to rest?
We're going to lay back and ask ourselves a few essential questions.
Ask yourself,
Did I brush my teeth?
Do I have cozy bedtime clothes on?
Did I go potty one last time?
Great,
I think we're ready for our story.
This story today is about a medium girl.
She wasn't little and she wasn't big.
She had lost her two top teeth and had already grown in new top teeth.
This little girl,
Wait a minute,
This medium sized girl was resting with her cat.
They were looking out the window together.
Both of them were lying on their bellies,
Resting their chins on their front paws.
I mean hands,
I mean the cat was resting his chin on his paws and the medium girl was resting her chin on her hands.
They were both just looking out at the tops of the trees and the middle part of the trees,
Really it was the middle part of the trees that they could see from their upstairs bedroom window.
The girl was thinking about some drawings she was making.
She had been working on drawing pictures for a book that's full.
She was making the illustrations.
So she was staring out at the middle part of the trees wondering what color she might use for the main character's shirt.
When suddenly,
Out of absolutely nowhere that she could see,
A large red shoulder hawk swooped right down in front of the window.
I'm telling you,
This red shoulder hawk was about six feet from the window,
Which is absolutely magnificent and magical and memorable.
It was like time froze for the cat and the girl because the red shoulder hawk soared down right in front of the cat and the little girl's eyes.
In the talons of the red shoulder hawk,
There was something.
It was really hard to tell what that hawk had in its talons,
But let's just say it was the size and shape of a mouse.
But maybe it was bigger than a mouse.
It was so hard to tell.
This happened all so quickly.
But definitely frozen in the girl's mind was the image of this up-close hawk with prey in its talons.
And the hawk glided up to a branch of the tree that was just outside of her window and the girl's eyes got huge,
Like donuts,
And the cat's eyes got huge,
Like donut holes.
And the cat and the girl heard the hawk calling.
Now I'm not going to make the sound of it because it might hurt your ears,
But a hawk call is very distinct and it gets everybody's attention.
It's sort of like this high-pitched,
Squeaking,
Squawking,
All alert,
Look at me,
Eyes on me.
So of course the cat and the girl were looking straight out at the hawk,
Who had now landed right in the tree,
Right outside the bedroom window.
And as soon as that hawk call ended,
A second hawk came swooping down from the right side of the window.
And this hawk was even bigger than the first hawk.
And this second hawk landed safely on the same branch.
And the two hawks said something to each other in hawk language.
There was a bit of a squabble and the girl imagined that the first hawk was the mommy hawk and the second hawk was the daddy hawk.
And she looked up and sure enough there is a hawk nest right in that tree.
I wonder,
Said the little girl,
Oh really it was a medium-sized girl,
I beg your pardon.
The medium-sized girl said to herself,
Well really she said it to the cat,
I wonder if there's a clutch of eggs in that nest.
And before she could mention anything else about it or get any answers,
The girl heard a voice.
And the voice said,
Ernie,
There's no way you're getting this chipmunk from me.
And the medium-sized girl looked at her cat and then the cat looked at the medium-sized girl.
And the medium-sized girl's eyes got as round as donuts and the cat's eyes got as round as donut holes.
And then she heard another voice.
And that voice said,
Candy,
Now I share all of my prey with you.
Why on earth wouldn't you share your chipmunk with me?
At this point the little girl and the cat were plastered to the window.
Their hands and paws and noses and eyeballs were suction cupped to the window looking and gawking at these hawks having this conversation.
And then on the sycamore tree outside of her bedroom window.
What strike of luck,
Not only to have a hawk swoop down six feet in front of your nose,
Mind you,
With prey in its talons.
And then hear its call and have a second hawk come swooping in.
But now she could actually,
Factually hear the hawks talking to each other.
And it was Ernie and Candy.
Ernie and Candy were their names.
The red-shoulder hawk,
Which if you didn't know,
Red-shoulder hawks do in fact have red feathers on their shoulders.
That's how they got their name.
And so the girl and the cat with their paws and hands and noses and eyeballs plastered to the window.
Waiting for Ernie and Candy to say something else.
And it was almost as if because now they were paying attention that those hawks were going to stop putting on the show.
Well,
Ernie,
Instead of talking,
Squawked in his hawk way and he flew off to the right of the window from where he came.
And Candy,
You could tell,
Was a little bit upset and frustrated.
You could actually,
The medium-sized girl and the cat could actually see the hawk's ribcage expand and get bigger as she inhaled in her nose.
And she could see it get smaller as she exhaled out of her beak.
Candy did two more deep breaths just like that so she could feel her ribcage expanding and getting bigger as she inhaled through her beak.
And she got smaller as she exhaled.
As you inhale one last time in through your nose and exhale,
Getting smaller,
There is a nice warmth in the cavity where your belly is.
So as the medium-sized girl started breathing with the hawk,
The hawk turned around on the branch to face the girl and the cat.
And Candy had a single eye wink at the medium-sized girl before she took her prey in her talon and flew off to the left of the window from where she came.
And all the rest of the day,
The girl wondered what had happened.
Had Candy eaten her meal?
Did she share it with Ernie?
Did they meet up and apologize to each other?
And so for a few more minutes as the artist girl was looking out onto the branch,
The empty branch now or just the clutch and the nest with a clutch of eggs rest on the sycamore branch,
She knew exactly what she was going to draw on the main character's shirt.
And after watching all of that happen,
The girl and the cat went back to the bed and they laid down now this time not on their bellies but on their sides,
Resting their cheeks on their paws or in the girl's case on her hands.
And as cats do,
The cat slowly blinked staring into the girl's eyes.
So the girl slowly blinked back at the cat.
Blink,
Blink.
I'm going to invite you now to practice your slow blinking.
Blink,
Blink.
And at one point,
The girl's eyes just stayed shut.
Oh,
That felt really good.
And she imagined Candy the hawk sitting on her branch,
Watching the hawk's ribcage expand as she breathed in and contract as she breathed out.
So her ribcage getting bigger and smaller.
And the cat and the girl slowly drifted off to sleep.
