For The Birds

"You'll take Archie back if his new home doesn't work out, right?" my mother asked this morning.
"Of course I will but that would mean we'd have to stop feeding the wild birds," I answered.
And that is why I chose to rehome Archie, the cat of my dreams, instead of taking down the bird feeders. Because we got so excited to see this painting bunting under the maple tree (it was a brief visit, unfortunately), because we get excited whenever a rose-breasted grosbeak drops by, because we want to have the sweet goldfinches singing outside our windows. Because we want cardinals here, too.
We are cat people but we also are bird people.
I made a mistake and I corrected it. The correction leaves me with a broken heart and an empty chair in my office where he used to sleep, but as long as I don't dwell on it, I am okay. Sort of. I'm not devastated about my decision to rehome Archie; I'm devastated because my own stupidity made him an outdoor cat in the first place. My heartbreak and the horrible empty space in this house once filled by a spunky orange cat could have been avoided.
But I had an email from his new momma and she says her dog loves Archie and they, humans and furmans, are spending the weekend getting to know each other.
"Thank you," she wrote. "He's such a good boy."