This morning, something awful happened.

A hawk came out of nowhere and attacked a robin’s nest right on my porch. In seconds, the nest was gone—knocked down, broken, scattered. When I opened the door, my heart dropped. Three tiny baby birds lay on the cold wood. Two were moving.

One wasn’t.

I just stood there, frozen, my coffee growing cold in my hands. Above me, the parents were frantic—darting through the trees, wings fluttering wildly, making that sharp, helpless sound that feels like panic turned into noise. I could feel their fear as clearly as my own.

I wanted to help. God, I wanted to help.
But I was scared.

Scared the hawk would come back.
Scared I’d do the wrong thing.
Scared that touching them might somehow make everything worse.

I whispered to myself, over and over, “What do I do? What do I do?” like the answer might fall out of the sky if I said it enough times.

My husband told me to breathe.

So I did.

I grabbed a pair of gloves, knelt down, and gently—so gently—picked up the babies one by one. They were impossibly light, like they were barely holding onto the world. Their bodies were still. Too still.

I placed them back into the nest.

And then I saw it.

The tiniest rise of a chest.
Then another.
Then the third.

All three were alive.

I don’t think I’ve ever felt relief hit my body that hard. It was like my lungs remembered how to work again. Minutes later, the mother came back and sat right down in the nest, calm and steady, as if chaos hadn’t just passed through. The father? Back and forth nonstop with worms—focused, relentless, fully clocked in.

Life didn’t pause. It continued.

Later, I sat down to finish a craft order for a client, trying to steady my hands. I worked slowly, watching the nest whenever I could. Every time I looked up, one of the babies had its beak just barely poking out—like it was checking in on me too.

Now I hear chirping. One tiny voice testing its strength. Mom swoops in with food. Dad stays close, always watching.

What started as panic became something else entirely—a loud, messy, beautiful orchestra of survival.

They’re going to make it.

And today… that’s more than enough for me.