{"id":8082,"date":"2014-03-11T17:36:51","date_gmt":"2014-03-11T21:36:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/?p=8082"},"modified":"2014-03-11T17:36:51","modified_gmt":"2014-03-11T21:36:51","slug":"a-miracle-of-starlings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/2014\/03\/a-miracle-of-starlings.html","title":{"rendered":"a miracle of starlings"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: center\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Dylan Winter and the Starling Murmurations\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/88UVJpQGi88?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left\">Actually, it&#8217;s called a <em>murmuration of starlings<\/em>. Possibly, as Dylan Winter, the narrator of this amazing clip notes, because of the murmuring of wings.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left\">Whatever the source of the name, the actual sight &#8212; even reduced to the size of a computer screen &#8212; is breathtaking. Starlings &#8212; those blackish birds most of us shoo from feeders &#8212; create magic in the fading sky of twilight.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left\">I think that&#8217;s one reason it seems so magical to me: starlings aren&#8217;t &#8216;special&#8217; birds. People don&#8217;t fly to Alaska to add starlings to their bird list. But this? I would fly to see this, believe me. Somehow, the idea that &#8216;ordinary&#8217; starlings can produce such beauty is comforting. If starlings, why not us? Why not you and me?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Actually, it&#8217;s called a murmuration of starlings. Possibly, as Dylan Winter, the narrator of this amazing clip notes, because of the murmuring of wings. Whatever the source of the name, the actual sight &#8212; even reduced to the size of a computer screen &#8212; is breathtaking. Starlings &#8212; those blackish birds most of us shoo&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":398,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[311,756],"tags":[11,1261,1181,1187,262,757,1354],"class_list":["post-8082","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-birds","category-murmuration-of-starlings","tag-beginners-heart","tag-birds","tag-britton-gildersleeve","tag-buddhism","tag-buddhist-blogs","tag-dylan-winter","tag-murmuration-of-starlings"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>a miracle of starlings - Beginner&#039;s Heart<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Actually, it&#039;s called a murmuration of starlings. 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Years spent living on the margins - in places with exotic names and food shortages - have left her with a visceral response to folks \u2018without,\u2019 as well as a desire to live her Buddhism in an engaged fashion. She\u2019s a writer and a teacher, the former director of a federal non-profit for teachers who write. She believes that if we talk to each other, we can learn to love each other (but she's still learning how). And she believes in tea. 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