This week, I’ve learned that when I judge too hastily, I can miss out on something really worth noticing. Not that I didn't know that, conceptually--but it's so very easy to miss seeing the judgments arising in one's own mind!

This past weekend, I talked with S, a lawyer friend who is a skillful birder. S has been enjoying watching the flocks of starlings living in the marshland adjacent to the University of Washington. He’s been amused to discover that these starlings have learned to mimic the sound of cell phones so well that people sometimes check their phones to see whether they’re ringing.

Since S mentioned this interesting finding, I’ve been paying much more attention to starlings. Researching them on the Internet, I’ve found that they’ve been observed to mimic everything from human speech to car alarms, as well as the calls of many other birds. And indeed, while walking along the lakeshore listening to starlings this week, I’ve heard them make a variety of calls, including one that sounds like a series of beeps (maybe an imitation of a frustrated motorist?). What could be the purpose of so much mimicry? I can only wonder at the starlings’ intentions—and at my own failure to notice such an obvious phenomenon!

Now I’m really interested in starlings! Until now, I’d dismissed them as not really worthy of attention. Reflecting, I see that my lack of interest has been founded in judgment. Because I know that starlings are a nonnative species that successfully competes with native bird species for nesting habitat, I’ve thought of them as a problem species—a kind of living trash—rather than as something to delight in, as I delight in many other birds. And because I see so many of them so often, I had taken them to be something ordinary and uninteresting—not exciting like an uncommon species. As I let my judgments go this week, I finally can appreciate them for themselves, and life is richer for it.