Seeing a mourning dove
A mourning dove's soft call can feel like a sign of comfort. Its own habits point somewhere more practical: it raises its young in a thin, untidy nest that works anyway, a strong case for good enough over perfect.
What it may mean
Few birds build as carelessly as the mourning dove. Its nest is a loose platform of twigs, often so thin that you can see the eggs from below, set in a gutter, a planter or the fork of a low branch. Yet doves raise brood after brood in these nests, several in a single summer. That humble success raises a question about the places where you are waiting for perfect conditions before you begin. Some things only need to be sturdy enough to hold. The dove has carried heavy symbolic weight for centuries, in church art and on wedding cards, and people read it in their own ways. This everyday gray-brown version, a little clumsy and very successful, has a more down-to-earth point to make.
Depending on how you saw it
Its call in the early morning
The slow, sad-sounding coo that carries through the early morning comes from a male announcing himself, and people often mistake it for an owl. Nothing about it is mournful to the dove. You might notice how often you hear sadness or annoyance in someone's voice that may not be there at all.
A whistle as it takes off
When a mourning dove bursts into flight, its wings make a sharp, whistling sound that can make you jump on a still path. Other doves hear it as an alarm and leave too. What works as your own early warning: a feeling in your stomach, a habit, a friend who says "wait"?
Feeding on the ground below other birds
Mourning doves eat seeds from the ground, often the ones that other birds scatter from the feeder above. They thrive on what others drop. Look at the leftovers of your own week, an unused hour or a stalled plan, and see what could still be made of them.
A white dove at a wedding or memorial
The white doves released at ceremonies are in most cases white homing pigeons, trained to fly straight back to their loft. The moment looks like a final goodbye, but the bird knows its way home. Which of the partings in your life are really closer to "see you later"?
Why it happens in nature
Mourning doves are among the most common birds in North America, from city parks to farm fields. Males call to claim a territory and attract a mate, most often on spring and summer mornings. Like pigeons, doves feed their young crop milk, a rich fluid made in the lining of the crop (a pouch in the throat), and this helps them breed for much of the year.
What folk beliefs say
Scotland
In Scotland, a white dove following a black dove foretold troubles followed by joys.
Source: Cora Linn Daniels; C. M. Stevans (eds.), Encyclopaedia of Superstitions, Folklore, and the Occult Sciences of the World, vol. 2 (1903), vol. 2, p. 621. View the page
India
In India, a young woman whose husband was away from home took the sight of two doves together as a sign that he would soon come back to her.
Source: Cora Linn Daniels; C. M. Stevans (eds.), Encyclopaedia of Superstitions, Folklore, and the Occult Sciences of the World, vol. 2 (1903), vol. 2, p. 621. View the page
Japan
Doves in Japan were held up as models of good manners: a dove was said never to perch on a branch less than three below the one where its parents sat.
Source: Cora Linn Daniels; C. M. Stevans (eds.), Encyclopaedia of Superstitions, Folklore, and the Occult Sciences of the World, vol. 2 (1903), vol. 2, p. 622. View the page
To reflect on
What are you holding off on until conditions are perfect, and would sturdy enough do?