Thursday, August 17th marks 2 years since my mom passed away. The following is a small project that was inspired by her.

Years ago something was disclosed to me that would forever change my life.
The conversation went something like this.

I was sitting outside at a beach house talking with one of the brightest and funniest people I have ever known. It was a beautiful evening and lots of birds were flying overhead on their way to their nighttime roosts. The person I was sitting with suddenly stopped talking and pointed at a group of pelicans flying overhead.

Confidently she said "You know... Pelicans ALWAYS fly around in odd numbers."
I looked at her a bit confused, not believing what I was hearing. "That can't be true."
"But it is, See that group over there? Seven. That one over there. Three."
"How do they know to fly around like that?" I asked
"They just do," she said

For the next half hour or so, we counted the numbers of pelicans flying together. Sure enough, quite a few of the groups had odd numbers, but there were almost just as many with even numbers. When I pointed out the even number groups, she would spin around in her chair and say something like,

"Well, you see those three over there? They're part of the same group, now they're an odd number."

She had a logical reason for every group that was even and she was very convincing. I knew that she was just having some fun with me, but that made it more fun. This was typical for her sense of humor, I never knew when she was plotting a joke or something.

Unfortunately, she'll never know how that moment in time has stayed with me and will stay with me forever. I continue to count Pelicans to this day. Odd numbers or even, it doesn't really matter anymore. Counting pelicans is now my way of remembering my mom and her incredible sense of humor.