A Bird in the Hand: A Coffee Morning and One Fleeting Little Surprise
Some moments feel so unlikely, they stay with you for years.
This one happened nearly two decades ago in Oklahoma, on a cool morning when my husband and I had gone out for coffee.
What makes it even sweeter is that he remembered this particular experience too.
When I asked him about it, he smiled and said yes — and he thinks it may have been the very first time we went to a big-name coffee shop that was new to the area, instead of one of the smaller local places we usually frequented.
That detail made me smile, because it means this memory carried more than one “first.”
It was a coffee shop date.
A shared memory.
And, for one fleeting second, a tiny bit of fairy-tale nonsense that somehow turned out to be true.
A Princess Joke Over Coffee
We were sitting outside with our coffee on a cool morning, listening to the birds chirping.
Beautiful lawn, tall trees, and happy people all around.
The setting felt especially pretty, and I was being playful.
I remember holding out my hand and joking that I was going to be a fairy-tale princess — the kind who sings a sweet little song, holds out her hand, and has a bird land there.
It was one of those silly, whimsical things you say without expecting anything to come of it.
And then it did.
A Bird in the Hand
A small bird — probably a sparrow, though I can’t say for certain — landed right in my hand.
Just like that.
For a brief moment,
I sat there in complete surprise, holding still and hardly believing what had just happened.
It didn’t last long.
But it lasted long enough to become one of those stories I’ve told over and over through the years, because it felt so unexpectedly magical.
Not staged.
Or imagined.
Just one tiny bird, my outstretched hand, and a moment I’ve never forgotten
Why It Stayed With Me
Some memories stay because they’re big.
Others stay because they’re small in exactly the right way.
This one felt whimsical and wonder-filled, yes — but it also felt like a reminder.
Joy has a way of showing up in ordinary places at ordinary times.
Coffee shop patios.
Cool mornings.
Playfulness waiting.
A hand held out in jest.
And then, for the briefest moment, something unexpected takes place.
A Card That Came From This Story
And now here I am telling YOU this story…making it the 101st time.
All these years later, that fleeting little moment eventually became a card.
The image leans into the wonder of it all — a bird, a peaceful setting, and a line that says exactly what the moment felt like:
Visit the You Make Ordinary Moments Feel Magical Greeting Card
A Bird in the Hand
The familiar proverb “a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush” means it can be wiser to value something you already have than risk losing it while reaching for something uncertain.
Versions of that idea have been part of English for centuries. One of the earliest known English forms appears in John Capgrave’s Life of St. Katharine, written around 1450. John Ray later included the proverb in his 1670 book A Collection of English Proverbs.
Read John Ray’s 1670 A Collection of English Proverbs:
The saying is ultimately about certainty versus possibility: the bird already in your hand has real value; the birds somewhere in the bush may never be yours at all.
I don’t read seventeenth-century English especially well, but on page 62 you can see Ray’s version of the saying for yourself. I also found myself flipping through several more of the old microfilm pages and spotting some wonderfully curious phrases along the way. For me, through this real-life experience, “a bird in the hand” carries another meaning too. Once in a while, a fleeting moment becomes a lasting treasure. Occasionally, delight lands for only a second. Sometimes the smallest surprises become stories we keep. And sometimes what sounds like fairy-tale silliness turns out to be real life after all.
Maybe you’d enjoy seeing the fairytale card inspired by this incredible real-life experience:
You Make Ordinary Moments Feel Magical Greeting Card
If this is the kind of stories you love, you may also like wandering through more Curious Phrases and joy-filled shares in the Studio Journal.
And if you’re looking for words to write in a card for someone, feel free to have a look at:
Where will you Scatter Joyfulness today?
