They say when you see a red cardinal it's someone you love who died. I never thought to think it was true because how could one bird be someone's personal loved one. Especially when it flies away to be seen by someone else. The birds just don't dissapear; do they? My great-grandmother liked red cardinals. She was a painter, a soft one. She painted with pastels and you could see every stroke bleeding into the form of a picture. I wonder if that's how she saw the world. My ignorance to the unbelievable was tested on Thanksgiving the year she passed. When her picture was set up on a table so no one would forget her place. I stared out the window to try and ignore the bickering that always seemed to come up out of nothing. That's when i saw it: the red cardinal sitting on the window sill. It was staring towards my grandmother with sad eyes, as if it wanted nothing more than to fly in and give her a shaky kiss on the cheek. But as soon as I blinked it was flying away. So, maybe a red cardinal is a reincarnated person that we love, or maybe it's just a figment of our imagination. Maybe, its just a way of our brains trying to deal with the sudden loss, making something up to make it less sudden, less permanent. Maybe it's to make us feel a little less alone. All I know now is whenever I see a red cardinal, I smile.