Robins rule --­ and do a fair Baywatch impression

This was a Pamela Anderson of a robin. Originally, I was going to write, "a Mae West of a robin," and while I still think that is marginally more accurate, it is also entirely obscure to the majority of people currently alive and well and capable of reading my column. So, I copped out and opted to invoke the pneumatic Pam.
At any rate, whether Pam or Mae, the robin certainly had the posture right, and the shape was unquestionably reminiscent.
Not that one usually thinks of Ms. Anderson hopping through a shade garden, carrying an insect in her mouth. This is what is called, in my trade, beating an image to death. Let's leave Canada's contribution to high culture behind, and focus entirely on the real birds.
This is the time of year when robins rule. They arrived home some weeks ago, of course --­ and did so, once again, mysteriously en masse. I no longer believe that robins migrate, at least in the traditional sense of the word. Instead, I am highly suspicious that they charter --­ a plane, a train, perhaps a bus ­-- and arrive back in southern Ontario all at once, get off the bus at some secret location, collect their bags, and show up in enormous groups in our neighbourhoods announcing "we're home! Are the worms ready, yet?"
This is the only possible explanation for the complete absence of robins, one spring day, followed by a torrential deluge of robins one day later. Hordes of robins. Gangs. Herds.
Upon their return, they are initially pretty docile. Happy to be home, confused to find bits of ground still frozen, a little displeased with gardeners who had not yet filled the bird baths, but generally peaceful.
Then, they built their nests, lay their eggs, and turn into Billy Jack, ready to defend hearth and home against all incursions. They take no flak from anyone ­
crow, blue jay, squirrel; heck, I imagine them driving off hippos if hippos could climb trees and took a liking to raw egg.
Perhaps you have deduced that I have a certain affection for Canadian robins. As well as a certain antagonism toward those who officially named it the American Robin, for, while we Canucks are certainly legitimate residents of the Americas, that term has been co-opted by a certain nation I have no intention of discussing further at this point. Besides, I am too embarrassed by our own political mess to start throwing stones southward. I digress horribly.
I like robins. I like their cheeky attitudes, I appreciate their role as the harbinger of spring, I enjoy watching them, I am fascinated by their odd ability to seek and decant subterranean worms.
Robins carry hope. Every spring, for sure, they bring hope of warm breezes and blue skies. But they also convey hope in the same way other flourishing fauna do. Healthy and plentiful robins give us reason to believe that, just maybe, there may be hope for the environment. We are still in plenty of ecological trouble, but at least humankind has had the foresight to abandon the use of certain chemicals that were laying waste many of our songbirds.
Robins abound. They find food in our lawns and gardens. Where there are robins, there is reason to think all is not lost.
Perhaps you, too, read the news reports some time ago about the discovery in the US of the ivory-billed woodpecker, long thought extinct. Did you get that frisson of excitement -- a sudden surge of hope?
Well, I get that every time a robin looking like a Baywatch babe hops across my lawn. All may not be well with our natural world, but here is one more reason for activist optimism.