That’s all he does most of the day, stare out the window — she says with a wink. The wink is important. It is a softener, a salve, to alleviate the sting in the words. Apart from that, most of the rest is true.

He rises early, makes his cup of coffee and takes it to his desk in the room upstairs overlooking the driveway. The coffee is a good instant blend that happened upon six years ago. It keeps him company for a few hours, dwindling sip by staggered sip in the cup in proportion with the cooling wrought upon it by the fresh air streaming in through the open window.

It is how Jerry’s day begins and ends most days.

“There’s a world out there, a million things to see if we have the eyes for it,” he once replied to his wife, Anna, by way of defending his perceived inactivity.

Anna, for her part, positioned herself behind his chair with her arms wrapped around his neck affectionately. “I think we must be using different eyes,” she stated, looking out the same window, “all I see is the neighbour’s backyard. I can hear Bazza barking his head off because his master is about to leave for work. I can see the same gum tree with probably the same magpies roosting in the branches or flying over to perch on the fence and wires for a bit of variety to their day. Other than that”, and she gave his neck a warm nuzzle to indicate she wasn’t being offensive, “other than that darling, I see nothing to keep me engaged”, another nuzzle, “somebody’s got the get the house up and running”.

Can’t you see the Anderson’s clothesline? he asked.

“Sure,” said Anna, raising her head and gazing out, “there’s washing. But so has ours and we left a lot of it out last night, so they’re all probably damp from the dew and need a second drying.”

“The bed sheets weren’t hanging out yesterday,” said Jerry.

“Theirs or ours?”

“Theirs, of course, I didn’t know you’d washed a load.”

“Okay, so what?”

The Anderson’s bed sheets weren’t hanging out on Sunday, observed Jerry.

“Or,” he added, “Saturday, or any of the days preceding. Today is Monday. What does that tell you, eh, Anna?”

“That you’re spying on the neighbours? I don’t know, Jerry, there could be a hundred reasons.”

“But why every Monday, is what I’m asking. Why not the weekend when most of us are free?”

Anyway, adds Jerry, hanging on to his wife’s hands which she has threatened to pull away to get on with her daily routine, anyway, forget about the Anderson’s backyard, look closer, he implores.

“Closer?”

“Yes, look at the space between their house and ours. Look closely into the air. And once you spot it, watch the two birds, they are bee eaters of course, you know that. Watch them.”

Anna stares into the distance with an effort. Then she sees them. Trapped in a ray of sunlight. A whirling spiral of insects, like dust motes. They are engaged in some crazy dance with no apparent rhythm. Hundreds of them, thousands even, forming a nearly invisible spinning column. Nearly invisible to the human eye — all except Jerry’s, that is ... and of course the two bee eaters. The birds are taking turns, diving into the column, beaks flung wide. Breakfast on the wing. After every sortie they fly to the Anderson’s colour bond fence and perch there awhile, digesting their morsels of good fortune.

“That’s amazing,” says Anna.

“Okay, now look past the Anderson’s,” says Jerry.

“And what am I looking for this time?” asks Anna.

“An idea. Don’t you see it? Out there. Okay, off you go now. Time for me to draw it in and set it down in writing.”

As they say, sometimes it is hard for a writer to convince someone he’s hard at work while he appears to be simply staring out a window.

Kevin Martin is a freelance journalist based in Sydney, Australia.