making a nest

Watching a youtube video of a trigger fish making a nest I was drawn into the incredible world of nestmaking. Looking at these animal nests I realised we have over complicated nest making with our fancy houses and furniture and so on. The essence of nest making is some repetitive therapeutic activity like weaving sticks in and out of each other, piling on leaves, layering cardboard, cutting snow blocks or any other super basic humannest building skill. Making a nest is fun and calming. I think it is better to think of a nest than a 'shelter' which is rather cold and objective. A nest has to be charming and cosy. I remember a picture of a medieval scholar in a sort of wooden nest with books and a desk inside a vast drafty cathedral. Derek Jarman once squatted a warehouse and lived within a glass nest- a greenhouse he put up in the middle. You can model nests too which can be interesting. Of course a treehouse or a burrow are closest to animal nests. Building a treehouse from similar sized pieces of scrap wood works well in nest building terms. The best nests are decorated inside and out.