The Bird Incident causes goosebumps
Chilling even days later, I can only refer to it as The Bird Incident.
Up until then, it had been a normal bird spring in our backyard.
We have three bird houses on the side of the garage, visible from the kitchen. Every spring and summer, we watch the comings and goings of the various sparrow families.
Their little dramas play out while we lamely interpret them in human terms. “Oh look, they’re arguing.” “Oh look, they’re telling that other one to stay away.” “Oh look, she wants to watch The Voice while the hockey game’s on.”
We can’t really know what birds are thinking. They are animals. And they have bird brains. Proof: I had to stop quite suddenly the other day for a pair of geese ambling across the road. I thought it was kind of cute. I indulged them with my superior human empathy. But later I thought, “Wait a second. You’ve just migrated 2,000 miles by FLYING. Who are you kidding?”
I’m not one of those bird people who know what kind of bird it is just by looking at it or hearing the noise it makes. I know crows, though. A few years ago, I hit one on my motorcycle. THUNK. It nailed my chest like a punch. Then it started flapping wildly until it righted itself and flapped off. Took three seconds, felt like 30. Stupid crow and its murderous friends.
Birds. They’re just creepy. When you find a dead one, they always seem to be accusing you with their rigor mortis claws and beady little black eyes. And you always have to wear gloves when you pick them up because they’re undoubtedly crawling with some kind of something.
Birds are best enjoyed from a distance, in other words. I knew that even before The Bird Incident. There we were, seeing the sparrows do their thing when a robin arrived and started trying to build a nest on top of one of the birdhouses. “OK, this is going to get awkward,” I thought.
But it wasn’t conflict between the species that caused The Bird Incident. The sparrows ignored the robin as she placed twigs on the roof while her mate watched from the fence. It was going to be fun to watch — the nesting, the eggs, the hatching, the chicklets (that’s what baby robins are called).
If nothing else, it sure made doing dishes more interesting. I looked up from a dinner plate. The robin was flying past the apple tree with a ball of string in her beak. So cute! So clever! I looked down to wash a fork. I looked up. The robin was hanging lifeless from a tree branch, string around its neck.
What the ... ? I couldn’t believe it. Alive and making plans one second and then strangled by your own building material the next? What kind of a world is this? The robin swayed like an executed prisoner. It was horrifying. Pathetically, her helpless mate flew to the tree to bear solemn witness. I might need therapy.
I grabbed the scissors. I had to cut her down to restore some of her dignity.
I rushed outside, swung the stepladder in place and reached out. Then the robin came to life and started flapping in a fury. Miraculously, she freed herself. She wasn’t dead, just maybe shocked into paralysis by her own bad luck. She flew to the nearest fence to collect her thoughts.
The conclusions to be drawn from The Bird Incident are many and varied. Life is fleeting. Male partners should pitch in rather than stand around and chirp. And, of course, the one lesson we can all live by: don’t fly past apple trees with string in your beak. Bird brain.