For the Birds

I didn’t really want to call this the dead baby bird story. Sort of takes the shine off right outta the gate, you know? I mean: no mystery, no suspense in that, right? You know there’s a baby bird and you know that it’s dead. Seems like all the story there is. ‘Course, you also know I am complex, and that there is probably a bit more to this than just a dead baby bird. So we begin.

The morning that we ended up knocking the hovel down, I saw a bird fly into this crevice up near the top of where the door out of the hovel and into the world used to be. Now, soon as I saw that, I knew without question that there had to be a nest up in there. Nary a doubt in my mind; might have been some long-buried country instinct that if you pressed me on I would deny possessing until we was out in the wild and I thought you weren’t looking. What I didn’t know, was that the hovel was coming down that day. I wonder still how things might have been different, if I’d a been knowing that. Still, what is, is, and no heap o’ sorrows can change yesterday.

The plan, and you know we always gots to have a plan, was to take the roof off and then assess options for framing in such hovel bones as was left. When mom and dad arrived, it leapt to my thoughts to say something about the bird, but I told myself to wait a minute, seeing as how we always spent a piece standing about, looking, hemming and hawing, afore we got down to the actual work of the thing.

On this day, for some incomprehensible reason, dad set right out to working. It was most unnatural, and I believe that what happened only reinforced his view that no good can come of leaping right into work; that instead, it should be eased into like a hot bath. And he somehow, of course, managed to strike in exactly the right spot to cause the maximum of delay and chaos. Down came one little board, the nest fell out on top of it, and out flopped three baby birds. We had quite a merry chase trying to catch them, too. One flew (I guess they might rightly more be called fledglings, on account as how they had more feathers than not) out into the yard and managed to fall into one of the two-foot deep holes left behind after I pulled the deck out. Mom had the task of reaching in to catch that one. Dad snatched his right up, easy as you please. Mine somehow managed to crawl under the water heater, where it promptly got stuck. After considerable debate, I took a short piece of old baseboard and gingerly pushed it out the other side, where I was able to corner and catch it.

We knew we needed to do something more, though, especially as momma and papa bird had taken to flying in and out of the hovel, angrily calling at us. I found a plastic box, put the nest and the birds (now still as soft brown stones), in it, and set the whole up on the table outside. Of course, that act was the object of fierce debate, seeing as how everyone in my family has advanced degrees in ornithology. So the box was moved to a chair far in the backyard (so we would not be perceived as a threat), but that was too far away from where the birds’ nest had been. Then it was moved to a chair closer up (so it would be closer to its original location), but that was in the direct sun. Then it was moved on top of the hurricane plywood shelf that hangs from the ceiling of the carport. This was deemed to be an acceptable location as it was both out of the way and close to where the birds had originally been.

I noticed a fourth bird (a hatchling rightly as it was not mostly feathers) when I deposited the one I caught into the box. But I thought little of it, other than “smart little bugger; staying quiet and still while the rest flapped around like maniacs”. After all, there was quite a bit of work to do, with the requisite standing around, yelled miscommunication, accident(s), and trip to Home Depot. As we worked, we checked periodically on the birds, not looking or getting up on the ladder to have a poke at them, just sort of being aware as we would walk underneath. Momma and papa bird had found the babies, and all seemed to be well. Soon enough, the hovel was down, lunch was et, and mom and dad departed, leaving me with the mess to clean up. I worked on cleaning up outside for a bit, realized that the inside of the house was a mess too and that the concrete blocks might pick themselves up if only I gave them a chance, and went inside for a spell to start cleaning in there.

It was late in the afternoon, with golden threads of sunlight trailing down through the trees before I took the trash out to the carport. As I rounded the corner, there were the three fledglings, flapping away on the ground. I swore a bit; ungrateful was what it was. All that effort, and here they were now, trying their damnedest to be hors d’ouevres for the black-and-white tom that sometimes waited around the carport garage door. I tried to catch them again, but they seemed to have grown in cunning in the last few hours. I reflected that they must have been just about ready to come out anyway; birds do spend a few days on the ground before going to a life in the trees, assuming they don’t become cat snacks in the meantime. Then I saw the one that had stayed in the nest, fallen and still, under the lawnmower.

I bent down to see if it was moving; it was, but just barely. I swore again and picked it up. It weighed nothing, but it was cold, cold as the bricks it had lain upon. I cupped it to my body and carried it inside. I had not enough coordination to use the phone book, dial the phone, and hold the bird all at the same time, so I set it on the counter. I got a hold of the Suncoast Seabird Sanctuary and the guy told me that I needed to hold the bird close to my body to warm it and that they were open until 8:30. Iwas sweaty and wearing nasty clothes, but I was ready to head out when I asked exactly where they were. He asked where I was. I told him, and he said that there was a place just up the road from me that would be much closer and to call this number. I called it and talked with a woman. She told me to fill a sock with rice, heat it in the microwave, wrap it in a washcloth, put the bird in another washcloth, put them both in a box, and how to get to her house. I did as she instructed and then hit the road.

The bird started to perk up: eyes brighter, moving a bit, opening its mouth, and I felt good. Then it stopped moving. I’m not sure where it happened, because I had to watch the road a little. But I arrived at the woman’s house and the bird was dead. I hoped that it wasn’t, but I knew, I knew. I am sure too that I killed it: the sock full of rice must have been too hot, and that movement was the bird trying to get away from the heat, the little peeps calls of distress that I didn’t understand. On top of it, the woman didn’t even open the door once I got there. I knocked and rang the doorbell; the birds in her house heard me, letting up such a racket as I don’t know how she could have not heard.

Then I left. Not much use for me to stand around waiting to hand some woman who can’t answer her door a dead bird. I drove home and thought about things on the way. How the bird would have died if I hadn’t tried to do something; how it’d died anyway. When I used to work at the aquarium, there was a lady that had a poster with a story on it in her cubicle. I don’t remember the name of the story, or even if it had a name, but it went something like this: a boy and his grandfather were walking down the beach after a storm. A great many sea stars had washed up on the shore, and the boy stopped and picked up every one he came across and threw it back into the sea. After a while, the grandfather said to him “You can’t save all of them, you know.” The boy looked at his grandfather and said “I know.” Then he picked up another sea star, threw it into the water and said “But I saved that one.” I know I can’t save everything and everyone, but that doesn’t mean I won’t try.