Birds of a Feather

First , you should know that I’m not a big bird person.  Besides the actual Big Bird, I don’t particularly like avian creatures, especially if they’re talking, angry, or Angry.   

Second, I don’t consider myself a particularly nurturing person.      

That’s why the events of this past Saturday were a bit shocking.  Well, at least, they were to me. 

See, I was heading over to my friends’ house for dinner and as I was leaving my development, I saw a bird in the middle of the road, clearly injured or in some other sort of bird distress.  As I passed it and drove on by – because it was just a bird after all – I glanced into my rear-view mirror and saw a hawk swoop down to try to pick off that little bird.  Hawk’s gotta eat, yo. 

What I saw next made me do something that was atypical of my bird-hating, un-nuturing self.   See, as that hawk went in for the kill, the little hurt bird’s birdie friends flew down and tried to protect it.  They flew in and chirped and batted their wings and that hawk flew away.  And the little hurt bird continued to struggle in the middle of the road. 

That’s when I flew into action (first use of a pun in 20 days!)

Commence Operation Save Wounded Birdie. 

I made a quick left and turned around to come back up the street.  As I was driving back up, the Death Hawk swooped down again.  And once again, the birdie friends scared him off. 

I turned onto a side street trying to figure out what to do because I didn’t have any sort of plan. Honestly, these types of situations are a little beyond me.  I mean, I have friends whom, I’m pretty sure, have the emergency animal clinic on speed-dial but me, what do I know about saving animals?  Cats are one thing.  Birds are a completely different animal.  Literally!  But in the moment, I didn’t care because I was going to Save. That. Bird. 

As I was on the second point of my three-point U-turn to get back to the scene of the bird drama, I saw the battle between predator and prey replay for a third time.  But then a passing car forced the protector birds to take flight.  That gave Death Hawk its opening and it swooped down and, well…Bye Bye Birdie.  I guess you could say Death Hawk got carry-out that night. 

I know it’s all survival of the fittest and all that but I found the whole situation to be very powerful.  Realistically, even if I had been able to save that little bird – or at least move it to the side of the road – it probably wouldn’t have survived.  But yet that little bird – hurt and broken – valiantly tried to hang on as it struggled to survive in the middle of a big, scary mess that it found itself in.  And in those last few moments before it became hawk food, that little bird’s friends were doing all they could to protect it.  It made me think...well, yes, birds of a feather do flock together.

And hawks are just mean.