Bird & Dog

The Thursday morning after i got the call about my mom, I sat on the metal bench outside the building where I work. It was a beautiful, clear day; the kind that is rare for April in South Florida. The air was a bit crisp and the sky was so blue it hurt the eyes. But I loved it! I had spoken to my Mom the night before; her spirits were up; and I had slept well. I was feeling good and peaceful.

Then, while eating an Einstein’s breakfast sandwich, I watched in amazement as a small bird whizzed by, darted left, then right, and smashed head first into a plate glass door. It fell to the ground, somewhat comically, on it’s back. Then it rolled over, it’s wings spread, and didn’t move. I was stunned. I didn’t know what to do. I looked around at first to see if anyone else had seen what I had just witnessed. But there was no one. It was just me. And the bird.

I thought to myself, “Am I being punked?” Actually, if truth be told, I thought of Candid Camera. Alan Funt was WAY before Mr. Deh-me Ashton Moore, often with funnier results.

Someone walked by a moment later, looked at the bird, or I thought they did, and kept on going. And suddenly it hit me; the panic. Oh my god, this poor bird was dying and I was the only human who witnessed it.

I dropped my sandwich and went to pick up the bird. His eyes were closed but his little body was warm and still breathing. And as I walked back to the bench I just wanted to die with sorrow. He was so beautiful. I don’t know what kind of bird he was but his feathers were almost a sage green with a tinge of white at the edge of his wings and two tiny black ringlets around his neck.

I stroked him gently, trying to comfort since there was nothing else I could do. The bird seemed to almost gasp silently and I choked. I really didn’t know what to do for him. I felt utterly helpless, useless and vulnerable.

“Don’t die! Please don’t die!” I murmured to him, covering him with both hands and willing him back to life the way they do in the movies. But I guess my life is not a Hollywood film and I don’t seem to have any kind of live-giving power.

Looking back now, a couple of days later, I realize there was something tragically poetic about holding such a tiny living creature in my hands; a creature with no boundaries, no home but the world. It’s only power the wings it was born with to simply take flight and soar to where ever he wanted, when ever he desired. I wondered where mother bird was, where had father bird disappeared to. Was he an only bird? Did he have brothers and sisters? Did he feel? Did he have emotions? Did he know what had happened to him? And I thought, how terribly sad to have no one, not even another bird, beside him while dying. And worse still, how horrible to have simply taken flight, taking for granted he would return from whence he came, or alight somewhere new, only to smash unexpectedly into something he didn’t see coming, let alone understand.

Realizing I was starting to panic, I pulled my cellphone from my pocket and called my partner. He works for a Veterinarian. I thought HE will know what to do! He couldn’t possibly be at work yet; I had left him only moments before as we left for our respective jobs.

But there was nothing he could do. The best I could hope for was that he was simply knocked unconscious. I would have to pray that he would come to eventually, and take flight again.

I don’t remember all the things I said to the bird. There was a part of me that felt kind of silly trying to explain to him why I had to leave him, that I was running late for work and could not stay watch him recover, or watch him die. I truly felt horrible as I placed him on the ground behind the bench, near a bush so he would be protected.

And then I stupidly decided that he would need food. I plucked a piece of bagel, egg, cheese and bacon (more food than a bird that size would ever need) and dropped it beside him.

I went to talk to the security guards (both women and hopefully, or so I hoped, a bit more sympathetic) about the bird. I told them what had happened but they said had witnessed it before. It wasn’t the first time; it would not be the last. I wanted to die. Didn’t anyone care about this poor little bird?

And to prove that it wouldn’t be the last time, one of the building maintenance guys, whom the security guards had been talking to before I showed up, pointed and said, “There’s another one!”

I hurried back out with one of the security guards and my heart sank. It was the same little bird. I didn’t understand. I looked towards the corner where I had laid him, hoping it was perhaps another one. But it wasn’t. Apparently another bird, big and raucous, has caught a whiff of the food I laid down for the first one. And I guess out of fear, the other bird simply took flight in the direction I had placed him and repeated his first mistake.

He was still alive when I left him to go upstairs to work. But I don’t think he made it. And I haven’t had the balls to ask the security guards about him. The image of the little bird’s tiny, broken body still haunts me. I don’t know why this should be. Perhaps because he looked so fragile? Because it was a reflection of our own fragility? A reminder of how quickly it could all be over? Or was it because watching those last few moments of the bird’s life reminded me of how life still marches on no matter how we feel?

The end of the day was no better I’m afraid. While on the way home from picking up dinner at Boston Market, my partner’s cell phone rang. It was a friend of ours. One of her neighbors, a gay couple who take their dog to the vet where my partner works, had to rush their dog to an emergency animal hospital.

There was no debate or question on what we would do. We were on our way to her house immediately. But in the 4 minutes it took to get there, the dog was gone. He lay in the back seat of their SUV covered with a green sheet not unlike the green of the bird from that morning.

I didn’t know the dog, nor his master, but I understood their grieving. And everyone, I mean everyone, in that small complex was outside comforting the two guys and crying along with them; even me. And here again, it was oddly poetic, tragically beautiful; yet inspiring all at the same time. Perhaps because it reminded me that there is still compassion in the world and that even in our sorrow we must reach out to one another to better understand our feelings.

A few minutes later, in an empty vet’s office with lengthening shadows, I helped my partner bag the dog. I tried hard not to think of our own dogs, the cats, my mom. Everyone I’ve ever known.

“This is what it comes down to?” I wondered.

We had our supper in silence while watching TV. I tried to make sense of what happened with the bird, the dog, and what lesson I was supposed to have learned from the days events. But all I could think of was how sad and beautiful it had all been. How horrible, yet inspiring to know that people had all reached out to one another. How wonderful to have witnessed first hand, the passion with which we must live each moment.

I don't remember ever crying the way I did that night, while Niko held me. I felt so numb, so pained. Every ounce of sorrow in the world seemed to have poured through me. I felt ashamed for the things I had wanted to do but kept putting off for one reason, excuse or another. And yet, strangely, I felt so alive! I don't remember feeling so passionate about the life I have yet to live.

Even now as I sit writing this, I’m not quite sure about the lesson I was supposed to have learned last Thursday. I only know that is Saturday morning. Well, almost noon. I am sitting in front of the computer, taking breaks to look out the window and watch the tree branches sway. The sky is so blue it hurts to look at it. The dogs are downstairs, out in the patio barking at passers by as morning doves croon their mournful song and the washer and dryer are going.

In a few minutes Niko will be home and I will go downstairs and hug him and squeeze him. And no, I will not call him George. But I WILL be grateful, as I am now. Grateful for him and our life together; in all it’s glorious mundaneness, in all it’s brilliantly hopeful opportunites, and all the crazy, impossible dreams we have yet to hatch.

Gratitude. Hmmm. Being grateful. Maybe that was the lesson?