birds

Haunted

/ sweetsaraline

My mother is sad that I don’t have more memories of her grandfather.

“Don’t you remember that he had a crow?” she asks. “And it would untie your shoelaces?”

I shake my head. I wish I remembered that. Was I upset that the crow kept untying my shoelaces, or did I think it was funny? I guess the crow that that I was funny if it wanted to play with me. I picture the glossy, black feathers and the big beak as shiny as a new record. It cocks its head side to side, watching me, and as soon as I let my guard down, it dives to my feet and pulls the string out of the loop again before making a dramatic escape.

I can picture my great-grandfather’s crow, but I don’t remember it.

I do, however, remember his haunted piano. He’s sitting on the bench smiling while the keys move up and down on their own. His hands rests on his knees while the piano plays its own jaunty tune without his assistance. He watches to see my reaction, and when I stare at the piano in wonder, he slaps his knee and laughs.

Sometimes I root for the squirrel

/ sweetsaraline / 1 Comment

A squirrel rests on its haunches next to a dumpster in the elementary school parking lot one morning when my son is still small. It has found a cherry danish, and what a find it is. The danish is almost as big as the squirrel. It clutches either side of this special treat with its two front paws. Its paws are getting sticky from the sugary glaze, but it is an uncultured rodent, so the squirrel doesn’t care. It nibbles on the cherry danish happily.

We hear a “Ssssscreeeeeeeee!” from the sky, like a pterodactyl announcing its presence in a dinosaur movie. There is an answering chorus of “Scree! Scree!” I look up to see a flock of seagulls coming for the squirrel with the cherry danish.

The squirrel sees them, too. It pauses for a couple of seconds so it can look at the seagulls in terror, and then it drops on all fours and runs with the very in-demand pastry grasped in its teeth.

My son and I cheer the squirrel on as we watch it running for its life across the parking lot and school yard. The shadow from the flock follows menacingly. And they’re gaining, they’re gaining, and—

The squirrel runs up a tree.

Maybe you’re thinking that a tree doesn’t seem like the best place to escape from a flock of birds, but this flock of birds has webbed feet that cannot cling to branches. All the seagulls can do is land on the ground next to the tree and look around angrily while the squirrel enjoys its hard-won cherry danish.