Thursday
Jul082010
A Crow and Her Mate and I
Thursday, July 8, 2010
I was walking my usual route to my most usual watering hole yesterday when, part way through my route, I felt pulled to walk on one side of the street rather than the other. I stopped to consider this for a moment, because, weird, this being pulled to walk on the east rather than the west side of the street, but I’ve learned to listen to these urges. There are points of significance when I do.
So, I turned the corner and walked on the less-than-usual east side of the street.
Halfway down the block, I caught some movement out of the corner of my eye. I looked down to see a smaller crow shuffling around on a lawn only two or three feet from me. When I stopped and looked down at her, she hunched a wing and affected a stagger.
photo credit: "My first Crow shot!" by suchitra prints
I wish I could explain how this happens, this thing that happens to me. I am often closed off, shut down from outside emotions. It's a defensive measure, because I can feel stronger emotions from people and animals to a sometimes debilitating degree. On occasion, though, like yesterday, I am caught with my defenses down.
I felt this prickling rush of grief cover and fill my whole body. Her fear and grief was staggering. Tears rushed, too, and I turned to look for her partner. I had to see it, too. I had to know. I found him twenty feet back lying on his side in the street. He was dead.
I've seen this at least twice before. Crows have strong pairbonds, generally mating for life, and they will try to draw attention away from their injured partner just as they would draw attention away from their nest of babies by behaving as though they are easy prey. Once, a male crow latched onto a fire hydrant and leaned out to bite my hands as he defended his injured mate. I cried then, too.
I walked back toward the female crow. He's gone, girl, I said. She cocked her head up at me, and we watched each other's eyes. You don't know that yet, but he's gone. She sidled left, then right, and then stopped to eye me again and listen to me speak.
As the sadness ebbed a little, I realized that, objectively, I was a woman openly weeping over a crow and talking to his partner out loud in the street about grief and loss. I didn't want to be seen when I was so strange and vulnerable. I walked away from her. I turned a sharp left and crossed in the middle of the street. I couldn't handle her feelings inside my chest, not when I could do nothing for her.
I hope she lets him go peacefully. I hope she has young to distract her. Crows can stay like this for days, and a grieving crow is sometimes destroyed by pest control if they become too aggressively protective and pose a threat to people.
I just can't shake her, that point of significance I found on the east side of the street. I can't shake the look of her as she staggered on that lawn and cocked her head, turning her eye in its socket to take all of me in.
So, I turned the corner and walked on the less-than-usual east side of the street.
Halfway down the block, I caught some movement out of the corner of my eye. I looked down to see a smaller crow shuffling around on a lawn only two or three feet from me. When I stopped and looked down at her, she hunched a wing and affected a stagger.
photo credit: "My first Crow shot!" by suchitra prints
I wish I could explain how this happens, this thing that happens to me. I am often closed off, shut down from outside emotions. It's a defensive measure, because I can feel stronger emotions from people and animals to a sometimes debilitating degree. On occasion, though, like yesterday, I am caught with my defenses down.
I felt this prickling rush of grief cover and fill my whole body. Her fear and grief was staggering. Tears rushed, too, and I turned to look for her partner. I had to see it, too. I had to know. I found him twenty feet back lying on his side in the street. He was dead.
I've seen this at least twice before. Crows have strong pairbonds, generally mating for life, and they will try to draw attention away from their injured partner just as they would draw attention away from their nest of babies by behaving as though they are easy prey. Once, a male crow latched onto a fire hydrant and leaned out to bite my hands as he defended his injured mate. I cried then, too.
I walked back toward the female crow. He's gone, girl, I said. She cocked her head up at me, and we watched each other's eyes. You don't know that yet, but he's gone. She sidled left, then right, and then stopped to eye me again and listen to me speak.
As the sadness ebbed a little, I realized that, objectively, I was a woman openly weeping over a crow and talking to his partner out loud in the street about grief and loss. I didn't want to be seen when I was so strange and vulnerable. I walked away from her. I turned a sharp left and crossed in the middle of the street. I couldn't handle her feelings inside my chest, not when I could do nothing for her.
I hope she lets him go peacefully. I hope she has young to distract her. Crows can stay like this for days, and a grieving crow is sometimes destroyed by pest control if they become too aggressively protective and pose a threat to people.
I just can't shake her, that point of significance I found on the east side of the street. I can't shake the look of her as she staggered on that lawn and cocked her head, turning her eye in its socket to take all of me in.
Reader Comments (19)
oh how sad, crows are so intelligent and characterful, emotional too..... I would have been upset too
Wow. That was a powerful post. I could feel exactly what you meant as I read it. And I could understand it too. I, too am so...overcome? by the strength of emotions that I feel, that I don't always know how to handle it, to go with it. So I avoid. I protect. I try not to let myself get soooo affected. But it catches me sometimes, when I'm not looking, and wham. I understand.
I am so sorry for that crow's loss. I am really happy that you were there for her.
That post sent chills from my head to my feet. Wow.
It was beautiful and I completely understand how empathy can sometimes be too much to bear. Very well written, my dear.
I never knew crows mated for life or made themselves so vulnerable to protect an injured loved one. Usually I don't give them a second thought. To me they are a menace, ripping open garbage bags while savaging for food scraps. Not that pretty and obnoxiously loud. Your post put them in a different prospective - thank you. A nice reminder to look for and see the good and wonderful qualities of all living things.
I am heartbroken for that poor bird. I get all weepy when things like that happen. I saw a swan last week whose mate had died. He was utterly lost and I admit tears filled my eyes when no one was looking.
this is one of your best peices of writing....period.
Really lovely & sad.
I've always loved crows. No other bird can make stealing onion rings look so dignified.
This was a gorgeous bit of writing.
It seems a little silly when I step back from it, but I feel glad that you were there for that bird. Thanks for sharing the moment.
Yes, it's sad. Birds in general mate for life. I once saw a frantic robin hopping around near her dead mate, flattened by a car in the street. She was there crying for days. I cried for days myself. But I feel worse for the crow because I love her best.
Beautifully written...you captured that vunerable empathy very well. Crows often surprise, (I've been dived bombed twice in one day recently!)and annoy (they sit outside on our birch tree at dawn "cawing" to each other, but just as often they make me laugh. I think of them as the "wise guys" of the bird world. But you have also captured another side as well....loyalty and dare I say love....
beautiful. just beautiful.
What a moving vignette.
Birds, especially crows, figure in many native-American stories. They are Big Medicine. If you noticed her pieced together what happened and felt empathy, then you got a taste of something bigger than us but universal to us.
But I know what ya mean about the thin membrane that separates me from the world--I feel everything, and I feel it strongly. Would love to dial that down a notch or two every now and then.
I have the same response to animals it seems as you.
Just reading this story made me tear up, and I wasn't even present.
The other night while walking my dog I nearly stepped on a tiny baby garden snake. He lunged at me, snappy fiercely at us, trying desperately to protect himself. After leaping over him I looked closer to see that he'd been run over. Parts of his stomach were stuck to the asphalt, and as he writhed and tried to bite at me and slither away, his insides literally anchored him to the pavement.
My eyes were welling up with tears because I could tell he was hurt, and scared, and completely unsure why he was unable to escape.
I wanted to help him, end his life, or maybe even save it, but I couldn't bring myself to finish what the car had started.
In the end I simply had to walk away and try to forget his struggle with tears sliding down my cheeks for a snake. I knew if anyone knew why I was crying they would think I was out of my mind.
Your story just reminded me of that poor snake, and the tears are back.
We should start a club. Or maybe a rescue. Or maybe just a hugging circle will do.
Crows are my favorite birds. They are extremely intelligent, loyal and loving family members. I always say (yes, out loud) hello to the crows in my neighbourhood. If people think I'm crazy, too bad. What a beautiful tribute to an awesome creature.
I'm getting soft in my old age or something, because this totally jabbed me in the heart. Poor crow. Empathetic Schmutzie. Oof.
Hoo boy, do I know that feeling of intense grief and regret when it comes to birds. You've written it absolutely beautifully.