Maquinna's Poop du Jour

Flight Lessons

I like to joke that I have a 'corner office' - but really what it is is a broom-closet sized space within a larger office that happens to be in a corner and has a pair of corner windows. It's no joke, however, that I have one of the best views on campus through brick-framed windows thickly lined with ivy. The vines and the berries that grow on them, along with the landscaping below, provide the perfect habitat for an endless National Geographic nature series.

Last year, mourning doves nested on one of the sills, and I watched as the parents took turns sitting on the pair of eggs. I got as excited as a kindergartner when I saw the first evidence of the babies having been born, and continued to watch them as they got so big the parents could barely contain them under their own bodies. Eventually, my own curiosity got the better of me and I thought I could try opening the window and getting a close-up photo of them while the parents were out foraging. Unfortunately, I scared one of the babies so badly when I did this that it took a very impromptu first flight lesson and I never saw it again. I have no idea how it fared.

This afternoon we could all hear chirping outside my windows. Through the ivy I eventually spied a baby cardinal sitting on a leaf stem. The parents were flying up and down in front of the baby like they were suspended on yo-yos. I wasn't sure at first what was going on, but it soon became apparent that this was the cardinal equivalent of teaching your kid how to drive.

Next to my office is the copy room, and the window in that overlooks my windows. I went in there to get a better vantage point, and the baby saw me, shot out off the leaf, and flew straight towards me, into the window beak first. It fell to the sill and I swear it shook its head as though dazed and seeing stars. The parents went ballistic and started flapping closer, but backing off once they saw the audience through the window.

The baby got back on its feet and kept trying to fly. It would get lift-off, rise a few inches, then land back on the sill. The mother and the father flanked the baby left and right, squawking encouragement. I even thought I detected a note of frustration as the baby refused to turn itself out towards the air, and kept trying to fly through the window!

Other staff and some faculty showed up to watch the show, and eventually we all got talking about one thing after another...and before we knew it, we couldn't hear any more chirping. We looked out the window, and the baby and its parents were gone. They weren't on the ground, or in any of the nearby bushes, so I have to assume they managed to get the baby flying at least some little distance.

I am sure, however, that I saw the same expression on the faces of the baby cardinal's parents as I did on my own, as they endured me grinding the gears and popping the clutch of the car.

posted by Maquinna @ 3:42 p.m.