Christmas is for the birds

I keep forgetting to tell this story. And then when I think about telling this story, I keep getting bogged down in the most boring way to tell it. I’m out of practice (although that assumes I wasn’t telling boring stories back when I was doing this regularly, and I’m not ready to make that assumption).

Let me give this a try.

Cast your mind back to Christmas, which already feels like several years ago instead of barely a month ago. We were able to bubble up with Emily, Sean, and the kids for the month of December because Sean’s school closed for the holidays (and the pandemic) right before Thanksgiving. It was great – the kids got to play together several times a week, for hours on end, inside both houses. It felt practically normal.

They came over to our house Christmas Day to have dinner (Italian catered – SO GOOD) and exchange presents and play. It was a really nice day, and then a bird flew into our house.

They were mostly in the car, heading out, and I was waving out the open back door when it happened. This bird swooped in the back door (by the driveway) with lots of flapping and took an immediate left up the back stairs. I shouted something along the lines of “HOLY FUCK A BIRD JUST FLEW IN THE HOUSE!” I slammed the door shut and chased it up the stairs. It landed on the baby gate at the top, then hopped to the floor. I carefully opened the gate, and it took off down the hallway. It flew the entire length of the house, straight down the hallway, and perched on the baby gate at the top of the front stairs, which is directly across from the front door. I shouted to John to open the front door, and while he was doing that, I crept down the hallway. Once it was open, I shooed at the bird with my hands. I may have muttered something to it about getting out of my damn house.

It listened. It flew down the stairs and straight out the front door. I was starting to feel sorry for the poor thing when I got back to the back stairs and realized there was bird shit on two of the risers and the wall. I suppose it was scared, but COME ON. Why are you flying in my house?

The thing is, this wasn’t even the first time. A few days earlier, also when Emily and Sean and the kids were leaving, a bird (same bird?) flew in as we opened the back door. It flew right back out that time. We think it might have been sitting on the super-fake, not remotely real, glitter-covered wreath. The wreath came down pretty soon after Christmas, and we haven’t had any bird sightings since.

3 Comments

  1. Momma Betty

    Your story reminds me of the time a hummingbird got into our house on Riva Ridge. Jill was coming to puppy sit for the weekend while Bob was in the hospital for chemo (about October 2015). I was getting more and more anxious because I couldn’t get the bird put of the house. Finally, Jill got there, calmed me down, and to,d me she’d take care of it. She posted a picture of her solution later. She took a broom and propped it across the open front door and the door frame. When the bird came to perch, she knocked the broom right out the front door. End of problem. More proof that Jill is a genius.

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