I remember first wanting a BB gun around age 6. I saw them on the shelf at the local hardware store. The cool steel of the barrel. The imitation wood grain in the molded plastic stock. The curve of the trigger, anxious to be embraced by an index finger. Every feature called out to me. “You need me, Scott. There are cans and bottles and army men at your house that need to be shot.”
My mom said no. My dad, upon hearing my mom’s answer shrugged as if to say, “I guess not.” I don’t know how many times I asked for an air rifle. I’m sure I was persistent. Plus, I had a wild card.
The next Christmas, my granddad handed my brother and I identical wrapped packages. It was a long slim box, slightly heavy for its size. The weight was evenly distributed along the length of the box. It rattled slightly when shaken.
Without hesitation we tore into the wrapping. Almost immediately the familiar Daisy logo became visible. In a flash the paper was removed, the boxes were opened, and we were pouring small metal BBs into our brand new air rifles.
My parents were not thrilled. Especially my mom. My dad was, at least tolerant of the situation. The ground rules were laid out. We were not to shoot animals. We were not to aim them at each other. We were not to shoot the toward anyone’s home or vehicle. We were not to take the guns home; they would stay at my grandparents’ house.
We followed the rules, as far as anyone knew, and eventually we were allowed to bring the guns home. Once we had them at home, we, again, proved ourselves responsible and after a couple of years we were allowed to get newer, more powerful, air rifles. Pellet guns. Life was good.
I’ve never been a lover of birds. They are dirty. They are not all that pretty. And while their songs are, for the most part, appealing, many times they a just plain annoying. Early on a summer morning, a blue jay decides to sit on your windowsill and sing until his little avian heart is content. A mocking bird watches as you enjoy a quiet afternoon in the backyard and squawks as if warning the neighborhood of the invading force that is you. A family of swallows decides to make your chimney their home and sing at full volume at all hours: especially if you are trying to watch TV in the adjacent den.
Such was the case at our house. Our chimney became host to a colony of swallows. Their tweets and whistles could be heard throughout the house almost any time of day. They seemed especially active in the early morning and early evening. They also seemed to burst to life whenever we turned on the TV in the den.
They were especially active in the summer of 1984. I stayed at home that summer, usually my brother and I alone. Everyday I sat in the den and listened to the birds chirping away in the chimney. I watched TV, they chirped. I ate a snack, they chirped. I took a nap, they chirped.
Mid-summer the chirping increased. More frequent. More desperate. Higher pitch. Our chimney had become a maternity for swallows.
I took a peek up the chimney. I could see a nest attached to the brick about halfway up. It seemed empty. I moved the flue a little to get a better view. At the creaking of the flue handle the nest sprang to life.
Tiny voices began calling out in short, high-pitched bursts. The nest seemed to shake slightly. I glimpsed miniature heads bobbing up and down; back and forth with mouths open wide, eyes yet to open. The tiny creatures searched frantically for their mother, hoping to find her food bearing mouth with theirs.
I backed my head out of the fireplace and carefully closed the glass screen. I sat on the hearth listening to the hungry voices echoing up the chimney. After several minutes they quieted.
An hour later the frantic chirping resumed. The mother had returned. I went back to the chimney and peered up the flue. As I leaned into the firebox the mother either saw or sensed my movement. She flew up the smokestack with a loud flutter. Her babies’ cries following her as she escaped.
Over the next few days I noticed a pattern. Periods of quiet followed by the sounds of the mother flapping in with food; then long, loud periods of chirping. Quiet, flapping, chirps, quiet, flapping, chirps, quiet, flapping, chirps. What was cute at first quickly became annoying.
“How can I hear this woman’s bid on the Showcase Showdown if you won’t shut up!”
I felt like I was at my wits end. I changed the pattern. Quiet, flapping, chirping, shoe hits the fireplace, flapping, chirping, quiet. This didn’t seem to work. The shoe scared the mother away, but the babies only chirped longer and more desperately when she left.
I’d had enough. How am I supposed to watch Press Your Luck with all of this racket? How can I empathize with Bo and Hope with these starving birdlings squawking all afternoon? My frustration had reached the boiling point. My 10 year-old brain was reeling to find a solution.
My eyes fell to the pellet gun sitting by the back door. I have no idea why it was there. I think it was so my brother could shoot at squirrels in the oak tree in our backyard. I don’t think I had a plan. I don’t think I knew what to expect. I just decided shooting a lead projectile up the chimney might just put an end to this madness.
I grabbed the air rifle and checked the chamber. It was already loaded with a pellet. I pumped the lever two or three times to build up a charge of compressed air. I sat on the hearth and looked into the chimney. The mother was there. The babies were chirping.
With my head and body outside of the fireplace I pointed the gun up the chimney. I worked the point of the barrel around and through the flue. I pulled the trigger.
Immediately the chirping stopped. In fact there was silence. I expected flapping, fluttering. The silence was brief. A split second filled with millions of thoughts. It was broken by the rattled of a thatched nest hitting the brick floor of the fireplace. That was followed by a slight thump.
I sat frozen, afraid to look. What had I done? Finally I turned to face the carnage I had perpetrated. There in the bottom of the fireplace I saw the nest. The flat side that was only a short moment ago attached to the chimney wall faced me. Next to that lay the lifeless body of the mother swallow.
I stared in horror. The evidence of my crime stared back at me with lifeless eyes. Then I remembered the baby birds. Slowly I reached for the nest, not really wanting to see what I knew I would find. I picked up the nest and noticed the body of one of the babies underneath. I inhaled sharply, but the breath caught in my throat. I gazed at the bird as tears filled my eyes.
As I held the nest with my eyes fixed on my victims, I heard a chirp. Then another. I turned and looked in the nest. Two baby birds were still indie. They stretched out their necks and opened their mouths wide and began chirping feverishly.
“Oh God! What do I do now?” This was the only thought processing through my brain. As I sat there, my spirits lifted slightly by the miracle of these two living birds, I tried to devise a plan to keep them alive.
I should point out at this point that I realize (whether you do or not) that this was the plot of an Andy Griffith episode. Just replace the pellet gun with a slingshot and young Scott with an even younger (and black and white) Ron Howard. Even so, this story is absolutely true. Any similarities between this story and that show are purely coincidental.
I would have to feed them. That meant I would have to keep them in the house. To accomplish that, I would have to explain their presence to my parents. I went to the refrigerator and took out a piece of bologna. As I schemed I tore the meat into strips and tried to get the crying birds to eat.
I came up with a story about a falling nest. I sat innocently watching Days of Our Lives and from the closed fireplace I heard a crack and a small thud. I opened the glass enclosure to find a dead bird and her fallen nest. It must have given way under her weight when she returned home with food for her babies.
For some reason I can’t remember my dad came home around lunchtime. I told my story and he seemed to believe me. I ended up going back to his office with him for the afternoon. I, of course, could not go without my newly adopted brood.
I brought the nest and its inhabitants along with me. My dad would not let me bring them inside. I found a pine tree out front with a low but sturdy branch. I placed the nest on the branch and sat beside them for a while. I spent the next 30-35 minutes searching for worms to feed to the birds. Eventually I was ready to go inside. I told the birds I was leaving, but I would be back to check on them soon.
I went inside feeling much better about my day. I had created a tragic situation, but I was working hard to rectify things. I was confident I could raise the birds to the point where they were ready to leave the nest. After all, Opie Taylor had done it.
My episode was not destined to end as happily as Opie’s. Life, unfortunately, does not often mimic the utopian hamlet of Mayberry, NC. It is much more cruel. It is much more punitive. Our actions have consequences and those consequences are not often wrapped up with a tidy feel-good ending.
After an hour or so I came out to check on the birds. The nest was where I’d left it. When I was close enough to see inside, I stopped dead in my tracks. The nest was empty. The baby birds were gone. Only a few ribbons of dried bologna were all that remained in the nest.
I looked on the ground all around the tree. There was no trace of them anywhere.
I kept the nest for a while. Its emptiness was the punishment for my crime. The hole in the bottom of the nest a reminder of the guilt and shame I’d felt.
I have never told my parents the truth about the nest. I’m not sure they would even remember that it happened. I do. It wasn’t the only time I killed a bird, or even the last time. But I remember it over all the others.
No comments:
Post a Comment