 Birds of a Feather
After dinner, I still read but I rarely do it outside. This type of weather encourages mosquitoes, and I am, unfortunately, a particularly favorite feast of the nasty critters. Better that I feast rather than be feasted upon even if that means not sitting outside in the cooler evening air. Instead, I curl up on one of the sofas that borders floor-to-ceiling windows where I can watch the mountains turn color and the birds fly by where I choose what to read from the pile of books and magazines on the coffee and end tables. One of those books has turned out to be surprisingly enthralling: The Verb ‘To Bird’: Sightings of an Avid Birder. Note that I am not a bird enthusiast. I like birds. I like the sounds of birds, even crows. I like their look. I admire their wings in flight and enjoy having them in trees and bushes around me. But I wouldn’t dream of getting up way before the sun rises, drive long distances, and trudge through mud, marshes, brush, and other natural obstacles to observe and then record my observations. In short, I am not and never will be a “birder.” Yet this book has me in its grip as surely as the unfortunate salmon that was plucked from the river by the bald eagle. In simpler words, it is perfect, a work of art in prose form. And I say this, again, as a non-birder, that I had no idea it could be so interesting. What makes this book so good? Its author, Peter Cashwell, a man I know only through an online book forum to which we both belong, has superb storytelling skills and a marvelous sense of humor, which makes the book excellent reading to people who are not birders. (Of course, birders will no doubt find it doubly fascinating, but it takes a lot, in my opinion, to make a book about a specialty interest great reading to those not so inclined.) As a high school English teacher, Cashwell begins the book with an amusing look at bird as a noun and verb. But you might not realize the complex history of the word and of its variations if you, like me, do not suffer from BCD (Birding Compulsive Disorder). Cashwell does. In truth, my mind is less distracted by birding than inordinately pleased with it, probably because birding is as much an intellectual passion as an emotional one. . . . Birding is one of the few outdoor activities that demand more of your powers of observation and deduction than of your physical abilities. This doesn’t mean birders are necessary smarter than non-birders: the stereotype of the bookish, eccentric intellectual compensating for his shortcomings of character and physique by taking up birding is just that: a stereotype. It is demonstrably true that not all birders make or have made good grades. It’s just that we like to correct other people. . . . And if I’m right when everyone else is wrong, so much the better. Birding is something of a contest, after all; you can succeed or fail in your attempt to identify a particular bird, despite years of experience, proper equipment, or even all the skill in the world—that’s what makes it interesting. . . . It’s even more satisfying, I think, because your opponent is no mere mortal. It’s Mother Nature herself, and she plays for blood. She knows all the trick: poor lighting, bad weather, thick foliage, muddy plumage, all kinds of ways to keep you from achieving your goal. She a defense-minded player, usually content to frustrate her opponents’ attacks, driving them home with empty count lists, frustrated and damp. Only rarely does she take a serious offensive posture, sending a birder over a cliff or into the jaws of a full-grown alligator, but, like a good power forward, she’s not shy about getting physical in order to discourage you. She’ll rub blisters on your heels, pour bacteria into your lungs, and fill your socks with wood ticks just as soon as look at you. When I get information out of an opponent like that, I don’t feel as though I’ve merely pulled down on offensive rebound in traffic—I feel like I’ve made the highlight reel. Cashwell lives in rural Virginia, but he doesn’t hesitate to bird on any trip anywhere, alone or with other birders. Keeping an accurate life list is essential to birders, and as he notes, birders are inherently and scrupulously honest about their lists. Birders with more limited means or the inability to travel can keep yard lists, which produces its own set of accomplishments, frustrations and, through Cashwell’s eyes, hilarity—squirrels as bird feeder thieves. He has also found birds in the bushes, specifically a turkey vulture. That appeared to be hurt. Hiding in boxwood, a notoriously thick and spiny shrub. Cashwell is in a dilemma. Should he grab it, and could he given that he’d need to cut through greenery first. Then, can he? Would the bird realize his actions were ones of concern and not predatory? It was, as Cashwell noted, his intelligence and opposable thumb versus the bird’s “nasty hooked beak and a pair of nasty hooked claws” plus a defensive position that made him hesitate. Who would win if it came down to a battle? And even if he did mange to cut the bird free, did he want to? “This is an animal, after all, which eats liquefying meat from animals who have long since rung down the curtain and joined the choir invisible.” So he did the best thing he could: he put a cold chicken frank down in front of the bush and retreated only to see later than the vulture had found its way out and taken to the wing, minus the chicken frank, which was probably too fresh for its taste. One of the funniest and most touching chapters concerns owls and Christmas. One specific Christmas time (1996) when the stress levels, already high from commercial pressures, multiple religious traditions, and holiday decorating, were compounded by:
And now I’ll let Cashwell take over: By the end of the trip I was gripping the steering wheel hard enough that I could easily have taken it with me into my parents’ house. Instead, I pried my fingers off and took the kids inside, putting off the unloading of the car for a while. I didn’t know it yet, but that decision would be an important one for me. When, later, he did go out to remove the luggage, it was a sound—Hooo, hooo, hoo-hoo-hoo, hoooooo—that left him stunned. It was the sound of the Great Horned Owl. He hooted in return and then . . . received a reply. After identifying the bird’s location, he returned to the house for binoculars. She wasn’t huge, as Great Horned Owls go, probably a little less than two feet in lenth, but she sat on the locust branch in full glory, her brown feathers blackened and grayed by the moon and the shadows, her horns clearly outlined against the deep blue of the northwestern sky. She called again, and this time I heard, from across the marsh, another fainter series of hoots answering it—a slightly different pattern, a male. She replied, and the two owls sat quietly, contentedly, and talked. I stood in the moonlight in the December night under a crystalline sky and listened. After a while, I went inside and brought my mother out to see the owl, and when the kids were finally asleep, I brought out my wife. She stood in the darkness, looking at a bird-shaped shadow that was doing nothing more than hooting, and by doing so both gave a present to me and received a present from me. She looked because it was important to me, not yet knowing she would see something strange and magical; and she looked because she could tell from my face that the worst was over; there was no holiday stress that could take from me the vision and sound of this owl moon. It was a gift beyond words. “A gift beyond words.” I am feeling that way about this book. The beauty of the writing, the stories so wonderfully related, the humor throughout, the inter-relationships of life, family, community, work, friends, passion, nature. I am not surprised it is published by Paul Dry Books, a boutique house that specializes in high quality. This is the kind of book that explains why I find non-fiction often so much more compelling than fiction. It’s not just facts; it’s a series of real stories put together in such a way that they are life. Sometimes messy, sometimes heartrending, sometimes crazy, sometimes hilarious, sometimes bland. But they are all told in one beautiful tale. Such is my reading this week. Upcoming Book Festivals and Fairs: Location: Iowa City, Iowa Location: Allentown, Pennsylvania Location: Cowan, Tennessee The Pub House: Imaging Books & Reading: Of Interest: Until next week, read well, read often and read on!
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The summer is upon us here in Santa Barbara with a vengeance. While our temperatures may seem mild compared to those elsewhere—Texas, the Midwest, the South, even our southern neighbor city, Los Angeles—it is hot for us and, unusually, muggy. For the last week, I have been coming home to a house that when I step in the front door feels like the inside of my oven on Thanksgiving Day. Even the cats’ dinner has to wait while I rush to close windows and turn on the air conditioning.