Grief In Our World

I am so very sad to report that the baby birds, at only 2 and 3 days old, did not survive. The details of their death is a mystery. It could have been a number of things. I went out of town to have dinner with some friends and knew I would be home really late. I left the porch light on, eventhough I had up to this time made a point NOT to have the light on at night. It shines right down on the nest. I do not know if this detail had an impact on the final outcome. When I arrived home around 11pm, having had non-stop rain and wind, I discovered the nest had fallen and was up-side-down on the ground. The baby birds could not have survived the fall. Even if they had, I did not have the nerve to check. I thought through all the possibilities--had the light made them prone to attack? Had the mother/father bird perched on the nest (which had been hanging precariously off the ledge for the last couple of days) and it fell? Had the wind or rain caused the fall?

I'll never know. But it was sad.

I do not enter into the presence of death very easily. I have had several baby birds die in my yard over the past few years. In fact, I think I have at least one every spring. I have always had to call my friends Julie or Stephanie to help me remove dead animals--even if there is no gore. Last summer my long time pet rabbit, Rumsey, had to be put down by the vet. They took special care to wrap him in a blanket and and additional outer wrappings. They had him in the pet carrier, wrapped up, when I went to retrieve his body to bury him. Again, my friend, Julie, had to come over and pick him up out of the carrier to place him in the hole I dug in my back yard. I wept like a baby. You can look back at a posting I made last fall, when I was considering getting another pet hamster for my classroom. I am often disuaded simply by the fact that I do not want to have to endure the little pet's death. I've buried two other hamsters and suffered a dark cloud on those days. It seems so trivial, just a hamster, but it is flat out miserable for me.

Friday night the black cloud visited again. I was sick to my stomach thinking of the little birds' death. I thought about the mom and dad robin. Saturday morning when I left my home, I pulled the front door shut behind me, and sitting on the branches where they had always been every morning were mom and dad robin. They began their loud screeching and fluttering around. It was a quick snapshot of grief. I don't know if birds grieve or not. But I know these birds were aware of something. They were behaving as if they were very angry. Understandably so. It was as if they met me at the door because we were the three living creatures who were witness to the deaths. I just stood there, face to "face" with them. I watched and listened to them. Call me crazy, but I had been talking to Rosalee every day when I walked by her nest to my front door--telling her in a soft voice (hoping it would keep her from attacking me) that she was such a good mother. This morning she spoke clearly back at me. After a moment of watching them (and I do mean they were looking right at me--perhaps scolding me, I do not know), I told them I was so sorry about the babies.

I haven't seen mom and dad robin since.