October 18, 2012
Crow brought a girlfriend to the porch this morning. He hopped up below the window sill and she followed suit. She saw the cat and jumped down and wailed. But Crow kept cawing in short bursts (“It’s a cat, dear, but it’s trapped behind that see-through thing. It can’t get you.”) and M’lady finally relented.
Crow fetched acorns and dropped them at her feet. He refused to eat until she had her fill. At one point they touched beaks. It would be so easy to anthropomorphize this behavior. The beak touching may have been signing.
A huge groundhog, its coat slick and thick, also a regular porch visitor, waddled up and began depositing acorns next to the nonplussed crows. It climbed up to the porch, stood up and balanced on its butt and tail, stared at Scout the Cat and me, and began chowing down. We have something in common: no girlfriends. We’re both overweight and devoted to food.
I didn’t know it then, but I would move before baby crows came in the spring. The new house would have crows and they would discuss me but not commune. Of all the wild animals I have admired, Crow is the coolest, sleek and suave and debonair.
A red-shouldered hawk lives in the trees. I have seen it watch Crow, but it doesn’t even make an attempt at attack. I can only assume it has experienced the myriad crow families of the woods banding together, pecking and screaming at intruders. Crows aren’t cooperative, prey-wise.
Crow and his lady friend appeared for weeks, always below the window.
What did they see in me?
