Wednesday, July 7, 2010

Clarice: Rest in Peace, Loved Dove

Nature can be a beautiful, fragile and wonderful thing, and sometimes it can be brutal and ruthless. We humans navigate our world, mostly with bulldozers and cement, but somehow we fail to completely annihilate the natural world. I don't know if we all possess a moral compass when it comes to caring about the creatures we so easily displace as we build our houses and roads and schools and businesses. I suppose this is as variable, beautiful, fragile, brutal and ruthless as nature itself.

We found the baby bird just before Memorial Day. There she lay on the grass just before dusk, looking somewhat stunned as ants crawled purposefully across her body. Her blood feathers were sticking out, covering her back and wings, and leaving stubbly gray bald patches here and there. Herbert said "Leave her. That's nature. Let nature do its thing," but I couldn't stand the idea of the ants darting across her body, taking small bites until they had taken her last breath. Obligation. I was obligated now, thanks to my nagging conscience. But what do you do with a baby bird? I looked for her nest (she was situated next to a large tree), but I could find no trace of it. I didn't want to touch her. She looked sick and something ingrained in me feared contamination. But the ant situation was bothering me. I ran into the house and searched the closets for a shoe box, found one, and filled it with tissue paper. I ran back to my new charge and placed her gingerly in the box. I had no hope of her surviving, but at least she wouldn't be eaten alive.

It's particularly handy when one finds oneself in such a predicament, to have a father who not only loves animals, but is also a veterinarian. So I called my father (panicked), hoping he would be able to tell me what to do with this little bird. We speculated about the type of bird I had found (I was clueless and took a photo and emailed it to him). The good father/doctor then told me to keep her safe and warm, and to make sure she got some nourishment. He recommended catching a spider and giving it to her. Now I'm not a squeamish kind of girl, but the idea of catching a spider and feeding it to this sick looking baby bird I didn't even want to touch was kind of freaking me out. But I was obligated, you see. And so I dutifully took the flashlight out to the yard, pushed up some leaves around one of the bushes, and immediately a group of angry looking arachnids scurried out. Armed with tissue, I grabbed one, and apologized to it before half crushing the life out of it. In the food chain, bird trumps spider. And human definitely trumps spider. Triumphantly, I ran back to the shoe box and presented the bird with the spider. She wasn't interested in the offering. After watching untold hours of Discovery Channel and Animal Planet, I fully expected this creature to open her mouth and let me shove food in there. But she didn't do that. She just looked warily at me, the big featherless bird that had placed her in an alien-smelling shoe box and offered her a spider in an apparently unacceptable way.

That night, I put the shoe box in an animal-free zone in the house (with three dogs and a cat I was worried that our home might be every bit as dangerous as the great wide open). Though I was obligated at this point, I was not emotionally invested, so the next morning when I went to check the box, I was somewhat resigned to the fact that the little creature wouldn't have made it through the night. I was wrong. There she was peeping up at me with a look that said "feed me." I called my father again and he told me I'd probably have to hold her beak open to get the nourishment (spider) in, and that she might also be weak and dehydrated. I would have to get over my aversion and handle the creature. I placed her on the back porch (in her box) and grabbed a piece of watermelon from the fridge, and then rustled up another spider (I was getting good at this). I gingerly held the bird's head with one hand, and tried to open her beak with my thumb and index finger while pushing crushed bits of watermelon into her mouth. She eagerly gulped at the melon and seemed to want more. I was delighted. I gave her more melon, and shoved the half dead spider in for good measure. At least she was getting some fluid and nourishment now. I was beginning to feel optimistic. My father had also suggested getting some baby cereal and creating a kind of formula for the bird, so off I went to the grocery store, where I procured some pear and mango and rice baby food, baby cereal and an eye dropper. When I tried to feed her with the eye dropper, the little bird perked up and immediately demanded more and more and more. Obligation was turning into involvement now. there was no turning back. I dubbed my little foundling Clarice, and resolved to nurse this creature back to health until she was strong enough to be rehabilitated into the wild.

After a few days, Herbert (the "leave it to nature" spouse), became every bit as interested as I was to check Clarice's progress, watch her at feeding time, coo at her and nestle her in his hand. We now had an adopted baby, and we doted on this creature as if she were our very own child. It soon became apparent to me that the shoe box would not do for a long stint. It was dark in there, and she couldn't see us or her surroundings. So off I went to Petco, where I selected a parakeet cage, and while there also picked up a huge bag of seed for when Clarice could be weaned off of formula.

As the days passed, Clarice became stronger and stronger and more and more alert. She flapped her wings excitedly whenever we approached, and became quite demanding when it was time to be fed. She enjoyed being cuddled, and it was obvious that we had all bonded in a big way. This strengthening of body and confidence continued for nearly six weeks. We had learned that Clarice was a Mourning Dove, and that these sweet birds can live up to 30 years with good care and in the absence of predators. We began to introduce her, slowly, to the world outside of her cage for longer periods. The patio became her playground, and as she had been weaned off of formula, she eagerly pecked at the premium finch seed we provided her with, made use of the little water dish we gave her, and generally flourished under our care. Soon she was stretching her wings, making little excursions up to the top of the roof and the patio umbrella - but would never stay up there for very long. Then one day she disappeared all day. I was sad about this, but assumed that she had taken her leave of us. But then the next morning there she was, fluttering her wings, running toward me, demanding a scratch behind the neck and a new supply of finch seed. I was pleased that she was able to navigate, explore, and find her way back home. She seemed to be on the road to independence, but still checked in every few hours to let us kow all was well.

After a while she began to hang out in a tree on the edge of the patio. I could sit there and watch her, and she could watch me and the skies. When I put her back in her cage for the night she was very unhappy, and fluttered around until she was exhausted. She lost some feathers and it was clear that this wild creature had outgrown her temporary man-made home. With some reservations, I let her stay in her tree the following night. I checked on her frequently, but she seemed to be up high and away from cats and foxes (my primary concern), always looking around vigilantly. This continued for a couple of weeks: she would perch on the tree at night, and go off exploring during the day, coming home intermittently to eat and drink and interact with her humans. It was kind of a nerve-wrecking situation: on the one hand, she was a wild thing and needed to be in her element; on the other hand, she had been hand-raised in captivity and was perhaps not equipped to deal with the dangers of the wild. But I let go of reservations, reasoning that our patio was a predator-free sanctuary for Clarice. One night I realized how naive this idea was. Clarice was up in her tree, and I was on the patio. Suddenly a peregrine falcon dive-bombed the tree, chasing Clarice in hot pursuit of a meal. Falcons are bird-eating raptors, and can travel (in a stoop) in excess of 200 mph. I watched helplessly as the falcon darted after our baby bird and out of sight. I was devastated. This little bird was no match for a peregrine falcon. i imagined all kinds of gruesome scenarios that involved, ultimately, Clarice ending up as the falcon's dinner. I went to bed that night with a heavy heart, much guilt and sadness. How had the falcon seen her in the dense tree? Why would he attack her right in front of humans? Why didn't I make her go into her cage for the night? Had it been quick? She trusted us to protect her. Self-recrimination continued until I finally fell asleep.

The next morning I was having my coffee on the patio when suddenly I heard the familiar call of our dove. Clarice had survived a brush with a peregrine falcon. I don't know how she did it. She must have made it into a thick tree and kept low until the blood-thirsty falcon had finally given up. She was overjoyed to be back, flapping her wings excitedly, and chirping incessantly. I kept her up on the porch, and she was content to be by my side all day after such a harrowing experience the previous evening. After the incident with the falcon, Clarice became more jittery than usual. She constantly watched the skies for threats, and stayed away from open areas. I was happy about her new-found vigilance. If one good thing had come of this brush with death, it was that she would be wary of threats and predators in the future. I felt a great deal more confident about her transition to the outdoors, but also more protective of her. We had a calculating falcon in our midst, preying on our baby. That was unacceptable. I placed Clarice in her cage that evening and she wasn't pleased. She flapped frantically, losing tail and wing feathers, chirping feverishly. She must have felt helpless to escape another threat should it come up. I felt rotten and resolved to build or buy a bigger shelter for her. the next day I let her out of her cage, and off she went with the bird-equivalent of a scowl and a defiant look. I hoped that her confinement hadn't pushed her over the edge and into the great wild world. I would have to wait and see.

She returned for brief stints, wary, staying near the patio furniture, and with an eye on the sky. She was always pleased to see me and would chirp excitedly. If I stayed on the patio, she would nestle down and have a sunbath, but the moment I went inside, she disappeared. She had now been conditioned, thanks to that devil falcon. I was still worried about her at dusk (which is when the attack had taken place) and wanted to bring her inside for the night, but she copped onto this plan, and disappeared well before dusk. I think she must have felt that she had a better hiding place, and one that would allow an escape route if things got dire. This new arrangement - Clarice popping off before dusk and returning in the morning - lasted for a few days. Until yesterday. Last night she visited, and then flew up into the patio tree where the attack had taken place a few days earlier. I sipped my soda and we sat in companionable silence for a while. Then I made a very big mistake. I assumed all was well and stepped inside for a moment to check on dinner. i was gone perhaps two minutes to stir what was on the stove, and then I cam back Clarice was gone. Really gone. She was no longer on her branch, that's what I noticed first. But the next thing I noticed was far more chilling: feathers everywhere. On the ground, and then leading up the steps and onto the porch. The falcon had returned, and the evidence told me that Clarice had made a last ditch effort to escape onto the porch, where her humans lived, and where they might save her. But they weren't there at that crucial moment. the skirmish must have been very fast and furious. The falcon must have been watching for me to leave so she could make her move. I heard nothing of it on the other side of the screen door. So many feathers make it impossible to be optimistic. i hope she got away. I hope it was simply another close call and the falcon ended up with a few feathers in her beak and nothing else. But the odds are against little Clarice. Escaping that cold and calculating falcon once was a near miracle, twice would be a near impossibility.

Needless to say, the self-recriminations, the sadness and the realization that nature is beautiful, fragile, brutal and ruthless remain with me today. That little bird gave us such joy, and I hope we gave her a feeling of love and belonging for her short time on earth.

Thursday, May 6, 2010

Don't Be Shy Little Heroes

I'm a little disillusioned lately. We've got the oil spill in the Gulf, random people blowing themselves and others up, economic crises, climate crises and natural disasters galore. But it's not the headlines alone that depress me. I know we humans require some drama or we get bored and start building doomsday machines and getting into mischief. What bothers me is James Cameron and his ilk making us believe that we have heroes in our midst who are capable of mitigating disaster.

As a child of celluloid, I was taught early on that should the Earth's core stop spinning and generating the electromagnetic field, really really smart people would immediately be called upon to set it right. If a colony of sea-faring aliens began to wonder if they should send tidal waves and other aquatic phenomena over to the greedy human land-dwellers to teach them a lesson, individuals with deep-sea technology and moral fortitude would show the interlopers that we're not so bad after all. And of course, if our little blue planet were on a collision course with an asteroid, we could rest assured Billy Bob Thornton would be able to organize a way to thwart global destruction.

Don't think for a second that I've forgotten about Superman and his spandex sporting super-colleagues either.

I can't quite put my finger on it, but I do think this is all somehow related to a kind of faith-based fatalism. A deus-ex-machina mentality that we've settled into. After all, we've already invented the cotton gin and the automobile. We've put a man on the moon. And we have the internet now, so we can Wikipedia any number of topics without learning about them in-depth, yet hold our own when it comes to pithy, random quips online. I just hope we won't evolve into a race of fat-bottomed, internet-savvy backseat drivers who have lost the ability to roll our sleeves up, get dirty, and embrace danger and adversity with the savoir faire of our Hollywood superheroes.

Sunday, February 28, 2010

Fish Fry Part Deux: Lovely Rita Fish Fry Maid

You are now aware of my nun fetish and my romantic notions of cloistered sisterhood; and have probably guessed that this goes hand-in-hand with a love of pre-Raphaelite painting and other idyllic relics from the days of yore. I can't help it, and furthermore, I won't apologize. No. We all have our vices.

But back to the Fish Fry. What actually occurs at a fish fry? Who goes and why? I can only speak for myself, of course. I was convinced by the village nun, Sister Carol, who perhaps sensed that I was vulnerable to nunified coercion and easily dazzled by diminutive virgins. Christ brides have to be able to tap into that sort of thing.

And so I committed to the task on a Wednesday. I was in a good mood when the good sister called, and since I have never been able to see beyond the present, it never occurred to me that Friday would arrive and I would be expected to make good on a promise. A promise made is a debt unpaid, as Robert Service warned us.

On the Friday in question, my spirits soared. Jack Frost had dumped 15" of snow overnight, and the blizzard seemed to carry on and on with no sign of abatement. I eagerly called St. Mary's to find out if the fish fry had been canceled. I was informed that it had not been canceled, nor would it be. I would be required to go. I immediately fell into a depressed panic, followed closely by a period of manic denial, and then finally acceptance: What the hell, it's not like I'd be joining a cult. I mean would I be joining a cult? I reflected on this for some seconds before putting it out of my mind and playing with the cat.

Finally the appointed hour - 4:30 p.m. EST - arrived, and after excavating my car from its snowy entombment, I made my way the 1/4 mile to St. Mary's. Immediately I spotted the fish fry men and their showy frying apparatus. They seemed smug, so I gave them a wide berth. I walked into the rec-hall kitchen, and a number of people were assembled there. They all stopped talking and looked at me as I entered. I became shy about my dark sunglasses, Blackberry adhered to my left palm and heeled boots. This was the home-made sweater crowd and I looked out of place. Had I known this already and dressed this way on purpose...to draw ridicule and suspicon? I suspect the answer to that is yes. But I mustered my poise and aggression and informed the most senior looking spatula-wielding person in the room that Sister Carol had enlisted me. A general murmur ensued and Betty White informed me that I should report to Rita. She pointed me down a long corridor lined with industrial-sized cans of pepperoncinis and stewed tomatoes. I quick-stepped it down the hall (stopping only momentarily to gaze longingly at a 12lb can of tuna) and it was not long before I met Rita.

The name Rita brings to mind a spitfire of a sensual being hailing from Venezuela. I have no idea why. But my fish fry Rita was a different kettle of fish altogether. She was a strapping gal with bulging biceps and a severe buzz-coif that immediately caused an image of Paul Bunyan pop into my head. She was smiling in a way that suggested that she could reduce any man or woman in the place to a whimpering heap of shattered limbs in a heartbeat. I approached her slowly, admiring the way her powder blue acrylic sweater clung to her ponderous bosom. In true primate fashion, I smiled to demonstrate my lack of aggression, and then informed her that I was Sister Carol's dupe and at her disposal for the duration of the fish fry. She then favored me with a friendly blow to the back which loosened a lower molar crown, and led me to what I would come to think of as "our" pizza booth.

Rita had already laden the table with 9 pizza pies, an assortment of cafeteria lady gloves, spatula(s), and a little basket for the parishioners to deposit their fish fry entry tickets. She stood very close to me beaming and asking questions, and as we had no customers for quite some time, we had a great deal of time to get to know one another. One of her first disclosures to me was that she lived on a 200 acre farm with her husband, and had two grown children. I was stunned, to say the least. There was no evidence of estrogen radiating from this woman, and I could not believe she had been endowed with female reproductive organs. She waved to a little unassuming man across the room and said "There's my baby." It was her husband, and he gazed at her with unbridled adoration and submission from where he stood on the other side of the mossy green hall. And so it came to pass that we exchanged general information and life stories as an assortment of St. Mary's faithful queued for fish and slaw, and then sat in orderly rows to eat of its goodness. Every once in a while a small child, no doubt repelled by the look and sound of oil-drenched Perch, appealed to us for pizza, and we were only too happy to comply. I was in charge of placing each slice of pizza onto a little paper plate for our customers, and each time I did so, Rita rewarded me with a brilliant smile and a "Well done!"

And so it went and so it went as the night wore on. And at some point I became comfortable enough with Rita to ask: What is the deal with Sister Carol? Where does she live? Where are the others in her order... and questions of that ilk. Rita then looked me square in the eyes and said: Sister Carol lives here at the church, and she has a "Special Friend" who lives in Toledo and visits her every weekend. I longed to find out more about the special friend, but suddenly we were inundated with pizza requests and had to get to work. Alas, I never did find out about Sister Carol's special friend. But I do have a new friend in Rita, the strapping pizza dame I encountered at the annual St. Mary's Fish Fry during the Blizzard of 2010.

Saturday, February 27, 2010

Fish Fry Fantasia

I'm just going to admit this right up front: I'm kind of obsessed with nuns. The habit, the sensible shoes, the compulsory life-sized crucifix dangling mid-bosom. The sartorial excesses (pre-Vatican II) leave me breathless with schoolgirl envy. I can't account for this, but you can chalk it up to fetishism, I guess.

Here in America, that cloistered, uniformed breed of Christ Bride is increasingly rare. One is hard-pressed to identify a nun in a crowd of civilians. But it can be done. Most assuredly a Sister will be of a certain age (60-93), sport a silvery hair helmet, and choose an ensemble of colorful polyester prints to complete the no-nonsense unisex look. The last vestige of habit will be the enormous cross adorning the red and green dahlia print blouse. But there's something less tangible than clergy couture that allows one to spot a nun: It is the general bearing of the individual. The piercing eyes, the nervous energy, the gamma rays of celibacy that radiate outward and make one aware that there was never (or shouldn't have been, anyhow) any funny business going on under the layers of synthetic and/or habit-ized attire.

Of course one hopes there were lapses in chaste judgment behind the rectory just before Vespers. But perhaps these are just the musings of the impure.

You see, the mind reels - positively reels - when it is forced to consider all that goes into the making of a nun. A nun must have a vocation, or calling to do so. But who's calling? God, Jesus, the Holy Spirit, ok. But here in the clinical world of feet-on-the-ground reality, we require some hard core evidence. What causes one to reject the status quo in favor of a commune of same-gendered (or, I should say, same-sexed...for gender is variable) peers whose sole purpose is to honor The LORD? They willingly choose to succumb to a regiment that entails, first, waking up at a ridiculously early hour to pray together and secondly that trinity of non-negotiable guidelines: compulsory celibacy, poverty and "obedience". To me this smacks of military service, and that's nothing for me. But at the same time, I truly admire the level of discipline a career in the God-Service-Industry requires. I guess on some level I'd like to drop out of society (I'm half way there anyhow), and allow Mother Superior to boss me around. I have trouble making decisions.

And that's why I agreed to man the Pizza Booth at the St. Mary's Friday Fish Fry yesterday- because of a Vatican II-style Sister from another mister. Sister Carol's her name, and parish fun is her game. I jest. She's a punchy ball of atomic energy who pulls our little town together through sheer force of will, God love her. Shortly after we first moved to this little town that time forgot on the margins of Lake Erie, she paid us a courtesy call. Apparently we were suspected Catholics. My beloved spouse, upon learning that she was a nun, high tailed it to the man-haven garage to fiddle with gas caps and pliers. I, on the other hand, was delighted. I now had a nun in captivity, and duly invited her into my home. We had a nice chat, and I learned that she had a fear of dogs (we have three), and had received her vocational calling at the age of five, when she and her sister used to "play church" with their Barbie dolls, instead of doing the usual assortment of perverse, orgified reenactments one is wont to do with dolls at that tender age. From that time on, she would call from time to time, or wander over for a visit while I pretended not to be home. And this week, she asked me to put my money where my mouth is: participate. I found that in spite of my generally anti-social nature, I could not, would not, say no.

And the fish fry itself? Oh, it was the usual sort of thing, held in the recreational center next to the church. A large old hall with terrazzo floors and an asylum green paint job. A 9 foot crucifix adorning one wall, and rows and rows of banquet tables lining the interior and waiting to accommodate fish lovers great and small. Of course not everyone loves fish, which is why we had a pizza booth. I, along with my partner in crime Rita, duly doled out pizza (cheese, for it was Friday, after all, and meat is a no-no) to the mostly 12 and under crowd. From my vantage point, I was able to watch as Sister Carol flitted hither and yon among the faithful parish members, schmoozing, maitre de'ing, ushering, matchmaking and casting a watchful eye on her flock as they crossed themselves and dug into their Perch. She was a force of nature, resplendent in her element of captive parishioners and I, for one, admire that level of commitment. Amen.

Monday, February 1, 2010

Is it too late to become a plumber?

It's all well and good to have a nice display of bifacials and hand axes, but the people of Ohio want more bang for their buck. What? You say you also know the dental formula for the Lemur? You know all about Linnaeus and Darwin? You can draw a kinship diagram for the Bantu AND the Yanomami??! Surely these are marketable skills. Surely any company worth its weight in field notes would scramble to add you to their payroll.

Surely...not.

It's a rude awakening, I assure you. To jump through the many fiery hoops of hell in grad school and then find that in the great big wide world your trade is a tad too esoteric to be applied to the labor market in any meaningful way is...well it's surprising.

But why surprising? Did you really buy that line that Anthropology is an exciting career choice with many a lucrative prospect at the end of the road? Did you also believe that should you fail to "apply" those much sought after anthropological skills in the real world, you could slip into a cushy ivory tower position somewhere in New Hampshire? The fact is, the point of anthropology is to generate more anthropologists (should you snag that coveted tenured gig, like the one sperm who gets through), but otherwise the profession has gone the way of the gentleman farmer. If you have independent means, why it's a nice diversion and will make you a big ticket item at suburban cocktail parties. If, however, you foolishly embarked upon a career in anthropology to EARN A LIVING, well...you were kind of fooling yourself, don't you think?

Now I know you're all thinking: But what of The Naked Archaeologist?? What of all of those sound bites we've seen on Discovery Channel documentaries, and for chrissakes the occasional CNN special interest blurb? Many an anthropologist has been dusted off and called upon to lend credence or an aura of erudite expertise to any given number of televised shows. And while I've never been called upon to say "Yes, Ardipithecus is an extraordinary find that will change the way in which we study human evolution," I don't need to be called upon to know that it's not enough to pay the rent.

Having said all of that, I applaud any discipline for which the only goal is pursuit of knowledge, understanding, and self-indulgent exploration of exotic locales. But that's why we have travel agents, when you get down to it. You should be an anthropologist on your own time, and not drag our economy further down the slimy tubes of depression.

Tuesday, January 26, 2010

My life is permafrost

As I sit here swaddled in fleece and alpaca shavings, gazing through the window at the sterile blanket of snow that descended and covered the yard last night, I can't help but wonder: would I have been a successful paleo-indian? I know that I would not. Others in the tribe would resent my inability to leave my rustic bivouac during inclement weather, and would probably not be willing to share their winter berries and lake fish with me when they learned of my need for extra hides and luxury beaded garments. I'd have to have some extraordinary and womanly talents to get a mate. Of that I am almost completely certain.

But I don't live in a teepee. That variety of domocile has been outlawed by the local authorities. This makes me sad and angry on some levels. If I had to haul water and collect firewood and kill various things to eke out an existence, I might be better at the cold weather thing.

Maybe I would be made of more durable and cold-resistant stuff if I had never set eyes on Macy's. It's an appealing idea to live a completely perishable life. Shelf life zilch. Eat your Mastadon as it comes. That's right. No Cuisinart deluxe chrome paneled coffeemakers filled with over-roasted Starbuck's Breakfast Blend. No sir. No cellophane baggies. No Swiffer Wet Jets. No virtual diversions, no paperwork, no Congress. But alas, no central heat.