Incoming!

 

by Pa Rock

Alarmist

Rosie and I were drowsing lazily on the couch late yesterday afternoon in front of the television when our quiet time was suddenly interrupted by a very loud "Wham!  Wham!" as something hit the front window, which was behind us, with a great deal of force.  Rosie barked in panic and ran for the kitchen to get away from whatever was trying to storm its way into our home, and I began the laborious process of trying to get off of the couch.

Once I succeeded in getting my tired old bag of bones into a standing position, I stumbled to the front of the house to look out of the picture window - which mercifully had not broken - to see if I could figure out what had happened.  As I did that, Rosie was barking insistently from the kitchen:  "In here, you fool, what if they have guns!"  Not seeing anything from the big window, I next walked to the front door and opened it - and then scanned the ground in front of the window looking for whatever had shattered the calm.

There, beneath the window looking back at me with more than a little aggravation showing on his face, sat a large hawk.  As I stepped out onto the porch, he rose into the air and took flight where the winged predator circled through the air with what appeared to be six or seven other hawks and then headed off beyond the tree-line, all cawing in bold defiance as they fled the scene of whatever had happened.

Even though my front window is not as clean as it could be, I still manage to get the occasional bird flying into it.  They often hit the ground dazed and then recover and fly away, sore and wiser.  But the hawk had been fully conscious when I got outside and I did not believe that a bird famed for his eyesight would have hit the window - and especially not twice in rapid succession.  So I stepped on into the yard to have a look-around.

There, also beneath the window, I found a pair of doves, one laying on its chest and the other on its back, and both obviously dead.  They were on either side of the place where the hawk had been sitting. There was also the corpse of a smaller bird lying nearby, perhaps a starling, and all three feathered bodies were still warm.

My surmise is this:  Mr Hawk and a few of his buds were out sailing the skies when the ringleader, my hawk, spotted a pair of fat doves at the bird feeder in front of my house,  He swooped down toward the feeder, and the doves flew off in a panic and collided with the window - wham, wham!  The hawk then landed and was preparing for a tasty snack when the damned human opened the door and spoiled everything.

Curses, foiled again!

It was an interesting little war metaphor:  hawks and doves, with the doves dying and the hawks getting a victory but unable to enjoy the spoils.

Of course, this morning the doves were gone, meaning that one of Mother Nature's creatures feasted well on the carnage of war.

(All of that put me in mind of Kevin McCarthy who spent much of yesterday uselessly flying into the hard marble walls of Congress.  One of my favorite photos of the day was of Democratic Representative Ted Lieu of California's 33rd congressional district.  That photo showed Rep. Lieu as he prepared to enter the House Chamber for the vote for Speaker.  He had a big grin on his face, and an even bigger bag of popcorn in his hands!)

I like popcorn, too, and so do the birds at Rock's Roost!

Party on, Ted!