A Tale for My Big Brother

A Tale for My Big Brother

The loud thud shook the hanging ornament on our front door. Something or someone had lunged at the door, and it woke both Sophie and I up. Sophie’s incessant barking could not be appeased until I had dragged my sleepy limbs from under the bed covers and tiptoed down the carpeted stairs barefoot.

Sophie continued to bark pausing to sniff the threshold of the door intermittently. A creature was still there. I debated calling 911. There was no sound. I assumed that whoever or whatever it was had decided to flee; Sophie’s barking is twice as loud as her size would indicate. It was a sleepless night that followed. What if someone was trying to break-in? They would have broken in by now. What if it was a coyote -I had heard of a growing population of urban coyotes in our area, but why would he or she lunge at the door?

Early next morning, I went down the stairs again. Daylight had flooded the hallway, and if a stranger was still lurking outside, I would be able to see him clearly. I slowly opened the door. There was nothing. The urn and planter setup did not look disrupted; nonetheless, there were leaves on the front door mat. I looked closer; they were not leaves. They were straws. I wondered where they came from. Looking closer, I observed three nestlings on their belly with their partially-formed beaks pointing down.  I froze. One moved. I immediately sought a box of Kleenex, grabbing as much as I could to pick the creatures off the ground. I tried warming all three in the palm of my hand. I kept a loose grasp for almost 30 minutes while I prepared to go to work, struggling with the next decision on these creatures’ fate.

I had rescued many a wildlife creature in Ohio before and had eventually become a member of the Ohio Wildlife Center; fallen nestlings, an injured chipmunk, an overweight bat, and even a Canadian goose with a broken wing. I called the center number to confirm that their location had not changed. They now had wisely added advice for people like me; instructions on how to handle different injured or abandoned species.

The number one instruction was to put the birds back in the nest and observe. I opened my front door, and as much as I hated to take the nestlings back into the cold, I decided this was for their own good. As I reached to lower the hammock of tissues I had created into the nest firmly attached to the side of the hanging bough on the door, I saw ‘father’ Robin from the corner of my eye. He was perched on a stone across the street and watching me closely. The instructions said to wait. I went back inside and went about my morning routine so as not to be later than I was for work.

Amidst the hum of my mother’s nagging, I quietly planned my next steps. I would check the nest in the next 30 to 45 minutes as the guidelines instructed. If father bird was not there, it meant the tiny creatures had been abandoned. Forty-five minutes later, I was getting ready to leave. I looked through the window; no one at the nest. They were repairing the roadways around the house, and there was a lot of construction and commotion. I waited a little more. I was not going to leave the nestlings to die. Even if they would eventually, I would have tried. I put my lunch bag and purse in the car. The next item in would be a make-shift nest from a small old Christmas basket with more tissue piled up in it. I lowered the birds into it and headed towards the Wild Life Center. As I approached, the familiar, ‘Do Not Bring Skunks into the Facility' sign loomed. The announced hours were 9:00 am to 6:00 pm, and even though I had arrived early, I saw someone walk in with a box. I knew they were open.

The vet who took the birds seemed convinced that my attacker was a raccoon. I did not know raccoons were omnivores. They ate ‘small things’ like frogs and fledglings. The vet kept the birds in the palm of her hand in a loose clutch just like I had. I pondered on whether I should have done that longer and not taken them back outside. As I drove to work, I knew I had not encountered any signs of raccoons in the neighborhood. It was most likely the Bengal cat from around the corner on one of his typical nocturnal adventures.

I carried on through the day with a somewhat heavy heart, my mother’s voice in the back of my mind scolding, “Infants die in Iraq every day!” At the end of the day, I was slowly pulling my car into the garage trying to avoid scattered construction debris, when I heard a Robin sing. I looked up. ‘Father’ Robin was there, perched on the tip of the gable pitch of the house opposite to mine. Was he calling for his partner, was he calling for the young, or was he lamenting his loss?

The vet had told me that given that the nestlings had been left on the ground, the attacker had probably escaped with one of the parents. Father bird had lost his partner, and now his offspring as well. It broke my heart to listen to him. Suddenly, another Robin started responding. The song got louder and closer. They kept going back and forth in their communication. I silenced my thoughts in awe of this beautiful moment. I hesitated to lower the garage door -the noise would interrupt their ‘conversation’. This was hope at its brightest moment.

I thought of my brother, Ahmed. He was going through an acrimonious divorce. In one day, just like Father Robin, he had lost his wife and children. His wife was insisting on separation, and following pressure from their mother, his children had chosen to slowly withdraw from him even if not permanently. Father Robin had decided that Spring was still in the air; it was barely summer yet, and he had an entire season ahead of him to raise a new family. Nothing was going to stop him! I thought of Ahmed. Ahmed would not lose his children forever; that would be too unkind of nature, but he had an entire life ahead of him to find a partner as beautiful as his soul, and raise a family again.