This spring a bird managed to worm its way into my fireplace chimney. How do I know you may ask? Because she then proceeded to build a nest in the top of my chimney, lay eggs and hatch them up there. She ran around collecting food for her new chicks, feeding them until they were big and strong. Then she pushed them out of the nest. Into my fireplace. And here’s where they became my problem.

I hear scratching on my fireplace glass. Curious, I open the fireplace door and screen. There is a tiny little bird, who can’t quite fly yet. He/she has more of a hop and glide system going on at this point. The little bird hops out of the fire place and proceeds to run/hop/glide around my great room. No problem, I eventually, with the help of magazine, shoo the little guy/girl out the front door and hopefully onto a better life.

Or what ever, not my problem anymore.
Problem solved.
For a few days anyway.

Two days later, I hear scratching going on in the fire place. I got this. I can do this. I open all the window and doors. I’m ready now. I open the fireplace doors and screen again. But this time three baby birds fly out. Fly out. Zoom. Oh shit. That’s right, these bad boys FLY!

There are birds flying around my house. MY HOUSE. Emie is screaming. I manage to corner one little guy/girl and herd it out the front door. I move onto the others. I try to corner the next one and it is to-tal-ly freaking out. It flies straight into my entry way mirror and falls in convulsions onto my brand new entry rug. I have never seen anything die before. I would have preferred to never see this poor thing die. But I was in denial at this point, so it was still okay. I grabbed a near by sweater and picked it up. It felt warm through the sweater, so it’s okay right? I threw it outside with an arching motion still hoping it would recover and fly off into the blue. (Hey it could happen, only seconds before it flew around my great room with such vigor.)

It landed with a thud.

It was only then that I realized it was really was dying/dead.

I eventually calmed Emie down. Jack came home from school in the middle of this and I spent the next several hours keeping all the neighborhood boys from playing with the dead bird in my front garden. Jeff eventually came home and threw it into the trash.

I never did find that third bird. It either flew out in all the commotion or is lurking for me in some corner waiting to give me a heart attack.

Either way.