Winter in northern Pennsylvania is what separates the ‘ridge runners’ from the ‘flatlanders.’ People who were born here say that’s what distinguishes the two, but to most of us, it’s the ability to thrive despite almost-daily snow and temperatures in single digits. Even some of the locally-born folks migrate south in the winter, but those of us who stock up, bundle up, and dig out secretly believe those people can’t hack it here. Privately, we consider them little better than camp-owners.
However, even I admit this has been a harsher than average winter. After the usual several months of almost-daily lake-effect snow, we’ve been hammered lately by Alberta Clippers dropping up to fifteen inches of snow per storm, one after the other, about twice a week, with the days in between often having low temperatures in negative-double-digits, high temperatures that usually but not always get above zero, and wind-chills breaking records in the minus-20’s and -30’s. The last storm was followed by a day so cold I put on an extra layer and used chemical hand-warmers in my gloves while I shoveled, hauled a bucket of feed to the deer feeder, and filled the bird feeders.
Yesterday’s twelve-degree high seemed like a heat wave. Even so, I put on my usual mid-winter working-around-the-house clothes: a long underwear top, and, that particular day, Tree-bark camo thermal-fleece men’s pajama bottoms (comfy whether I’m lounging or working) and a cheerful tie-dye t-shirt sporting Native American pictograms. Yeah, it was a Clash Day contest winner outfit, but I seldom even think of bothering about color-coordinating on days I’m staying home and not expecting visitors. Indoors, I kick around in lined Crocs, but when I went out (as I did several times that day), I changed to the knee-high hunting-camo Muck boots I keep in the garage, with Yak-trax permanently strapped to them for traction on ice and snow. I had just come in from a prolonged and very physical session moving heavy equipment outdoors, hung up the stained denim jacket I use for dirty work, and was headed for tea-time, when a THUD against the living room window told me a bird from the feeders had flown into it. Maggi went over to see if it was alright, and made a sound of dismay.
I walked over to look, and saw a crumpled junco sprawled in the snow. Was it dead? I thought I saw a twitch of movement, but wasn’t sure. Neither one of us could tolerate the possibility of the poor thing freezing to death if it was still alive, so I sighed and headed for the garage and my boot box. Time was of the essence if the poor critter was stunned, for it could easily go into shock and freeze to death. So I pulled on my boots again, but, at twelve whole degrees, above zero, didn’t bother with coat, gloves, or hat. I grabbed a feed scoop to pick the bird up with and slogged out to the feeder area in front of that big bay window.
The snowbird was still there, position unchanged. I scooped it up, getting a cup or so of snow in the process, and carried it back to the shoveled area in front of the garage door where I examined it. Its eyes were open and it blinked at me. It was alive! Gently I scooped it out of the cup with one bare hand, leaving the snow behind, and it settled into my cupped palm, wings closed, watching me. With the forefinger of my other hand, I gently stroked its head and back, feeling for deformities, watching its reactions. I smoothed each wing, noting a few bent secondary feathers, but nothing obviously broken, and straightened out the tail. Carefully I checked underneath for signs of blood. Nothing. No bird poop, either, and I hoped in passing that would not change. Except for the possibility of internal injuries, it appeared the only thing wrong with this poor wee thing was shock. The treatment? Warmth and security. Holding the bird cupped in one hand, covered except for its head with the other, I held it against my chest for maximum warming action.
As minutes passed, I pondered my options. There was no place snow-free outdoors to sit the bird down once it began to show signs of recovery, except the concrete apron in front of the garage doors, and I was hesitant to leave it so exposed. In addition to killing cold, there was a sharpshin hawk hanging around the yard almost daily, and other predators would come out at night. Indoors, I have five cats. (Not to mention the pandemonium that would ensue when the bird came out of shock and went into panicked flight.) I stood there, getting gradually colder myself due to my underdressed state, cuddling the bird, absently talking to it in a calm, quiet voice, and thinking.
You all now know the back-story. But the driver of the UPS truck that came up my driveway and pulled onto the concrete apron did not have that advantage. I wasn’t expecting a delivery (with five new inches of snow I wasn’t expecting anyone) and was quite startled, but that was nothing compared to the poor UPS guy who came out of the truck bearing a smallish box and an indescribable expression when he saw an aging hippie in tie-dye and camo, coatless outdoors, cradling a bird against her bosom. Of course, I knew the back-story, having lived it, and wondered what the heck his problem was.
Oh, yes! I smiled and said, “Hi. Please excuse the bird.”
“Uh. Do you have an actual mail box? I mean, is that one down by the intersection yours?”
I removed one hand from sheltering the snowbird to point. “No. Ours is that-a-way, on the main road, in a clump of three mailboxes by some big evergreens. You might find it easier to wrap future deliveries in plastic and leave them there.”
“That’s for sure,” he said fervently. I figured he was talking about the steep slope up the side road to our lengthy, currently snow-covered, driveway.
The box was shaking in his wavering hands. It was just a little too large for me to handle with one hand. Luckily my housemate Maggi came out just that moment and took it. She was a bit less Bohemian about her color choices than I, but had wrapped herself in a shawl as her only protection from the cold and was wearing floppy slippers the color and texture of Cookie Monster from Sesame Street. “How’s the bird?”
“See for yourself,” I told her. She cooed at it and stroked its little head. The UPS man was hastily climbing into his truck, backed with a crunch into a plow mound while turning, then gunned his engine furiously and fishtailed down the driveway and away. Meanwhile we’d brought the injured bird into the garage so we could be a little warmer while I continued to treat the bird for shock and discussed the next step. It was moving a little more, actually standing on my hand instead of having its legs tucked beneath its belly, so I knew it was feeling a little better. We decided to put it on the screened-in porch, where it is at least a couple degrees warmer than in the open, and it would be safe from predators even with the door propped open so it could exit once it felt able to fly again.
Taking a couple of tablespoons of birdseed from the bin and a rag for a warm nest, I carefully carried the bird to the porch, made sure the door would not close, and settled the little thing on a bench with the seeds nearby. When I went to tuck the rag around it, though, the junco fluttered away in alarm, of course heading the opposite direction from the door, bounced off a screen, and ended up perched on the railing. All right! If it could fly, it could survive. As the sun was nearly down, I placed a small cardboard box out there as a tiny shelter, next to the pile of seed, just in case the little fellow did not find its way out of the porch door by sunset.
Periodically as I was making dinner I looked out the kitchen window where I could see the snowbird, first in its spot on the rail, later huddled under a pile of plastic porch chairs. Finally Maggi observed it was gone, and I later confirmed that. Our patient had survived and had gone back to its natural environment, no doubt with a tale to tell its buddies about being abducted by aliens and taken to strange places with no sky.
Most of the evening I just enjoyed the warm glow of having saved a life, but at some point the incident with the UPS man popped into my mind in all its weird glory. I realized what he must have seen and thought, and remembered his reactions. How strange must I have looked to this random stranger who burst upon just that scene at just that time? It seemed a rational chain of events that had led me there, from my point of view, but he walked into this scene of the movie of my life in the middle; and, like the junco, had a bizarre tale to tell that he would remember and relate for some time to come.
“Damn! I’ve done it again!” I thought. (“Again?” you ask.) “I’ve been doing something perfectly rational and had someone come into it at just the wrong moment, the moment guaranteed to give the impression of maximum weirdness!” And I smiled. Yes, there’s a part of me that was upset, thinking “oh, no!” But a larger part of me was amused, and the largest part appreciates being different enough from “normal” to be memorable; to make someone’s day different, special, and give them a story to tell.
