i believe i can fly

There was a bird in my apartment yesterday. The idea that I might have been in the same closed-in area with a bird while at my most vulnerable (i.e. straight out of the shower... I don't know why I feel that way, but I do. I guess it's the thought of running out of my house naked in blind fear. The bird would only be the beginning of my problems.) is both thrilling and terrifying. Let me explain: apparently, Sunday night, my cousin, while letting her dog out to do its business in our backyard through the basement back door, accidentally allowed a black bird to fly into the house. I will blame this entire thing on that dog, although it is very nice, because it is extremely badly behaved and almost tore my finger off in its choke chain once when I was trying to walk it... but that's another story. Anyway, she did what any typical woman would do (me included) and ran back to her apartment, slamming the door shut behind her. Monday afternoon, she went back to the basement and couldn't find the bird. She had happened to call her father (our landlord) to come fix a heating issue in the house. In doing so, they both went upstairs to my apartment to check the thermostat. All three occupants were at work, but my cousin heard a rustling noise in the living room and slowly went to investigate, at which point, she found the bird trapped in the curtains behind my couch. My uncle somehow grabbed it in a towel and set it free off my back porch. I'm sure my neighbor will have some reason to complain about this incident, too. The bird was probably making so much noise, he couldn't hear his television.

When I got home yesterday evening, all that remained of the bird were some wrinkled curtains and a few droplets on my couch that resembled white out. But the scariest part of this is that there was no contact with this bird from Sunday night, till Monday afternoon, which means that it could very well have been in my living room, sitting in the dark, while I was getting ready for work. I just can't even imagine how terrified I would have been had I heard a noise, gone to check it out, and been hit in the face with a camouflaged and panicked bird. I'd probably still be crying.

I wonder if I'd be this afraid of birds if a seagull hadn't tried to steal my turkey sandwich out of my hands when I was eleven. I mean, I got the sandwich back, but ultimately the seagull won, as my parents wouldn't let me eat it after the bird's claws had been sunk into the roll. I can still see that bird flapping in my face and my cousin, Michael, then sixteen, sitting on a beach chair nearby, laughing.

Don't tell me I'm not scarred.