Wishbirdskull

How do you tell Starlings from Grackles?

The birds always seem to be around her now that I’ve noticed. Never picked up on that before. I guess I just had no reason to pay any attention to it. Makes you wonder how many people there are walking around out there with flocks of birds following them. Do other people have other things? Snake men? Cricket girls? Flea boys? Do people like that walk among us everyday surrounded by their flocks and we just don’t see them because we are caught up in our own daily concerns?

It started one evening in the spring as I was pulling out of the driveway. There’s an ally that runs back behind the property up to some vacant lots and then eventually to the backsides of some businesses. I had the windows in the car rolled down and I couldn’t help but hearing this tree full of birds making a cawing cacophony. For whatever reason I decided to turn that way and see what all the commotion was about. Sometimes if the cat is out, birds will sit in the trees and yell at him. I guess I figured that I should have a look.
Up ahead in the empty lot I see a bunch of Goth looking kids. You know the type, all dressed in dirty black and all layers of clothing and hoods and all. But in the center of this group is an old lady who I’ve seen around the neighborhood on and off. The kids appear to be harassing her (which I thought was odd because normally I’ve found the Goth kids to be unfailingly respectful and polite). Anyway it looked like they were shoving her around some so I layed on the horn and drove straight at them like as if I was going to run them all down or something. They all scattered, I must have scared the shit out of them. Then it occurs to me that I must probably have scared the shit out of the old lady too. I got out to make sure that she was all right, she seemed fine, and I asked her if she wanted me to call the cops or something. She seemed not surprisingly adverse to the idea of getting the police involved. She said that they had just caught her by surprise, and now that she’ knew who they were’ it would never happen again. So Ok, no damage done, crisis averted, story’s over. Asked her if she needed a lift anywhere and she refused. The kids seemed to have melted into nowhere. So I said good by.

The thing is, like I said I’d seen her around the neighborhood before, and after that incident I seemed to see her around more. Always seemed like there were more birds when she was around too. Maybe it was that for some reason the birds were just more active when she was there so I noticed them more but it sure seemed like they follow her around. I started chatting her up some but then she started in with trying to give me the little gifts. Actually before she started with the gifts she tried to offer me money, which I thought was totally bizarre coming from a person who I had always assumed to be basically a homeless street person. I of course politely refused her offer. But it seemed to be important to her to repay me for assisting her. It kind of seemed like the cash was a test or something. It was very weird, I don’t know. I told her that that really wasn’t necessary, I wouldn’t accept any kind of reward, and her thanks were enough. Clearly that was not enough for her. I told her that maybe someday she would be in a position to help me out and then we could call it even.
Then she tells me that for certain the day will come when I will require her services, and it’s all because of the position I put myself in when I came to her aid.




So I figure that she’s good-natured but totally wack. What’s the worst that could happen? I’ve got some underage punks going to break my windows because I stopped them from mugging a homeless woman? What are they going to do, spray paint me? Dude…
I’ve got a security system and a fence and dogs and guns, not to mention a beautiful and resourceful wife who could kick all our asses together at once without working up a sweat.
As a fall back security system there’s always the neighbors. The incredibly annoying perpetually drunken neighbors who spend as much of their time as possible sitting on their back deck drinking themselves stupid and “keeping an eye on the neighborhood”. If they have no problem knocking on the door to tell us that they are seeing imaginary turkeys running out of our yard, in the middle of the city, in the middle of the day, they’ll certainly be alerting us if they see teenage hoodlums lurking about.

Kathy chats her up more that I do. That probably has something to do with Kathy being a nicer person than I am, but whatever. The wife will be out working in the garden and she’ll stop by and they’ll chat. It seems that she even has a name. Kathy thought to ask; it’s part of that being nicer person stuff. Never would have occurred to me. Any way she goes by the name of Devendra. I guess they talk mostly about the garden, plants and stuff. It seems old girl has a huge and vast knowledge of horticulture. Who’d a thunk it? I guess we all know something about something. Me, I like to save the few brain cells that still function for important stuff. Like, football and scooters. But if somebody wants to know about plants and stuff I don’t hold it against them.

I saw old Devendra the other day and much to my surprise she was sitting and talking to some Goth street kids. I wandered over to see what was going on and the kids all politely excused them selves and left. I asked Devendra if those were the kids who had attacked her and if she was negotiating some kind of truce or what? She had a funny response, she said, “Can’t you tell Starlings from Grackles?”
Street people humor I guess.

Which brings us back to the birds. One day Kathy comes in from the yard and says,
“Look what Devendra gave us!” “Oh goody” I say, “A dead bird.” Kathy says it’s not just a dead bird; it’s a totemic voodoo garden sculpture! It’s to help keep squirrels out of the garden.
Oh boy says I, I’ve always wanted one! A mummified dead bird with its wings spread and bangles hanging from it and ‘things’ stuffed in it, the neighbors will be so jealous! But you know what? The damn thing worked. I don’t know how, we had tried just about everything. We had even talked about killing some squirrels and putting their little heads on sticks in the yard as a warning to the others, (ultimately we decided that that might have been a little too cerebral).
But anyway the little bird totem thing worked. Suddenly we are able to enjoy the fruits of our labors, and the vegetables of our labors too. We had figured when we planted the garden that we were going to lose a certain amount of the crops to attrition from birds and varmints. So we planted big. That way we could lose some and still have enough for ourselves. But first came the rabbits then the fence then the squirrels, and the squirrels were the worst. Taking the fruit just as it ripens, having a few bites and dropping the rest. Man that’s frustrating. But somehow Devendra’s magic dead voodoo bird thingy worked.
They just stopped coming around. It was very cool. Whatever it was and however it worked she had paid me back in full by my reckoning.

Wait, how did I get here? This is supposed to be about the Wishbird Skulls and so far I haven’t even mentioned them.