On the brink of whatever

[pameladean]

It's early spring, muddy, misty, blue one moment and gray the next. No real green yet, aside from a stray blade here and there in well-kept lawns (not mine). One very small triangle of new miniature iris leaf in my yard.

I took stuff to the post office, including Minicon registrations. Some of the clerks had green Mardi Gras beads or green and rather battered plastic leis around their necks. I'd forgotten it was St. Patrick's Day. Who will rid us of our human snakes?

Walked home from Eric's. Toliman was very wary of sounds he could hear and I couldn't, but he also purred a lot. The walk home was perfect in its way. I found my own cat once back here and took him out on his leash. He remembers the drill. We went all around the front and back and side yards.

On the north side of house there was a huge spill of pigeon feathers, from whole gray-blue wing feathers to small bits of fluff and down. No blood, no bones, only feathers, but all of them, as far as I could see. Do hawks pluck their kills? It was not gross, not bloody, but inexpressibly horrible to look at, like a very bad omen in a nightmare. Ari thought it was fascinating, but I got him distracted shortly.

As we stood in the back yard, having made it safely back around past the omen, a small wedge of ducks flew overhead, moving from pale blue to blue-white to pink to orange for their background, into the westering sun.

I want to go home, but I am home. I wish to God Eric were safe here instead of somewhere from which he must fly to be here. I wish New York were safe. I wish everyone were safe. But there is that useful survival, the subjunctive. For conditions contrary to fact.

Pamela

Comments

[redbird]

Hawks do pluck their kills, but they also toss small bloody bits out of trees (or off fire escapes, as the case may be).

[pameladean]

If they were small enough I mightn't have seen them against the muddy ground, I suppose.

I do love the idea of urban hawks. This was just not the day to see one's handiwork.

Pamela

[redbird]

And thank you for saying "I wish New York were safe." It helps to know that my friends in other parts of the world are thinking of us.

[pameladean]

I think about you guys every day. It's a pity this isn't some other universe where that has a tangible effect. I guess we'll have to settle for the effect it does have. You are more than welcome.

Pamela

[snippy]

Urrh, ah, my first thought about the feathers was that the bird had been bodily transmuted into another place where it will have even better feathers.

[pameladean]

Just as plausible as my bad omen. I didn't feel I was walking around in that particular book today, however.

Pamela

[avengangle.livejournal.com]

Right, so the first thing I thought of was the short "For the Birds" that's before Monsters, Inc. . . . hopefully that's what happened.