Bird’s Eye View

With the sun beating down so early the moon was still showing and with the faint smell of smoke from the Veterans Fire, the acrobats dangled from the Sundial Bridge. The Turkey Vultures, curious, hovered over them while the cliff swallows panicked. It is nesting season for them and their homes are under the bridge, of course they would. The irony in this is that the danglers’ routine was called “Flocks,” paying homage to migrating swallows along the Pacific Flyway . And like the swallows, this group performs up and down the entire length of the Pacific Flyway having performed in Chile last. Everyone wants to be a bird. I don’t. Their chances of survival are slim to none. And they’re not as free as they seem, their biological clocks dictate their actions entirely.

I sent my father a video and he said, “they kind of remind me of Los Voladores de Papantla.” My father has seen the ancient Mesoamerican ritual performed dozens of times being from Veracruz.

“Not nearly as impressive as los voladores” I replied. I have never seen the ritual in person, just on tv and maybe a modified version of the ritual somewhere, I can’t be sure. When you get older, you have a hard time remembering what was real, dreamed or imagined. I wonder what it feels like to freefall like that.

The mention of the Pacific Flyway and the smell of smoke reminded me of my secret lover of a thousand years. I wondered if he had even noticed I disappeared all those months ago. “I disappeared.” I like the sound of that. I sighed and mentally sang the Deer Tick song.

If you’re running away, I’m looking for you.

And if you’ve lost your way, I’m seeing you through.

But he would never. Not look for me nor see me through a thing. He was a shitty lover to me, and an even shittier friend. I have no doubt at all that he cared for me deeply after so many years, but I guess I’m just that scary. The other day in a movie I heard someone say, “sometimes the thing you want the most is also the scariest.”

Maybe that’s what happened with him, and his fear won. I guess I’ll never know. Know what prompted the lies of love and forever friendship. I didn’t need those lies all those years to stick around, I was never looking for a husband. Alas, my love is for the birds. Then I mentally sang the Gregory Isaac lyrics while I walked to my car, to go home away from the heat and the smoke, and to feed the bouquet of hummingbirds which hang in my yard around the feeders. Did you know that hummingbirds don’t mate for life, and Ruby-throated hummers migrate alone? I think I’m all hummingbird.

You’re a ghost to me,

I’m a ghost to you, bird’s eye view San Luis.

Magical Animal Husbandry

For an entire week he blocked traffic going both ways. Everyone already late for work, we exited our cars to lure him over to one of us, but every time we tried, he’d run closer to Highway 299, the two lane windy road which is the only way to Eureka from here. I was finally able to get him off the road and into my car with the help of a handsome farmer, treats and the leash I always carry for just these occasions. No one knew whose dog he was and of course, he had no tags to go with his collar so I took him home.

I called my dad who happened to be visiting , “Dad, I’m coming back with a big Huskey I kept from crossing 299, I am already so late for work, can you please close the farm gate after I leave and get him water and food while you make signs and post them around?” I felt bad for roping dad into my animal drama. Here, cuando no es a bear going through the trash or dead on the road, it’s my foxes eating the neighbor’s chickens, or Brown-headed Crow birds stalking my birds’ nests so they can leave their eggs for them to foster, or the Red-shoulder hawks circling my cat in the backyard. Then, of course, there is the daily hummingbird fights because my resident Anna’s hummingbird, Fearless, is a territorial son of a bitch. When two Rufous Hummers came last month, I hoped they’d fuck up Fearless for being an asshole. The Rufous are known to be the more aggressive of the hummingbirds, but they eventually left and Fearless reclaimed his throne at the feeder. And now there was this rando suicidal dog making me late for work. Dad closed the gate behind me and went in to get the dog water. When dad came out, the dog was gone. Not knowing we were preparing for this incident, dad and I had just patched up any holes to the property so how had he gotten out?

“Maybe he wasn’t real,” Dear Chicago said nailing what I had already thought.

” I thought of that too, but I have the pictures and dad to corroborate my story.”

The next morning on my way to work, there stood the dog in the middle of the road again. Same exact scenario. This time he recognized me so he came to me right away and got in my car. And again, no one knew who the dog belonged to. We did it all over again, in the same order but with no longer a sense of urgency. And like yesterday’s story, the dog got out of the fenced property somehow.

On the third day, It happened all again.

On the fourth day, I left for work early to throw off the narrative of this shapeshifter. You see, when you get caught in a magical circle of sorts, you have to do something different to break the spell. Leaving for work early did it and I thought that had been the last of the dog.

Three days later, dad and I took on the arduous project of staining 300 feet of fence. As we worked in the 95 degree weather, I looked up and there he was at the gate waiting to be let in. I screamed, “dad, look who’s here! He knows how to get back!” We named him Jax.

We opened the gate to let him in, and closed it again so the dogs wouldn’t get out. Jax played with my dogs for a few hours, ate and drank. I kept my eye on him at all times because dammit, I wanted to know how he was getting out. He eventually got bored and he very casually walked over to the heavy closed metal farm gate, he pushed it open with his muzzle just enough to slip out and it closed back up behind him. He walked away down the long dirt road not ever looking back. I haven’t seen Jax since.

Fear of Fire

A red-shoulder hawk screeching woke me at noon. It is breeding time after all. I only ever hear two hawks at a time, but there’s three. I’ve seen them circling the yard. Probably two males courting the female. I checked my phone and I had a text from my secret lover of a thousand years. I texted back, “I just woke up. I always have the same dream. We’re at the same party and you ignore me. “

“Never!!!!” He replies.

If I have repeated dreams that you ignore me, and I tell you, why are you not listening to what I’m saying. Most days, I don’t know what to do with him or about him. Then I tell myself I don’t need to know or worry what I’m doing about him, I will do nothing, because this is nothing but a repetitive bad dream that will someday end. The other repetitive dream I have is the one where I text him that I can’t talk to him again because I have decided to take on a serious lover. I don’t even want a serious lover, or any lover at all, but what I want is to be cruel, to make the point that I will not be here forever.

“You don’t need to help me burn my fallen trees anymore, I have someone who can help me in earnest now. Someone who won’t ignore me if we’re at the same party.”

I think he thinks I’m a robot with no feelings, needs or wants. I wish I was, but I’m not, and I need someone to help me burn because I am terrified of fire.

a burning question was answered

The fire came swooping down from the west, meeting the swimming pool and splitting in two. What burned and what was spared is still a mystery. The house I now own was not spared. It burned to the ground in three minutes flat. I’d like to think it burned for me, that while I sat in my high-rise condo reading about the fire, the now-charred lot waited for me to move here 3 years later and help bring it back to life.

When I moved here, the lot was open wide and the dogs from the drug house across stalked me. Part of the owners’ fence burned down and they had only half -ass fixed it. The dogs soon discovered the six missing planks leaving a gap big enough for them to come in and out of. Three big dogs of mixed races waited for me to come home from work, and sat on my front yard all day sending my indoor dogs into a frenzy. At night, they would pace up and down or sleep in my front door setting off all the cameras and their notifications. So I had a fence built.

The fence builder asked me if he could leave all 200 feet of plank in the front of the property. I said, “I would prefer you didn’t, that’s too close to the druggy neighbors.” But he made a face, “then it will take us a lot longer to have to haul the planks over here from over there.”

So the material was left overnight close to the neighbors’ fence for three days.

One morning, I looked out towards my new fence which would soon be finished and I noticed the neighbors’ fence had been mended overnight. Six planks, which looked exactly like mine, now covering up the dogs’ escape route. They had stolen six of my planks when the price of wood was at its highest. And if six planks is all it took for them to fix my problem, they should have said so long ago and I would have brought the wood for them from work. Instead I was paying $4,000 for a fence to keep their dogs out.

On the last day of the fence project, I pulled up from work to see the worker was still not done. “I was short six planks, and my boss went to get them” he said. If those were indeed my planks, it could be known, but not easily proven because there lay a fallen oak in front of their fence where the new planks were. I would have to walk all the way over there and climb behind the fallen tree to see. The proof has this: If the planks did not reach the bottom and were a foot short, they were mine for sure. My fence was 5 feet tall, theirs was six.

The burning question sat with me for days until I had to just let it go. If I have learned to live with the burning question as to why men who allegedly love me are so terrified of me, I can live with the mystery of the six planks. Besides, they would never remove that fallen oak to reveal the truth.

But yesterday while I gardened, one of they neighbors called me, “Hi, neighbor.” I walked over there, “did you finally sell your house?”

“I did” so I’m trying to figure out what I need to take care of around the property before the inspection. She pointed to the fallen burned oak tree.

“I’m not sure whose property that is on. I think it’s theirs, or maybe mine.”

“Or mine” I said. “My property line is somewhere over there, too.”

We walked over there to see what this new pink property flag placed by who knows who said. “Property line under tree.”

“There is always surveyors around here leaving flags, still trying to assess the fire damage.” She said.

The tree looked somewhat moved. It was no longer right along the fence where the new planks were, so I looked over the trunk to see the fence, to finally have that burning question answered after all these years, one of them, anyway. Did they mend their fence by stealing my wooden planks?

The six planks went all the way down to the ground. Six feet. They were not mine.

“So half of it is on your and half of it is on mine.” I told her. “I’m not picking it up.”

“Neither am I” she said. “Let the new owners decide what they want to do with it.”

I got scared about having new neighbors. What if they wanted to remove all the fallen trees the woodpeckers use. What if they wanted to remove that half charred stick standing that is the acorn woodpeckers’ granary. What if they wanted to use rat poison and pesticides on their property, they would kill the owls and the hawks and the turkey vultures. They could potentially disrupt our little eco system here entirely.

The Bears and Wolves

When you called I was sleeping. It confused me to hear your voice.

It was 1:42, I was drunk asleep and dreaming when you called. My pain was raw and exposed. I railed you for treating me how you do, but you always have an excuse

You were saved the by the Good Book, I was saved by the half-full glass

All I could bring myself to say was, “I am getting off the phone.” before I hung up.

It was like I was dreaming and ten years became a noise

You texted, “Hey. I like you, Rebeca.” I know you meant, I love you, Rebeca. We’ve been lovers for so long, we wouldn’t be if there wasn’t some sort of love.

When falling feels like flying there’s a dangerous hope

I didn’t have to explain then or now why I had to hang up.

Lurking in the shadows with the bears and wolves is where I feel the most at home these days.

*Lyrics from The Good Book by Tired Pony

I’m a little less haunted these days

January 28th came and went without incident. Without notice. I thought The Cowboy’s ghost would come and haunt me on this the anniversary of me having ghosted him, but if he did, I didn’t even notice. So much has happened since then, and yet nothing at all has. Since then, I have become kind of a recluse. It’s just me and the animals, and the birds I’ve created a safe haven for this fall. You will be amazed at how many birds come and visit you when you deliberately leave the fallen leaves. My favorite of the visitors is a pair of Northern Flickers who eat the grubs underneath the leaves. Northern Flickers can be so elusive, I only ever hear them by the river, but don’t see them until they take flight, and even then all I get to see is a flash of something orange flying by. To get a front row seat to this pair has been a treat.

There’s been no snow, but a quick drop in temperature which turned on warning lights in the Jaguar: Low tire pressure, Low Coolant. I filled the coolant tank with that so very expensive coolant I had to romance someone into going to buy for me in Sacramento. I laughed remembering what The Cowboy had said about the black and white 125.00 dollar bottle of coolant, “The fuck! Is it made out of Panda?”

While I filled the tank I told my parents, “Where the fuck is the coolant going that I need to fill it every 6 months. It worries me and the dealership doesn’t have an answer. The Cowboy told me it was a sealed system.”

My mom snapped her lips at me, “Pinche Cowboy mujeriego.”

I laughed. I never told my mother he was a womanizer, so it’s funny she inferred it, but he most definitely was and I didn’t particularly care. That was not the reason why I left. But people are so simplistic and two-dimensional. The Cowboy was not two-dimensional and that’s why I liked him so much. I also liked him because he was dark. So dark. Dark enough to see my light. But this darkness was new to him, brought on by a tragedy. I think before this darkness, he and I would have never been able to relate about a thing. I think that before this tragedy he thought he had it all figured out in life. It’s unfortunate when people are not students of classic literature, mythology, Shakespeare…or they would know the cause of every man’s demise, always: Hubris. It is such a given it makes all stories kind of boring, really, it is such a spoiler alert and yet, the characters never seem to see it until tragedy strikes.

When I mentioned The Cowboy, it came from a place of nostalgia, but not with any pain and I noticed the lack of feeling. Time eventually lessens all pains, I thought. I’m sure the Cowboy would absolutely disagree with me, and he would be right to.

It has begun raining again, and I don’t mind. These days I’m such a homebody, a recluse. But spring is around the corner and I’m looking out for new flowers. New flowers I just spotted for the first time in my abundant Manzanita. Wow. I always wondered why my Manzanita never bloomed. Well. In unison they decided it was finally time to bloom, again.

I told myself, that for the birds…

C texts me back, “You must be braver.”

He’s referring to me not giving a like to a stranger’s comment I saw on an acquaintance’s Instagram post about writers’ backing out of the AWP conference in Kansas City because the AWP will not declare themselves Pro Palestine and denounce Israel. The stranger’s post is a long one asking why we don’t denounce Hamas instead. The commenter listed all the ways in which what is happening to the Palestinians is Hamas’ fault. I sent C a link to the post and comment because I thought it to be a really good one, and a balsy one given where they posted it.

C wrote back, “that’s a good one. One of the best I’ve read. Why didn’t you like it?”

I wasn’t afraid to tell him I probably wouldn’t like the comment, because I had no idea who that person was. He told me to be braver, –as he heads to Kansas City to participate in a Jewish Anthology reading and his essay on his Jewish identity has recently been published in the The Times of Israel–but to have liked the post would not have felt brave, but weak. To hide behind the anonymity of social media feels so disingenuous and fake. It’s what those who are afraid of real life confrontation do. And I’m not afraid of real life confrontation. If you were to ask me in person how I feel, I’d have no problems telling you, though it would be nothing you’d want to hear. But I’m not combative about it, like when one of my birders said, “I think we can all agree on a cease fire.”

As I looked through my binoculars, I said, “There was a cease fire for years. Hamas violated it on October 7th.”

“I am in a meeting,” I replied to C. I wasn’t lying, it was 9 pm and I was still in the middle of an Audubon meeting. The meeting had gone on for a while because we had a lot of important issues to cover. One of them being, the casual mention by our Nominating Committee that next year, I will not serve as president, or on the board at all. I didn’t remind C, that at the very moment, I was being brave in my own way by stepping down. I had decided to step down, not because I was just getting on my moral high horse. I told myself that, for the birds, I should ignore that we had just participated in canceling a man, who lived 200 years ago, whose accomplishments and contributions to birding and ornithology should not be ignored inspite his sins. That, for the birds, I should look past the fact that I am against the toxicity and righteousness of cancel culture, which expects everyone to be super human and not have ever faulted in anything since birth. That, for the birds, I should get over my frustration that after the name of Audubon was dropped, I privately received notes from members saying they really regretted we had given in to the mobs that the name Audubon had meant something to them. Why hadn’t they spoken up before, when there was time to speak up? Because the mobs are bullies. I told myself that, for the birds, I should ignore that the name change had been sold to everyone as a means to be inclusive so people of color would feel safe joining our bird club, yet, since the name change, there have been zero people of color wanting to join our bird club, because there are no people of color here. And that, for the birds, I should get past my anger that so many hours had been wasted, and continue to be wasted, on the name change while we could have been out there saving birds–which was, in a nutshell, the reason why National did not change their name. So while I told the birds, that for them, I would carry on, it was no longer feasible. My heart is no longer in it after this. And to put in that many hours as a volunteer, attending city council meetings, board meetings, and events after my stressful full-time job, is no longer a good idea if your heart isn’t in it. It isn’t good for my peace of mind.

In a way it is what I did with the publishing world and why I stopped writing.

I told the birds I will continue to watch them and love them, house them and advocate for them, but just in a different way. And of course, I will always write about them and practice bird medicine and scream in excitement when they fly by, like I did this morning when on my way to work, a red-tailed hawk flew in front of my car to say hi.

If fear of the night is a measure for loneliness…

Morning comes and the animals lick me awake. They’ve tired of dreaming and want to eat and play. But I’m never ready to wake up. The night is my favorite and I hate to see it go. Dreaming is my favorite and I hate to see it end. When night comes I feel safe and I finally get to relax from the threats of the day. And the deeper into the night, the safer I feel, like nothing or no one can touch me in the dead of the night. This feeling for the night always reminds me of the Neko Case lyrics which make me wonder if I’m weird.

But now, not even the masons know what drug will keep night from coming

Because if fear of the night is the measurement for loneliness, then loneliness me hace los mandados because night is my lover and I don’t take it well when drunk assholes interrupt it. And the lover of a thousand years has been interrupting my nights for so many years I have lost count, but these days I am not so giving. So when he texted me last night I wasn’t very accommodating, it didn’t help him that in the morning I had woken up hating him. I must have had a dream about what a pussy and a liar he is when it comes to me. The truth is that I’ve had enough of him for sometime. I thought of ghosting him and just blocking him but I decided against it. I wanted him to know how I felt, if even for just a little.

So when he said, “I like you” I said, “You do??? You could have fooled me, I thought I was chopped liver.”

He said, “Hey now”

I did not appreciate the lack of comma usage so I stopped texting back and went back to my lover, the night. I had some money riding on the UFC fight anyway.

The Olive Weed

The plant began to grow in a potted Plumeria I had bought in San Pedro and brought back to the house in Fullerton. I had placed the Plumeria in the front porch beneath one of the 70 year-old Olive Trees which lined the front of the house. Did I mention that I recently found out that Norton Simon once lived in my house in Fullerton? As he made his fortune and acquired his art collection, he hid away in Fullerton. In the house that 70 years later would be mine! It was a gorgeous house. Spanish Bungalow built in 1928 with still everything original. The Olive trees had been planted by one of the owners with the help of some neighbors, which still lived there and told me the story. That is how I know exactly when those trees were planted.

And so one of the seeds germinated in the Plumeria pot as it traveled with my parents to Riverside County when they moved to Beaumont and I moved to DTLA. My mother may know how to cook the best Mexican food ever, but she doesn’t know a thing about plants so when she asked me if she could pull the weed out, which was growing next to the Plumeria, I’m glad I said, “let me see this weed.”

It was no weed, but an Olive tree I soon realized was an offshoot of my beloved trees in Fullerton–which by way, were taken down by the couple who bought the house from me. A disease took over them apparently. Unfortunate. That is why it’s extra special that they still exist in some form. When I moved to Whiskeytown, my mother said, “we’re bringing you your weed that has gotten so big.” The Plumeria had already been transplanted from that pot to the ground and it became a beautiful Plumeria tree which stayed in the Yorba Linda house when my parents moved. A Plumeria tree my lover of a thousand years loved as it was his favorite flower. I say was because I think he’s lost all ability to enjoy the small things in life like a perfectly formed, pink Plumeria flower.

Now Olivia the Olive Tree is here with me in the country and she seems to like it. We have traveled a lot to get here and I decided not to put her in the ground because I don’t think we’ll be here forever and I would love to have her come with me again and again. I just repotted her and she is heavy and strong. She has grown to the side like the wind wants to carry her away but can’t.

counting lovers like sheep

Fall migration has started, hushing whatever was screaming inside me to a stop. Birdsong has that power over me. I spend my days tending to my plants and my rescue animals fully embracing my solitude, knowing that at last I’m done with the outside world. I have dozens of juvenile Western Bluebirds and them growing into their colors has been my daily meditation on life. At first they were so brown and speckled I thought them to be juvenile European Starlings, but once I saw them in flight, I knew. If you look real close, they have some blue in their wings and if the light hits them just right, you could start to see the orange coming through on their chest. Where so many nested is unknown to me as they did not next in my Western Bluebird nesting boxes. They bathe in my small birdbath and the dogs, the cat and eye just watch. As the days go by, these bluebirds are growing into their full colors. They, too, will soon leave.

But while my days are now quiet and serene with an inner peace I have perhaps never experienced like this before, my nights have become restless. Every little thing wakes me and I can’t go back to sleep. Last night I tossed and turned all night. The restless dogs nestled against me, making it impossible for me to go back to sleep. The weirdest thoughts and aches came to me there in the dark. I ended up counting all the lovers I could never love, one by one, like sheep, who could lull me back to sleep. I used to feel bad about them, how I treated them. These days I could give two fucks. I am haunted by one lover and one lover only: The cowboy. But these days his absence comes with acceptance and understanding that I will always be haunted by him and that’s okay. I cared for him deeply and do still and always will and I hope the best for him.

When I finally fell asleep an hour before it was time to get up for work. I had a vision: The cowboy was out in the woods hunting deer now that hunting season has started, and he came upon a feather on the ground. He thought of me and picked it up knowing, because of me, that to take a feather is a federal crime. He put it in his backpack and thought, ‘Maybe someday I’ll give it to BB and she can tell me what bird it belongs to.’

Maybe in another life when the river is carrying the cowboy by, it will stop its fast-moving current and let him come to me.

Can’t count all the lovers I’ve burned through

So why do I still burn for you? I can’t say. ~Sun Kil Moon