tiny squawker

When I awake, I am greeted by my lovely family - the boys are smiling and waving at me, my wife is beaming. My mother-in-law is still perfecting gefilte fish (an impossible task) and Buubie is sleeping peacefully. I ignore them all and head straight for the birds. At first I panic - through the tiny slit opening in the A/C cover I can't see anything, I can't see the bird, I can't see the egg, I am on the verge of a complete melt down. I hold back tears. I regret everything, the matzoh, the blog, everything.

I look again and there she is. This morning there is a different bird atop the egg, the mother I am assuming, only because she is smaller and slimmer than the bird with whom I first had contact. Were I dealing with humans I know this would be assumptive and stereotypical and blah blah, but with pigeons I feel as though the general rules of gender apply. If my father has taught me anything about birds, it's that the female is always going to be less impressive than the male, in size and presence. And so it is with my aviary friends.

There is one problem... the egg is no longer in the nest. It's next to the nest, on the cold, unforgiving metal. The mother bird is still sitting on it, incubating is the term we pigeon masters use, but I worry, nonetheless. For those of you who aren't keeping up with NYC weather, it's fucking cold here. And here's this little egg, no winter coat, no heat lamp, just a bird sitting on it to keep it warm. I ignore thousands, if not millions, of years of successful pigeon breeding and convince myself it's time to intervene.

But what does one do in such a situation? I consider scaring off the mother, returning the egg to the nest, bringing the whole thing inside and turning the bathroom into a pigeon NICU - proper humidity, surrogate pigeon parent puppet, training the cats to gently sit on the egg - everyone pitching in to provide 24 hour care. What better opportunity to teach the boys about the cycle of life? And what a funny story they can tell their friends about their totally insane mommy who shut down the house in order to hatch a pigeon egg.