The Birds

This morning, I was outside having a coffee and a smoke. It was about 6:30 and I had only slept an hour and couldn’t get back to sleep so I stayed up thinking and then turned on some foreign films to try to sleep, but they were too interesting and I started to enjoy the night to myself. So around sunrise, I went outside and saw the robins digging for worms and reminded me of a couple of incidents involving some birds in my yard.

I had just bought a pellet gun with a gift card I received as a gift. I was about 20 or so, and I had always wanted one, so I bought it just to kill some time and shoot some cans in the backyard.

I had a friend over one day and he shot a bird that was sitting on the wires behind my house. We both think it was an accident, or at least I did at first because it didn’t seem like he even aimed the rifle at her.

She didn’t die, but fell down into my backyard and was flapping in agony. We were both in shock, and the sound of painful chirping was making me sick.

I ran down off the porch and grabbed a shovel. I swung at it hard but the poor thing wouldn’t die. She was still flapping and I had to swing a few more times before she died. I’m pretty sure we buried her in the dirt area between my yard and the woods.

A few days later another friend, as well as the main shooter, came over my house. We were outside again and now I had the urge to shoot a bird. It was an awful experience to have to kill a bird with a shovel, but with a rifle and good aim, I wanted to experience a good clean shot. The bird was perched on a branch. It was a small bird, probably a chickadee, and it was there as if it were waiting for me to end it’s life.

My heart was racing. I had never killed anything besides insects and spiders; I don’t even like to kill them unless they enter my territory. I aimed the pellet gun and held steady. I breathed in and out a few times and on the last breath out, my finger pulled the trigger. The pellet hit the birds head and he died instantly. I rested the rifle on my shoulder and felt sick. Why do we destroy everything that is beautiful?

I hear birds everyday, I love the sound of their chirps, I love the way they fly, I love everything about them. This morning was the first time I can remember actually thinking about those two days of bird killing. It started raining so I went inside, but now I feel as if those two birds followed me in.