THE CARDINAL

Talk about case studies in psychiatry. Now this is a good one. One morning, several weeks ago, I was awoken by a cardinal flying into my window. Now, at first, I thought it was a mistake. I thought, "poor bird didn't see the window." WRONG, dead wrong! The bird not only saw the window, he continued to fly into the window for days which turned into weeks. Every morning, around 6 a.m., this male cardinal would land on a tree branch outside my window, start chirpping, then continue to fly into my window. Well, needless to say, I tried everything from opening the top part of the window to putting towels over the window. Well, the towels worked as long as they were hanging on my window. But, once removed, the cardinal returned.

Now, my eldest son suggested it might be his deceased father reincarnated. This child was always a jokster. And, obviously, still is. But, since neither his father nor myself believe(d) in reincarnation, I quickly excused that suggestion. And anyway, if it were my late husband, I would think he would have flown into the bedroom to visit me when the top windows were open.

Well, to make what could be a very long story a short one, I called my eldest son this past weekend and asked him to bring his shotgun. Yes, that is right! I, the supporter and member of the WWF, the Sierra Club, the Wildlife Fund and don't forget the local SPCA had my son shoot the cardinal as it was getting ready to attack my bedroom window for the trillionth time! The guilt of this murder stayed with me until this morning.

This morning, I woke up at around 7:15 a.m. with lovely singing of robins, wrens, bluebirds and even bluejays. But, thanks to the accurate aim of my son with his shotgun, I did not wake up to the sounds of a cardinal. Amen!!!