There Is No Time in Space

So, for those of you who are following, the story:

He brought a bird into the house in his mouth. I couldn't tell if it was alive, but now that is becoming the default selection. I claim ignorance, and I should, but I have read about as much regarding domestic cat behavior at this point as someone with other obligations can be asked to. I understand what he is doing, I respect its origin, and I hate its consequences.

Anyway, ultimately I got the bird, and it was still living. Prior to that, I heard sounds issue from the cat's mouth which I hadn't been aware cats could make, sounds more reminiscent of a low-rent lion or a big dog than a small domestic longhair. Eventually I found a way to scruff/disable the cat with one hand and scoop up the bird gently with the other. I found the bird a box and a sweater, put all three in the washroom, and called the wildlife rescue.

Since I can't understand direction, I only vaguely know where anything is. I didn't expect anyone to be there, but I hoped there would be a rescue box in the manner of unwanted-baby 'drop boxes' in some hospitals and fire stations in some countries in some centuries, including ours. The website and the phone message didn't mention that, but since I was shaking I called back a second time to see if perhaps I had missed something, and I got a human being, which was definitely something I had missed on the first go-round.

He said he was still going to be there for a while and that I could bring the bird in. I prayed the whole time and I knew my gas would hold out. But he (John) (of PAWS in Lynnwood, WA) showed me all the things that were wrong and told me he would have to put the bird to sleep. The bird was very injured, but I had nothing to offer it other than a slow death, with a predator pacing and moaning on the other side of the door. He at least had peace to offer at his disposal; I had only pain and more fear to give the little sparrow.

But he at least showed me a box of bunnies, with their eyes still not opened. A lady had accidentally ruined their little nest, and when the mother returned, she noticed that and left. They were thin and long, and John had fed them once so far, and the one he was concerned about was looking more lively. I sat in my car and cried for the sparrow, that this John could return to its tiny broken body very soon and alleviate its suffering, and for the little rabbits, that their bad start might be forgotten with a long life of surreptitiously ruining lettuce crops in Lynnwood. Or Issaquah, if they prefer microgreens.

Even though I needed to, I felt a bit odd sitting in a car outside an animal rescue and crying, so I put on the GPS and pulled out. I wasn't really looking or listening, though, so I just turned onto the first 'highway' sign.

About a half-hour into the trip, though, I started to feel unfamiliar. I didn't know the street signs; I didn't understand why I was seeing the exits for the cities I was seeing; I had no idea what either Diane Rehm or her guests on the low-playing NPR or 'Aonghus' on the GPS had been saying; I realized a tour bus, of all things, had actually passed me for going too slowly; and I wondered which direction I might be going in and, indeed, on which highway. I looked at the gas meter: it was E, but not really less than E, although I don't know from firsthand experience that there is on this car a visual cue signaling in an unmistakable manner 'less than E.' I looked around: it was indeed a highway, so in terms of speed, I could shoot for somewhere between 50-70 MPH and be considered to be driving reasonably. And, frankly, since less than 50 had served me (not necessarily 'well,' but then, I hadn't been noticing) thus far, rather a good part of me hoped that my lack of speed would signal a dangerous lack of confidence to any nearby highway patrolmen, who might be enlisted, after having pulled me over, to tell me where, precisely, I happened to be at that moment.

I would insert 'But thank God for GPS' right about here into this narrative, were such an interjection not so patently disingenuous. Aonghus kept telling me to take all sorts of terrifying side-routes, winding backtracks, and rural byways which, though scenic enough in the daytime to justify all manner of diversion, are nonetheless potentially fraught with peril at one million o'clock in the night for a failed practitioner of feline behavior modification, a crying and hopeless bird rescuer, a sleep-deprived owner of what is, in fact, the most comfortable and ridiculous bed in Seattle, a geographical and spatial ignoramus, and a girl still in the same just-fine-at-4PM kitten-heeled mules and red sweater set at one (1 AM) in the morning, hoping against hope, praying for the safe passage not simply of the broken sparrow, the tiny, stupid, closed-eyed bunnies, the unknowing, inappropriately grateful, un-Buddhist cat, but everyone who broke all of those, and all of us, and for everyone who is yet to come and break or be broken, just to get home somehow, someway, sometime, soon enough to make it to Prince of Peace tomorrow by at eleven.

Okay, twelve-ish.

And on the way home, once I figured out where I was and had been and could be headed if I made some judicious choices I pointed south and then took the 520 bridge back. Once I figured out how to get there. And four seagulls lined the way across on my side, where I've never seen birds sitting like that before.

I don't think anyone is afraid to die; I think only they are afraid that when they go, no one will be there to pet their head. It's that moment, not what comes after. And really, dog, cat, parrot, sparrow, or human, it is that touch that tells us that we were really here, that we really belonged. That we were known, and we were loved, and that we can leave now, knowing our imprint never vanishes, and our life was never for nothing. Hold me tight, and fast, and gentle, and true - now, only now, whatever you've done before. Only this moment exists, and I can die on the streets alone, or I can die in your arms. Don't offer me absolution; offer me Love -- and then you, and I, and God, can do anything. This is what keeps me coming back to 'soup kitchens' (sorry, Bill, for the 1930s vocab) - to meal programs: the sparrow. The broken, the small, the weak, the wounded. The mild, the frightened, the too-trusting, the untrusting, and the never-yet-to-be-begun. Open your arms and you'll be surprised what falls into them; lean back into the unknown and you'll be shocked at who cradles your fall.