Oh.
'Scuse me. I've heard too many vaudeville jokes for my own good, I guess.
Ahem.
Moving right along:
On our walk this morning, my poor ears were attacked by a very loud, raucous cry from above. I knew what it was before I looked, and hoped I could see what I was hearing.
Sure enough, the bird was flying toward me, and landed in an old dead tree just above me. Its cry proceeded it, and I guess they holler as they fly.
It was a Pileated woodpecker.
Now, I've seen these birds as tall as a chicken, but most of them are about the size of a large crow. When I see them around the house, they are usually in pairs.
But seeing (and hearing) the one this morning brought to mind a family story. Here goes:
When Daughter was twenty-seven months old I put her down for her nap. It was fall, the weather was perfect, and I'd opened windows.
In a half hour or so, I heard her crying, and I went into her room. She was sitting up in her bed, those blue eyes of hers as big as the sky.
I asked her what was wrong. Did she have a bad dream? She looked at me, still mute, and I could tell she didn't grasp what "dream" meant.
So I re-worded. "Did you have a scary thing happen while you were asleep?"
She nodded eagerly.
"Do you want to tell me what it was?"
By now I was sitting on the bed next to her. She leaned close and whispered, "It was a wickerpacker!"
Our pileated woodpeckers had been carrying on at the edge of the wood, and with the window open, I'm sure the call they made infiltrated my baby's dreamworld, scaring her half to death.
Of course, nap time was over for the day, and I tried to soothe her fears.
But, as you probably already know, woodpeckers, to this very day, in our house are wickerpackers!
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