Make new friends but keep the old...

Some times are just hard times. These recent days, weeks, times since January 20, can definitely be classified as hard times. Some days seem dismal and dark and hard to get through.

But yesterday we got a phone call from a very dear friend in Vermont. The conversation made the dark times disappear like a wispy, little cloud. We didn’t talk much about politics or Tom’s recent health scare or anything distressing; we mostly talked about John’s new best friend.

His new friend is a crow. Yes, a crow. Now I am not totally sure if the crow is John’s best friend or if John is the crow’s best friend—I think it goes both ways. From what we heard on the phone call I think this crow may have picked John as much as John picked the crow as a friend.

John noticed this crow wasn’t getting the best of treatments from his buddy crows. (Maybe that is why a group of crows is known as a murder). Anyway, John’s new crow buddy seemed to have a few of his feathers plucked out on more days than one.

So John decided that he could be a crow’s best friend. I am not sure exactly how it started except John called to report that his crow loves Ritz crackers, hot dogs and also has developed a taste for tidy pieces of pork loin.

Don’t freak out. Crows are omnivores. They like meat and they also enjoy berries, insects, eggs (usually from other birds’ nests) and will even enjoy a meal of road kill. John’s crow, whom he has named Corva (crows are in the genus Corvus), seems very content to enjoy the variety of meals and snacks John is providing. John admitted he did not know if Corva was male or female but something convinced him that his crow friend was a she and so that is what she shall be.

Corva will appear at the window near John’s desk and give it a few taps to get John’s attention and maybe just a reminder that it might be time for a little smackerel of something (as Pooh Bear would say). John is happy to respond and word has it that Corva has on occasion enjoyed a snack in the living room with John as well as on the back deck.

John has always been a bird lover with multiple feeding stations in his back yard. He knows a lot about birds. From what I have read, crows are highly intelligent and this seems a perfect match for our highly intelligent friend John. I have also read that crows can learn to mimic their owner’s voice and some crows have learned more than 100 words as well as learned to count aloud. Well, only up to seven but I still think that is quite an amazing feat. John did not relay to us that he and his crow were having verbal conversations but I would not be surprised to hear this news on future phone calls.

Crows can also be very creative pranksters—flying off with peoples mail, stealing things like car keys, and other pranks. Again, no word of this from Corva yet but John himself is a bit of a prankster so I am imagining that he and Corva share the same wicked sense of humor. Perhaps that is what brought them together. As they say, “Birds of a feather, flock together.”

So remember that a phone call can sometimes be just the thing that turns a day to a better place for a friend. Remember that the world is full of possible friends even when some may seem a bit improbable.

Yes, there are days when it seems like the times we live in are hard and dark and disappointing. But we always need to be on the lookout for when a Corva might fly into our lives and turn a dark day bright with an almost unbelievable but totally delightful friendship.