Pigeon Poop and Purification.

This morning I chased a pigeon off my hotel balcony. She was aggressively trying to get into my room to hunt for non-existent morsels of food that I imagine she anticipated she would find. After a ridiculous dance, which I am pretty sure the pigeon won because she spent the next 15 minutes making circles around my chair, I remembered this time in college that a pigeon got trapped in my bedroom.

As I recall, I had been gone from my apartment in Annapolis, Maryland for a day or two during record high temperatures. I returned to open my bedroom door feeling a wave of oven-like heat as a pigeon aggressively dive-bombed my face! Instinctually I slammed the door closed keeping the pigeon trapped in my 10’x8’ furnace-of-a-bedroom with all of my possessions. Not really sure what to do next, I listened to the flutter and crashing in my bedroom for a few moments before I decided that I needed to get the bird out of my room. I opened the door, preparing to protect my face from the pigeon’s wrath, just in time to see the rump of the bird toppling out of the screened in window.


Laughing at the hilarity of the situation, I gawked at the frenzy of feathers and poop all over everything, wondering how long the bird had been in my room? I remember cleaning up the poop, which had pretty much changed the color of my pillow case, looking at the window and wondering how the bird had gotten through the screen in the first place? As I began to move my gaze from the screen, which was now askew in the frame, I saw the most perfect sunset over the capitol building with early autumn leaves illuminated by the golden-amber light. I thought to myself – sometimes you have to clean up a lot of shit in order to see something this beautiful. I doubt I would have seen that sunset if I hadn’t been contemplating the pigeon’s break-and-entry.

I am really grateful for the bounty of sunsets that I have witnessed in Hawaii. And for the internal cleansing I am having during my time here.