Yesterday unfolded much as most of my Saturday mornings unfold – with our family basset hound, Hugo, whining at our bedroom door signaling his desire for me to forego my morning of sleeping late to let him out in the backyard. Hugo is an unusually athletic specimen of a basset hound, with a handsome front end, able to leap tall pieces of furniture in a single bound and sprint up and down stairs in a matter of milliseconds. He is extraordinarily adorable and extraordinarily stubborn. On a typical Saturday, I will wrap myself in a comforter pulled from our bed and quietly shuffle downstairs to open the door to our backyard porch to let Hugo outside. I will then shuffle over to our couch and, wrapped in my comforter cocoon, curl up and gently close my eyes until I hear Hugo a) begin to howl at our back gate, or b) scratch madly at the back door. At the sound of a) or b), I will roll back off the couch and perform a return cocoon-shuffle to the door, open it, yell “Hugie!” and slam the door as soon as he runs in the house. I will then return to the couch with my ears insulated beneath the comforter in the hopes that Hugo will snuggle up to me and allow me an extra 45 minutes of Saturday morning sleep.
Yesterday morning was no different – I had completed my final cocoon-shuffle to the sofa and fallen solidly asleep. I am not sure how long I slept or what exactly transpired during my blissful slumber that caused the back door to swing wide open. What I do know is I was abruptly awoken by the sound of my son’s deep and pointed voice, “Mom, why is there a bird in the house?” I squinted my eyes and peered through the opening of my cocoon. “OMG. It’s a chaparral.” Now, for those of you not native to the southwest, chaparral is just another name for roadrunner, which is, of course, an extremely fast-footed species of cuckoo bird with a beautiful long, spotted tail, known for attacking rattlesnakes and tarantulas. These creatures are speedy and fierce, and also happen to be the school mascot for my kids’ overachieving high school, better known as the Westlake Chaparrals. This bird is a symbol so intrinsic to my community’s culture (every email I’ve ever received from the high school, whether it be informing me of a team championship, a parent open house, or bomb threat, ends in “Go CHAPS!”), I felt a bit like we had suddenly been transported to Hogwart’s and found ourselves in the presence of the Phoenix in Dumbledore’s office. The chaparral itself was truly breathtaking, almost two feet of black feathers with contrasting white speckles, standing upon feet that pointed forward and backward simultaneously. I froze for a moment, intimidated by the majesty perched on the edge of my sofa. I moved slowly and turned to my son, “Get Hugo,” I stated firmly. My son glanced toward the stairs.
Now – perhaps this is a good time for a quick flashback and some obvious foreshadowing. This was not the first time our house had served as an aviary of sorts. In fact, this was the third time and the two prior events, I regret to report, had ended in some severe ornithological carnage. Last spring, a baby dove had fallen from a nest into our yard and caught Hugo’s attention with its hopping and fluttering in the grass. Hugo started by pawing the tiny bird, which I witnessed, spurring me to dash under the tree, wildly waving a piece of lunch meat, in an attempt to lure the dog into the house. While I was successful in luring him inside, I failed miserably at convincing him to drop the bird in exchange for the sandwich meat. I chased Hugo in circles around our fireplace screaming “HUGIE!!! DROP THE BIRD!!!” for what seemed like millennia. All the while, I could hear that tiny baby chirping from inside my dog’s clenched jaw. At some desperate juncture during the chase I slapped him on the nose, at which point I heard a gut-wrenching crunch, followed by an ominous gulp, and an abrupt end to the faint chirping. Hugo stared at me contently while I shook in the horror of it all. The second incident was fairly similar to the first, except that the second dove was fully grown and flit into the house alive and of its own accord, only to leave in Hugo’s clutches, followed by me and my husband in hot pursuit, waving our slices of Hormel.
So – we return to our Chap perched atop my end table. “Get HUGO,” I repeated. And, as if on cue, Hugo thumped and bounded down the stairs full of focus and intention. He thrust and slammed his body against the wall, the blinds, the windows and the fiddle leaf fig tree in the corner of the room as part of a sound strategy to stun our Chap into a panic and cause it to retreat to the floor. The Chap popped up into the air and hovered around the ceiling for a few seconds, only to drop back onto Hugo’s pillow. A cloud of black feathers and white fur ensued – before we knew it Hugo had escaped the house into the pouring rain, our beautiful Chap clutched between his jaws, me screaming behind him as he headed for the right corner of the yard. About this time, my husband entered the scene in response to my cries of despair with the same Hugoesque thumping and bounding down the stairs. “HUGO’S CAUGHT ANOTHER BIRD!!! IT’S A CHAPARRAL!!!!! HE TOOK IT TO THE CORNER OF THE YARD!” My husband sprang into action by arming himself with a large stick and a blue plastic fly swatter. He sprinted into the stormy yard and took a sharp left, toward the gate. “THE OTHER CORNER OF THE YARD!!!!” I called out to him. He immediately backtracked and found Hugo panting and guarding over the body of our Chap, which was completely still and lying up against the wet fence. My husband crept toward Hugo and whacked him on the back with the stick but Hugo refused to give up his ground. Hugo returned with a growl, prompting my husband to smart him with the fly swatter. Hugo reacted to the swat by pulling back his nose, providing our Chap with just enough time to leap up into a nearby tree branch to safety. Our clever Chap (oh yes, pun intentional) had played dead! Hugo glared at our Chap in the rain, while our Chap distanced itself from our basset predator by hopping to a further tree branch overhanging the front yard and our hero’s path to freedom. We couldn’t tell if our clever Chap was wounded by the ordeal, but I am happy to report that I have not come across a chaparral corpse in the neighborhood yet.
Thoughts relating to the chaparral incident – Although I have been horrified to witness my sweet, and otherwise lovable basset hound, display his killer compulsion so blatantly, there is a part of me (perhaps a warped maternal instinct) that recognizes that Hugo is a gifted hunter. I have never seen an animal move so adeptly at catching its prey, and there is a strange and terrifying beauty to observing such an event. I find myself struggling to reconcile the beauty of the living beings I love with the innate violence that we all possess. Must we all play the part of the hunter and the prey? Or can we choose our roles and override our more ferocious instincts?
Perhaps. What I do know is, if the kids and I ever find ourselves in some Hitchcockian dilemma that involves aggressive flocks of ravens or gulls, we’ll feel like we have a fighting chance with Hugo on our side. But for now, our clever Chap lives to fight another day, and anyone who leaves the back door open in my house must be prepared to wrangle with me and my lunch meat. Go CHAPS!
And, the theme song for this entry is…