A few weeks ago I was visiting with my aunt about all things
spring including birds. She said every year a bird tries to make its nest
inside their garage on their garage door opener. I thought that was interesting
because I could only remember just one time a bird flew into our garage as a
kid and my dad running around trying to get it out.
Fast forward to last weekend. I’m working in my yard with my
garage door wide open. When I was finished with the yard work I walked back
into the garage and startled a bird that had accidentally flown inside and is now
sitting on top of my open garage door in a complete panic because she believes
she’s trapped. Of course there is an opening large enough for two cars to drive
through, which is plenty of space for a bird to fly in and out of; but the term “bird brain” didn’t come about because
birds are particularly smart creatures. So I got the broom and started waving it around, knocking on
things and saying “come on little birdy” all while trying to avoid any bird
droppings that were flying through the air. (Bird poo in my hair would pretty
much ruin my day.) But Miss Bird kept flying up except there is a ceiling in my
garage and she couldn’t get very far so she just kept landing on the highest
thing… the open garage door.
After a few unsuccessful minutes of this, I called my mom. (Moms
always have the answers to odd questions like this.) She brilliantly suggested
that I leave the garage door half up and half down which will create a space at
the very top of the garage door opening and then go about my day and wait for
the little birdy to fly out on her own. The only problem was I couldn’t get my
garage door to stay halfway. It kept going up and down which made Miss Birdy
totally panic and she left her spot on the (now moving) garage door and perched
on the handlebars of a bicycle hanging on hooks on the wall. In all the commotion
she finally saw the opening to the outside would and soared out into wide open
spaces. I shut the garage door as fast as I could – I didn’t want her to change
her mind and turn around and head back for my garage. (Thankfully she didn’t)
Shortly thereafter I remembered I needed to get the mail. Standing
at the mailbox looking back at my garage door I was amazed at how much that
little birdy had pooped all over it. Because when it’s up the front of the
garage door is facing the ceiling of the garage and that was Miss Bird’s perch
of choice. In her frightened state she must have lost control of her bowels. So I got some soapy water and paper towels and
scrubbed bird doo-doo off the front of the door all the while thinking to
myself this is not what I planned on doing
today. But hey, Miss Bird was free and my garage door was clean and when I
told the story to my husband later, he had a good laugh.