It Screams Like A Girl

The sudden screams coming from the attic shot up my spine like an electric shock. I dropped the box of desentigrating old newspapers with a thud, disaster scenarios rolling through my mind as I took the steps to the 3rd floor attic two- at-a- time.

Had she fallen? Been electrocuted? Spider bitten? Cami shot through through the heavy curtains that served as a makeshift room divider in the expansive 3rd floor attic just as I topped the stairs.

I crossed the room in two strides looking back and forth between her and the curtains, as if I was literally looking for an explanation to materialize from thin, dusty air.

"There's a bird in there," she gasped. "A big Bird! It screamed at me just like a girl!"

"Well, you certainly screamed like a girl", and at that, my heart fluttered and eyes widened. "Wait, screamed at you?" I asked, hopefully.

I pulled back the heavy fabric and tip-toed cautiously across the lofted expanse of the front room. I had little attention to spare for the dust coated chairs and boxes piled about the space, but felt my heart squeeze involuntarily as I took in the familiarity of the space. Nothing had moved in 20 years. It even smelled the same in here.

Cami was glued to my side, broom grasped like a weapon. I knelt down, timidly peeking into the far corner of the pitched ceiling space and gasped. 4 golden eyes staring back from two white balls of fluff.

The smaller of the two screeched bravely and I was instantly transported back in time to the summer of 1989. I was 11 years old and on the threshold of what be remember as the most glorious summer of my childhood.

The Summer Project

"What? What?!" My brother was yelling as he ran toward my corner of the attic. Robert was 3 years my junior and been off in another portion of the attic rummaging boxes when he heard me squeal and fall backwards, hitting my head with a thud against the dusty old, rag of a rug that covered the attic floor.

We spent our summer days at our grandparents' house while our parents worked. A huge, old, Victorian Era home, the attic was bigger than many of the places I would over- pay to rent in my lifetime. We had watched the "Goonies" for the first time over Christmas Break that year and were certain that a map or some clue to hidden treasure was there, just waiting to be discovered in Grandma's attic.

Fully engrossed in my mission, I saw something strange wedged far back in a dark corner and pulled back a loose piece of panelling for a better look. I crawled about a foot into the space And turned on my tiny plastic flashlight. Pointing it to the corner ahead of me, the beam illuminated a set of glowing, golden eyes. The shock sent me scrambling backwards on all 4’s.

"There's something in there!" I gasped, struggling to my feet as Robert came running, b-b gun at the ready.

I held the flashlight while he crawled in, weapon primed and ready.

"It's just a bird, you're such a chicken."

"Birds don't have eyes like that, you big jerk."

Before the bickering could continue, we heard footsteps coming up the attic stairs. Clearly we'd made enough racket that grandma had picked up on the commotion and was making her way in our direction.

We were beside ourselves, each trying to be first to describe the nest and location of our great find. There were always dead birds in the attic. Some poor sparrow would get in and not be able find its way out. Once our older cousin had even found a bat that must have gotten its wires crossed on its way through the area on it's migration, but we knew this was something special.

Grandma took the flashlight and leaned in. She gasped. "It's an owls nest," she said reverently. She shook her head and clicked her tongue in the way that she did and backed out of the dark corner.

"We need to get out of here and leave it alone. The parents will be watching and won't come back while we’re here," she said.

The rest of the day was torture. Not only was our treasure map just sitting up there being not found, there was a nest of owls, just haning out in our house and we weren't getting to be part of the fun.

What was worse, mom was going to pick us up soon and we'd have to wait until tomorrow to even try to go back upstairs. Pure child- mind agony.

When we were dropped off the next morning, we raced up the sidwalk, eager to start the day. Typically it took 2 glasses of chocolate milk and a couple of hours of cartoons to get us moving, but that day, we had a mission.

Grandpa was sitting at the kitchen table in his usual spot, a cigarette between his fingers, avocado-green coffee mug half full in front of him, browsing the local paper. "Have you told them what you put on the front porch", he asked.

Our heads whipped around to look at our grandmother. She rolled her eyes and beckoned us to follow her to the porch. The "front porch" was a 12x12 cinderblock and cement addition that had replaced the classic wrap around porch when it had started falling into dis-repair, some time in the late 70's. Completely screened in, and therefore safe from mosquitos on a warm summer night, through the years the porch had served as outdoor sleeping quarters, an extension of the lving room, roller skating rink, and finally, for the next 3 months apiary.

Apparently, grandma had gone back up a few times through the night and early morning to find the parents had never returned to their nest. On further inspection, she found that there was a second owlet that had died in the nest and the survivor was nearly starved. She made the decision to drag out the whole nest and relocate it to the corner of the porch, making a safe little cubby behind some boxes.

Robert and I turned to each other, eyes wide, and exchanged the kind of silent understanding that only exists between siblings. The look that said "Screw the treasure, we have a freaking owl!"

The handy "N-O" edition of the enclyopedia was already out on the desk and ready for us to soak up all of the knowledge that Encyclopedia Britanica had to offer regarding the care and feeding of an Owl. Lacking mice, ours got chopped raw chicken, mixed with water. We took turns dropping the mush into the eager upturned beak every couple of hours.

After lunch, owlet still alive and kicking, Grandpa took us to the library. Looking through a picture book of common owl types, likely to be found in our area, we decide we are dealing with a common Barn Owl. In the end, we didn't learn much more than what we had from the encyclopedia, but it was an excellent teaching moment, the kind that future kids with the internet, just cant appreciate.

Money was tight, and we were living in a tiny town in the middle of Texas in the 1980's, so running to the pet store to pick up some feeder mice for our newly adopted owlet was not an option.

The debate over what to name the owl started an hour after discovering it in the attic the day before. Whether we were allowed to have anything to do with them or not, there was a family of animals residing in our house so names must be assigned.

"I think it's a girl", Robert said thoughtfully. When I asked, why, he explained, " it screams like a girl." In the end, we agreed on the gender neutral monicker, "Screamer."

I texted my brother when I got back down stairs and wiped the dust off.

Me: "You'll never believe what your kid found in the attic..."

Rob: "If its treasure, I’ll Hold it for her until shes 18.”

Me: "She found owls."

Rob: "I don't think that shit will fly like it did in the 80's. It's probably illegal to keep owls on your porch."

Me: "Haha I think these have parents."

Rob: "Too bad. That was a good summer."

He's right. It was a good summer. I wish that I had woken up for a job in my adult life, as excited, even for one day, as we both did every single day that summer to take care of Screamer.

The passion and commitment came so effortlessly. We checked out all of the books on owls that the library would allow on our weekly trips.

My grandmother encouraged and supported us in the effort but always warned that Screamer was not meant to be a pet. One day we would have to let her leave and we had a responsibility to teach her to be a hunter and fend for herself.

We took that responsibility seriously. We set mice and rat traps all over the 2 acre property, getting creative, if not straight out diabolical, in order to catch live mice to release on the porch, and encourage Sreamer to dive and catch them.

One morning, a mouse escaped on our way through the house headed to the porch. We watched in awe as our grandmother executed a flawless 3 foot vertical leap straight onto the dining room table as the terrified mouse scurried around the kitchen in its desperate pursuit of freedom.

Sitting on the front porch now, 30 years later, watching my 10 year old niece research owls on her iPad, the memory of that shared joy brings a smile to my face. I feel the stirring of that old familiar passion and purpose once again.

When Greg and I made the decision to spend the fall months going all in on rennovating the old house. I was ecstatic, but once I was face to face with the reality, I found it hard to see joy hidden behind the work. The house has been vacant for a decade and was not in great repair the day it was boarded up and left as it sat the day grandma went into the nursing home.

The thought of Screamers' decendents taking over the place and making themselves at home while the humans were out of the way made me proud.

As it turned out, this generation of owlets did indeed have excellent parents. Cami’s research uncovered an owl sanctuary and education center in Austin, so her dad would be bringing an owl nesting box for us to set up in the yard when he came to pick her up . She spent most of her Christmas break with a pair of binoculars, keeping watch to be sure the owl parents kept up with their family duties, and scouting the perfect place to put the nesting box for next season’s owl family. I had used the owls presence as an excuse to splurge on a new zoom lens. I hadn’t taken the time to work on a good photography project in a while and now that I had such an eager assistant I felt it was only appropriate.

We were up at sunrise every morning, coffee and hot chocolate in had binoculars and camera armed and ready. Funny, without even trying I had rediscovered a passion worthy of jumping out of bed every morning.

On our last morning before her dad took her home, Cami presented me with her list of detailed instructions for continued owl watching. We were quietly holding hands as we sat in our folding chairs in the front yard watching up to the attic window. Discretely watching her in that moment, I was once again transported back in time, to the last week of summer vacation in 1989.

Our hearts were bursting with mingled pride and heartbreak on the morning that Screamer swooped from her favorite perch in the eves of the porch to snatch up a live mouse right in front of us. We’d done our job well, which meant one day soon, she’d be leaving us.

We made a big ceremony out of releasing Screamer out into he wild. The whole family was in the yard and we made sure she’d had an extra big breakfast that morning. She had grown to the point we needed a leather glove to protect us from her talons, so we said our goodbyes on the porch before dad donned the glove to do the honor of carrying her out.

She was majestic as she took to flight. She landed about 40 feet away the big mesquite tree in the front yard and stayed. She spent most of her time there or somewhere close those first few days on her own. Little by little we saw her less often. One day we were thrilled to find a pair of owls perched on the roof. Since that summer, there have always been owls around the house.

Even though she never came back in to stay, grandma never quit leaving the front porch door open, just incase she ever needed a safe place to land.