Thursday, April 22, 2010

Visitor Number 933 To Room 525

Yesterday morning, around 6:45 am, I woke up to a guttural noise. At first, I thought it was a dream. I didn't feel awake. You know when you hear a sound in your half-sleep state and just drift back off? Well, that's what I did.

Then I heard it again. It was loud. Close. I left the sliding door on the balcony open the night before because it was nice and cool and I wanted the fresh, cold air wafting in to sleep by and my first thought was, oh my God, there's a bobcat in my room. Then I remebered I was on the fifth floor and the guest rooms started several floors above the main building, so really, it was equivalent to being on the tenth floor. No bobcats are getting in on the tenth freakin' floor.

So I just craned my neck and listened again, trying to determine the direction from which it was coming. Oh. My. God. Right next to the nightstand! Here is the source of the noise:

A pigeon! Not a ferocious bobcat. A pigeon. Just strutting around my hotel room. I wasn't sure if it was a dove or a pigeon at first, with all the cooing. But duh, those colors just scream pigeon! And he was just walked in from the balcony like he freakin' owned the place. He seemed very comfortable around people, which a lot of pigeons are, since they are used to being around them so much. I didn't approach him or touch him since I was still laying in bed watching him walk around the room, but I thought about it. He eventually walked back out to the balcony and flew off. I must have fallen back to sleep because a little bit later, I heard the loud cooing again and opened my eyes to find him once again in my room.

I was both inquisitive and thrilled to see the pigeon - my grandfather raised pigeons when I was a child in New York and we had a pigeon coop on our property full of different types of pigeons; several of them were homing pigeons that looked just like this one. I had a favorite homing pigeon, who was white, and both my brother and I loved being in the pigeon coop; mostly because Poppy built it for us. We were the only grandchildren in the family who had such a large piece of property and the place where my grandfather spent much of his time. He loved building and tinkering and my mother gave him free reign.

My grandparents lived in the Bronx and we lived 90 miles north in the Catskill Mountain area. My grandfather would often take one or two of our pigeons home with him, attach a message to their leg, and then set them free in the Bronx to fly home to us, where their coop was. This is why I was so excited to see that the pigeon was banded. He didn't have a message on his leg, but he did have a band. You can see it in the video. I'm not sure what that means exactly, but I did contact the American Racing Pigeon Union to see if they could provide some information. I'm just curious about whether he belongs to someone. What if this little guy landed here on his way across country? What if he got sidetracked by this pretty hotel balcony? Or maybe he was local. If so, did he come here often?

The funny thing is, every time we see a pigeon, my mother says it's my grandfather showing up in our lives. After I saw the pigeon and then woke up Ed to make him look, I said to him "You know what this means, right?"

"Yeah, yeah." Ed said. "Your grandfather is here."Ree Drummond, The Pioneer Woman, ThePioneerWoman.com, Confessions of a Pioneer Woman, The Pioneer Woman Cooks, Pioneer Woman Photography, Pioneer Woman Home & Garden, Pioneer Woman, Pioneer Woman, Ree Drummond, Ladd Drummond, Ree, Ladd, Drummond, P-Dub, PW, Pioneer Woman Homeschooling, Tasty Kitchen, tastykitchen.com, www.tastykitchen.com, thetastykitchen, the tasty kitchen, pioneerwoman2006@yahoo.com,
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
1 YEAR AGO: Makes A Nice Desktop
2 YEARS AGO:
Leaning Tower Of Texas
3 YEARS AGO:
It Should Be Called “Thimble Shot”
4 YEARS AGO:
Southern Hideaway

2 comments:

Gil said...

Nothing like some help from the Holy Spirit or your grandfather to guide you on your trips. Only you two would wake up with a pigeon in your room!

Angela said...

The video is fabulous. Thanks I needed that laugh. I once watched a pigeon cross the street-in a crosswalk!!! Smart critters if you ask me!