RIVER CITY JOURNAL: PIGEONS OFFER A LESSON ABOUT REALITY AND LIFE

Warning. This isn't a happy story.

Two pigeons on a balcony overlooking a busy downtown street tried to have a family. They failed. In the process, they demonstrated that being a parent is tough, whether you are human or pigeon.

It all started with an egg about the size of a pullet egg. Anyone who grew up on a farm with chickens knows about pullets and the miniature eggs they produce when they first start laying. Child-sized eggs is one way of describing them, just right for a youngster's breakfast.

The white egg was in a flower urn on the balcony, one of four urns and a bird bath that have crowded together over a sidewalk because they were displaced from a ground-level patio. It wasn't the urns' choice to become balcony denizens, but there they are. This year the urns have nothing growing in them, even though the soil is still there from previous growing seasons. And the bird bath collects only the rainfall that the wind manages to push in from the east past the protective overhang of the roof. That doesn't happen very often.

But that's where two pigeons decided to start a family almost four weeks ago.

Not much can be said of the pigeons' industriousness. They didn't bother with nest-building and instead relied on the warm potting soil and the edges of the urn to define their nursery. It was exciting to see the egg and, later, the pigeons. This would be something to watch for a while.

Soon there was a second egg, and the pigeons got more serious about the task of keeping the eggs at whatever constant temperature they require to hatch. Occasionally, they seemed somewhat negligent, the mother and father pigeons. Did you know they mate for life? And that both take responsibility for hatching the eggs by taking turns? You learn a lot about pigeons when they choose your balcony, in plain view through French doors, to become parents.

The bird book said the eggs would incubate about three weeks. That didn't stop you from checking two or three times a day. The pigeons became accustomed to seeing you peering through the beveled panes of glass. They never got used to the cat, however, who jealously tried to frighten the birds away whenever anyone went to look at them. Cats are like that.

One morning you went out on the sidewalk and found broken egg shells. Either this one had hatched, or tragedy had struck the pigeon nest. It took two days to get a good look under the pigeons and discover that there was a newborn pigeon there next to a still unhatched egg.

The parents became much more intense about the job at hand. Instead of flying off and leaving the nest unattended, the nest was closely tended. One of the highlights was watching the pigeon pas de deux as they traded off one evening. The male pigeon swooped down to the balcony railing from the peak of the Presbyterian church, jumped into an adjoining urn and eased into the nesting urn next to the female. In unison, they did a soft dance, turning first one way and then another, until the chick and egg and been moved from underneath the mother to beneath the father. The chick and egg were never exposed to daylight throughout the entire process.

A few more days passed, and the chick seemed to thrive, but the second egg didn't hatch. The adult pigeons became more and more agitated. Something was wrong.

It may seem unusual that two grown humans would become so involved in the life cycle of pigeons. But the cat is spayed and your two grown sons show little interest at this point in marriage or fatherhood. You take what you can get.

Finally, the dark prospect became reality. The pigeons abandoned the nest. The chick died. The second egg remains unhatched.

Were these pigeons irresponsible parents? Did they give up too soon? Did a hawk visit while you weren't looking and scare them away?

If there were a happy ending or a punch line to this tale, now would be the time to share it. But there isn't. All that's left is reality. Life is tough. So is death. It doesn't matter whether you are human or a pigeon.

This story may be so upsetting that you will need a cinnamon roll, the world's best cure for whatever ails you, to relieve the distress. See, there is a silver lining in every cloud after all. Go get the cinnamon roll. You've earned it.

~R. Joe Sullivan is the editor of the Southeast Missourian.