As I drove home one night recently, my stomach growled, hungry for the pizza, salad and French fries stacked neatly on the passenger seat beside me.
I had just accepted a friend’s call on my Bluetooth when I suddenly heard a thud. As I looked out the rear view mirror, I saw hair flying behind my car through the back window. My friend asked about the loud noise, and I was unsure. Then, there was another thump on my roof. That’s when I ended the call and frantically called my husband, Rick.
Less than a mile from home, I hurried to my driveway where he awaited. All I heard was, “Oh my God!” That’s all I needed to send me into hysterics. You see, I don’t do well in these situations. No, I better correct myself. I don’t DO these situations. At ALL. Once, a mouse ran across my lap while I was driving. I refused to get back into the car until the critter was caught and removed. It took a few traps and a day or so, but that gave me an ultimate case of the “creeps.”
On this night, all I could imagine was a deer hoof or a head on my roof. I was freaked out beyond belief. My husband thought it was some kind of bird and he instructed me to ride around the neighborhood, making sharp turns, to try to get it to leave the roof. I obliged, crying and screaming the entire way.
I returned, only to find it still there. I jumped out of the car and ran inside (a feat for someone five weeks post-foot surgery). Rick took my place, and with the food still the passenger, he rode around faster. No success.
When Rick returned, he was joined by our friend, Larry, who I had messaged for help. Larry arrived with gloves and bags. To their surprise, the bird was an owl and its head was lodged under the roof rack of my CRV.
After patting it to generate trust and assure he was there to help, Larry deftly removed the owl, which was alive. Its wings flapped, but it couldn’t fly. One wing was torn. The poor creature was traumatized from the accident and the high speed “roller coaster ride.” Larry placed the owl on the grass and patted it some more.
Rick checked on the owl a few times over the subsequent few hours and it had moved across the lawn. Then, we remembered our neighbor, Willis, volunteers for the Irvine Nature Center. At about 11:30 p.m., Willis arrived with a cage, gloves and towels, and the guys ventured out to save the owl. At first, they didn’t see it. But then found it nudged against a tree, hiding.
Willis carefully got the owl in the cage and nursed it through the night. The next morning, he reported the owl was in shock and was, in fact, a girl. Later that day, she was transported to Frisky’s Wildlife & Primate Sanctuary in Woodstock, a nonprofit wildlife rehabilitation center that cares for injured, orphaned, abandoned or displaced wildlife.
As of Wednesday morning, the owl was hanging in there after enduring head trauma nearly a week earlier. The caregivers at Frisky’s hope they can “turn her around.” If she fully recovers, she will be released back into the wild. If not, she will stay at Frisky’s as an “ambassador animal.”
I don’t know if I will visit her. I feel guilty for what she went through.
Oh, and I’m not driving on that tree-lined road at night anymore.
Linda Esterson is an Owings Mills-based freelance writer.
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