One day I heard a raven crying out. I thought something bad had happened to the bird, or a cat had snuck into the tree. In the meantime, the crow sat on the window sill, and kept yelling.
I once caught my husband doing something strange. Came out in the morning into the yard, saw my husband with a rake in his hands. Michael was waving it around a tree, trying to get at something, it seemed to me.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
“Like what? Knocking down a nest of crows. They found a place to live!” said my husband.
I was frightened out of my wits. I don’t really believe in all sorts of omens, but I’ve heard somewhere that it is categorically not recommended to destroy nests…
“Give me that!” I shouted at my husband, taking the rake away. “You’d better get busy!”
“All right!” sulked Michael. “Just try to complain that these birds are annoying you! I will not even move! When the time comes, you’ll be afraid to walk in your own yard.”
Anyway, Michael left the crow’s nest alone. We quickly reconciled, forgetting the morning’s altercation. My husband’s predictions did not come true. The crows behaved very peacefully, and one even begged for food occasionally.
One day I heard a shrieking crow. I thought that some trouble had happened to the bird, or a cat had got into the tree. Meanwhile, the crow sat on the window sill and kept yelling.
I went out into the yard to see what had happened. When the bird saw me, it screamed even louder. It started to fly away, then came back to me and screamed. I could tell by its behavior that the crow was calling me.
Curiosity won out. I decided to follow it. The crow flew ahead of me, looking back at me all the time. Soon it flew up to a large, branchy mulberry tree near an abandoned house, and it cawed loudly.
“Help!” she heard the thin voice of her six-year-old son.
“‘Alex?! How did you get up there?” I was frightened when I saw the child at the very top of the tree. “Get down immediately!”
“I can’t! I’m scared. I’ve been sitting here since this morning. I call for help, but no one hears me. Only that nasty crow is flying and cawing!”
“It’s not nasty, son, it’s clever. It was this crow that called me!” she explained to her son.
I had to run after my husband to get the baby out of the tree. Since then our family has had a different attitude to crows. We have been convinced that birds are smart and grateful.