Lucky?

Finding myself with an unopened sandwich and nothing much better to do for half an hour I decided to occupy a shady bench in the garden behind St John’s Church and watch the world go by. It was about four o’clock. The sun was high and the sky an unbroken roll of blue but beneath the trees there was a definite nip of autumn in the air.

The place is always full of pigeons and people, in that order. Pigeons throng here because the people are generous or careless with leftover snacks so the food supply is plentiful. As I was sitting there a woman with a small child scattered scraps of bread she snipped from a large polythene bag while the toddler chased the scurrying birds, squealing with delight. The child was at the age before balance has quite kicked in or speech reached the stage of sentences, so tumbled and fumbled and grabbed at tail feathers shouting “birdy catch … fly way!”

Why do kids do that? And what would happen if they actually caught one? I’ve always found pigeons utterly repellent – not on the scale of moths, obviously; nothing is quite as disgusting as a dirty, dingy, raggedy moth, and my mother informs me that I was similarly squeamish as a bairn and simply could not bear any flapping creature in my vicinity – but most kids seem to delight in the chase. If a child did happen to catch one – say some adult in a moment of detached experimental interest laced a loaf of Hovis with an avian anaesthetic and invited the local flock for lunch – I wonder what would happen. Imagine the look of disappointment as one by one the entire cohort stopped flittering, went limp, and fell into a silent swoon … “birdy sleep?”

The pigeons weren’t so lucky with the scraps from the young guy on the next bench. He was plugged into his iPhone and didn’t notice the bloke on crutches begging cash as he made his way to the gate. All I saw was the young guy remove his earpiece, mock check his jacket pockets, shrug, and then hand over the the remaining contents of his lunch bag. The man on crutches made his way as fast as he could to the furthest corner and devoured the half eaten sandwich, crusts and all. The pigeons looked on, disapprovingly.

The next chap to arrive removed a McVities Jamaica Ginger Cake from a Pound Shop bag. He carefully unsealed the package, slid out a good six inches of the sticky-sweet slab, and took a mighty bite. He then opened a small bottle of purple fizz, guzzled, and smiled a broad, contented smile as the first wave of the sugar rush hit. Before he resealed the ginger cake he remembered his manners and broke a piece off, tossing it gently into the middle of the rabble of pigeons that had been waiting impatiently for their portion of the proceedings.

I never feed the pigeons and I’m a stickler for litter. I put the sandwich wrapper and empty bottle of orange juice into a tescos bag and deposited it in the nearest receptacle, then sat back down to put my book away and gather my belongings. As I was bent over zipping up my rucksack I felt something cold and clammy hit the back of my neck and drizzle down my shoulder. Ten feet above me on an overhanging branch was a pigeon, fixing me with a look of scorn and triumph, and I swear it was doing the dance from Saturday Night Fever.