When a Pheasant Can Fly Through Your Window, it is not Energy Efficient

This may sound crazy to those who know my kids, but when Sloan was in fourth grade and Emma was in fifth, I decided to let them stay home by themselves starting the month before school ended.  That was going to be the trial to see if they could stay by themselves for the summer.  They had to sign this agreement:

We, Emma and Sloan Skelton, agree that staying at home by ourselves is a privilege and a responsibility.  We agree that the results of this trial will determine whether we are able to stay home by ourselves during summer vacation or whether we will go to the YMCA Day Camp for the summer. 

We agree that we will walk directly home from school and will never invite friends over while we are unattended.  We agree that we will not talk to strangers or ride with strangers.  We agree that we will always take our house keys to school.  We agree to always keep our cell phone handy so that we can call our parents if needed and they can call us.  We agree that as soon as we get home, we will immediately do our homework without interruption.  We also agree that when we are finished with homework, we will do chores in the house which will include the following:

S
weep and/or mop hardwood floors

Load dishwasher if needed
Clean kitchen counter
Clean bedrooms
Vacuum rugs if needed
Any other chores as designated by your parents

After – and ONLY after – homework is done and chores are completed, can we watch TV or get on the computer, or we can also go outside in the backyard to play.  Only parent-approved websites are permitted on electronics (YouTube is not allowed without supervision).  Time on electronics, including TV, computer, cell phones, and iPods, is limited to one hour during this time.  At no time will we ever answer the door when we are home alone.

We agree that we will honor these agreements by signing this document.  We know that honesty and integrity guides us in all that we do and in all that we agree to do.  We agree that if we do not abide by these agreements, we will forfeit our right to stay home unattended during the summer.

 

They agreed to sign the agreement and did very well in abiding by the terms.  I would call them or they would call me once they got home from school.  So we got to that last week of school that is pretty much useless in that the kids go 1/2 days for about a week and really do nothing, and all of the parents' work schedules are all jacked up trying to accommodate the Greenville County School schedule.




Emma called me one of those days and I was on a conference call at work.  As soon as it was over, I called her back and asked the usual questions, "How was your day at school?  What did you do?"  Before I could get the entire second question out of my mouth, Emma said, "Mom, we need to get to the point here."  I was shocked, literally, with my jaw dropped open.  How dare she speak to me like that?  So I said, "Exactly what is the point?"  She tried to explain the "point" as I struggled to hear, as Sloan was screaming in the background.  She said, "Mom, there is some kind of bird in the house.  It looks like a turkey bird.  It is under the dining room table.  At first we thought you had gotten a chicken and then we saw that the window in the living room was busted out."  (Now, just to explain, I have been wanting chickens for at least a year now.  How great would it be to have fresh eggs for breakfast?  But I can assure you, I had not purchased any chickens, and if I had, I would not have allowed them to walk around in my house.)  Sloan, wanting to get in on the action, grabbed the phone from Emma's hand, and said, "Mom, you are not gonna believe this bird.  I will send you a pic of it." 




So I told him to send me a picture and told them to leave the bird alone and I would be there soon.  Emma said they had also called their dad (because they were with him that night) and he was on the way.




In a matter of minutes,  their dad, JA1, called and said this was some strange bird that was in the house, but that he was taking the kids and I could take care of the bird.  I said, "Whoooahhhhh.  Can't you do something with the bird?"  In typical JA1 fashion, he said he could get the laundry basket and put it on top of the bird.  I was not looking forward to coming home to a Tide-smelling turkey-bird that was clamoring to get out of a laundry basket, so I asked if he could get one of the kids to go get the dog kennel and put it in there.  He agreed.




Even though he agreed, I had no idea what to expect when I got home.  This is what I came home to:

Well, that and and lots of broken glass in the living room from the window that the pheasant flew through!  I did not capture that in a photo.  Just too much going on at the time.  My first thought was that somebody in the neighborhood had lost a beautiful pet bird, so I posted the picture on our neighborhood website.  Other than comments about how pretty the bird was, I got nothing.  My dad had also left me a message in the meantime.  He said, "Angie, I came by your house today and you either bought a chicken or your parakeet has been eating a lot."  It was actually hilarious, especially in hindsight, because he and Emma had been on the same page.  They both thought I had bought a chicken.  Only my father had not seen the glass.  He REALLY thought I had gone out and bought a bird that I was allowing to wander through my house!

I started going door to door in my neighborhood.  This was really weird.  One of my neighbors looked up the bird and realized it was a male golden pheasant!  I truly did not know what to do with the thing.  Finally, I carried it down to the basement (still in the dog kennel) and thought I'd let it wander around down there until I found out where it was supposed to be.  All kinds of thoughts were going through my head, like what kind of noises does this bird make in the middle of the night?  It is going to jolt me awake with some shrieking sound?  It was at this point that I decided to call the wildlife hotline.  It is an IVR.  There are options for all kinds of wildlife -- deer, snakes, etc., but absolutely nothing for a golden pheasant!!  I took my chance and selected one of the options, thinking nobody is going to call me back (note that I had left a message on this same hotline once before when Sloan "mistakenly" shot a bluebird and never got a call back.)  Within 5 minutes, somebody called me back.  She said that ironically, she and her daughter had been in Travelers Rest the previous week and saw a female pheasant walking on the side of the road.  They were both amazed because these birds aren't indigenous to SC at all!  So she was quite surprised when she got my call.  Her thought was that maybe somebody was hauling them to a lodge for pheasant hunting and some of them escaped.  She was curious to see my male pheasant and agreed to take him to her.  I was nervous walking down the basement steps, thinking I would have to corral the thing back into the dog kennel, but he had not moved.  Apparently I scared him as much as he scared me!

I took him to the wildlife rescue person in Travelers Rest and was completely amazed once she got him out of the cage and I could see how absolutely beautiful this bird was!  So many gorgeous colors on one bird that somehow flew into my house!  Simply amazing.....  She was going to try to find a home for him or just keep him herself.  I couldn't blame her, especially once I saw how majestic this bird was.

I drove back home thinking, is there some message here?  I mean, why would a bird just fly into a random window in a random house?  My first thought was that maybe I should go buy lottery tickets.  Actually I think I did, and of course, nothing came of it.  I did an Internet search (because, of course, everything on the Internet is true!) and below are "pheasant messages":

Using your gifts to get what you want.

Knowing when to express yourself and when to refrain from doing so.

Being aware of when to protect yourself and your loved ones.

Being creative, productive, and tapping into the passions that burn within you.

So I am still trying to figure out the gifts and the creativity piece, and knowing when to hold my tongue is apparently very important as well.  In the meantime, my dad fixed my window (though the local hardware store guy thinks he is crazy because who would believe that a pheasant caused all of this?) and I am just thinking how lucky I am that I got to share my house with a golden pheasant.  Oh yes, and then I really did get my windows replaced......