|
Bisbee,
Arizona news, reviews, art, events, history, business and entertainment
|
 |
|
I live on Brophy Avenue. This is of note - or should be - to birders who specialize in raptors, especially those who study raptors of the families Aegypiidae and Cathartidae. In other words: vultures! Most evenings, and most mornings, the flock of vultures you see swooping in wide arcs around the upper section of Old Bisbee are not just circling a general neighborhood. No, they are circling my house. I'm certain of it. Depending on my mood, this feathery phenomenon is either spectacular or disconcerting. Watching vultures swoop is spectacular because of its simple beauty. I look up at the tangle of arcs and circles the wide-winged birds make. I stare straight up through the center of their gyre. It's not just dizzying, it's mezmerizing. The birds are of different sizes to my undifferentiated gaze. That's because the vultures fly at different altitudes. There must be some kind of controller, checking out their flight patterns on a radar screen, giving them the coordinates they need to avoid buzzard bashing above Bisbee. By the way, did you learn the word "gyre" the same way I did? I bet you did. It's when you studied W. B. Yeats's Byzantium in school, wasn't it? Other than the dozen or so actual falconers alive today, only people trying to understand the "widening gyre" in Yeats's poem would have even the foggiest notion what the word means. However, watching vultures fly in their circles can also be disconcerting. If you also lived on Brophy Avenue, maybe next door to me, you'd think twice about sitting out on your deck during the hour they're winging above. Vulture droppings are considerable. And besides, what do circling vultures signify? You know, don't you? Something's dead or dying down below. At least that's what all those Hollywood Westerns have been saying over the years. Isn't it? Until a few days ago, this was simply a conceptual issue. I mean, so long as these carrion consumers stay in their own grocery aisle and don't try to nudge ahead of me to the cash register, thereby getting way too up-close and personal, what do I care if they circle overhead? However, my view on vultures has taken a turn. Last Tuesday, I awoke at the very early dawn. Night was just turning into the first glimpses of gray morning. The sun had not yet peeked above the rim of the mountain on the opposite side on Tombstone Canyon. As I stumbled from bed, rubbing sleepers from my eyes, I chanced to look out the back bedroom window. There, perched on a post not 10 feet from the house, was a turkey vulture of considerable substance. Just how big are these birds? This particular bird was accomplishing its usual morning routine, preening and cleaning its feathers. In another twenty minutes, when the sun rose above the mountain horizon, this vulture would spread out its wings and allow the sun's heat to dry its wings. Now, though, Mr. Vulture (I think it was a guy, maybe Vern or Vinnie to its vulture buddies) hesitated in its morning ablutions. It stopped preening and stared right back at me, through the window. I swear it was on the verge on flapping its way through my open window. A sure case of feathery fenestration was a mere moment away. I had the presence of mind to whisper "Hey, Vinnie, there's nobody dead in here." Happily, my words had an impact. The vulture winked - he really did - and turned his attention back to cleaning his long black wing feathers. Now, a week later, I wonder the significance of my vulture venture. I am alive, am I not?
Bisbee's Peripatetic Lexicographer The most interesting thing about working at Bisbee's Visitor Center is meeting people from all over the world. The second best thing is that I work next door to Shacti's, on Subway Street. That's where Norman Wycoff, the walking thesaurus, works several times a week. Norman is fascinating for a multitude of reason, as any human being is. However, his truly unique distinction is that he's a source of words, and then more words. Norman claims that he used to read dictionaries as a pastime. I believe it. Did you know that the word "pilgarlic" means "bald"? In fact, did you know there was such a word as "pilgarlic" at all? That's all right. Neither did I. At least, not until Norman enlightened me. So,
all you crossword fanatics and all you folks at a loss for words
- believe it or not, there are such people in Bisbee - come on down
to Shacti's. Let Norman, Bisbee's master of Greek and Roman word
roots, cure your word cramp.
|
