Gone to the birds (or the beginning)

MEET THE GROGS

I'm afraid of waves, wings (on birds that is) and being watched, yet most mornings I am running on the beach with a raven at my side.

How this unlikely scenario unfolded was a result of my husband's comment on corvids, particularly a crow's flight: "Watch them fly and you will see their sense of fun." I had never thought of birds having fun and so began my observations and readings. I read the fascinating Mind of the Raven by Bernd Heinrich and began to look to the skies.

Crows move and work in groups; a murder of crows is their collective noun. Ravens, bigger and more silent, deeper in voice, mate for life and work as a pair. At the beach where I run, I noticed two big black birds that flew together in graceful patterns, that perched on the cliffs watchfully. I saw them and saw them see me.

That was the beginning of my interest in raven intelligence and pleasure in their personalities, these black birds with brilliant streaks of purple and green in the sun's light: black stars in the day sky.