A Turkey Trot

The sound of ominous gobbling filled the skies, and I buried my face deeper into my jacket collar.  The school bus would drop my daughter off at any moment, but I was preoccupied. My stance at the corner was a cower, my nervous gaze darting left to right.  The wild turkeys were on the move.  The gobbles bounced off the trees and homes, off the eight broke down cars in the driveway of the corner yellow house.  I used to side eye that house anxiously, wondering about the comings and goings of the literally 16 people who lived inside of it, some of whom drove on the front lawn in order to access the garage. Today, my nosy ass didn't care.  Today, it was all about the gang of roaming birds that had recently descended unto our neighborhood, numbering no less than twenty.

My hands tapped against my thighs.  I was agitated.  My eleven year old son had screamed a surprising fact at me a few days ago when the turkeys had abruptly lurched into our front yard while we were unloading groceries from the car. "Turkeys can fly up to 55 miles per hour!"  He had inherited my anxiety about unchecked, untamed animals.  "Stay away from them! They're going to attack and PECK OUR EYES OUT."  Later, I posed a question to Google, feeling like there was hope we were overreacting.  Surely wild turkeys couldn't fly up to 55 miles per hour.  But, oh yes.  Those beasts could get some air.  In short bursts, Google qualified, but still.  I didn't need to ask about the pecking our eyes out part, that factoid I already believed.

The neighborhood was already home to two regular, wild residents- a pair of elegant herons who pencil legged their way slowly around the park, harmlessly strolling and only occasionally lifting into a slow, dainty flight pattern.  The herons provided a touch of beauty to the area, adding whole percentage points to our property value, practically negating what the yellow house had subtracted.  I enjoyed the herons.  "I do like some animals," I told my husband as I unclipped a dead chipmunk from one of many snap traps in the yard.  "The herons are downright classy.  I bet they listen to NPR."

Now, finally, the school bus was rounding the corner.  I tapped a foot impatiently, staying alert as it ground to a halt and the accordion doors creaked open.  Could these kids be any slower?  They made their way to the front of the bus like octogenarians with tennis balled walkers, loose papers escaping their backpacks and creating a slow motion flurry of hunting and gathering.  Meanwhile, the gobbling still sounded in the skies, getting louder, getting closer.

"Let's get the show on the road!" I called out to my daughter and her bus mates, stepping in front of the other parents who'd been waiting at the bus stop as well.  "Just leave all the papers, I'm sure Mr. Cliff can clean them up later."

Mr. Cliff glared at me from the bus' driver seat.  "Like hell I can," he muttered.

Finally, the kids were off the bus, squinting into the daylight as if emerging from a thousand year night.  I grabbed my daughter's hand and pulled her forward down the street, her little feet stumbling to keep up.  "Let's get home!  Gotta start dinner.  Club sandwiches, maybe?"

I didn't hear her reply over the abrupt rush of blood to my ears.  We had turned our corner, and there, mere feet from us, was the turkey squad.  We skidded to a stop in our tracks.  I had seen the turkeys head off cars in the street and circle baby strollers on the sidewalk, their wattles rattling as they prepared their coordinated attack.  The turkeys were fearless, strengthened by the foolish homeowners in our subdivision that thought them novel and attractively photogenic, the ones that tossed food their way and let them stroll into their open garage while snapping away photos for Facebook.  "OMG!  Look how cute!  Turkey emoji, red heart eyes emoji, laughing until I cry emoji!"

They had only emboldened the turkeys.  They obviously did not know the factoids my eleven year old did.

At the sight of the turkeys, my daughter yelped under her breath and gripped my hand tighter.  The turkeys assembled, staring us down with their beady black eyes.  There were so many of them, well over a dozen.  It was like varsity team and junior varsity team, combining their forces in an unfair game.

"Mommy?" my daughter whispered, and I tore my stare away from the turkeys to where she pointed.  It was the duo of herons, their heads bent gorgeously as they picked their way toward us from across the street.

"Jeez.  Save yourselves!" I hissed at the herons. Of course, it made sense that they wanted to protect us from the savagery.  The herons were civilized and graceful, posh and refined.  I could not let these delicate creatures risk their welfare to help save mine from these untamed turkeys.

"Mommy?" my daughter whispered again, more urgently.  Something was happening, a fresh layer of hell revealing itself.  The herons were moving faster towards us, gaining speed and coming at us from one side while the turkeys still advanced from our front. The slim, knife sharp bills of the herons seemed to glint in the sun, and- hey, was that a small amount of blood and human hair dripping off the end of the larger one? In a mere moment, they would be fully upon us.  If a heron had eyebrows, their eyebrows were both knitted together angrily, emphasizing the murderous sheen of their eyes.  Was this really happening?  Had the world gone mad?  Did the herons have rabies?  Helpless, I squeezed my eyes shut and let out the scream that had burbled up my throat, cringing as I waited to be eaten alive by nature's most deceptively appealing bird.  God, I had been a sucker.  I was no better than the neighborhood Facebookers with their misguided turkey adoration.

"Mommy."  The soft whisper of awe in my daughter's voice jerked me back into the moment.  I opened my eyes slowly.  The herons were inches from us but had stopped.  The turkeys, however, were on the move.  They gobbled in a sort of unison, feathers ruffling and puffing as they performed a chaotic dance.  And then, one by one, they leaped to attention, aiming their squat horrible bodies toward the herons.  Was it 55 miles per hour?  Maybe.  They bypassed me and my daughter, taking aggressive flight towards the herons.  We took the moment that was given to us and raced past the scuffle towards home, glancing back only once to glimpse the mess of birds.  Dashing into the house, we double bolted the front door and then plastered our hands and faces to the window, peering down the street to see how the bird fight would finish off.

Yet the road was eerily empty.  Only a couple of loose feathers floated perfectly in the air, spiraling down to the ground like a commercial for down pillows or expensive mattresses.  It was almost as if nothing had happened; except, in the in the distance, we could hear it.  The reassuring sound of gobbling.  And maybe the hum of an engine as a car rolled over a front yard into its garage.