The Flocking Feeling of Helpless Dread

[bobhamlin]

My morning commute is mostly in the dark--dawn happens along the way. Dawn is when birds -- such as starlings -- start flying. Starlings tend to flock. During the summer, the flocks tend to be groups that slept together in the same tree. Significant, but not awe-inspiring.

End-of-summer flocks, on the other hand, are like watching the aeronautical version of schooling bait fish. Zillions of individual members in a mesmerizing choreography. They must be prepping for migration. The enormity of the flocks is awe-inspiring, unless one realizes that one is going to ride directly under that awe-inspiring display. At that point, my only inspiration was to mutter a doom-and-gloom "Oh, sh*t."

Trapped and helpless: the flight path of that humongous flock was directly over the slow I270 traffic. I was going to pass directly under what seemed to be all the starlings in the mid-Atlantic region. Just last night, I had watched the "Battle of Midway" on the Military Channel's On-Demand. This must be what the Japanese carriers felt like when the second wave of U.S. planes appeared and their fighters were not around for protection.

Luckily, I WAS wearing my raingear (scattered showers this morning) -- but only my half helmet. I could only proceed.

I tilted my head down, scrunched up my shoulders, shrunk behind the windshield, sealed my lips tightly, and rode on. The flock seemed to be never-ending -- but eventually did.

No hits at all. I better be careful the rest of the day, since I used up a lot of luck already.