This one's for the BIRDS

So every trip to Walmart, there is always some drama unfolding somewhere. Walmart is a perpetual interactive theater, 24-hours a day, seven days a week, with a cast of thousands.

Because I’m not a drama queen (Julie and Kelly I saw you roll your eyes), I’ve been trying to limit my exposure. I have teenagers so I have enough drama in my life without finding it at Walmart. However, I had to go and get some supplies for our spring admissions photo shoot.

This morning, the drama unfolded before I even set foot in the store.

I pulled into the parking lot and headed up my usual row and just as I’m about to pull into my space, I see something kind of weird on the ground. So I slow down and take a closer look. A big bird of some sort, maybe a falcon, has another bird pinned to the ground and is standing on it. I have never seen anything like this before, so I stop the car completely and gawk.

Both birds look up at me. The bird with his face smashed to the ground looks up at me with pleading eyes as if to say “haaaalpme.” The bully bird gives me a dirty look, as if to say “Get outta here or you’re next.” I’m certain that if the bully bird had fingers, I would have been on the receiving end of a rude gesture. (And that would be the bird giving me the bird. Ha.)

Crud crud crud! Only 9:15 am and I’ve already got a moral dilemma.

Do I mind my own business and let nature take its course and then spend the rest of the day feeling guilty and un-Samaritan like? or Do I use my mom voice and give the bigger bird a good talking to and shame him into repentance? Given that I am terrified of big birds (not the Big Bird of Sesame Street because he’s all yellow and everything), that second choice wasn’t really an option.

At that moment, in a flash of brilliance, I decided that I would rev the engine and honk the horn a couple of times, thus scaring the bigger bird away and giving the smaller bird a chance to get away and notify the Walmart security team.

But if you were the elderly lady putting groceries in your trunk two spaces ahead, all you saw was some crazy lady in a dirty SUV revving her engine at you and honking furiously. For the second time that morning, I got a dirty look. But to her credit, she did not use her middle finger.

I pulled up next to her and rolled down my window to explain. She backed out and took no notice of my pleading eyes. I wanted to tell her that I wasn’t honking at her, but that there was this big bird standing on this little bird….

Oh never mind….

Exit stage left.