Wearing thick socks, gloves, and a hoodie over my pajamas, I gingerly opened the door a crack and peeked inside the room. No movement. My other hand tightly gripped a broom. I pulled the hood up over my head and tightened it as much as I could and still see. My heart pounding, I began nudging my couch away from the wall so that I could creep behind it, casting nervous glances at the huge plant across the room. It went that way for about two minutes. Nudge, glance, nudge, glance, nudge, glance...FREEZE at the sound of a rustle and a flutter in the plant, run back to the door, resume nudging... Finally I had cleared enough of a path behind the couch that I could creep behind and oh so sneakily move towards the window on the opposite wall. With one quick motion, I flung open the window and bolted out of the room by way of my couch tunnel, slamming the door behind me.
You may be wondering what was the series of events that led to me donning this pathetic suit of armor and planning a sneak attack in my own home.
Saturday morning began like any other - me curled up under my duvet, savoring every last minute of sleep I could muster, trying to ignore the sunlight that streamed through my curtains because I was too lazy to close the rolladen the night before. Around 9:00 I gave up the fight and stumbled into the bathroom. As I brushed my teeth and began making my mental to-do list for the day, I heard an interesting sound that seemed to be coming from the living room.
It was a sound not unlike any I'd ever heard before. The flutter of wings and clunk. I've heard this sound many times at school, where the birds accidentally fly towards our huge windows and slam into the glass, stunning themselves and flapping away confused. This time, however, the sound repeated itself. I froze in the middle of spitting out my toothpaste, listening carefully. With a growing horror, I realized that the sound of fluttering and clunking was not coming from outside, but from INSIDE my living room window.
I dropped my toothbrush and dashed to the living room just in time to see a gray winged creature fly across the room and bounce off the window with a clunk. I gripped the doorknob in terror and slammed the door, trapping the bird in the living room.
Yes. I was hiding from a bird.
I won't tell you all the awful experiences I've had with birds, I'll just say this: I hate them with every fiber of my being. There was a time in my life when I thought maybe my fear was irrational and began taking steps to overcome my fear, but have since decided that while I may be a 25-year-old independent single woman who lives in a foreign country, holds a European driver's license, maneuvers international airports with ease and even teaches middle school for goodness sakes... I am TERRIFIED of birds and not afraid to admit it.
So, back to the bird. I'm now standing outside my living room with the door closed, listening to the flapping and clunking as the bird tries to escape through my closed living room window. Then, the flapping stops and I hear an odd warbling sound. I peek into the room, wondering where the bird has gone. I hear a rustle in the huge potted plant on my bookshelf, and see one of the leaves quiver. The bird is hiding in a potted plant in my living room!
But how did the bird get into the apartment in the first place? I ask myself. Last night before bed, anticipating the first frost of the season, I had closed all my windows. But yesterday morning while getting ready for school, I had been a good little German and opened my bathroom window wide after my shower. This is standard operating procedures, as German bathrooms do not come equipped with an exhaust fan. Up until this point, the weather has been nice enough to leave bathroom window open while I am at school. It hadn't worried me before because I live on the second floor, high enough that no burglars (or neighbors' cats) could crawl into the window, and no peeping toms would be able to look into my home.
Apparantly I hadn't considered trespassers of the winged variety.
My conclusion is that the bird entered my apartment through the bathroom window yesterday while I was at school. Unsure of how to get back out, it made its way into my living room, where it found refuge in the potted plant in the corner and stayed out of sight until this morning. It did such a good job of hiding that I was able to spend three hours in the living room last night eating dinner, watching movies, and reading without suspecting a thing.
So after spending 45 minutes standing behind the closed living room door and debating with myself whether I would man up and get rid of the bird myself or be a chicken and call for help, I finally proceeded with my plan to cover as much of my body as possible, creep towards the window on the opposite wall, and open it before the bird could attack me.
After several agonizing minutes, the bird finally took flight and rocketed through the open window. I dashed to the window, slammed it shut, and vowed to never again leave my window open during the day.
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