How to Win an Argument with a Crow

Take the long way every time. To and from work. Along the freight train tracks. Where the cottonwoods grow tall. Where they have room to misbehave.

Pick a spot. As remote as possible. Not visible from the chain link fence. Lost in the thistle. Atop a pile of discarded railroad ties. The trunk of a fallen tree perhaps. That one slab of cement jutting out of the gravel, spraypainted with the names of seventeen people, friends and lovers, long gone, colors faded.

This is the one place you can go, before your shift or afterwards, on your lunch break. You cannot change spots once you’ve picked it out. This is one of the rules. There are others.

Stop there and rest when you need to, in moments of radical dissent, empathetic unsettlement, bewilderment, crestfallenness, or fits of spleen. Take a book from your backpack. Notebook and mechanical pencil too. Read a page, a section, a chapter. Feel unclouded, ever so slightly. Write a phrase, a poem, a page. Enough to let the sunlight in. Assemble the words loosely, haphazardly, without tightening the screws. Remove the thermos from its place in the side pocket of your backpack. Serve a mate or two. Watch the steam rise from the newly moistened yerba at the base of the bombilla. Now is the time.

Up in the crowns of the cottonwoods, the crow will begin to stir. Hopping from branch to branch, flapping their wings loudly, they will gossip among themselves until they are very clearly agitated, very clearly no longer talking among themselves but talking, rather, to you. More specifically, gawking.

An emissary or two will swoop down. It is their job to obtain more information on the nature of this intrusion into their territory. Sure, the “no man’s land” along the tracks might not be claimed by any human but it would be inaccurate to assume that it has not been claimed at all. It has. You are a guest. That being the case, there are rules.

The welcoming committee will keep a distance at first. They will pick a spot, most likely, on the other side of the tracks, the hem, where the gravel gives way to the thistles. This is the site of hopping and gawking of a different kind, more elaborate this time, more urgent, with a set of steps and yelps that seem carefully choreographed but also leave a margin for improvisation, for flare.

Do not interrupt. Pay close attention to all the details, the height of the hops, the pitch of the notes of the gawks, the angle of the tilt of the heads, the dramatic opening of the wings at key moments throughout the performance.

Artwork from How to Know a Crow, written by Candace Savage and illustrated by Rachel Hudson

Lament that Curli cannot be there with you to translate. You spent the first part of your life making friends with a highly select group of people with a highly specialized set of skills, like proficiency in the languages of birds, as is the case with Curli, guardian of the dale and close friend of all its creatures. But your friends are all far away now, on the other side of The Hole in the Fence, the one that you crawled through in the middle of the night, all those years ago.

Don’t despair, in any case. You might not be able to make out all the words, but there are certain principles of the interaction that you can nonetheless infer. Now that the emissaries’ heads are tilted, now that their wings are folded, now that their torsos are inclined ever so slightly in your direction, for example, you can safely assume that it is your turn to talk.

Choose your words carefully. But not just the words. The intonation, the dramatic pauses, the gestures, all the nonverbal cues.

Don’t overshare. Don’t give explanations or justifications. The crows wouldn’t believe them anyway because they know the difference, the enormous gap, between who you are and the things that say about yourself.

Read, instead, a page from your notebook. Tell them how you scrutinize the urban landscape especially its undersides and gaps, the empty lots, the abandoned buildings, the ditches, in search of new skate spots even though it has been years since you touched a skateboard. Recite to them the lyrics of your favorite emo punk band from back in the day, your punk past life, not the one from D.C. that everyone associates with the movement, uncritically in your opinion, but the one from Baltimore. Tell them about the night that you took The Decision, after which there was no turning back.

Try not to go on too long, despite yourself. And try not to get up and pace, despite your ever-present walkaholic urge.

The crow emissaries will fly away, perhaps a little more abruptly than you would have liked, without saying goodbye, a little rude in your opinion. They will return to the very highest branches in the cottonwoods to hold counsel. The Great Debate will ensue. Twigs, small pieces of bark, and miniscule clumps of leaf matter will rain from above with all the hopping and gawking. You will have the distinct impression that it is no going to well for you. And The Verdict will confirm your suspicion. The consensus will lean in the direction of discontentment, with some room for dialogue. The possibility of future communications will not be entirely off the table.

Don’t fret about the results of your first conversation, an Interview, if you will. Look at the good side: there will be more opportunities to build rapport.

Do not show any signs of rejection upon packing your belongings. Maintain your composure as you stow thermos, mate, notebook, and mechanical pencil in their respective compartments. Pause, however, before you turn to leave. There is one thing you’re forgetting, perhaps the most important.

The time has come to leave something behind, a remnant, some debris from your life, a gift of sorts. It would be wrong to think of it as a bribe. It is, more accurately, the next step in the process of establishing communication.

Remove the red shoelace from your left shoe. Arrange it ceremoniously in the spot where you had been seated. Imagine, for a second, how beautiful it will look in a crow’s nest. But don’t stop there. Feeling inspired, return to your notebook and rip out a page, the most important one, the one where you started to outline The New Plan, the one that will get you out of this mess.

Say goodbye, calmer now, with the certainty, nonetheless, that your salutation will not be reciprocated.

Return to The Spot frequently. Every time you take The Long Way. To and from work or on your lunch break. Uncloud. Read aloud. Leave gifts, remnants, signs, pages from your notebook.

For seventeen weeks, the crows will gawk and hop from branch to branch, hurling what often seem to be insults. Little pieces of bark and moss will fall and land in your hair, on the pages of your notebook.

Notice, at the same time, that the gifts that you leave on one visit are invariably gone by the following visit.

There will come a time when there is no more hopping from branch to branch, no more loud flapping of the wings, no more insults.

The crows will look down from the highest branches, tilting their heads to one side and then to the other. Occasionally, a crow or two will swoop down and stand on the other side of the freight train tracks.

When this happens, listen first always to their reasons. Recognize, as well, when it is your turn to speak. Tell them about the rooftop of The Punk University. Tell them how your hands were shaking. Tell them about how you inched away from the ledge, uncertain whether it was cowardice or courage that made you do so. Tell them about how your boat capsized and how, eventually, you found your way back to dry land. Tell them what you have never told anybody, the details of The Great Debacle, the long nights behind the push-broom. Tell it at a whisper, without being ashamed, for once. Allow the silence to follow.

Braid the stems of some wildflowers together. Place it in the spot when you leave, together with one of the artifacts from Your Past Life, fragments from the notebooks.

One day, to your surprise, they will swoop down and stand on your side of the tracks. The pauses in your conversations will grow longer. Eventually you will just stare at the tracks together, like friends who haven't seen each other in years.

Return again and again to your spot, the spot you now share, as if it were the pages of a notebook, as if you were telling a story together. Return when the thistle turns yellow and brittle, when their stalks break. Return when the raspy leaves of the cottonwoods rub together in the breeze. Return when the darkness takes hold. Return when the moonlight reflects on the steel rails, sharpening its blade. Return when the first tracks appear in the snow, crow tracks.

Return until the day that The Verdict is officially overturned. Return to find, in your usual spot, the long-awaited response, a large and slightly shrivelled nut, the rarest fruit, an indentation in its corner, a gift from your confidants and co-conspirators, a sign, the invaluable kind.

Artwork from The Ladybird of Trees (1963), by S.R. Badmin