The other morning Conrad came bounding into our bedroom at 6am and said, “Mom! Dad! You’ve got to see this there’s an enormous bird in our yard! Come Quick!”

I just laid there in the bed thinking it is much to early for me to drag my butt out of bed to see a bird that I suspected was just a big crow. David, God bless him went downstairs to look. An hour later I was awake and pouring him a bowl of Panda Puffs. “What color was it?”

“Black.”

So it was a crow, I thought, but I didn’t say anything because he was still really excited about it.

Later that morning I was driving to yoga and there in my neighbor’s yard was an enormous ugly big black bird. “Holy crap. That’s Conrad’s black bird!”

Conrad’s bird was a very large and unattractive turkey vulture.  I was late to class, but I pulled over, parked the car and starting snapping photos with my phone trying not to get to close to scare it away. There was a terrible rotting stench and I thought gosh this bird stinks until I realized it was eating a dead raccoon which made my stomach turn and I had to head back the car. I was so proud of Conrad. There was a huge bird in the yard and I was wrong, I wanted to bust in on his classroom and tell him I’d seen his bird but I knew it had to wait until later.

That evening, while serving him his chicken nuggets I told him about my big ugly bird sighting. “Did your bird look like this?” I asked and I whipped out the photos. He was thrilled to see the pictures and then he turned to me and said, “I told you it was a big black bird and I know you thought all I saw was a crow.”

“You’re right Con, I did think it was just a crow and I’m sorry I didn’t get out of bed fast enough to see it.”

“I know what I crow looks like mom.”

“I know you do.”

And that’s when it hit me. Conrad is six-and-a-half, he while he can’t read fluently, he understands the world in a way that I haven’t appreciated until just now. I’m used to him being four and saying, “look a big bird!”, and that big bird being a crow and me knowing it would be a crow. There’s no more nodding along with his discoveries anymore because what he’s learning now will very likely surprise me. Italians think of birds as omens, often bad ones, and though I am superstitious, I don’t think this bird is a bad sign. Quite the contrary, I’m very grateful. The turkey vulture showed me that I need to pay attention, be honest and listen to Conrad or I risk thinking that I know where he’s coming from when I don’t have any idea at all.