I Can’t Stop Crying About An Owl
Birding was my quarantine hobby — but then it became unexpectedly emotional
Like many people, I got into birding during quarantine.
I didn’t set out to do, didn’t think “Oh, that’s a fun hobby I should try.” I slid into it gradually. Without anywhere to go in the summer of 2020, I was spending far more time hiking than usual, putting in anywhere from three to six miles in Griffith Park, often three times a week. It started as exercise: headphones in, something to endure, a means to an end.
But the more I hiked the same trails over and over, the more I started to pay attention. I couldn’t help it. As months rolled on, I noticed what flowers bloomed and where, I noticed what the quality of light did to certain trails at certain hours. One particularly windy day, I became fascinated with the movement of a hawk, the way it rode the gusts of air to be completely stationary, hovering above me. The next hike I noticed a crow and a hawk doing battle in the sky, and I stood with my neck craned by the Hollywood Reservoir for a solid three minutes as confused passers-by tried to figure out what I was looking at.
I told my mom about the hawk and crow, and she mailed me a pair of my dad’s spare binoculars. I started taking them with me on my hikes, turning off my headphones…
