It was midmorning, midweek and skies were blue. The last few seats on the hawk watch platform at Cape May Point State Park were filling fast when someone shouted:
MERLIN!
Two hundred lives went on hold.
Up in the Peanut Gallery, conversation stopped mid-syllable.
“So I say to this Bozo, you don't even know what a joist—“
“Oh, right, well he might think that he saw one bu—“
“Cold front!? Cold front!? What's a col—“
“No, I went up there this morning. Spent two hours watching the feeders but aside from a couple of Ruby-throateds I didn’—“
“You don't like egg salad? Oh, man, how can you not like egg sal—“
The interruption hardly mattered. At the Leica Sponsored Hawk Watch, conversation is just what happens between hawk sightings and chances are nobody would remember what they were talking about when post-Merlin conversation resumed.
Down at the end of the platform, M. and L. were discussing the pros and cons of buying the new, Ultravid binoculars that he coveted but insisted they couldn’t afford and that she wanted him to buy (if only because it opened the door, tit for tat, for her to get new carpet in the bedroom)…
Standing by the rail was R. who was gnawing a bone relating to:
“That b*#@h! That lousy, stinking, lying little two faced b*#@h. She's been angling for my job ever since she joined the company and it's obvious she was just waiting for the opportunity to rub my nose in...”
On upper deck was D. who was working on the London Times Crossword Puzzle and mulling over the possibilities inherent in the suggestion: “a different sort of epicurean symbiosis, perhaps” (twelve letters). Next to her was L. mulling over of the considerable merits of several different models of scopes.
Rifle scopes.
And whether to get a Mil-Dot reticle or Heavy Duplex. He hunted deer in heavy brush and while he’d always used a Mil-Dot, he thought, maybe, given his failing eyesight, the cross-hairs on the HD might be easier to see.
Speaking of dots, not far away was N. who was trying to convince her two home schooled children that searching for little dots in the sky (there were hawks) was far more fascinating than text messaging friends, and just down the row was M. who was thinking that N. had really nice legs.
She was also unbanded! A bonus and a state that did not apply to him, or to the young (meaning thirtyish) couple that had just walked up on the platform only to discover that they were surrounded by…
Bird watchers!
Not sure how to precede (i.e. give any indication that they noticed that they were surrounded by bird watchers or indicate by smiles and nods that they didn’t mind being in the presence of bird watchers).
They proceeded oh-so-very-casual-like to the far edge of the platform so they could make their comments in whispers (so as not to offend anyone).
On the lower deck, B was thinking ahead to lunch. J. was worrying about the “check engine” light that had just gone on in her Volvo when she’d pulled off Sunset. C. was talking to her mother on her cell phone. G. was cleaning his binoculars. S. was studying the plates of raptors in her 1972 edition Golden (Field) Guide and W. was just getting up to head for the bathroom because he really, really, really....
Then someone shouted “MERLIN!” and as the small, dark falcon flashed past the hawk watch, 200 lives went on hold (minus the thirtyish couple who were looking at each other, wondering what everyone else was suddenly so excited about).
Two point eight seconds later the bird was gone. Everyone (except the thirtyish couple) exchanged nods and smiles and went back to their lives.