When my friends and I talk about our biggest fears, I get a strong sense of embarrassment. I do not have a regular fear, and people often are very confused and even laugh at me when I tell them. Every person I know has a normal relationship with birds. When they walk past them, maybe they toss a piece of bread or even smile when one walks by. I am not one of those people. My relationship with birds is more like a war, except the birds are unaware of the war and I am the only one who is constantly on edge. The whole fear started back in the summer before fourth or fifth grade, when I had a nightmare that a pigeon attacked me. At the time, I brushed it off. Kids have nightmares all the time, right? Wrong. The universe decided to turn my nightmare into a reality.
About a month later, I was on a cruise with my family, stepping off the boat onto a port in Alaska. I was relaxed, excited and blissfully unaware of the trauma I was about to endure. That is when I saw it. The biggest bird I had ever seen in my entire life. This was not a bird. It was an enormous creature. It was black, looming and staring directly into my soul. I swear it knew about my pigeon nightmares. It felt like it was looking at me and thinking, “Oh, yes, this one fears me,” and in that moment, my fate was sealed. Fear locked into place like a switch that had flipped inside of me.
I am the most unathletic person I have ever met. I do not play sports and I am the slowest runner anyone will ever meet. But from that day on, I became a track star. When a bird was around me, it could be across the street and I would be off. Peacocks strolling down my neighborhood, gorgeous and majestic to everyone else, became my personal enemies. This is ironic because I have actually dressed up as a peacock twice for Halloween, trying to reclaim my power, but even that did not work. Seagulls at the beach turned into terrifying guards that felt the need to ruin my perfect tan. Pigeons on the sidewalk and even geese became little-winged alarms that sent me sprinting in the opposite direction. Being outdoors turned into a mission to avoid birds at all costs.
But then something shocking happened. Last school year, my fear began to shrink. Not disappear entirely, but I could at least exist within the same general area as a bird without freaking out. I thought maybe I was growing out of what I felt was a childhood fear. For a moment, I believed I could be a regular person again.
I was wrong.
This summer, my family and I visited a few places in Europe, including Amsterdam. It was an enjoyable trip filled with museums, canals and shopping. No one mentioned it was also the secret capital of pigeons. One day, while trying to cross what I thought was a harmless plaza, I realized I could not, in fact, see the ground because the ground had disappeared. There were only pigeons. I bet at least a hundred of them. It looked like a feathered ocean, and my family just expected me to casually stroll past them.
I froze. Then the panic hit. Then the tears. Full-on toddler meltdown, right there in the middle of Amsterdam, surrounded by birds who were unaware of my fear. My mom and grandma had to escort me away like I was actually having an emergency. We ended up taking a random back road just to avoid the flock and meet back up with the rest of my family.
So, yes. I know it sounds odd and random, but I am scared of birds. A nightmare, a cruise ship monster, years of dodging peacocks on the road and one international breakdown later, here I am. Some people have normal fears, like spiders or heights (which I also find relatable). I fear anything with feathers and beady eyes. My fear has turned me into an athlete, like the natural mama bear instinct rushes through my body when a bird comes by and suddenly I could beat Usain Bolt in a race. If there is a bird nearby, I definitely will not be.
