Chapter 28 Field Study
In mid-January, the semester starts again and I’m relieved to be back at work, finding solace in my job. Professor Montgomery keeps looking at me askance, but he doesn’t press, and I’m glad of that.
Taking a deep breath, I ask, “Professor, you told me about a field study back in November. I know I said I wasn’t interested, but I wonder if they are still looking for people? I’m thinking I may want to do it now.”
I breathe, “What? What happened?”
“Wow. That is amazing.” My brow crinkles. “But how am I going to spot this bird if even the experts aren’t sure?”
“Well, I, for one, believe those experts really did see the
ivory-bill. Those folks can’t mix up an ivory-bill and a pileated.
Christ! They can distinguish a cattle egret from a snowy egret at thirty paces.
They wouldn’t mix up a goddamn ivory-bill with a pileated.
” He thumps his fist on his desk. “Let me find a book that will help. It tells the whole sordid story of this magical bird and its awful demise. It’s around here somewhere.
” He ambles over to his overflowing bookcase and sorts through the books resting on the shelves in a jumbled mess.
“Ah! Here it is. The Race to Save the Lord God Bird by Phillip Hoose. This will tell you what you need to know. Pictures and everything.”
On the cover is a huge, wild, amber-eyed, black-and-white bird with a scarlet crest and a white bill.
He looks like he thundered down straight out of Zeus’s bow.
I flip through some pages, examining the drawings and pictures of the ivory-bill, and something cracks open in my chest. This is a creature from another world, or at least another time, it feels like magic.
Professor Montgomery interrupts my thoughts. “This book will fill in the facts and the history, but ask Jake—”
“No, Professor, I don’t want to ask Jake, and I don’t want you to mention this to him. I want to do this on my own.”
Frowning, he presses, “But Jake—”
“Nothing about Jake on this,” I cut him off again. “This is me on my own.”
Professor Montgomery looks wounded. “Emma, if some-thing is wrong, you need to talk to Jake and not run away. Running away never solved anything. You aren’t the sort.”
I turn away with a jerk. I’m not running away. I’m just hoping time and distance will help heal a broken heart. I can’t bear to tell Professor that talking is futile, as it was all a charade.
Instead, to change the subject back to safer ground, I say, “I found this wonderful quote by someone, I forget his name, but he said just knowing ivory-bills may still inhabit our world is enough for him at this moment.”
Smiling, I remember sharing that quote with Jake. Maybe this will be my life from now on. Remembering memories from this special time. God, I hope that will be enough.
“Oh, that was David Marshall. One of the premier west coast ornithologists. We have a healthy rivalry. I’m the king of the east coast and he is king of the west. We both have life lists of over eight hundred.
I think he might be one or two birds ahead of me now.
I agree with his sentiment, but we do want to know for sure. ”
Professor Montgomery jabs his finger at the book in my hand.
“You’ll find the crazy story about Sonny Boy in this book.
Look at that picture. They are the most majestic of all avian creatures.
They stand over two feet tall and have an iridescent black body, with a jagged white eye stripe, and show a large amount of white in the wings.
Truly a magnificent bird. The males have a red cap, and they fly like soaring eagles, according to John Muir.
I would give my eye tooth to see one in flight.
” He pauses reverently. “You’ll be trying to solve the most hotly debated topic among ornithologists.
Are they still living and somehow have found a way to survive far from us humans who have fragmented and cut down so much of their habitat, which is the old-growth forests?
Ivory-bills need at least seven acres of old-wood growth forest, and we clear cut those long ago.
Researchers rediscovered a nesting pair in Florida in 1924, complete with photographs.
You’ll see the pictures of the lovely pair in the book.
Ivory-bills mate for life, you know. Can you guess what some idiot did after finding them? ”
I shake my head having no clue. I’ve never seen Professor Montgomery quite so incensed.
“They shot them both, stuffed and mounted them. Idiots, we are all idiots.”
I can’t let myself dwell too long on the image of those two beautiful birds stuffed and hanging on a wall or I’ll start blubbering right here. Why is life so cruel?
Squaring my shoulders, I ask, “How do I go about applying? I would love to be even a small part of trying to find such a bird.” I pause and add playfully, “Although, what will you do without me for a few months?”
Professor Montgomery gazes at me, smiling. “Ah, to be young and able to get back into the field. I’m jealous, for sure. When you return, you must tell me all about it, promise?
Let’s go on the website and apply together.”
Laughing, I feel a part of my heart thaw just a touch.
On the home page is a beautiful picture of the ivory-bill.
I’m humbled at the thought of it. I quickly complete the required information and hit submit.
Professor Montgomery said he would send a personal email to the project team in Arkansas and assured me there won’t be any issue with me joining.
While Professor Montgomery is confident, I’m less so. They would need to be desperate to accept me with my paltry months of organizing and cataloguing thrush data in a cozy office. I try not to get my hopes up.
Professor Montgomery was right! They are desperate.
With this new adventure awaiting me, my life, which felt so unhinged since my un-diagnosis, feels a little bit more under control. I decide I won’t tell Jake anything until I have everything all figured out for my new job. I need to do this myself, or at least without Jake.
We are coexisting. I’m using Vee’s bedroom to sleep, and while she isn’t happy about that, she’s not meddling too much.
I make dinner for us, as it seems petty not to when I’m making something for myself, but I draw the line at making pasta Bolognese.
Jake is busy emailing someone back and forth, spending a lot of time on his phone or computer.
It appears he’s not working on his thesis; his papers aren’t spread out on the table as they normally are when he’s working.
I try not to keep tabs on his comings and goings, but habits are hard to break.
I’m always aware of where he is in the apartment.
And when he is gone from the apartment to teach his class, the emptiness sometimes makes me collapse in a heap on the couch.
I hope my change in venue will stop this. If I didn’t know better, I’d think it was MS again.
I’m sitting, staring blankly at the pages of one of Vee’s Vogue magazines, when Jake comes into the apartment and comes directly over to me. I received acceptance into the IBWO project a week ago, and I still haven’t told him. The cushions shift as he sits on the edge of the couch.
He takes my hand and says earnestly, “Emma, I want to talk.”
Looking up at him, I give a barely perceptible shrug.
“I know I should have said something to my mother when she said those awful things. But I want to explain the reason I didn’t do anything then.
I’m not making excuses, just explaining things.
I didn’t want you to see Oliver like that.
He gets mean when he drinks and that is nothing you need to deal with.
My mom and I have been dealing with it since .
. . umm . . . forever. It goes way back.
So, my sole focus that night was to keep things smooth and calm and get him into bed. ”
Jake stands and starts pacing.
“This has been playing out my whole life; it’s what we learned to do.
I’m not sure I even registered what my mom said, I was so focused on Oliver.
Well, that isn’t true—I knew what she said.
But I knew not to say anything then. God, if I had ever said anything to her, with Oliver in that state, he would have reacted and reacted badly. ”
Jake takes a deep breath and runs his hands through his hair. I’m digesting what he’s sharing, trying to understand it.
“Well, I’ve thought and thought about this and all the messed-up crap that got me to the place where I wouldn’t open my mouth when my mom said something despicable.
I finally confronted my mom. I told her who you are and how wrong it is for her to call her neighbors’ horrible names.
She feels really bad. Well, once she got over the shock, she did. ”
I imagine Carol’s shock and disdain at the news of her son’s engagement to the Polack next door; a painful lump rose in my throat. I try to formulate my thoughts at this revelation. I almost say thank you but bite the words back. “I’m sure she’s not happy with you or me.”
He shrugs. “She’ll come around.”
“Well, she won’t need to come around for too much longer, will she? Our time is almost up,” I remark dully, although something flickers in my chest at the thought that Jake told his mother.
“Look, we need to talk about that. This whole thing needs to be figured out.” He waves his arms in a circle.
“But I’ve got to go away for a week or so.
I have a mini-crisis I need to take care of.
I’m working on a special project but not scheduled to start working on it again until March, but I need to make a quick check now.
I’ll be back soon, and then we can talk.
This will give us both time to think about what we really want. ”
Looking into those deep brown eyes, I ache to run my hands through his hair one last time.
If only I had known the last time I’d done it was going to be my last, I would have committed it to memory.
Now all I have is the hazy memory of running my hand through his unruly hair the afternoon of the party, but I don’t have all the sharp details I need so I can hold on to them long after our time is over.
“Emma, okay?” he pleads. “We can talk when I get back. We need to talk about our future.”
I vacillate on whether I should just tell him the whole sordid MS story and be done with it.
But I’m still not sure how to explain it all to him.
And does it even matter? All I know is I don’t want to come up with our breakup story and tell the few people who need to hear it, especially Carol.
Just disappearing will be best because I’m done.
I squash the little flicker and something akin to relief loosens the muscles deep in my chest. I will survive this, and one day, breathing will not hurt so much.
I watch as Jake packs a small bag. Within an hour, he is gone. I ask myself, Should I have told him my secret?
The apartment is quieter than ever.