Magpies and Moodylocks

I always count magpies on my way to work. It's the one superstition I have. Of course, I know it's a superstition, and that I shouldn't read too much into it, but still, it's hard not to. "One for sorrow, two for joy ..I've only seen one, so that means bad luck today. I better be on my guard." The rhyme said so. And it's an old rhyme, handed down from long ago. From a world that had different knowledge. My mam taught me it. She got it from somewhere else. No classroom was needed. Somehow it survived into secular modernity. A catchy jingle from more superstitious times.

One for sorrow, two for joy. Three for a girl, four for a boy. Five for silver, six for gold. Seven for a story never to be told.

Fortunately (luckily), I generally see a lot of magpies on my way to work; on my little semi-nature trek over the River Tees. So I'm sometimes far beyond seven. Well into the realms of the untold. I'm actually quite fond of magpies too. I think they're very beautiful birds. They tend to get a bad rap - seen as thieves that steal shiny things, and as predators that bully other birds. (Pretty much everyone I know hates them.) Perhaps they are troublemakers, but the crisp distinction of the black against the white always leaves me impressed by the neat artistry of nature. There's also a slight iridescent blue to their dark feathers when you see them up close. They're well-turned out birds. The fact that they tend to pair bond for life gives an added admiration.

I also sometimes see swans on my way to work. These remind me of Helen of Troy. The real Helen of Troy - the one that's turned my brain to goo recently. The one who can't be named except in simile. (I noted once before on here that I tend to get the inspiration but not the girl when it comes to love. She's definitely in the moody muse category. So I think the pattern is most certainly continuing. That I'm here writing this probably tells you that.) It's said that Helen had skin so fair it was like the shell of a swan's egg. The real version even looks like a little swan when she's sat huddled over her mobile phone in the office.

The other birds that catch my thoughts are the collared doves that hang out in the garden. The current two are like boyfriend and girlfriend, inseparable, sitting for hours on the fence or in the tree branches. Just there, with each other. Timelessly. I sometimes feel a little jealous when I see them. I'd like to reincarnate as one. The calm peace of an easy love. It reminds me of years ago when I used to see wild rabbits on my way to work when I worked in a factory. I'd always think, "What a life. Just bouncing around, eating ever-available grass and having sex." Again, with a similar feeling that the animals have it better than Man.

(It seems birds, being creatures of the air, are more symbolic of love than sex. Closer to the heavens; less weighed down by the material earth. So perhaps with age my thinking is getting more ethereal.)

Incidentally, I also sometimes see rabbits on my way home from work. Their little white tails bobbing through the dusk like little headlights. Innocent and cute, bringing to the world a sense of Eden.

It was my walk home last night that inspired me to post this morning. After a day of failure I was thinking it was time to put the moody one fully out of my thoughts and dreams. I like her too much, but the moment has passed, and she likes me ever less. Anyway, as I was walking home, at about ten o'clock, in the dark, I first heard, then saw, two magpies. They were chattering away, making quite a racket, in a tree above a parked car with its engine still on. Dimly lit by the glow of streetlights.

Normally I never see magpies at night. In fact, when I count them on my way to work I bear this in mind. Having seen one before work I could then hold out hope of seeing a second when I finish. Rescuing me from the misfortune. Given it's night when I leave work though I know this cannot be. So the cut off point for prognostication is when I enter the building and start my shift. Consequently, seeing two at night, with my head so full of defeat and failure, felt like something of an omen. Not necessarily of good or bad portent, but more with a feeling of, "Okay, this is part of life's meaningful odyssey."

And fittingly I've just started reading Homer's Odyssey. (I did fear to read it as I found Homer's Iliad so boring. However, it's actually excellent. It reads like a work of fiction, not like a long poem - as per the Iliad. It also has medieval fairy tale type elements too. Such as Penelope's devoted love to Odysseus, and how she unpicks the shroud she's weaving every night by firelight to buy herself more time before having to remarry. Upholding the troubadour ideal of true love as divine and time-conquering.)

In the Odyssey there's a bit where Zeus sends two eagles across the sky as an omen. This is then interpreted by an older man (Halitherses) who's experienced in "bird lore and soothsaying." It reminded me that fortune telling by birds was once a common thing. It also reminds me of the book, The Alchemist, another tale of an odyssey or journey with elements of bird divination.

As I go through life it's hard not to feel like an Odysseus type figure. Being both helped and tormented by the gods. Though I suspect I may be more the "auburn haired" Menelaus at this point.