An outdoor cat — a feral cat, a cat born and raised in a nearby backyard — caught a hummingbird and dropped it alongside my fence.
I saw the cat and I saw the bird — but I only saw the aftermath. All of the blood and the feathers.
I didn’t catch the cat in the act, so I couldn’t have stopped him.
I didn’t even realize what I was looking at, not at first. I thought it was a baby bird, until I saw the brilliant green feathers on the bird’s tiny throat. My sorrow was mixed with a bit of … grotesque awe. I didn’t even know cats could move that quickly.
Bad things often happen when you aren’t ready to intervene — when you aren’t prepared, when you’re feeling slow or tired, when you’re scared.
This week, some neighbors in my grandmother’s neighborhood were fighting — a domestic dispute between a couple I’d never met — and I wondered if I ought to call someone to break it up. But I hesitated.
I admit that I did nothing. I did nothing, other than to stand in the front window and watch the two of them spin around the front yard. It was an awkward waltz between two people of surprisingly equal strength. She grabbed him by the wrists and pushed him away from her, and I felt like she’d handled the situation relatively well, all things considered.
But I was surprised by my own feelings of helplessness and guilt.
I felt the same as when I discovered a big screw in a parking lot at work, back when there were two different projects going on at the same time. Which crew should I turn it over to? What if the folks from the other crew come looking for this screw? Have I stolen a screw that was rightfully theirs? Will they blame me?
I shrugged — and I didn’t get involved. I still felt guilty, but the guilt subsided when I realized that I don’t always need to agonize. I need to keep it moving, or to help and then keep it moving. But agonizing doesn’t help anyone, particularly if that’s the only thing I do.
Agony isn’t really the sort of vibe to bring to the function. It might be mindful — in an overthinking-type way — but it certainly isn’t demure.
As I’ve grown older. I’ve learned to pick my battles, but I rarely feel like a war general. I usually feel like a piece of General Tso’s chicken.