Epiphany 2024: A New Year's Message from the Birds

In the spring of 2023, I was going on a little walk through the woods with one of my friends (hey, Chrystie!) when she took out her phone to use an app to identify some plants that sparked her curiosity. We did that a few times, and I didn’t think too much of it, because usually when I’m curious enough about a plant to know something more about it I just ask my husband Joel, because he knows EVERYTHING about plants. (OK, maybe not EVERYTHING, but enough for any casual interest I might have from time to time.) At some point though, during our walk, she also used an app to identify some birdcalls that we wanted to know more about, and my brain exploded! (Not literally, thank God.)

Shortly after returning home from that visit to Virginia, I downloaded “Merlin” to my phone, and I’ve been hooked ever since!

Just a month or two prior to that visit, Joel and I moved to Ballenger Creek, MD, about an hour west of Baltimore City where we’d lived for many, many years. In our new home, I take many more opportunities – sometimes daily – to be in nature and to explore my surroundings, including hiking up mountains, strolling alongside rivers, and now, identifying birds! I’ve been learning all about my new hobby, including its language (pro tip: it’s called “birding;” “birdwatching” is literally a spectator sport in comparison), and even joining the local chapter of the Maryland Ornithological Society. That now makes two separate MOS’s that my household is a member of, through Joel, who is an active member of the Maryland Orchid Society. Anyway, birding gets me up and out of the house doing things that I find interesting, and it’s good for both my physical and mental health. I love it.

Now that I am a fledgling birder (ha! see what I did there?), I am constantly listening for birdsong and peering through my new pair of binoculars trying to identify species by what I hear and see. THEY ARE EVERYWHERE! How did I not notice them before? Why did they all kind of just look/sound the same and blend into the background? I cannot believe the incredible diversity of avian species; they are endlessly fascinating. So, when the new year rolled around, it was almost a game for me to find out what my first birds of 2024 would be…

Because I heard the loud caw of an American crow before I could even leave my house, I made a mental note of that and went out to find the first bird I would actually see for the new year. From the car on my way to a New Year’s Day hike with Joel, I saw a vulture soaring in the distance. It was most likely a turkey vulture, since that is what is predominantly present around here this time of year – but it was too far away, and I know too few positive distinguishing markers between it and the black vulture from that distance, so I also made a mental note of that and kept driving. Then whoosh!, a red-shouldered hawk flew by. Three different birds, each one closer, in the span of a few short minutes. A treat! And what could these birds portend?

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Around Thanksgiving of last year, I ordered and received a copy of Queers the Word: A 40-Day Devotional for LGBTQ+ Christians. I calculated that if I started the following Monday, November 27, it would take me through Advent and I would finish on January 5, the last day of the Christmas season; indeed, I finished the devotional yesterday, and it was a great spiritual practice for me to engage with a friend. Today, January 6, is Epiphany, which (in Western Christianity) is a celebration of the manifestation of Christ to the Gentiles in the birth of Jesus of Nazareth. Broadly speaking, however, an epiphany can be any manifestation of the divine breaking through to us mortal folk, whether that be as an apparition, as inspiration, as an idea, as an omen…as the birth of a holy child…as…birds? Hrm…

The first person I thought about while that bird was screaming its head off outside my bedroom window was my friend and colleague Mathew P. Taylor, the second anniversary of whose death we just commemorated in December. I can’t even begin to describe what a warm embrace that cawing was to my spirit. If I had been using the Merlin app, it would have identified what I was hearing as Corvus brachyrhynchos, or the American Crow. What my spirit immediately heard was Mathew saying, “hey, friend! I pulled a card for you, and I want you to know…you got this! Have a great year!” What a blessing. Mathew is still with me.

And then I saw, but did not positively identify, a turkey vulture, Cathartes aura. In my short eight months as a novice birder, I have come to understand that vultures generally get a bad rap. They are commonly seen as ugly, perhaps gross, and may even be feared. But the more I encounter these supposedly ugly, gross, and fearsome creatures, the more I have come to appreciate them. They play a vital role in their ecosystems, often consuming the carcasses of other animals that have died – their scientific name means “purifier,” and it is cognate with the word catharsis. Incidentally, they also eat other things, like fruits. They are also kind of beautiful up close, somewhat statuesque, certainly graceful, and they actually seem to be rather good-tempered despite human misgivings. At least around here! And so I thought to myself…what can it mean for me to be encountering this turkey vulture on New Year’s Day? Well, there is a lot about this world, and my experience of it, that is ugly, gross, and fearsome…but through the example of this hulking bird, perhaps I can learn to consume and be nourished by those things in me that have died, or that need to die, to help purify and keep my spiritual ecosystem healthy. Perhaps I can come to see that the past – and the present – that I constantly ruminate over doesn’t have to maintain a death grip on my life; perhaps if I look closely, I can find the beauty and grace in my experience, learn from it, and let it go, soaring like the vulture into a brighter day…

Finally, the red-shouldered hawk, Buteo lineatus. I haven’t learned to identify many hawks yet, and the meaning of its scientific name, “lined buzzard,” doesn’t hold any apparent spiritual significance for me. Most of the hawks I can identify around here are red-tails. But this one was clearly a red-shouldered hawk – the first bird that I both saw and positively identified this year, though I did not hear its call. One of the main things that hawks are known for is their keen eyesight. Because of their visual acuity, hawks can see very clearly objects that are up to 100 feet away, enabling them to hunt efficiently and effectively from great soaring heights. For this reason and others, hawks are often symbols of seeing “the big[ger] picture,” with the red-tailed and red-shouldered hawks serving additionally as symbols of spiritual vision, clarity, forward movement, and an efficient and effective pursuit of goals and dreams. WHAT? I’m too superstitious to say anything more about that right now lol I don’t want to jinx myself. Let’s just say that this is very encouraging!

So there you have it. I have begun 2024 with a threefold (hahaha) epiphany, a divine manifestation with a message for my life this year: 1) those who love me are rooting for me and have my back, 2) the past, though it may seem bad and dead, can nourish me and sustain my life, but only if I purify my relationship with it and learn to let it go, and 3) I can and will soar, clearly spotting my goals and dreams, and moving forward to grab hold of them. Whew! I am encouraged. May you, too, find encouragement in your life as you pursue your own dreams.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!