actually, the house remains untouched; it's mostly above the tree line

For the past few months, Northeast Baltimore has been hit with a plague. A plague of crows. I do not remember it being like this last year. And I think I would remember walking out the door to this every morning.

It's terrible. They perch up in the trees by the hundreds all night. They scream every morning before it's light out. People run down the streets in fear of standing in one place for too long. The worst, though, is its effect on our cars.

At least in our neighborhood, everyone is in the same boat. The crows don't discriminate onto which cars they release the contents of their cloacas. Crow poop: the great equalizer. However, if you travel south in the city at all, the area somehow exempt from this curse (Is the blood of a lamb painted over their door frames or something?), people will gawk at you as if you were an alien. A yellow and white poop-spattered alien.

While I am used to the stares and comments by now, today was a new record. My day went a little something like this:

Act I

I'm taking the children I nanny to the Walters Art Gallery. I park on Cathedral Street, get out of the car, and start attempting to open the stroller by some mystical combination of levers and buttons activated in just the right order. A breeze blows, much warmer than the past few frigid days. A middle-aged woman who I have never met approaches.

homeless lady: Excuse me, Miss. Can you do me a favor?
me: Maybe.
homeless lady: You know me. You see me here all the time. Can you help me and my three children get to the shelter? We're freezing out here.
me: I'm not giving any rides...
homeless lady: Could you give us some bus fare?
me: No thanks. I'm sorry.

Having used all her pitches to no avail, the lady drops her pained expression. A genuine smile crosses her face as she points toward my car.

homeless lady: You park by a lot of birds?
me: Yes. It's the worst!!!

The lady laughs and shakes her head as she walks away.

Act II

Leaving the museum, I scheme about the best way to get the baby to fall asleep in the car. I decide we should drive around a bit, and I propose this idea to the three-year-old girl.

me: Do you want to drive by my house? And see where Miss Anna lives?
three-year-old girl: ...It have bird poop on it?

Act III

After having seen my house, which is NOT covered in bird poop, thank you, the kids and I head back to their residence. On President Street, some teenage girls in the back of a black SUV start heckling me.

teenage girls: Hey! Hey! Roll down your window! You got something on your car! I think there's some bird poop on it! I'll pay YOU to wash your car!!

The girls continue to shout at me for the duration of the green light as I stare ahead and refuse to engage with them, much like I did with the bullies in sixth grade. Even as they turn right at the light and I go straight, one girl sticks her head out the window and continues to shout at me. Apparently distracted by her antics, the driver makes a very wide turn, passing too close to a street sign on her left and knocking that girl's loud head clear off her shoulders and onto the sidewalk.

Okay, so that very last part didn't happen, but it could have. A curse upon her house. We know there's already one upon mine.