Birding for Mom: Why I kept the binoculars I used to resent, but now love using

Birding for mom at Elkhorn Slough.

I kept my mother's binoculars after the crash, even though I kind of hated birding. First for being the passion that took her out of the house so much, then for being the passion that kind of killed her.

But when my grandfather, the person who first gave my mother the birding bug, had her binoculars repaired after we retrieved them from the crumpled car, I was so touched by his thoughtful gesture that I kept them, despite my resentment.

And I was very glad to have her binoculars 30 years later when I finally met up with one of her birding pals again for a walk, because not only did he still recognize them, they made him cry.

That was cool

Cool not because I like to make people sad, but because of how it felt to be with someone else who missed my mother. One of the few things that can truly ease the grief of losing someone is being with another person who feels their absence, because they understand that no matter how long it has been, no matter how fine you look, you are still just the walking wounded.

Losing my mother at 15 felt like someone ripped out one of my lungs and told me to just keep breathing. My body learned to adjust, but it's never the same. You never forget how it felt to breathe with two lungs, and there's never another day where you don't feel at least a twinge of pain.

But the only thing worse than feeling pain is having to explain it, so eventually we all box up our sadness and shove it in the closet with all the other nasty truths no one likes to talk about. Until, of course, you find someone with the same scar, and you not only both welcome the chance to talk about your pain, doing so can finally help you heal.

Like that day I walked with her pal Bruce, and he told me how he still agonized over how my mother had ended up riding with the newest and youngest member of their bird club because Bruce's car was full when they all went out looking for one of the last birds on her Life List: a Spotted Redshank.

I didn't like knowing that Bruce still carried pain from that day, but I did like how carrying the pain together made it feel lighter while we walked. So to celebrate my mother's 80th birthday, I plan to take another walk with someone else who remembers my mother – one of her closest friends, Cecilia, who not only became a surrogate mother to me, but is now one of my closest friends, as well.

And we don't plan to just carry our pain together, but to do something my mother would do if she could, which is to spend the day outdoors and just enjoy being alive. And maybe if there are two of us thinking about her, she will be able to feel us together, and it will make her smile.

Especially because I will be taking her binoculars with us. I don’t keep them tucked under my driver’s seat like my mother did, so she could whip them out whenever she saw anything other than a turkey vulture flying overhead, but I do take them birding whenever I can – always hoping that someday, I will see that Spotted Redshank for her.

And that would be very cool.