Gerald Jr. Brought a Bottle Cap

Three weeks running, there has been a crow on the window ledge of the bouldering gym. Not every session, but often enough that Simone and I have started checking before we warm up, the way you check for your regular at a coffee shop. He is large. He is completely unbothered by the sound of chalk bags and the occasional frustrated groan from the V4 corner. He watches.

Today he brought something. A bottle cap, silver, placed very deliberately on the concrete ledge beside him. We both stopped. Simone turned to me and said, with absolute calm, that he had started a collection. I said I wasn't sure it was for us. She said it was absolutely for us. I think she is right and I think that is its own small problem.

We named him. I want to be clear that I knew this was a mistake the moment Simone said 'Gerald Jr.' and I laughed instead of objecting. Gerald, the real Gerald, the pothos trailing his vine along the kitchen shelf, did not ask to be a namesake. The crow did not ask to be named. And yet here we are.

The naming committee in session.

He was still there when we finished the session. The bottle cap was still there too. Simone photographed it before we left, very seriously, like she was documenting something for the record. I think she was. I think I was too. There is something about an animal that shows up consistently to the same window that makes you want to stay longer than you planned, and I don't have a more complicated explanation than that.