The Owls are My Sign

Many people believe that seeing a cardinal is a sign that you are being visited by a loved one who has died. For me, cardinals are much too common in my yard for them to feel like a special sign. But I do have some avian visitors who have come to feel like a connection with my late husband: owls. 

Although I've never actually seen an owl at my house, I have heard them with varying frequency in the five years we've lived here. I'm enough of a "bird nerd" that I keep records of the different types of birds that I hear and see, so I can get a sense of their patterns and seasons, and the first time I heard an owl here was in spring of 2022, not quite two years after we moved in. It was a barred owl, the kind that hoots, "Who cooks for you? Who cooks for yoooouuuu???" We often heard barred owls at our previous house, so it was a fun, familiar sound. We also frequently heard them when we went camping, and it was not uncommon for my husband or I to wake each other up in the middle of the night on a camping trip or even a night at home and whisper excitedly, "Listen! The owls!"

In the summer of 2022, we heard a screech owl here for the first time. When I was growing up, the Boston Museum of Science had a screech owl aptly named Spooky, and that's where I first learned the sound of their eerie call: a haunting, falling, trilled "HOOOooooooo." Again, I was delighted to get a visit from this charming little owl. 

In the spring of 2023, we got our first visit from a great horned owl. Their hoot pattern is harder to describe in words, but once you've heard the rich, "Hoot hoooo, hoot hoot" or "Hoot hoo-hoooo, hoo hoo" pattern, you're likely to recognize it again. Another interesting thing I've noticed about the great horned owls that doesn't seem to be true of other types of owls, in my experience, is the variety of their voices, with some deeper and others much higher. It is a lot easier to recognize pairs of great horneds "chatting" back and forth than with other owls because the individuals have such distinct voices. 

Once we discovered that the owls occasionally called in our yard, we always tried to keep the windows in our bedroom open at night so we wouldn't miss a sound. There was something special about lying awake together in the dark, holding our breath and listening intently for them, giggling with delight when we heard them, often even grabbing each other's hand with excitement when we heard them. 

Over the past two months since his death, I have spent a lot of time lying awake in the dark. Maybe that's why I've been hearing the owls more frequently over the past couple of weeks. But every time I hear them, it makes me think of him. For just a moment, I imagine that he's lying next to me in the dark, silently holding his breath so we don't miss a single quiet hoot. I hear the higher-voiced owl, perhaps the female, calling out a questioning, "Hoot, hoo-hoo, hoo hoo?" and the deeper male voice responding with a reassuring, "Hoot hooo, hoot hoot," coming from a bit further away. 

I like to think that he's close by, even though I can't see him, reassuring me when I question my ability to manage as a single mom, to take care of the house and the kids, to unravel all the red tape that comes with the death of a spouse. An owl feels like an appropriate symbol for him, with his deep voice, quiet wisdom, and unruffled calmness. As the weather grows cooler, I suspect that I'll hear the owls less and less, but I hope that as time goes by, I'll need his reassurance less and less, as I find my way and slowly master each new task and check each bureaucratic item off my "to do" list. 

But for now, I'll keep listening for my owls.