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Our aircraft battled through successive sheets of freezing rain on its descent into its destination. A sense of dread filled me during the journey, only deepening as I made my way through the terminal. I resented coming back to the city where I had grown up, after living on the far side of the world for what had felt like a an age.

After a few days, I ventured out to get a haircut. My thoughts was miles away, back across an sea, when I was startled by something hit the sidewalk. I looked down to see a bird on its back, sprawled, and twitching.

The impact happened just as kids were emerging from the local elementary school and so within a short time a small chorus of youngsters had formed, surrounded by their parents. This circle of bemused faces peered down at the creature, not knowing what to think or act. The kids were more certain: “Dad, she needs a vet, can we call an animal ambulance?” I removed my anorak, knelt down and scooped the pigeon up into it. “No problem, dear, the kind man will help her!” exclaimed one mother with a sigh of relief. I had been transformed into the emergency transport for this pigeon that had just come down hard, unintentionally, as I had a short time earlier.

I trudged home, arms held out, with the bird nestled inside the jacket.

Little did I know that my impromptu decision to medivac the bird (the name I bestowed upon my patient) would lead me to a community of local residents giving up significant amounts of effort to provide not only rescue services for street birds but X-rays, convalescence, and even “bird rehabilitation”.

I retrieved a cardboard box for Belinda, placed inside it with an old T-shirt, and put her inside. Every short while, I’d peek inside just long enough for us to share a momentary glance.

Those instances of common confusion punctuated my desperate search for what to do after that. I contacted friends for suggestions and one suggested trying online groups, where, to my surprise, I discovered a local pigeon rescue group, and submitted a request to join.

A Community Effort

With a large membership, the group operates on an anarchic system: someone in Manchester discovers an injured pigeon, a pleading post is created, then a comment section “assessment” ensues. If the bird is deemed in need of an scan, someone with a vet link can organize it; if it needs physio, a “rehabilitator” will offer to foster the bird.

Carers each have their own finely honed specialities, whether it’s setting broken wings or dressing wounds. Their significant, cooperative effort for the pigeons of the city depends completely on kindness.

Belinda was promptly assessed with a neurological issue, likely a concussion, and placed with a rehabber who would give comfort and a course of gentle physio. We never found out exactly what made her to fall from the sky. I took up the role of bird taxi once more, boarding the streetcar across the city with Belinda in a container on my lap so she could get the treatment she deserved.

Rediscovering Home

After discovering this secret pigeon “health service”, I began to feel much more positive about being back in my home town. I question any of the places I had lived in while away could have anything comparable. It also struck me that this was not the first time I’d been part of a pigeon aid mission: almost 20 years earlier I’d seen one drop from the sky into the grounds of my high school. Again, children surrounded the bird, but only one – my closest friend at the time – had the courage to rescue it and take it to safety.

The aforementioned friend has since been lost – one of a number of companions to die in the years before my departure from Manchester. I came to see that this had been a big part of what had made coming back so painful.

A History of Comfort

Pigeons have a tradition as “therapy” animals, especially in the north of England. Laborers started to raise the birds because they gave them comfort and an opportunity to stare at the heavens between long shifts of subterranean gloom. During the hard times, workers on the assistance also found comfort in pigeons, but keeping them was seen as a sign of “idleness”.

Nowadays, pigeons are often written off as simple, unclean or a pest. Before finding the rehab group, I had spoken to a veterinarian, who told me: “if you bring the bird here, leave that in the parking lot and we’ll euthanise it.”

It? Not her. Although improbable to ever take to the skies , she has taken to her newly land-based life with aplomb in a volunteer’s home. Each happy sound, often prompted by her favourite snack, peas, feels like a example in perseverance and fortitude – and I am always appreciative to her for revealing to me a different facet to the city I thought I knew.