Whenever I’m out shopping or dining, and I encounter an especially rude or onery person, I enjoy quipping to my family, “I know Jesus said we’re supposed to love everyone, but surely he didn’t mean that guy!”
Similarly, when Emily admonishes me for favoring certain birds over others by scolding, “Jim, they’re all good birds,” I like to respond, “Yeah, but not Myrtle, right?”
So this is a confession and maybe an apology. I just never liked Myrtle. We never clicked. And what makes this fact so shameful is that Myrtle never did anything wrong. On the contrary, she has suffered enormous tragedy over the years and is probably the most deserving of my compassion, love, and sympathy.
Her many misfortunes over the years are far too numerous to list here, but a few big ones come readily to mind. Like her first season in 2015, when her chicks hatched early and immediately got run over by a speeding pickup truck with a bed full of young girls giggling in their bikinis. Or when her soulmate, Captain Jack, was murdered at their nest, and Myrtle disappeared completely for two long years. We were sure she was dead. Or how about her 2021 season with Giantsbane, where they lost three times in a row and always very late, so she effectively incubated non-stop for over 100 long days and nights with nothing to show?
All of that trauma took a toll on Myrtle’s personality. She’s anxious, panicky, paranoid, and prone to overreact. There were seasons I couldn’t even bring myself to check on her. It was too upsetting to watch. Her overreaction to me counting her chicks, even from a great distance, was almost enough to make me question if the dark cloud that has always followed Myrtle was actually of her own making.
Yet here she is. That cold, foggy, miserable Sunday afternoon when Michelle trapped and banded Myrtle by herself despite an unfortunate case of bronchitis was eight long years ago.
Trapped as an adult, we now know Myrtle is nine years old at least.
And now, Myrtle is the last OG plover banded by Michelle still alive in Barnegat Light.
So she wins. Myrtle is Barnegat Light’s ultimate survivor. Congratulations, girl. Anointing you with the crown, I already see you in a new light. I see now we both need to put all the trauma of the past behind us, and transcend it together.
I know you’ll always hate me, and that’s OK. Because if everything I disliked about you actually propelled you to this victory, if all that friction is what shaped you into the last girl standing, well… then I guess I hope to meet many more Piping Plovers I really don’t care for.
