Jo spent most of her adolescence perched atop the Surf City water tower. It was a happy time. I, of course, was thrilled that she was sticking around as I’d been dreaming of and increasingly hopeful that she might even nest here one day. And she was growing before our eyes.
Over roughly two-and-a-half years, you could see her feathers molting from juvenile into adult plumage; her brown feathers slowly giving way to a cool steel grey, and her yellow feathers becoming a brilliant white. It’s rare to have the opportunity to see this so clearly in a wild Peregrine falcon.
She became a regular fixture around town, and even people with zero interest in this kind of thing soon became curious about her. Few realized it was the same bird up there each day and that she had a name and a curious backstory.
My family teased me a lot around this time for my eagerness to run questionably necessary errands, which always brought me conveniently close to the water tower. During this period, I ate a lot of Surf City Pizza. Instead of calling ahead, I’d walk into the shop and order there, happy to spend the 20-minute wait strolling over to the tower to visit Jo Durt.
But the most memorable moment was one night in early spring while driving home after dark; I stopped at a crosswalk close to the tower and suddenly heard Jo Durt crying in the darkness from somewhere up on the tower. I couldn’t stay but returned the next night and many nights after that. It was rare but otherworldly when she cried out into the darkness, and her song echoed through the empty streets! Her songs could pierce you right through the heart, as if she were a master songstress who knew precisely how to articulate the core longing we all experience. I believe she could have made the whole world feel it at the same time if enough people heard it.
I tried a few times to record it, but something always foiled me. Perhaps her songs were supposed to remain secret, or maybe just for the ears of those willing to stroll the dark streets of Surf City to hear them.
It was always around this time of year. Who knows what she was singing for? But her haunting, plaintive cries were most likely cries into the dark void for companionship. That was my sense, anyway. Jo Durt was lonely. She was calling for a mate. And ready for a family.
Her songs were as miserable as they were stunning; love songs for the genuinely cunning. I will never forget them.
