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2009-09-02 - 4:52 p.m.

I'm off, for almost two weeks, to Austria and Italy. I've been learning the basics of both languages. One's harsh and halting. The other's up-and-down and tugs on your sleeve, smiling. I teach my first class tonight, hand out the syllabus, and try to make a joke.

But, before the trains and planes and napping in different chairs, there's this. Yesterday, I got some tacos for lunch. It's a chain place, in a nice, clean shopping center in the suburbs. Next door is a Blinds Today and a golf store and a GNC. I sat outside, by myself, and ate the tacos. I had a magazine with me, and read that. Then, on the table where I was eating, I saw a terrific shadow move across it. The shadow was gone almost right away. That was a bird, I thought, but a big one. i looked up, at the entrance to the shopping center, where new and bright cars were coming and going, continuously. I saw a twinge of movement up in the air. I squinted and looked, at the top of a light pole. There was the light, big and droopy, but on top of it was something else. It was a big thing, unfolding and folding its wings. That's a crow, I thought. A big crow. But, no. My eyes settled in on this big, dark, moving thing and I saw that it was much bigger than a crow. It was a turkey vulture. It was very big. It folded its wings again, and its big, angled head watched the parking lot in front of me. I looked. I saw some meat there, underneath a car waiting at a red light. That's what he was was after.

And, sitting there, watching this huge bird up close, from thirty yards away, my stomach shrank a little and I had the feeling that where I was did not match up with this bird sitting there, that two worlds had come together and that, somehow, it would be his world that would win.

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