One summer, many years ago, when my granddaughter, Katya, was at my house, we’d just returned from the grocery store, and put on our bathing suits. As soon as we opened the patio door, we heard this loud squawking. Looking around, we finally realized it was coming from the pool skimmer. Horrors!
We pried up the cover, and there was this poor crow trying to hold his beak up above the water.
Conundrum! How to get him out? And how in the world had he gotten himself in there? Katya ran to the greenhouse and grabbed a rake and we slowly poked the handle down in the skimmer.
He was squawking up a storm but he eventually got his claws attached to the handle and we slowly pulled him out. He was free!
He just stood there for a minute, shaking his wings but he couldn’t fly, so he took off running towards the gate. (How he knew about gates I don’t know—he didn’t run toward the fence, he ran to the closed gate!) Amazing.
Katya, younger and faster than I, (duh) raced to the gate and opened it. The crow ran out and straight into the street. We held our breaths that a car wasn’t coming, and luckily, there wasn’t, and he made it across into a neighbor’s yard. He walked around in the grass, flapping away, drying himself, but still didn’t fly off.
We watched for a while, but probably having almost drowned, and swallowed a lot of water, it took him some time to fly. He finally did, and we cheered him on his way.
It was a very dramatic event, and we had to fortify ourselves with banana popsicles. Sitting on the side of the pool, we talked about him and speculated on how he wound up in the skimmer. Some ideas were pretty funny, and we had a wonderful laugh fest, but we never figured out what really happened.
Anyway, I told Katya that I had read somewhere that crows were smart birds – she got a chuckle out of that – but it said that sometime if a human is nice or helpful to a crow, it will remember and bring a gift to the person, like a penny or a button as they are scavengers and pick up things like that. Of course we waited around outside, in case he did, but we finally decided we needed something more substantial than a popsicle and went in to fix supper.
I have to admit that still, for a few days afterwards, I kinda looked around for a little token. I guess our crow’s mama never taught him that little useful tidbit, and we never saw him again. Unappreciative little snit. Just kidding!!! Ha ha ha.
However, my cute little grandchild told her class at school how we had saved a crow from drowning, and had a grand time answering questions and being a super hero! And I loved hearing all about it!
5/26/2026
The Words That Got to Me
"Horrors!" An immediate setting of tone and personality. I really enjoyed the use of the rake as an improvised rescue tool. I enjoyed the way the story evolved in the final paragraph, becoming less about the crow and far more about the joy and excitement of the granddaughter at the events.
Suggestions / Possible Tweaks
Some sentences are a little long and conversational to the point of becoming slightly loose. Tightening a few would sharpen the narrative flow.
I liked this. It's a charming, heartfelt piece that succeeds through its sincerity, humour, and strong sense of voice. The rescue story is engaging on its own, but the real emotional core lies in the bond between grandmother and granddaughter and the joy of sharing an adventure together. A subtle strength of the piece is that it never tries too hard to be meaningful. The warmth emerges naturally through the shared experience, which makes it more affecting. With a little tightening in places, the piece would become even more polished while fully preserving its warmth and personality.