Knocking at my chamber door

I was talking with Phil's roommate the other day. He suffers from ornithophobia and was relaying a story of being dive bombed by a raven the other day. The poor guy ran down the street screaming like Tippi Hedren.

I told him about Kelley's old porch where birds used to nest. They'd swoop down and try to intimidate us as we smoked butts. Their little nestlings chirped away.

So I told him that maybe he had gotten too close to a nest.

That's when it hit me--I've never in my life considered that ravens nest. Bluebirds, sure. Woodpeckers, you bet, but those forboding ebony creatures? Never.

I always imagined that ravens just, I don't know, emerge from the darkness of night. They could never be hatchlings, right?

(And, in case you're keeping track, one month five days without a cigarette.)