Crow Country

O.E. hroc, from P.Gmc. *khrokaz (cf. O.N. hrokr, M.Du. roec, M.Swed. roka, O.H.G. hruoh), possibly imitative of its raucous voice. Used as a disparaging term for persons since at least 1508, and extended by 1577 to mean "a cheat," especially in a game (1590).

Last week saw a news item that showed a woman teaching migratory birds-who had somehow lost the instinct to get up and go-how to stir their consciousness from its dark slumber, unsettle themselves from their ordinary lives, so that they could once again learn that simple and elemental truth: all of life, all its heartache and mystery, revolves around departures and homecomings. Lost and found. There's no other game in town.

I have a terrible sense of geography. I look at the map and can recognize Delhi, Melbourne, London, and Rome. Beyond that, a few places perhaps: California, Montana. Vaguer still: is that South Africa, Argentina? But home ? That's a question of a completely different order...

True places don't exist on maps, never do.
---Melville.