A small boy on a bicycle stopped beside me as I waited with my bike for a crossing light in Mount Barker, South Australia.  I was taking a quick spin beside the railway line to clear my head after work.  As serious cyclists do, the small boy and I checked out each other's rides.

"There's a magpie up ahead," he said. "It's swooping."

"Thanks for the heads-up," I replied.  "I'll keep a lookout."

"I cross the railway line half way up. It's swooping pretty bad.  It hits your head."

"Lucky I've got a brim on my helmet then.  That usually stops them."

He thought about this for a while.

"I'm lucky I've got a short neck.  Most people are higher than me and they get hit first." He was very matter-of-fact about his self-diagnosed lack of stature in the neck department, displaying an admirable facility for finding a silver lining.

I refrained from commenting on the length of his neck, short or otherwise.  We watched an oncoming cyclist get swooped by aforementioned magpie.  The lights changed, traffic stopped, and off we went across the road.  The small boy stayed close, trusting that my brimmed helmet, traveling at altitude, would be first in line for swooping.

The magpie did not swoop.  We reached a junction and the small boy turned right, across the railway line.  He rode without looking for trains which was all good as the only train that used the railway line was the tourist steam train and it didn't run today.  The small boy didn't say goodbye.

I rode straight ahead, my day all the richer for having escorted a small boy with a short neck through a swooping zone.

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In our current house-sit a family of magpies visits every day, singing and chirruping outside the kitchen window until I feed them a sparse handful of dry cat food.  One of them, braver than the rest, will carefully take the food from my hand if I am both patient and hunched down to make myself as small as possible.

I like magpies.  Even when they swoop.