The Crow

When he was young, Spencer shared Christine’s affinity for bright colors. For a period, this even extended to his hair color.

But once his teenage years arrived, he gradually faded to black. During his daily visits to the Skating Club of Boston for training, he would sometimes wear a shirt with a splash of color. But a black jacket and black pants were constants.

And no matter how many black jackets he had, there was always another even more expensive one that he coveted. At one point, as a joke, I simulated one of those job site safety signs on our kitchen whiteboard, writing, “It’s been 0 days since Spencer asked for a new black jacket.”

One of the strange — and at times difficult — aspects of my aviation safety advocacy journey over the last 20 months is that it has required a bit of tunnel vision when it comes to politics.

There are elected officials I disagree with on most issues but agree with 100 percent on what’s needed to make the skies safer. Meanwhile, there are politicians I’m aligned with ideologically whom I feel let down by on aviation safety.

I decided early on that I would give the mission of aviation safety priority over my personal political views. For some indeterminate period of time, I have a voice that can’t be ignored on this specific topic. I feel an obligation to use that power to its maximum impact. And I decided if that requires occasionally feeling like I’m selling a little piece of my soul, I can find peace with that.

Where it gets murky is that using my voice in this way generally involves me speaking about Christine and Spencer. And their souls are not mine to sell.

This internal tension was weighing on me before one of the trips I took to D.C. during the summer of 2025. The day before I was scheduled to leave, I was pacing around my living room, worrying about what Christine in particular would have thought of what I was going down to do. (With the benefit of hindsight, it was 100 percent the right call. But it wasn’t clear in the moment.)

As I was pacing, I looked out the front window and saw a single black crow standing in my driveway and staring directly at me. Instantly, I thought, “That’s Spencer.”

He didn’t deliver a clear-cut message about whether I was on the right track with my plans for the week. But the message I felt was that he and Christine trusted me to follow my gut. It was OK to make mistakes as long as I was trying to do the right thing.

About a month later, I was walking my dog Charlee in the same exact field where I had my first encounter with an orange monarch butterfly. As we reached the parking lot on our way out, I saw four black crows sitting on top of the backstop. I knew exactly which one was Spencer. And the other three were Cory, Franco, and Eddie, the other male skaters from Spencer’s age group on Flight 5342. (I assumed that the female skaters were prettier birds.)

I decided to just stop and hang out with them. I sat on the fence rail near the parking lot and got quite emotional. Much to Charlee’s displeasure, I was going to stay as long as they did. Eventually, Spencer flew off first, and the others soon followed.

After that second occurrence, I began noticing black crows all of the time, alone or in groups. They are more common than monarch butterflies.

Sometimes, I don’t have an intense feeling but just think of Spencer. Other times, I feel his presence more strongly, including one day after a particularly difficult parenting situation.

About a year ago, I took a fairly long walk by myself and ended up near a street in my town where there is an outdoor skating rink. It’s pretty basic, and the ice is not maintained. But Spencer would occasionally ask me to take him there when the ice was reasonably solid.

Here is a short clip of him skating there, dressed in all black, naturally. He added the music before posting to TikTok on Christmas Day, 2024 — a little over a month before he died. Listen to the lyrics.

I decided to detour down the street even though it’s a dead end. As I got near the rink, a black crow swooped down from behind, just over my head, like it was dive-bombing me. I assure you that I did not hallucinate this. I actually managed to pull my phone out of my pocket and snap a photo as the crow was making its getaway.

I smiled and laughed to myself.

This concludes “Doug Has Lost His Mind” week.