It's spring, all right. And while this means that yes, it's rainy, and when it's not rainy, it's cold, and the mountains are so socked-in with clouds that Denver's true nature as a high plains city is starkly apparent, it also means that the birds are out. And the benefits of being in a newish building in a place that's still half wild and abandoned ranch are becoming apparent. I pass six or seven meadowlark territories on my fifteen-minute lunchtime walk, nesting kestrels, nesting killdeer, magpies and a prairie dog town. There's also a trio of Swainsons's hawks whose exact family relations I am trying to work out--I'm assuming two adults and a grown offspring, but really, who can tell? And you don't want to over assume these things. On Monday I went birding before work and while my basic take-home experience was it was so bleeping cold, it was still awesome. And I saw lark sparrows, a grasslands treat. As I drove from there to work I found myself flickering into an old seasonal excitement about the unfolding of a new place. And it seems like forever since I've felt that--or, well, since 2008, when we moved, and a new place was unfolding before us.
That feeling has mostly sloughed away and this week has been marked more by heaviness and low-boiling dread--this rain, I think, and also panic over the approaching end of school. The unstructured deliciousness of summer sounded great back in February, when every day is a slog of is-this-Tuesday-then-we-must-be-having-chicken-soup sameness, but now, as it roars up upon us, all I can imagine is summer's daily chaos. Last year we did too much camp, so we've neatly compensated by probably doing too little this summer, and I'm worried the kids won't get enough swim time, or exercise, or mental stimulation. I'm also worried they'll eat M alive, or if not him, then his ability to get any work done at all. I imagine nine straight hours of "STOP SAYING THAT" and "that's MY ice cream cone eraser" and "why does HE get a playdate" and "IT'S NOT FAIR!" Meanwhile I'll be at work, writhing in sympathetic suffering and feeling constantly compromised. Also wishing I could be at home to make sure everybody does their daily writing and page of math and reading and etc. Secretly I see summer as my chance to cram into the kids' heads all the things I think they might be missing during the school year and I am constantly irritated at how employment interferes with my ability to homeschool.
Good times. I must strenuously remind myself that in 15 years, when the kids have turned out how they're going to turn out, I will remember this state of mind as happiness. It's hard to believe, I know. But it's true. That certainty is a little magic pebble I keep in my pocket and touch now and then, for comfort.
Showing posts with label birds. Show all posts
Showing posts with label birds. Show all posts
Thursday, May 19, 2011
Friday, April 16, 2010
Friday favorites
Man, I have been DROW ZEE this week. It's killing me. Whenever I get like this, I always say "the weather must be changing" and roll my eyes in an exasperated way at that old screwup, Weather. Then I feel about 80 years old. My kids, and most likely my grandkids, will remember this as one of my traits that I think is loveable and they think is just annoying.
Speaking of grandkids, Helen told me the other day that when she has a "girl kid" she's going to name her Maggie. I said, Hold your horses right there, Missy! Ain't NO grandkids coming to this house until the kids have moved out! Okay, I kid. I did say something awkward about how that's great! But you don't even need to have kids! Lots of people don't! Apparently I'm worried that she's going to pay too much attention to the cultural imperative to breed. (note: she is FIVE. Also, it's Si with his lax attention to things like dental floss and helmets that is likely to make him an early breeder.)
Moving on! I believe it's been a while since I did a Friday Favorites post. I'm going to travel again for work next week (Duluth! in April! whoo-hee!), which could be a great topic, but I think I'm going to take the easy way out and list my favorite things about April:
1. The shrubs and trees are starting to make their flowering plans known. I run out every evening when I get back from work and check the fruit trees for bud action (last year neither of them flowered, due probably to a late cold snap but which in my mind was due to my negligence and/or their recalcitrance). I also keep poking my fingers in the lilac buds, trying to determine the size and color of their flowers-to-be.
2. We can leave the windows wide open at night again. I love sleeping with the windows open. There's been a great-horned owl in our pine trees the past two nights--listening to it makes me feel like I'm listening to somebody's fascinating secret life (although I think his secrets are probably more like, Come here, baby. Woo-woo. Come here, baby).
3. Arugula! I strategically let a few go to seed last year, and now half the weeds in my garden area are arugula. I find this stuff addictive in small doses. It's like the macadamia nut of the leafy greens world.
4. Ants! We have carpenter ants in our roof! Isn't that gr--okay, it sucks. SKIP.
5. Long days. I have daylight or at least dusk at both ends of my day, now. Partly this is because I haven't been able to drag myself out for a run before 6 a.m. this week, but still! Daylight! LOVE!
Speaking of grandkids, Helen told me the other day that when she has a "girl kid" she's going to name her Maggie. I said, Hold your horses right there, Missy! Ain't NO grandkids coming to this house until the kids have moved out! Okay, I kid. I did say something awkward about how that's great! But you don't even need to have kids! Lots of people don't! Apparently I'm worried that she's going to pay too much attention to the cultural imperative to breed. (note: she is FIVE. Also, it's Si with his lax attention to things like dental floss and helmets that is likely to make him an early breeder.)
Moving on! I believe it's been a while since I did a Friday Favorites post. I'm going to travel again for work next week (Duluth! in April! whoo-hee!), which could be a great topic, but I think I'm going to take the easy way out and list my favorite things about April:
1. The shrubs and trees are starting to make their flowering plans known. I run out every evening when I get back from work and check the fruit trees for bud action (last year neither of them flowered, due probably to a late cold snap but which in my mind was due to my negligence and/or their recalcitrance). I also keep poking my fingers in the lilac buds, trying to determine the size and color of their flowers-to-be.
2. We can leave the windows wide open at night again. I love sleeping with the windows open. There's been a great-horned owl in our pine trees the past two nights--listening to it makes me feel like I'm listening to somebody's fascinating secret life (although I think his secrets are probably more like, Come here, baby. Woo-woo. Come here, baby).
3. Arugula! I strategically let a few go to seed last year, and now half the weeds in my garden area are arugula. I find this stuff addictive in small doses. It's like the macadamia nut of the leafy greens world.
4. Ants! We have carpenter ants in our roof! Isn't that gr--okay, it sucks. SKIP.
5. Long days. I have daylight or at least dusk at both ends of my day, now. Partly this is because I haven't been able to drag myself out for a run before 6 a.m. this week, but still! Daylight! LOVE!
Tuesday, July 7, 2009
Life With Birds
Our household pet population includes birds. Specifically, three parakeets and a cockatiel. (Blue, green, yellow, and white, and no, they don't really have names. Thanks for asking.) The first pet we owned as a couple was a bird (a parakeet); that first parakeet got a deluge of adoring attention (a name, for example; also a hand-built climbing tree, the run of the house, and I believe I could have told you his hobbies). I felt Daring and Unusual in owning a bird, since as a child I'd only had the basic pets (gerbils, goldfish, mollies, a dog, and a stray cat that wandered away and got lost). I may have fantasized about teaching the parakeet to talk, or to fly to my finger. I may have actually tried to do these things, but such attempts belong in the Things Best Forgotten File.
The thing about owning a bird, especially one that you talk about, is this: people will start giving you birds. They will pour their birds upon you. They may make a pretence of asking you to pay for the bird, or at least the cage, but when you hesitate they'll say Never Mind! Please just take the damn thing! It's driving me insane!
So pretty soon we had two birds. A parakeet, Papa, who was sweet and mild, and Muriel, the Lovebird. Muriel was horrible. She shrieked. She bit. She bit when you tried to feed her. She bit when you tried to clean her cage. She liked to fly around the house, and if she didn't get to fly around enough, she bit. She bit if you vacuumed near her cage. Nevertheless, she was kind of endearing, in her own high maintainance way, and it was kind of interesting challenge to be able to interact with her without getting bitten. We had a sort of miserable, co-dependent relationship, she and I.
Lovebirds, due to the shrieking and the biting, tend to be popular birds to give away. Within a year we had four lovebirds, an elderly zebra finch, and the parakeet. We bought a companion for the parakeet, since we just weren't able to give him the attention he needed and deserved, what with the Lovebirds (who had all learned how to get out of their cages and get into his, and once in it, tended to bite him), and also the dog, which automatically demoted all of the birds to second-pet status. At some point a friend of ours found a cockatiel on a tennis court in January, and gave him to us. Seven birds at the peak of our bird-owning career, although soon the elderly finch died and the parakeets caught colds and one of the Lovebirds killed another, so then we had five or so.
Then we had a child, the ultimate pet demoter. There is nothing like being woken up from a desperately needed postpartum nap by a bird. Around this time I read a beautiful scene in a Toni Morrison novel about how a grieving woman lets all her parrots go out the window of her New York apartment in a snowstorm. For years after that I fantasized about letting the damn lovebirds go, especially when I was trying to nap and they were shrieking.
Eventually I sold the lovebirds in a garage sale. The parakeets died and were replaced with more (the birds still made me feel Daring and Unusual; also, we had invested heavily in bird infrastructure and it seemed a waste not to outfit it with birds). When we moved into our last house we bought a big five-foot-by-three-foot cage, and the evolution was complete: from cherished first pet to self-sufficient subculture. We feed them; we cover the cage if they get too noisy; otherwise they're left to their own devices, amusements, love triangles, etc. The cockatiel, a female, keeps falling in love with parakeets, having intense relationships with them, and then getting widowed. The third-wheel parakeets have affairs with the hanging bell. They all like celery, I think. At any rate, I keep giving them celery, and one of them eats it.
Lately, the birds have become something of a burden, noisewise. There is no convenient out-of-the-way spot for them in our new house; they're located in our TV room and at night, with the kids talking and the birds chirpity chirping and the TV blabbing away you can't even hear yourself THINK, let alone pay attention to the children or the TV or your spouse. There has been tense talk of Giving the Birds Away, and also melodramatic statements about how you do not just Get Sick Of Your Pets and Ditch Them. Also, one of us has a problem with the infrastructure investment and just giving THAT away--the big cage was like two hundred dollars. (I know, I know, sunk costs, cut your losses, etc. That's just not how I roll, okay?)
So. I think we will continue being Bird Owners, for a while, at least. Once the cockatiel dies, however, we might let the bird thing slide. Maybe. Unless someone happens to give us another bird.
The thing about owning a bird, especially one that you talk about, is this: people will start giving you birds. They will pour their birds upon you. They may make a pretence of asking you to pay for the bird, or at least the cage, but when you hesitate they'll say Never Mind! Please just take the damn thing! It's driving me insane!
So pretty soon we had two birds. A parakeet, Papa, who was sweet and mild, and Muriel, the Lovebird. Muriel was horrible. She shrieked. She bit. She bit when you tried to feed her. She bit when you tried to clean her cage. She liked to fly around the house, and if she didn't get to fly around enough, she bit. She bit if you vacuumed near her cage. Nevertheless, she was kind of endearing, in her own high maintainance way, and it was kind of interesting challenge to be able to interact with her without getting bitten. We had a sort of miserable, co-dependent relationship, she and I.
Lovebirds, due to the shrieking and the biting, tend to be popular birds to give away. Within a year we had four lovebirds, an elderly zebra finch, and the parakeet. We bought a companion for the parakeet, since we just weren't able to give him the attention he needed and deserved, what with the Lovebirds (who had all learned how to get out of their cages and get into his, and once in it, tended to bite him), and also the dog, which automatically demoted all of the birds to second-pet status. At some point a friend of ours found a cockatiel on a tennis court in January, and gave him to us. Seven birds at the peak of our bird-owning career, although soon the elderly finch died and the parakeets caught colds and one of the Lovebirds killed another, so then we had five or so.
Then we had a child, the ultimate pet demoter. There is nothing like being woken up from a desperately needed postpartum nap by a bird. Around this time I read a beautiful scene in a Toni Morrison novel about how a grieving woman lets all her parrots go out the window of her New York apartment in a snowstorm. For years after that I fantasized about letting the damn lovebirds go, especially when I was trying to nap and they were shrieking.
Eventually I sold the lovebirds in a garage sale. The parakeets died and were replaced with more (the birds still made me feel Daring and Unusual; also, we had invested heavily in bird infrastructure and it seemed a waste not to outfit it with birds). When we moved into our last house we bought a big five-foot-by-three-foot cage, and the evolution was complete: from cherished first pet to self-sufficient subculture. We feed them; we cover the cage if they get too noisy; otherwise they're left to their own devices, amusements, love triangles, etc. The cockatiel, a female, keeps falling in love with parakeets, having intense relationships with them, and then getting widowed. The third-wheel parakeets have affairs with the hanging bell. They all like celery, I think. At any rate, I keep giving them celery, and one of them eats it.
Lately, the birds have become something of a burden, noisewise. There is no convenient out-of-the-way spot for them in our new house; they're located in our TV room and at night, with the kids talking and the birds chirpity chirping and the TV blabbing away you can't even hear yourself THINK, let alone pay attention to the children or the TV or your spouse. There has been tense talk of Giving the Birds Away, and also melodramatic statements about how you do not just Get Sick Of Your Pets and Ditch Them. Also, one of us has a problem with the infrastructure investment and just giving THAT away--the big cage was like two hundred dollars. (I know, I know, sunk costs, cut your losses, etc. That's just not how I roll, okay?)
So. I think we will continue being Bird Owners, for a while, at least. Once the cockatiel dies, however, we might let the bird thing slide. Maybe. Unless someone happens to give us another bird.
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