Birds

I just noticed that I've written a lot of blogs with birds in the titles. Why? I'm not sure, I'm not a bird owner or anything. In fact, that is one creature I would never want as a pet. My mother has told me about when she was young and her little brother had a pet canary. She was the one who always had to clean the cage (I have no idea why, it wasn't even her bird - it was probably because she was the oldest.) She said the bird was messy and she hated cleaning up after it. Because of that, to this day she is not that fond of birds. My mother-in-law is also a bird despiser. She has, over the years, had multiple incident where birds have flown into her house or screened-in porch, flown around over her head, and refused to leave. She's had to chase them out with a broom, probably hollering at them the whole time. 

Birds are dirty and disease prone, at least that's what comes to mind when you think of pigeons. And they poop on things, like your freshly washed car, and sometimes on people. I remember once in high school when it was a beautiful spring day, a bunch of us decided to have lunch outside. This one person whom I couldn't stand, Theresa Nichols, (good god she was such an evil person), was sitting with us because she was friends with my friends, and a bird flew overhead and shit on her head. That was the best! She really deserved it. And I must say, I was actually nice enough not to laugh out loud. 

I also remember about ten years ago when a pigeon flew into our house, sat on one of Sparky's paintings and pooped on it, and then flew over to his cowboy boots and pooped into one of them for good measure. The bird's critique of his work was not in his best interest though, as Sparky whacked him down with a tennis raquet, and then Earl the cat jumped on the poor pigeon and did what cats do best. Not very subtle but certainly very direct. I remember that Sparky decided to incorporate the bird shit into his painting. I can't recall if his attempt was successful or not.

I read Jonathan Livingston Seagull once when I was a kid. My father's sister gave it to him, and I remember he wasn't impressed with it - I don't even think he read it because it had the label of being a spiritual self-help type of book, not his cup of tea to say the least.  It was also vastly trendy at the time. But I picked it up and read it and actually quite enjoyed it. That Jonathan L. Seagull sure loved to fly. Which is the cool thing about birds - they can fly! I used to have lucid flying dreams all the time, which supposedly means that you are in control of things. In my dreams I would look down on my surroundings and it was a very cool sensation. One could see forever! I haven't had one of those dreams in a very long while; I kind of miss them. 

Once not too long ago, Sparky and I watched from our window as a red tailed-hawk dove down from the sky out of nowhere, plucked up a pigeon who was pecking around in our yard, and proceeded to kill it and eat it. I wouldn't let our cat Lila outside for a little while after witnessing that, I have to say it was pretty impressive. We used to have a lot of pigeons around our neighborhood, but not so much anymore. The hawks, which are most likely from Elysian Park, have found a new hunting ground.

We also have a flock of wild parrots that like to frequent our Eucalyptus trees, and they are a sight to behold. Word on the street is that years ago in Burbank a pet store caught on fire, and the owners released all of the birds in order to save their lives. This flock is supposedly their descendants. Anyway, they are noisy, colorful, and fun to watch.

And that is the one thing that is funny about both my mother and my mother-in-law. These two bird haters both have bird feeders in their yards. And when a bird stops by the feeder to eat they'll say, "Look at that beautiful cardinal/hummingbird/red-throated warbler," or something along those lines. So they don't really hate all birds. Just the ones that mess with them. Or maybe they just like them in their natural habitats and not inside their homes. That makes sense to me. Birds have wings, so they should be outside flying all around. If I could fly like in my dreams I certainly wouldn't want to be caged up either.