Chirp

I want a bird.

Before this goes any farther, I would like to thank all of you who have so unselfishly given me “the bird” over the years, especially the very nice lady in the grocery store parking lot last week, but this type of bird is the feathered variety.

I had a bird when I was a small child – a budgie as the Brits say – or common, garden-variety parakeet, the kind Rocky Balboa referred to as “flyin’ candy”.  His name was Dick.  He was a greenish-yellow fellow who enjoyed pulling the only hair or two left on my grandfather’s bald head, raising 7 kinds of hell and slinging his bell when my grandmother sneezed, running around on the floor under a spread out sheet of newspaper and biting me.  He was personable, bright, and eventually went to his just reward in a toothpaste box placed in the bottom of the garden.

I find I miss him.