flying again

My sister and I have always had a very special relationship with my Grandmother.  The hands you see holding the leash in the picture to the left, after all, belong to her.  Come to think of it, a lot of who I am belongs to her...

Now that Grandma Roo is 95, Veronica* and I have found it even more difficult to decline any of her requests.  If she asks us to take a trip to the gas station at 9 AM for lottery tickets, we oblige.  When she signals a hand gesture for more wine, we pour (as long as my mother is not in the near vicinity).  When she asks us to dance in public places, we throw our self-consciousness away, and boogie.  And when she asked me to write this post, I picked up a pencil. 

It seems like a billion years ago that a family of birds moved onto our back patio.  In reality, their move-in was a couple months ago.  My dad was still walking around healthily, my mom had no broken bones, and my grandmother was still in a wheel chair after her recent hip fracture.  A lot has changed since then.  As you may be well aware, a lot of things happening in a little bit of time can turn a fortnight into a light-year.  So the birds moved in about a billion years ago.

The family of birds, at the time, was limited to two.  They were building a nest together, and they were building it well.  We'd watch them at the breakfast table, and my dad was usually the first to compliment their construction work.  The nest was solid -- a building you might feel safe to hide in during Katrina or Alex or whatever, for example. If you were a bird, of course.

Knowing that I was schooled last semester by a very avid birder*, my parents naturally looked to me to ID them.  My first guess was barn swallow.  My mom disagreed (she's a thrill seeker, and as a thrill seeker, she'd prefer the birds to be something a little more exotic), but my dad had good faith.  Nevertheless, the pressure was on to provide evidence.  I got out an old copy of a bird book my parents have probably owned since B.L.K*, and began searching.  Five minutes later, and there she was:  The yellow-ish underbelly, the navy back, the swallow-tail, and even the nest description matched up.  Barn swallow.

Over the course of the next couple months, we watched the birds diligently.  The real excitement began, however, one morning as grandma and I sat at the breakfast table for our usual coffee and life-chats seminar.  I saw a little pink head pop up from the nest! And then another!!! And then ANOTHER!!!!!  You get the picture.  I frantically pointed in the direction so Grandma would look, but they disappeared.  Grandma accused me of pulling her leg. Not that I blame her.  I've been pulling her leg since childhood. 

Anywho, our bird watching and bird discussions became pretty intense after the initial baby sighting.  Family dinners and family chats were enveloped by bird talk:

"Have they, or have they not hatched?" -Grandma

"How many do you think there are?" - Veronica

"The parents are athletes, aren't they?!" - Dad

"Are we sure they're barn swallows?" - Mom.

Soon enough, all five babies lost their stage fright.  They'd pop up all together and open their little baby beaks real wide for us..  And the parents, working as a team, would take turns flying off for food.  They were a dynamic duo.

Somewhere between the hatching of the babies and the growing of feathers, my dad was hospitalized for a broken hip.  But no tragedy could stop the bird talk.  He spent 28 days away from home and the nest of swallows, but we kept him up to date. He received full news reports, commentaries from yours truly, and Bill O'Reily-esque debates (but not as obnoxious) between my mother and me:

Mom: "We should set up a net just in case one of the birds falls from the nest becau--"

"Absolutely not."

He really didn't even need a TV.

It was a couple of days after my dad had been released from the hospital. In those couple of days, my mother had fallen off of a ladder onto the tile floor while replacing our air conditioner filters. She managed to break her cheekbone, a rib and her left wrist.  At that point, the only elder of our family who was not an invalid was my grandmother--- who, by then, had made such a tremendous recovery that she could walk without help of any wheelchair, walker or granddaughter.  Like her, the baby swallows were ready to fly on their own too.

And even though my parents were in pretty rough shape, no broken bones or any other ailment could keep them from the birds.

So, one evening after Grandma Roo and I witnessed all five of the babies standing on the edge of their nest--looking quite flight-ready, our whole family gathered at the kitchen table.  Casts, walkers, ice packs, and all.  We sat as a family, and we watched. One by one, the baby birds flew from their nests with a parent to its left and a parent to its right.  For a couple of brief rare moments, our family was speechless.  Until my grandmother spoke up.

"You know, you can live 100 years and never have seen this?"....a few moments later..."Eileen Mary, pour me a glass of wine."

My dad and I laughed, but my mother gave me The Look*-so no wine happened, but the celebration and bird watching continued.

All but one baby bird had left the nest.  Her brothers and sisters (having already learned from their parents) continued flying around the backyard, but she just stayed. She timidly watched the others from the edge of the nest, and she ate what her family brought her, but she simply could not fly.  After a couple hours, both my family and the swallow family decided to retire for bed.  Instead of the bird family retreating to their own rooms, however, all six of them decided to sleep around the nest while the sole flightless swallow remained.  They stuck together, and refused to leave until the last bird was ready.

The way the family stuck together reminded a lot of my own family this summer.  Today, my mom is up and at it (despite the broken bones)--being her normal hyperactive self, and my grandmother can make her own coffee and dance by herself in the living room when Spain scores a goal.  My dad, however, remains in recovery.  Broken hips are hard, and they're especially difficult when you're 6'2'', and you broke yours like he did.  But we all stand by him, and we continue to remind him of how much stronger he's getting every day. 

The night before the last of the five birds left the nest, I went into my parents' bedroom to kiss them goodnight.  I decided, just for the hell of it, to jump in between them (college graduate or not, I'm still not too old to snuggle with my parents) and lie there for a while.  After a couple of minutes, my dad spoke.

"I'm like that last little bird, you know?  I'll get there too... it just takes time."

And he was right.  He'll fly again too.  But until then, we'll stand by him.

Veronica: my big sister, and my very best friend.  But don't get me wrong, nasty brawls and "you really plan to wear that?" jokes are still a very large part of the relationship - healthy though it may be.

birder: a bird watcher.  They hang out in cemeteries because the bird watching is good there.  And they stop class mid-sentence to identify a bird flying around outside the window of the foreign language building.  They're weird, but fun to be around.  Fun to have as professors.

B.L.K: before the birth of leash kid

The Look:  Every parent or parent-like figure has one.  It's that look that they give you that usually means something along the lines of: oh hell no, or stop what you're doing immediately, or don't even think about it, or I can't wait until we get out of public so I can tell you how I really feel about what you just did.  The last one's my favorite.