Daddy and I had a little time to visit late Sunday afternoon, while Mama was off helping with Vacation Bible School. (Their theme is "The Wild West," and she has been stressing over how to create cowboy-themed refreshments. I told her it's all in the name. Kool-Aid becomes "Texas Tea," and hot dogs become "Bunk House Dogs." It's all about language.) Anyway, Daddy asked me why I've never written about Charlie—not Charlie the horse (may he rest in peace) but Charlie the bird. (One more digression, and then I'll focus. Daddy names everything Charlie. It is his very favorite name. When my baby cousin Dane was toddling around, Daddy would look at him and say, "Now, ain't he the cutest thing in the world? Reckon why they didn't name him Charlie?")
Back to the bird. Years and years ago, a baby bird fell out of its nest—near my parents' driveway, I think. Daddy being Daddy, he initiated rescue procedures. The bird wasn't injured—no broken wings or anything—he was just too little to fly. Until Daddy reminded me, I had forgotten that we had to wait for him to grow up a little before we realized he was a robin. I say "he" because Daddy named the bird . . . Charlie. Of course. He made Charlie a nest out of a plastic margarine bowl and put it in the window sill in the kitchen, I guess so the little bird could see out and watch the big boys fly around the yard, thus learning how to flap his wings. At first, we hand-fed him tiny pieces of bologna dipped in water. It took him a little while to catch on, but soon he would see one of us approaching his nest and pop that little beak wide open. As he grew bigger, he graduated to fishing worms (Daddy's effort to acclimate him to his natural diet.)
We would cup Charlie in our hands and pet him and help him out of his butter-bowl nest so he could hop around on the kitchen table. Then one Sunday, we came home from church and he was on top of my old upright piano. Mama, Daddy, and I all said it at about the same time: "Charlie can fly!" Soon he was flying all over the house, so we took him outside and gave him a gentle toss up in the air, and away he went—but just for a second. Those first flights were short hops, as Charlie did a turn or two very close to us and quickly returned to the safety of his family:) But we kept it up, and his flight plans became more adventurous. With every takeoff, he flew wider and higher circles. For several weeks after Charlie moved outside, we could go out into the yard and call him, and he would fly down from wherever he was and light on the nearest shoulder.
Eventually, though, the call of the wild called Charlie, too. He stopped coming when we called. No more flapping of wings as he sailed down from high in a pine tree to greet us. But that's how it should be.
Epilogue: My mother is a certified "bird lady." She sets a full buffet for them on her deck every single day. And when I watch them nibbling away at that bird seed, I like to think they're Charlie's friends and family. I like to imagine him telling them, "It's a family-owned place, and the food is great, but you better get there early to beat the crowd."
[Image by Dwight Tracy at Freerangestock.com]
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