green is healing to me;
when the leaves fall
from season to season,
the tree does not merely
give up its life,
but continues its duration
by sprouting new leaves.
not of red and brown decay,
but of a new living start.
i started college this year. it was scary as i didnt know what i was doing with my life. i came out of some very hurtful experiences that i am still trying to find healing for, and though im realizing getting a job and going to college dont help ease the pain, they both have helped me get out of my comfort zone.
i had a bird that meant the world to me, though he was not in my life very long. we were reunited, and when his owner died, i gave him the best end to his life i could possibly give him. john, the bird, was an indian ringneck parakeet that told me and my family to sit down, shut up, stop that, don’t wanna; he demanded his cartoons, peanuts and almonds and bananas and grapes, and was just a spoiled tennis ball. but i loved him. this bird could have run me over with a truck and i would still take him in and love him just as much as i did. he made things better by letting me talk about what i was feeling and what i experienced, and he never made me feel like i was bothering him. i would cry talking to him, but he wanted to hear it. he loved talking to me though he never liked being petted. he showed me a different form of love i had never seen, and i thank God for that.
john has been dead for a little over a year, and i miss him. his name from the bible means “God has shown favor upon,” and through all the events that took place before we brought him and his little gang in, it makes me wonder about how my life played out.
somehow, i blamed myself for his death. we were cat people for eighteen years, and then all of a sudden we were taking care of eighteen birds. we had no idea what we were doing. i would do research, i would ask one of my friends who had birds longer than me, but im not sure what john died from. did i not spend enough time with him? did i feed him something that made him sick? did he miss his late owner and die from a broken heart? we planned to take him to the vet a month after seeing him first throwing up, which made me concerned. but then he would miraculously recover. then he went downhill fast.
i thought he had a fatty liver from all the grapes we fed him. but i remember this bird and his late mate from when i was a child. he was older than twenty, so maybe it was old age? i dont know, and thats the part that sucked and sticks with me: not knowing exactly what happened or the cause. i do know that it felt like i lost a close friend.
something that i connected with john was we both had our rough patches and edges, and both were jaded. he was never taught how to be okay with the human hand, and i had been hurt by people that i thought i could trust. my birds have been helpful in my therapy journey as i learn how to heal and cope with my past. if you asked me when i was fourteen what i thought God’s idea for my life would look like, i would probably say having a boyfriend, getting married, having this fairy tale relationship. birds and the scars i wear would not even cross my mind. its funny: that year, i was playing a bird in a musical, i had turned eighteen, and i had my eighteen birds. maybe its not that funny but it is ironic to me.
thinking of john has this beautiful melancholy, as if it is spring and all the flowers and butterflies are blue and purple, and the sky is this beautiful shade of navy blue. its still a gorgeous sight, but the colors are off from being bright and vibrant. i have friends, i have people who love me, and i am learning how to show love and spread that love to others. john helped me to see love isnt just cuddles and kisses, but commitment, dedication, a choice to do anything for someone (or something) because of them and not what you can get out of it. im writing a story of john as if he were human because though he was mentally six years old, he was older than me, and i always viewed him as human though he was far from it.
i thank God he was in my life, as i dont want to imagine a world where he never existed.