What's A Girl To Do?

What’s a girl to do? If you have lived your life for the past 14 or so years amidst a crossroads of Kentucky fried families, hunting holidays, chrono-holics (bathe in the drink and smoke the leaf and thus are emotionally stagnant) the Apostolic who espouse equality, but hate gays, the mechanic who loves ferrets (“critters”) but hates blacks, where city council members hold public prayer gatherings on the economy, where cars are the lifeblood and bloodlines of the many, or when they come to the door and yell,
“HEY, HEY, I’m pressing on your doorbell and it’s not working, it doesn’t even move!”

“It’s a mezuzah, an ancient Jewish artifact—you put it on your door so God knows that a Jew lives here.”

“Why would you want him to know that?”

True.

If God did know I lived here, he or she, or a blend (heshe) is probably thinking,
“What is wrong with her? I mean, what is a nice, cute, curvy (34-25-34) Jewish girl living, owning, for God/me-sake, a townhouse, in a town whose cultural legacy is, is .. a car called the Hudson Hornet, home to the Elvis Fest, and a phallus-shaped water tower, one with a large girth that is. All farmisht, I tell you!”

But, God--I can get a really good Tempeh burger up the street. There are smatterings of civilization.

What is a girl to do when her cultural landscape is a volatile mixture of hockey, Midwestern marriages (engaged at 18, married at 22), manufacturing and men who love your independence but want the security of dependence, or maybe that’s submission or traditionalism, I forget, mmh? “ Sure, honey you go out with the boys and I’ll stay all by myself, cleaning, catching up on the latest Digest, watching Dinah Shore (on reruns), and wait for the messiah to return.”

What’s a girl to do.. except.. watch birds.

So, as I edge towards the 40, contemplating all that has come before me (debt) and all that is still ahead (more debt), I thought it best to become a birder.
An amateur birder, not like a wearing, rubber pants wading through swamp birder. No, like a backyard birder, The-I’m-driving-and-must pull-over-because-there-is-a-red-tailed-hawk-birder, the-can’t-go-out-tonight-birder-because-some-Egrets-may-be-migrating-back birder. THAT kind of birder not some wade through bacteria infested water birder. Meshuganah. No, not me.

I know the motivation behind my bird bug (social stagnation, and guilt) but I'm unsure as to what I seek or desire through it.

My cat Uno, once a ferocious hunter now a comfort-eating overweight and low-ridin’ feline, was an ornithologist's nightmare. Even with a collar and bell she still could mame and kill many of the feathered. Most of them were most likely slow suffering from some bird flu and thus needed to be naturally selected..to die. I understand the food chain, though I am a vegan with only like three pairs of leather shoes mind you, and thus supported Uno following each kill. However, to appease my PETA heart, I thought I should probably figure out what kinds of birds Uno was mauling. That way at least the birds had some identity, before I swept them onto the dustpan and out to a little grassy knoll, where I would, as in the Jewish burying tradition, throw dirt on them and then recite this prayer:

A friend is someone who likes you
It can be a girl or a boy or a little white mouse
Sometimes you don’t know who your friends are
Sometimes they walk right by you and don't’ even know your name.

But I knew their name, or at least their Phylum.

House Sparrow, male and female
House Finch, male and female
American Tree Sparrow
Chipping Sparrow
Starling (baby)
Dark Eyed Junco
Black Capped Chickadee
I should add that Uno was a petite cat and thus her bird kills were reflective of her size. She did go on a little rampage of baby squirrels, killing a whole family, before she came in for a meal of Friskies soft, chicken in gravy.

And thus began my trek in the world of birds, naming, searching, sighting – my world and my love life for that matter has never been the same.

As a child, I had preponderance with naming things. I kept a little notebook of names I liked and created figures to go with the names. I recall names like Shale and Oren (he had a larger nose) gracing my orange mead notebook. Most notable was the naming of my large family of stuffed animals, known as stuffies. Early on I began naming ceremonies as each new stuffie entered the world or my bed. I took this very seriously often spending days studying the stuffie, before I actually bestowed a name on it
“Tomato!”
“ Freckles”
“Frankie”
The names along with some vital statistics (size, shape, color, texture) were documented in a forest green calendar.

Back to birds. The excitement I feel when first locating a bird I have never seen and then the joy and sense of victory I feel at my ability to name and categorize is hard to describe:
-7-9 inches
-A seeder of some sort, but beak is more similar to a starling, which means it could also be a wormer.
Mmh..mmh
-It’s iridescent like a Starling but smaller and sleeker…
And then I find it! A Brown-Headed Cowbird, a parasitic bird. This bird has some commitment issues for sure. It lays its eggs in other birds' nests, hoping that they will raise it, while it, the Brown-Headed Cowbird lives a fly and fancy free life . The thrill of naming!

Now.. I’m not pulling a Christopher Columbus, saying I discovered something that was already here, but what I have done is notice what has always been here. So, What else have I /am I missing?

“ A love life!”
shouts the mother.

That’s not completely true. I have had several loves and lusts and equally as many losses in the past 15 years. I would name them but unlike the birds such naming may result in legal retribution

Many know that the men in my life here—like the bird- are of varied species and colors and well, sizes. Some migrated quite quickly to other nests and states, while others stayed for seasons. Not sure what made one fly west, another east and others to remain. Just like, as often as I study I still cannot tell the difference between a Purple Finch and a House. The differences are so minute, I’m not even sure they know.

Last week, I had a rendezvous with romantic potential in the city of San Fran, far away from the middle mediocre west.
After Jazz and Pinot we were at the top of hill looking out into the city. He tells me that this is where the Wild Parrots live.

“Wild Parrots?”

Yeah, the Wild Parrots of Telegraph Hill, there was a movie, my neighbor fed them for years, there’s tons, 30-40.

"Thirty or forty wild parrots? What...what kinds?"

I don’t know—someone probably released some or they escaped, they fly down to the park, hangout in this tree.

"This tree?!"

We start to kiss and fondle, but I keep thinking about the birds.
30 or 40, wild parrots?!
Kiss .kiss. caress.fondle.
Escaped? Wild?
Kiss.kiss.fondle.fondle.fondle.
They fly to the park and back?!

I end the making out, which is quite unlike me as recent history will attest. Truth, the kiss-stoppage was a combination of having had a rendezvous with someone else earlier in the week, and thus I was feeling a little like a ho ho, and… of course I kept thinking about the birds.

“How about we continue this tomorrow?”

I go back to my friend’s apartment where I’m staying, so excited at the possibility not of romance, not of Jazz and Pinot, but of a flock of wild parrots. (Actually cherry-headed conures as I later 'discovered')

Filling my life with birds is probably not good game. Perhaps it’s too late for me to find or have long lasting, life lasting love. I do know if there is someone out there for me they will most likely have to swoop in after the Spring migration. I just can’t bear the thought of missing out on seeing a white crowned sparrow, a blue heron or a ruby-throated hummingbird. Birds, even migrating ones seem so much more permanent and possible than.. love. What’s a girl to do?