Damn Bird

I wasn't feeling particularly well.
I woke up with a slight nausea, a major headache and, sign that something was definitely wrong with me, no appetite.

There is no better moment than breakfast. When you face your morning stamina-booster, your own kingly meal of whatever you want. But not that day. The king was gone off-castle and a vague after taste of moat was all that was left.

What had I been doing? My daily life was nothing more than the usual routine: wake up, go to work, leave work, slack, sleep.
No reason to get sick, or exceedingly tired. No reason to lose my regal appetite.

"Forget it" I thought. Maybe some sunlight would help.

Windows. Open… Bird?

I live downtown. I'm lucky enough to be able to see the sky from my window instead of some anonymous grey tower, but I'd never thought I'd see a bird perched on my balcony first thing in the morning.
A parrot, at that.

Not in the mood means not in the mood.
At any other time I would have stared while trying to work-out at least a dozen ways to keep it around.
I just gave it a blank stare and said "Oh, so Polly wants a biscuit, uh?"

It answered by bobbing its head up and down a couple of time and gave me a beady-eyed look.
"Suit yourself, yaaar." said I while heading for the kitchen, hoping caffeine would help me back to my senses.

I was halfway done filling my cup when I heard Polly (I had to give it that name, didn't I?) utter something -The last thing I'd have expected from a parrot.
"You're going to die".

Was it the blinding headache, the general gloom in which I woke up or had I simply gone mad?
"Say what, bird?"
- "You're going to die"
I was still sane, after all.
"Your owner must be the life of parties everywhere…"

I decided it was too creepy for my sleepy self, and proceeded to ignore the creature.
I also remarkably failed in doing so.

Polly was there every morning. Perched on the railing of my balcony, looking at me with one inquisitive bird eye and bobbing its head. And every morning, the same sentence.
"You are going to die"

Curiously enough, my appetite didn't come back. My headaches were persistent, and after a couple of weeks I found myself unable to commute to work. And every morning, the same sentence.
"You are going to die"

I tried everything.
I threw an ashtray at it once and caused an accident down my street.
I sprayed it with deodorant, blew cigarette smoke at it, sprayed it with ice cold water (which equally displeased pedestrians underneath), screamed at it.
Nothing.
Each and every morning, Polly the Deathsayer would greet me with its very own quote of the day.

Four months in, I had lost lots of weight and all of my job. My savings were growing thin. Not that I went out a lot, or even ate anything expensive. The only thing I craved for was parrot soup.

"You are going to die".
That time, I exploded.
"Listen, feathery fuckup from hell! I am NOT going to die anytime soon! I am NOT going to let you ruin my mornings anymore, I am going to get out, enjoy my life, find a new job and when I do I'll make sure to bake you in a pie and share you with my colleagues!"

- "Dare. Yaaaar"
That was Polly.

I nearly lost my balance and the curtain of anger in front of my eyes suddenly dropped.
"Say what?" I asked, haggard.

- "Dare you. Yaaaar."

The harsh, raucous voice was ringing more like a threat than a challenge. I felt my blood going once again all the way to my face.

"Or else what?", I asked, furious.
- "You are going to die"

Ok, back to track one, I thought. Well, it was about time I did something for myself in any case. I took a shower, clipped my nails and went out for a stroll.
Back to my apartment I sent enough job applications to keep a small village of HR people busy for a week, exercised enough to ache for a year and went to sleep.

Time passed. My appetite reborn. The king was back from the Holy Land and devouring his harvest, venison and vassals.
I didn't care. I had found another job, took care of my body, met people regularly and, all in all I was happy… almost happy.

For every morning, when I opened my windows, I could still find Polly, ready to inject into my day a steady dose of misery. The daily remainder that yes "You are going to die".

Some things must be put to a stop.
Ignoring the parasitic parrot wasn't enough.

So one morning, Polly and I had a talk.
"Ok, Polly. I AM going to die. We're ALL going to die, though I hope you do that way before me. So what?"

-"You're going to die, what is your life for?"

"My life's for being lived! That's why it's called life! Now what do you want from me?!"
It looked at me, taking a half crouched stance. Stood still.

-"I want you to wake up!"
And bit my hand. Hard.

I woke up.
I woke up hungry.
I woke up and nothing had happened. My hand had gone to sleep and I was feeling pins and needles reminding my body of its own existence, the same way my insane dream had reminded me of mine.

I had just been taught a life lesson by an imaginary Socratic avian.

Damn bird...
 


Damn Bird - Picture and Text by Danny Hefer is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

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