5 Life Lessons I Learned from My Parrot
Anyone with a pet parrot, or probably in that case, with any pet, can testify to the fact that pets teach us a lot. They are such complex creatures in their own right, and yet we often underappreciate this aspect of their personalities.
My parrot, Buddy, is a 25 year old spectacled or white-fronted amazon. This, as bird lovers know, is not the largest, nor the most friendly, nor the most appreciated pet bird out there. They are small by amazon standards and though they have a lot of complex behaviors, they don’t endlessly mimic human voices (some more than others) and they are generally not the ones you see on videos being bird Einsteins. Nonetheless, they offer up some amazing gifts — sometimes direct ones when they show you that you really matter to them, and sometimes indirect ones. One thing to keep in mind about parrots is they live a very long time and as such, you and they get to share a long history, typically much longer than you get with other such pets.
With this bit of intro, here are five things Buddy has taught me over the last few years.
Lesson Number 1: Pay attention to your pet’s body language when he meets someone new.
The first, and arguably the biggest thing I learned from Buddy is to trust his instincts when it comes to people. He makes snap decisions about people. When he sees someone the first time, he decides almost immediately if he likes them or not. He indicates this by very specific behaviors. He is either noisy and flirtatious and wants to interact with them, or he is quiet and withdrawn when they come near. I’m not sure what it is about certain people that he is picking up on but invariably he has some insight that I don’t. One big example of this was my relatively recent ex-partner. From the moment he entered our lives, Buddy did not like him. For almost the entire length of our 10 year relationship, Buddy would turn his back on him when he walked into the room. I didn’t want to see this so I ignored it, to my own detriment. Yet, he persisted right up until the day the relationship ended and my ex left our lives for good. Truth is, he saw something there I didn’t want to see. The only time he was ‘pleasant’ was when I would leave him in my ex’s care such as when I would go on a trip. Apparently, or so I was told, he became ‘friendly’ during those periods but I’m sure it was because he knew who controlled the food. I never got to see this behavior because the moment I returned, the back-turning returned as well.
It’s not a 100% reliable barometer of a person’s character but it sure indicates I need to pay closer attention.
Lesson Number 2: Give each other space, even if it’s hard to do.
Another important life lesson: life-long mates are tough on one another. The longer you’re together with a significant partner, husband, wife, or parrot who thinks you’re his partner, the more ordinary events become tedious. Buddy loves me. He really loves me! I’m his life partner and for him, that means everything. And when it’s mating season, it means we are supposed to be together all the time. Just being, or feeding one another, or presumably having sex, which I don’t want to even imagine. And for the 6 months of warm sunny weather we have each year, it gets really tedious. He becomes the same as any life partner who feels neglected. He screams, squawks or generally makes noise, endlessly, until I pay attention to him. He has very specific sounds he makes which are at times plaintive, at times demanding. And they just go on and on. And to manage this, I must learn to act as if it doesn’t matter. I give him specific times each day that we spend together. But I also set clear parameters around how much time and when that is.
Because, as I have learned from Buddy but was unable to apply in the two relationships I had, sometimes the best way to manage a ‘needy’ person, or pet, is to leave them to manage it themselves. No matter how much someone ‘needs’ your attention, when it is relentless, you just need to say ‘no,’ and move on. Stay present, stay available (notice if the screech is a different tone that really speaks to a problem), but just stay away sometimes. We all need our own space, even if we don’t always know it.
Lesson number 3: If a ‘dumb’ parrot knows how to take commitment to another (parrot or person) seriously, ‘smart’ people ought to be able to do so as well.
The third thing is that there are souls out there who understand what real commitment is, and I think in the greater scheme of things, it’s not primarily homo sapiens who get this. Amazons generally mate for life. And if you’re their mate, whether you’re a person or a bird, you better realize the importance of that.
I am Buddy’s mate. No matter how annoyed he gets with me, and he gets annoyed because I don’t give him all of what he wants, I am still his mate. In my two long term relationships with men, I have watched as slight after perceived slight built up, was never acknowledged and eventually became the weight of a lead albatross around the neck of our love. You see, one thing that men are not always so good at is acknowledging slights and bruised egos. We’re tough. We can take it. But the simple truth is that men are very often extremely thin skinned. In both relationships, there were many fights. In both cases, the hurts were never addressed and never released.
Buddy and I have had many fights, too, usually predicated by a bite to my hand or neck because I was focusing on something other than him. He, like my life partners, felt that I was not paying enough attention to his needs, and instead focusing on my own. Yet, with Buddy, when the fight is over, which doesn’t usually last very long, he is right back to where he was with me. He gets annoyed, he bites me so I do what he wants, then it’s over. Often it is I, the human, who has the harder time adjusting because I’m still smarting from a sore he inflicted on me. With very few exceptions, he doesn’t hold onto concerns about bad behavior between us. The only obvious symbol of his dislike is any towel. To have his nails or wings clipped, he has been wrapped in a towel once too many times for his liking and towels are clearly now the enemy. It is his level of commitment that astounds me and reminds me that if it is possible for my ‘simple’ parrot to commit so deeply, it ought to be possible to find that in another human being. I’m still looking.
Lesson number 4: Easy access does not necessarily make for appreciation and conservation. In fact, having to work to get something seems to be the primary way that happens.
The fourth thing that he makes me consider is excess. Buddy, as are so many people, and birds, is very wasteful. And that is not good for him, nor for us. Just like people, his species has had many generations of plenty. Or maybe since he’s never been in the wild, it’s just domestic birds. I don’t know, but he throws food around like there is an endless supply. He will even turn up his nose at things he typically likes if he has to sort through his dish for them.
Convenience of food, too easy accessibility, isn’t really a good thing for parrot, nor human behavior. If it’s too easy to obtain, we start to think there is an endless supply of it and we take it for granted. Now, being fair, this is as much my fault as his. I’m the controller of the food and I don’t have to give him food every time I think it’s necessary without first seeing what’s in the dish. I have started letting him work harder at it, which does seem to have its benefits. When he eats then, he eats more thoroughly.
This has wider ranging implications for relationships as well. Both times I fell in love, I did so with abandon and without reserve. I gave everything I had to both of these people, each in the way they seemed to need and want it. I thought I had all the answers for how to solve their problems. And that answer was, more or less, to keep trying harder to anticipate their needs, their issues and their underlying responses and plan for them. I always tried to be available. It got so I resented how much I was expected to be doing for them, yet I was the one that started placing those expectations on myself. I grew up believing it was my job to make them happy. And so, I held nothing back.
This proved to be the absolutely wrong approach. By being too available, too open and trying too hard, I gave them nothing to have to work toward on their side. Why did they have to do anything for me? I was doing it all. That was a problem that went from relationship one to relationship two. Giving too much and expecting too little in return.
And so, I have had to realize that an abundance of anything too easily gotten seems to only make us think it’s always going to be there. Because we don’t have to work for it, we take it for granted. Even my bird does that.
Lesson number 5: Persistence pays off.
And maybe the most important lesson, one that I have spent most of my life trying to learn, is that persistence pays off. Maybe not in exactly the way you want, but you do get something you need from it.
With Buddy, as with all parrots, being social is a fundamental part of his life. He must feel connected to events and people and things going on for at least some portion of each day. He needs to be with me, and if not me, than with others. He wants and needs that so badly that he will continue to ask for it day in and day out, year after year, until he gets it.
There were several periods of time in my life when I was simply not able to provide him that. During both periods of ‘divorce’ from my two prior relationships, I was simply not able to give him the attention he needed. In fact, I forgot how important it was for him. I would feed him and give him fresh water but I was not available for him emotionally or physically. And yes, he is an emotional creature who clearly shows his unhappiness if he doesn’t get attention and his elation when he does.
During those periods, he screeched every morning and every evening. Parrots do that anyway in what’s termed a ‘call to flock’ response. But the screeches for attention are different and persistent. I simply wasn’t home to hear them, as I was out of the house most days for months on end nursing my own hurts and avoiding my ex’s as much as possible until the separation happened.
Nonetheless, I could hear Buddy. I could hear him from my car in the driveway, from my walks in the park behind the house, from around the corner where, in the case of my second ex, I would wait until he left the house each day so I could return home in peace.
And each time when I would go to see Buddy, he was thrilled to see me. He shouted with his calls of joy and excitement that I was there again with him. And slowly, I realized that by my being hurt and focusing solely on myself, in the process I was hurting others around me, Buddy included. His persistence, over months of time, got me to see that he deserved the attention he was craving because he never gave up on me, even if I was inadvertently giving up on him.
As an artist, I’ve endured years of rejections. As a man who has seen two long term relationships fail, one miserably, I got to the point that I believed there was no point in even trying anymore. Why bother? No one gives a damn about what I’m producing as an artist. And I’m simply not good at relationships. But truth is, there are people out there who get it, who maybe are looking for me and what I have to say and who I am. I simply have to remember to be persistent, regardless of how long it takes. In the end, I might not get exactly what I’m looking for. However, like Buddy, who doesn’t get to sit with me all day every day, I will get some of it and some of the right things can often be more than enough.
