by Minrose Gwin
Now, this Monday morning, when I go to the bedroom window and peer out again, my wet hair whipped up in peaks all over my head, the dawn’s come up watermelon pink. I have a good view of the yard through the tree branches, but again I see nothing remarkable. A flock of pine siskins swoops in and feeds on the cones of the Purvises’ trees. A wren throws its voice here and there from a camellia next to my window and two cardinals flit from limb to limb, calling out cheat, cheat, cheat, as if each is accusing the other of infidelity. No orange or green flashes, no squawking. I head back into the bathroom, comb out the tangles in my hair, blow it dry, fluff it up, and go downstairs. I grab a cup of coffee, head back outdoors, and sit down on the front porch step. I pick up the goggles, I mean bio-specs—no, binoculars!—where I left them and scan the trees.
Then I see him. See his head actually. A dollop of orange and yellow the size and shape of one of those stick-on Christmas bows, poking out of a hole in the trunk of a dilapidated water oak, one I know I’ll have to have taken out soon. The tree’s a zillion feet tall, now with just a tip of green left at the top, its trunk deeply creviced. The bird (what is he?) perches on the edge of the hole, his head now cocked. One fierce raisin eye, lined in white, looks directly back at me.
How I yearn to pick up the phone and tell my sister about this remarkable creature living in a hole in my very own water oak! I’m dying to take this crazy bird story and offer it as a peace offering. I wonder whether June has been able to set out feeders and nest boxes this year. What would she do if I just pick up the phone and say, Hi, just called to tell you about this strange and wondrous bird in my yard? After all these years of blame and silence? Might she laugh and say, Come on, a parrot in a tree? Sure it’s not a partridge in a pear tree? Are you getting senile on me, Grace? Then, after I send her a picture on my phone, might she instruct me to call Wildlife Rescue? Might I tell her that, as a matter of fact, I am indeed growing more senile by the moment, that even as we speak, kudzu, green and vigorous and deadly, slithers through my neuron forest?
Suddenly the bird squawks again, then begins to chatter and cackle. I jump, and, damn, slosh coffee on my good pants. Now, oh my, he’s coming out, sitting on the edge of the crevice, gazing straight at me like I’m the wild one, the pretty one. As I watch, open-mouthed, the bird hops from his perch to a long branch of the oak and begins to strut—that’s the exact word, strut—back and forth as if to say, Here I am, look at me.
Who are you? I ask. Too small for a macaw, with a curved beak the color of bone, which is odd too because all the macaws I’ve seen have had dark beaks. I participate in the Audubon Society annual bird count every year, get respectable tallies. But this one has me stumped. Now he adjusts his head, ruffles his feathers, then raises a three-fingered claw as if in greeting. His eye seems to know me in some uncanny way, in some way I don’t know myself.
I glance down at my watch. It’s 8:15 and I haven’t done the last-minute prep for my ten o’clock class. Still, I run to my bird book and quickly scan it. I find absolutely nothing in the book that has the coloring of my bird. Maybe it’s an odd mutation of one of those South American parrots down on the Gulf coast, an accidental. Could he have migrated all the way up to Tennessee? I know next to nothing about parrots. June and I used to see them around the zoo in New Orleans, clustering in the tops of the date palms, eating the fruit and shrieking at the tops of their lungs. But they’re mostly green and much smaller than this bird. I’ll have to go online and look at exotic birds, the kind in zoos that come from the Amazon jungle. This is clearly an escapee who likes to live in tree hollows and eat acorns. Was he drawn to the deer’s corn?
It’s a brisk morning; I worry he’s cold.
When class is over, I head back to my office and start looking up parrots and macaws on my computer, quickly scanning the pictures and descriptions. No matches. Then I look up exotic birds and rainforest birds. Still nothing. I consider calling the president of the Nashville Audubon Society, Natalie Somebody. By now, though, I’m—how do you say it? Intrigued, I’m intrigued by this bird. Enlisting outside expertise would be cheating. And although I hesitate to say this for fear of sounding somehow like my mother (which I am most definitely not!), I pride myself on understanding birds. I bend my days to their habits, hurrying home in winter to put out seed for the last flurry of feeding before dark. I enter their privacy like a peeping Tom, watching them mate in spring. In late spring I peek into their nests and count the eggs.
I hurry out across campus to take an overdue book back to the library. At the library entrance there’s a poster advertising an art exhibit inside. My mouth drops open. The subject of the exhibit is the Carolina Parakeet, a splashy thing. Extraordinary. A dead ringer, stem to stern, for my bird: the orange head, yellow neck, green and blue plumage.
How could I have missed it? Why wasn’t the Carolina Parakeet in my bird book? As the question flits from one side of my brain to the other, hopscotching over and under thickets of kudzu, the hair on the back of my neck rises. Of course. It wouldn’t be in my book. What a fool I am! The Carolina Parakeet has been extinct for almost a century. Had I spotted an accidental lost in time rather than in space?
I gallop up the steps of the library (I catch myself mirrored in the glass door, loose-limbed, wild-haired, a glorious blur of motion!), and drop my library book into the slot without paying up. Inside the exhibit, everywhere I look there’s my bird (I think of him as mine now) in all his glory, there and there and there, in the exquisite drawings, oils, and watercolors. Gorgeous cavity nesters, their range in the swamps and river bottoms of the Midwest and southeast, noisy chatterers, victims of farmers who shot them for eating the corn, of feather traders for the outlandish hats women wore back then, finally of the honeybees who stole their tree cavities and set up shop. Sociable, always flying in flocks, large murmurations (how I adore that word murmuration, taught me by my own mother!) that rose and fell together, always together, like massive families. Never shot for food because their favorite seed came from the poisonous cocklebur and made their flesh deadly. Gone from the Carolinas by the Civil War, last confirmed sighting in a Florida swamp in 1904. Declared extinct in 1918!
Reading all this, I know there has to be an explanation; my bird can’t possibly be a Carolina Parakeet. But what a lark (though not one) to think it might be!
I dash home around midafternoon, neglecting my office hours. I’m so distracted I almost don’t notice the hullabaloo going on across the street. Two huge flatbed trucks have pulled up in front of the Purvises’ house and a third is unloading a giant water bird—I mean crane, a giant crane. Four pickup trucks and a sedan are parked up and down the street. The Purvises, Mrs. P in her apron and Mr. P with that infernal rake in his hand, the two of them American Gothic personifications, are standing out in their yard talking to some workmen clustered around them. Mr. Purvis is pointing at the sky: that, that, and that, he points.
Above him those gorgeous pines swish in a whisper of a breeze. And those delicious pine cone seeds. I’ve read how the Carolina Parakeet loves them. How wise of mine to roost in a tree cavity directly across the street from an endless supply! The perfect habitat!
The leader of the men nods, a pact sealed.
I pull my car into the driveway. I get out and walk up the driveway toward the street, ostensibly to get my mail but actually to get a sense of what the Purvises are up to. By now a man has driven the crane to the center of the Purvises’ large yard and parked it. I pull my mail from the box and make a show of sorting it, looking up every now and then at the Purvises, who are continuing to point upward and talk with the men. After a few minutes, I walk back down my driveway and into the house. I’m hoping the men are there to shore up the dilapidated carport next to the Purvises’ house. It looks like it’s going to fall in any minute and crush the couple’s rusty Oldsmobile.
Whatever they do, I worry their work will disturb my Carolina Parakeet (yes, mine), scare him away if he’s thinking of nesting for the s
eason, and what a thrill that would be! Is it possible he has a mate I haven’t seen? I consider calling the Audubons to come see, but hesitate. Something about all this feels deliciously private.
By the time I drop my briefcase and purse on the kitchen table, change and dump my school clothes on the bed, and head out the door with my binoculars, the men have departed in their cars and pickups, leaving the crane and flatbed trucks parked across the way. The Purvises have disappeared inside. I scan the cavity in the water oak, and, happy day, there’s that orange and yellow bow of a head, right on the edge. Is it possible he’s sitting on a nest of eggs? Where is his mate?
There is something about a bird on its nest that is reserved and secretive, and so the hungry eye seizes upon it, yearns for it. A grin plays at my mouth; there’s a strange knock-knock in my chest, as if my heart is trying to break through my rib cage. Who’s there? The last time I had this sensation was a half century ago, a half century, think of it, when Dad used to take me and June to watch the giraffes dance at the back of the zoo.
The next morning I sleep through to dawn, the first good night’s sleep I’ve gotten in weeks. Then something loud (a crash? a bomb?) jars me awake. Then I hear a high-pitched mechanical sound, then a booming crash that sets me bolt upright in bed. I leap up, cross the bedroom, look out the window. Across the street, the men are back. One is up in one of the Purvises’ pines looking like a monkey clinging to the trunk; he has a rope around his waist and blades on the inside of his boots, like sideways ice skates. At that moment, as I pull back the curtain and focus my eyes, he lops off the top of the tree, one of the Purvises’ largest and greenest.
That’s no way to prune a tree! I throw on some clothes and bolt down the steps, reminding myself to keep a firm grip on the banister. Over the past few months I’ve gotten a bit clumsy, one foot drags a bit, I drop things. I’m terrified of falling again and not being found, of lying there for days. I should get one of those medical alert devices. At the bottom of the stairs I throw open the front door and race across the street, twigs and pebbles scraping my bare feet, threading my way between the trucks and the men standing around watching the man in the tree.
In that instant of running toward the Purvises’, I feel suddenly leaden, as if I’m swimming a belabored breaststroke to my destination, the man in the tree. Am I moving at all? Hell yes, I’m moving. Not just moving but running. Not just running but shot out of a cannon, damn the pebbles, damn these men. By now I’m close enough for them to see the fire in my eyes, my fisted hands, mottled with age spots. My hair, long and silver and ratty, standing out from my face as if I’m running into a high wind. Their eyes widen, their mouths drop open. One of them shouts, “La Llorona!” and makes the sign of the cross. They approach me with their hands in the air. “Cuidado!” they shout, pointing upward. Watch out.
“Stop,” I scream at the man in the tree. I come to a screeching halt in the middle of the Purvises’ yard. “Stop it right now. You can’t prune a tree like this. This tree’s . . .” I can’t think of the word, something about jewelry, stones, diamonds; something beginning with p. Instead I say, “protected, this tree’s protected.” I stop a moment, realizing suddenly that the men don’t speak English, realizing that even if they did, I haven’t conveyed what I mean. Meanwhile the man above, who hasn’t even seen me standing below, has moved down a few notches and is applying the chainsaw to a large uppermost branch.
“No, no!” the men shout up at him and point at me. “Abuela loca!”
The man doesn’t hear them. He continues to cut, oblivious to the commotion below. He loops one of his ropes around the tree limb, pulls it taut, glances down to check below, then thankfully sees me, the crazy grandmother, waving my arms, saying something. He stops and gapes. I run for the Purvises’ front door and go straight in.
The Purvises are sitting at their kitchen table with their heads bowed and eyes closed, holding hands. They are praying the trees won’t fall on the house. When I stride in, they leap to their feet, their faces splotched with alarm. “What are you doing letting that man hack away at that beautiful old tree?” I demand. “It’s healthy as a horse.” The word comes to me: precious. That tree is precious. I wave my arms in the air, point out the door, which I’ve left ajar. The men have stopped their work now and collected on the front porch.
Mrs. Purvis glares at me. “They’re our trees, we can do whatever we please with them.”
“What do you mean, them? You’re going to prune more than one?”
“Getting rid of them,” she says with satisfaction. “Every last one of them. Thirty-two in all.”
“Sick of the needles,” Mr. Purvis says. “Sick to death of them. Spent my whole life raking them, about drove me crazy.”
“One of them’s going to fall on the house and kill us both,” Mrs. Purvis says, her lips in a grim line. “You going to save us then, dig us out? Pay for our funeral?”
My mouth drops open. “You can’t do that. It’s got to be against the law, the zoning ordinances, to cut down that many trees. These are . . .” I want the word about the past, how the past is precious too, a simple word but I can’t find it. (What a bother Alzheimer’s is in an emergency!) Surely, though, there are ordinances prohibiting the removal of thirty-two mature trees on one lot! We live in a university area that’s downright prissy about preservation, prissy about everything. Men in kelly green outfits resembling overgrown leprechauns collect the recycling in matching green trucks with trees painted on the sides. The cardboard, corrugated only, has to be presented at the curb tied neatly in twine or it won’t get taken. In my neighborhood, the city plants and mulches and prunes trees here, there, and everywhere; vacuums the streets.
Mr. Purvis says, “I planted them fifty years ago. Stupid fool thing to do, plant pines. We got them for free.” He whips out a piece of paper.
“What’s that?” I ask.
“It’s my permission letter. The trees are endangering my house.”
I snatch the piece of paper from him. It’s a form stamped “Tree Removal Approved.”
“We’ll just see about this,” I say, and head for the door, the letter in my hand. Then a light bulb goes off in my neuron forest. I stop and take a good look at the logging trucks outside. I turn back to Mr. Purvis. I’m pretty sure I have an unattractive sneer on my face. “How much are these trees worth in timber?”
He glares at me. “None of your damn business.”
“That’s the real reason you’re cutting them down. You’re selling them.” My heart flutters and flaps in my bag of a chest. What a wild unruly heart I still have!
The men give me wide berth as I sweep through the Purvises’ yard, head back across the street to my own house.
Once inside, I go straight to the phone and call the mayor’s office. The chainsaw starts up again. On the phone I’m directed to zoning. The man I talk to looks up the Purvises and says yes, they have permission for tree removal.
“These are healthy pine trees, huge trees, magnificent trees,” I say. I’m proud of myself, foraging among the kudzu and coming up with the adjective magnificent. I try to keep my voice low and firm, though I desperately want to scream. “This is outrageous. This is a beautiful neighborhood. They have a logging operation going on over there, right across the street, and there’s an extinct bird roosting in my water oak.” I bite my thumbnail so hard it splits halfway down.
“Do you want me to connect you to Wildlife Control?” the man asks.
“No, you idiot,” I say. “I want you to make them stop cutting down perfectly good trees.” Finally the h word comes to me: “Historic trees.”
“It says on their petition here that the trees are a hazard to the house,” the man says. He sounds as if he’s in a hurry, has something more important to take care of. “He’s obligated to provide new landscaping once the trees are down.”
I snort. “He’s never planted anything but those pines. It’s going to be a wasteland over there. And think of the birds, the
wildlife he’s disturbing. Can’t you do something?”
“Ma’am, he’s gone through the process.”
I can feel the pulse pounding in my neck. Maybe I’ll have a stroke and that will solve everything. “Who do you think you are, letting these old fools cut down a beautiful forest? You . . . you jack-donkey!” I slam down the phone and run to the window. The noise is deafening. There is that familiar taste of bile in my mouth.
How I wish for my sister in this moment! June would know what to do, something wildly improbable, a wreck, a fire, a demonstration. Do I dare call her?
I know the number by heart: (504) 228-2554.
To my surprise, she answers on the first ring. “Well, if it isn’t my long-lost sister.”
“June,” I gasp, “they’re cutting down all the trees across the street, and I don’t know how to stop them. I’ve got a Carolina Parakeet nesting in my yard, and they’re going to ruin everything.”
“Have you lost your mind? Those things are extinct. It’s April. Are you sure it’s not a painted bunting? An accidental? They’re migrating now.”
“Not this one.”
There is silence on the other end of the phone. Then she says, “Maybe you should chain yourself to one of those trees.”
I think she’s just being sarcastic, but then she says, “Seriously. At least you’ll stop them for now. It’ll buy us time to figure out the next step.” She sounds excited; actually she sounds thrilled to death.
“Okay,” I say. “Okay!” We are in league. Later we will plan and plot. She’s not dead yet.
“Call me back,” she orders. “And send me a picture of that bird of yours. Put my number in your pocket in case you get arrested.”