Speaking of Birds

Read a subject on a message posted as: The Bird on the UP Seal....
made me think about avian creatures and how, well sad mostly, seeing Jackie Chan's info-spot in Star World about how children are not supposed to play with birds...instead play with the paper (origami) version.

I flashback to my childhood when I remember stealing my elder brother's "tirador" and helping myself to a few shots at resting, even nesting, birds on the many trees that grew on my greatgrandmother's farm. Shameful to admit, but I did some terrible damage to God's smaller creatures back then; removing wings off a beetle, drowning a few ducklings, stepping on a couple of chicks, and yes, hitting several birds. If I only knew then that my own daughter would be deprived of the joy of being able to play with a live creature, I'd have stopped before foolishly plunging into the whiles of my childhood.

Remember when we used to go home from school and just outside the school gates, there would be some vendors squatting in front of some boxes selling real live chicks or small birds painted in bright colours? It cost like P5.00 back then and many of us would save our baons so we could take home a few. My brother and I even managed to care for a couple of chicks that grew to young adulthood! We kept them in a similar box (as the vendors), with the bottom fortified by pages of newspaper. A study lamp served as their "heater" for cold nights and on regular nights, they were just kept near the back of the fridge.

Now, all I can do is tell my little girl stories of how I romped around my Lola Peling's land and played with all sorts of animals. I can show her pictures of it, I can even download films and buy videos about them; but the first hand experience of being able to hold, feed, be biten by, or even inadvertently or purposely stiffling the life off one will just be left to her imagination.

On a lighter (and 'greener') note, if she were a boy, I could perhaps say, "play with your own bird na lang, anak," but imagine how many child abuse agencies would take me away?! When she'll be older (dating age and all) I could say, "play with youf BF's bird na lang, anak" but then VD and HIV are also things to consider. I guess I could say, "dress up your BF's bird na lang, anak" and hand her a pack of colorful Trojans.

Woe to the birds of our time - those which take flight and those which stand upright :-)