When my sister and I were 8 years old, my mom allowed us to get pet parakeets that we’d been begging for, for basically forever. At least, that’s how it felt to an 8-year-old who walked by the pet store in the mall every so often and saw those cute little chirpy birds.
Finally, for our birthday, we could get one each, on one condition—that we took sole responsibility for their care. Feeding, cleaning the cage, sweeping under the cage for shells…the whole lot was up to us. We heartily agreed and left the pet store that day with a bright yellow and bright blue parakeet. I was a bit of a nerd as a kid—into science and I poured over the Encyclopedia Britannica set that we had on our living room bookshelf—for fun.
My sister immediately named her yellow bird “Sunshine.” I rolled my eyes. “How original…” I’m sure some sort of physical scuffle ensued. Then I went back to the encyclopedia. I decided that my bluebird would be called “Budgie,” which I learned was French for “bird.”
Budgie and Sunshine lived happy lives together in a tall pen in our laundry room. We would occasionally let them light onto our finger and bring them out of the cage to sort of pet if you can really call it petting a bird. It was more like smoothing its feathers and hoping to God that it didn’t shit on your hand. Budgie got handled far less than Sunshine, which is what I believe is at least partially responsible for Sunshine’s early demise.
One morning, we woke to a squawk that was much louder than usual. We went to the cage, and Budgie was having a nervous breakdown because Sunshine was lying on his back with his feet straight up in the air, in the spot where he must have perished.
My sister was terribly distraught, and I was a little bit grateful on the inside that it wasn’t Budgie. Like somehow the competition of keeping our birds alive was over and I had won. I know. It’s sick. But, I also loved my bird and was thankful he or she was still alive. We never did determine the sex of either bird; however, I think that I read somewhere that the blues are mostly female and the yellow are male. The name “Budgie” was androgynous enough to cover either gender identity.
We decided that it was only right to give Sunshine a proper burial. We decorated a shoe box with ornate jewels and Lisa Frank stickers. I’m almost sure that I sprayed perfume into the box. My sister put Sunshine’s “toys” in the box with him/her. We put the lid on the box and wrote his/her name on the top.
We were ready. We walked outside and found the perfect spot beside a tree in the yard where we would be able to see the grave marker. We had dressed appropriately for Sunshine’s funeral. We had a prayer and dug the hole. My mom placed Sunshine’s casket into the hole and we covered it with dirt.
We turned away and began to sing “I’ll Fly Away.” What other song would you possibly sing at a parakeet’s funeral??
We turned back around to say our final goodbyes, but the hole had been uncovered and the lid was missing. Upon further investigation, we discovered that Sunshine’s body was also missing. That box was as empty as Jesus' tomb on Easter Sunday. Queue perfectly in sync turn to the left and screams as my sister’s cat, Scratch, was happily carrying Sunshine into the woods.
Budgie died soon after, as parakeets are tribal birds and are meant to be paired with at least one other bird. I think his funeral was far less elaborate and the hole was dug much deeper for his coffin.
Lessons learned:
- Birds are fun to look at
- Birds are very messy
- Birds have about a 2-minute poop span from the time you pick them up unless they’re nervous—then, you’re screwed
- Pets live, and pets die.
- The Lion King was right—there is a circle of life. Scratch proved it.
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