The sun was setting and Jay was gone.
“Jay!” I shouted. “Jay Blue Jay!”
“Jay!” Mom called to the trees.
We were in the driveway looking up. A bird flittered to a branch, paused, and moved on, but there was no sign of the feathery blue menace we had raised from infancy. The occasional blue jay call – something between a screech and a caw – stoked my hope, but hope was fading with the light.
Jay Blue Jay came into our lives totally unexpectedly. We were walking in the woods one spring, and on our way back, at the edge of the driveway, we found a tiny bird on the ground. He was naked, pink, and alien-like, but far from pathetic. His eyes were closed, but when he detected our presence he opened his beak wide and screeched for food. With no sign of his mother, we scooped him up and kept him safe and warm in a cardboard box lined with hay. We fed him wet cat food on a toothpick, and Jay gobbled it up greedily. His high-pitched skirl was persuasive, and he used it any time his tiny stomach rumbled. He screeched and he ate and he grew into a strong, healthy bird.
“Jay!” I shouted. “Jay Blue Jay!”
“Jay!” Mom called to the trees.
We were in the driveway looking up. A bird flittered to a branch, paused, and moved on, but there was no sign of the feathery blue menace we had raised from infancy. The occasional blue jay call – something between a screech and a caw – stoked my hope, but hope was fading with the light.
Jay Blue Jay came into our lives totally unexpectedly. We were walking in the woods one spring, and on our way back, at the edge of the driveway, we found a tiny bird on the ground. He was naked, pink, and alien-like, but far from pathetic. His eyes were closed, but when he detected our presence he opened his beak wide and screeched for food. With no sign of his mother, we scooped him up and kept him safe and warm in a cardboard box lined with hay. We fed him wet cat food on a toothpick, and Jay gobbled it up greedily. His high-pitched skirl was persuasive, and he used it any time his tiny stomach rumbled. He screeched and he ate and he grew into a strong, healthy bird.
***
We took Jay outside often. Our yard was a birdy playground with towering trees. Generally, Jay must have felt safe in the company of the only creatures he knew as family. I was about nine and used to ride my bicycle a lot, around and around the gravel driveway. He blended seamlessly with the outdoor environment, but I always had the feeling he knew exactly where I was. He was great about coming when we called him.
“Jay!” I would call, and the blue bird with the pointy crest would flap down and light on my hand or in the nearby lilac where I could easily retrieve him. Jay slept in a cage that Mom built of screen and wood. There was a branchy stick inside to mimic the outdoors. During the day we would let him out to explore the house and be near us. Blue jays are thieves, and in our house nothing small and shiny was safe. I was peeking through my microscope one day when Jay landed on the table, picked up the plastic lens cover in his pointy beak, and flapped up to a curtain rod just above my reach. I chased him, but he stayed one flap ahead, unwilling to give up his trophy. He was poised and cocky and fully in control. I think he was mocking me.
The physical comedy didn’t end there. He took a ride once on a spinning record and seemed to get a kick out of our laughter. Maybe we sounded like blue jays. I think he did funny things like that for attention. In fact, most of what he did seemed intended as a means of interacting with humans. In his cage, perched on his stick, he would work and work at imitating human speech. His wild tongue was the wrong shape for forming human words, but the tone and cadence were uncanny. I used to dream that one day he would figure out how to make himself understood. As if that would remove the last barrier to communication between human and animal. As if that would somehow make him one of us, or us one of him
“Jay!” I would call, and the blue bird with the pointy crest would flap down and light on my hand or in the nearby lilac where I could easily retrieve him. Jay slept in a cage that Mom built of screen and wood. There was a branchy stick inside to mimic the outdoors. During the day we would let him out to explore the house and be near us. Blue jays are thieves, and in our house nothing small and shiny was safe. I was peeking through my microscope one day when Jay landed on the table, picked up the plastic lens cover in his pointy beak, and flapped up to a curtain rod just above my reach. I chased him, but he stayed one flap ahead, unwilling to give up his trophy. He was poised and cocky and fully in control. I think he was mocking me.
The physical comedy didn’t end there. He took a ride once on a spinning record and seemed to get a kick out of our laughter. Maybe we sounded like blue jays. I think he did funny things like that for attention. In fact, most of what he did seemed intended as a means of interacting with humans. In his cage, perched on his stick, he would work and work at imitating human speech. His wild tongue was the wrong shape for forming human words, but the tone and cadence were uncanny. I used to dream that one day he would figure out how to make himself understood. As if that would remove the last barrier to communication between human and animal. As if that would somehow make him one of us, or us one of him
***
Mom and I have two different memories of the day Jay left. We had taken him outside to enjoy a beautiful late-summer day. I remember standing in the driveway calling and calling for what seemed like hours. When he didn’t return that day, I tried again the next day and the next. I couldn’t understand why he would just leave us.
Mom always knew that Jay needed to be free. The way she tells the story, each day she would take him outside and let him stay out for longer and longer on his own. With each whiff of the wild world outside, the thread that bound him to us grew thinner and thinner. On that last day, Jay was hanging out somewhere in a tree when a huge flock of blue jays swooped out of the sky and landed in the blue spruce. They started calling, their gravely caws rising in a vast bubble over the yard and into the afternoon sky. Jay joined their group. When they took to the sky, Jay went too. When he didn’t return, Mom cried.
For years afterward, each time Mom or I would see a blue jay – especially a big, plump, healthy one – we would wonder if it was Jay coming back for a visit. If it was, though, he never let us know.
Mom always knew that Jay needed to be free. The way she tells the story, each day she would take him outside and let him stay out for longer and longer on his own. With each whiff of the wild world outside, the thread that bound him to us grew thinner and thinner. On that last day, Jay was hanging out somewhere in a tree when a huge flock of blue jays swooped out of the sky and landed in the blue spruce. They started calling, their gravely caws rising in a vast bubble over the yard and into the afternoon sky. Jay joined their group. When they took to the sky, Jay went too. When he didn’t return, Mom cried.
For years afterward, each time Mom or I would see a blue jay – especially a big, plump, healthy one – we would wonder if it was Jay coming back for a visit. If it was, though, he never let us know.
***
Camping recently with my family I was awakened early by the obnoxious squawkings of blue jays. These wild creatures were all worked up about something in the woods, and they wanted everyone to know it. We have camped every summer since my children were little. Each visit to New Hampshire marks new milestones in independence. As a two-year-old, Alaina tripped on rocks and roots and threw temper tantrums. Now nine, she hops on her pink BMX bike and coasts confidently over the gravel, chatting and singing. She makes plans for family fun time and keeps track of the flashlights. Abe was four the first time we camped and stuck close by my side. Now a gangly 11-year-old, he fishes independently and can go to the camp store to make purchases on his own. Together they sit in the rec hall and watch a movie while we stay at the site cooking dinner. I notice, too, the independence of the older kids at the campground. They gather to discuss the things that are important to them or play makeshift Frisbee games. Rarely is a parent needed.
To Jay Blue Jay we were family, but there was something in him that knew there was more – a bigger, wilder life – out there for him to live. It’s the same with children. They spend their days discovering what kind of creature they are meant to be. Eventually they fly off to be that creature.
As a nine-year-old boy scanning the trees for his pet, I didn’t understand any of this. But Mom did. She knew Jay Blue Jay had to leave. And when he did, she grieved. Now I know that it wasn’t the blue jay that brought her tears.
To Jay Blue Jay we were family, but there was something in him that knew there was more – a bigger, wilder life – out there for him to live. It’s the same with children. They spend their days discovering what kind of creature they are meant to be. Eventually they fly off to be that creature.
As a nine-year-old boy scanning the trees for his pet, I didn’t understand any of this. But Mom did. She knew Jay Blue Jay had to leave. And when he did, she grieved. Now I know that it wasn’t the blue jay that brought her tears.
Header art by T. Guzzio. Original photo by Darren Swim.
CONNECT WITH BEN:
Ben Adelman is an English teacher, musician, and former newspaper editor who lives in a small, wooded town north of Boston. He reads DeLillo and DFW and loves folk music and Led Zeppelin. Email him at [email protected].
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