Puppy Love

A close encounter with an uncommunicative parrot gives Pat McDermott pause for thought. Could it be time for a new puppy?

- Pat McDermott

I was sitting in a small cafe near our new apartment when a woman walked in with a bird on her shoulder. This may sound like the beginning of the “dead parrot” sketch by John Cleese but I promise you it isn’t. The bird was bright green and very much alive. Its wee claws didn’t appear to be glued to the owner’s shoulder. Could it be an Indian Ring neck? A Lorikeet? A smallish King Parrot perhaps?

Who am I kidding? I wouldn’t know an Indian Ring neck from a bacon and egg roll – certainly not at 6.37 in the morning in a cafe full of edgy people. But I love all creatures great and small and this wee bird was clearly one of them. So I struck up a conversation. With Bird – not “Owner”. Owner, like everyone else in the place, was texting.

“Who’s a pretty boy then?” I inquired politely. Bird fixed me with a hard stare. The kind of stare you give someone who, having asked what you do for a living, says. “Insurance! Really? Wow! That must be fascinating!”