Woke up to a spectacular morning; cloudless, mild and still. It would be an Indian Summer, or maybe an Aboriginal Summer, if we weren't so far into winter already. Expected after the rain we had we'd get the customary cold Antarctic blast.
Have decided on a different course with Jack because he is so reluctant to take treats. He does take them but it takes him a long time to decide. Occasionally he will eat a few in succession with some enthusiasm but usually it is a long process where he stares at me, often with head lowered, while deciding, it seems, whether he will launch himself at my face or just take the treat. Now I am still offering the treat but instead of immediately offering another, I say 'Good boy!' and leave the aviary. So the reward is that he is rid of my presence at the same time as he gets a yummy snack. We'll see how it goes. I have also started him on pellets today. Not happy! He did eat a few but he talked and murmured and squawked, letting us know that he wasn't pleased with breakfast. At 3pm I'll put in seed. With the exception of one bird (another cockatoo) this method has worked in introducing seed addicted birds to pellets.
Did yoga for 50 minutes today. R had gone in for a haircut so had plenty of time to finish housework and still get in some mat time. Always makes the day better.
Woke up at 2am with a splitting headache (damn menopause). Took two aspros and went back to bed. Concentrated on the pain and after a while it wasn't pain so much as a sensation. I don't know how successful I'd be in coping with chronic pain as I'm so dismal at coping with any sort of physical discomfort, a real Princess and the Pea kind of oversensitivity, yet it was an interesting phenomenon nevertheless.
Babaji has been a sort of prayerful adjunct to my life of late. He was a yogi in India, a character in Autobiography of a Yoga that I'm reading. For some reason, more than the other saints in the book, he made an impression on me. I called upon his aid when Jack was so ill. Jack became better. I suppose it's another version of calling on Mother Mary or St. Francis or Gaia - not IT but a human face of IT. At odd moments I remember and am thankful for the now; for the gifts of a bed to sleep in, the air I breathe, my feet which carry me so well, odd moments and odd things, whatever comes to mind at that moment, in that moment. The purity and innocence of birds, the greenness of green, my husband, food. Yoga has everything to do with this. When I did drugs all those years ago while I lived high and loud in one sense, in another I think I was on a more spiritual wavelength and not so caught up in the illusion and minutiae of life. Part of the attraction of drugs but also the judgment of drugs for when you do them you get a glimpse and then become blind because of the drug culture/dependency. At any rate, perhaps another reason is that creativity and questing is all a part of the twenties. We get comfortable in the 30's and positively staid in the 40's. Perhaps the 50's can be the start of a childhood reversion.
Friday, July 9, 2010
Thursday, July 8, 2010
Jack, DImitri, yoga and dreaming
Bit of a barney this morning with Jack. Yesterday discovered that he'd either been attacked through the wire by Algernon, as one toenail on his right food was mangled and bleeding, or less likely, he'd caught it in the wire. I think he'd had a fight with Algernon as Algernon has been sticking close to home the past week or so. I've broken up skirmishes before. I was vacuuming when whatever happened happened as I'd been out just before to visit him and went out immediately after because I heard black cockatoos in the distance. And there he was, blood smears on the perch, coagulated blood on the ground and him holding it up and looking forlorn. Not that injury and my soft words improve his temper. I put his seed out this morning but he ignored it as he was on the ground (hope we don't get another infected toe). Anyway, he tried to climb but had trouble so I extended, with some trepidation, the handheld perch for him to get on. He did but just as he was stepping from it to the aviary perch he lunged for my hand. I dropped the handheld with him on it and in retaliation he attacked my foot (luckily ensconced in ugh boot) and bit. Connected too the little toad. So I kicked/tossed him away and scolded him. Not that he cared. He's not one bit cowed. Naturally I don't want him cowed but he does need to understand that a) it's not acceptable to bite and b) it's not acceptable to bite. I haven't been out since but am going to later as there are some delectable torelliana tree branches which have fallen that can be divided up between the birds. They always like having fresh chewable branches.
At least he's in good feather and looking well. He's energetic and getting around, an entirely different bird than when he arrived.
Dimitri continues to relax around me. Yesterday he even walked towards me as I was walking towards him. I don't think he even realized what he was doing. I love his little 'hooo?' sound that he makes. Like a contact call. I repeat it back to him so we have this little conversation going which is pleasant for us both. I haven't worked with him, as in clicker training, for awhile. I do think it's important but frankly it's been too bloody cold to sit on the floor and train. Perhaps that's why he's relaxed. I must advertise to him that I want something for he's less relaxed when we're training than when we aren't even though I try and keep a relaxed body posture and try not to want things from him. Bird training is very zen really. It's when you don't want too much that you make progress.
I'm intermittent in my yoga training. Some days I just don't get to it and feel guilty for not training which is self-defeating I know. But I do want to do yoga as the changes in me are noticeable. I am far more supple than I was this time last year. I think it's helped clear this heavy chest cold that I've had too. The deep breathing but also the inversions. I do a decent shoulder stand but haven't been game to really attempt a headstand yet. Tried yesterday and what used to be so easy felt very awkward and difficult. Will try again today. Did a backbend which I couldn't do last year. I can't stay up for very long but that's because of weakness not because it hurts my back. The Plank with bent arms is still difficult but is easier than it was before. Half Moon is much better. It really illustrates how differently the two halves of my body cope with postures. It's amazing to me that despite being fairly regular in my practice I still feel it in my body the next day. The feeling after being on the mat is tremendous. Yoga really does work all of me, stretches and invigorates.
As for meditation. Well, poo. My ability to concentrate has improved a miniscule amount. A reallly minisule amount. Usually when something is practiced regularly there is some noticeable improvement. The improvement is negligible, so much that I'm a bit defeated.
Had a really great dream two nights ago. Two paintings, influenced by William Blake's The Flea. Haven't seen that painting in quite a while but must have recalled it because of seeing a reproduction of The Red Dragon and the Woman Clothed with the Sun in the book (a horrific book BTW) The Red Dragon. (Almost decided against finishing the book as it is the mental equivalent of pigging out on ice cream and doritos). Anyway, there were two paintings; mine and someone else's - both an old yellow gold on black background of faces of a surrealist nature. I can still see the colours although I can't see the faces. I would like to try and duplicate that colour using pencil rather than pastel. May have a go today. Then again I may whiffle the day away and do nothing.
At least he's in good feather and looking well. He's energetic and getting around, an entirely different bird than when he arrived.
Dimitri continues to relax around me. Yesterday he even walked towards me as I was walking towards him. I don't think he even realized what he was doing. I love his little 'hooo?' sound that he makes. Like a contact call. I repeat it back to him so we have this little conversation going which is pleasant for us both. I haven't worked with him, as in clicker training, for awhile. I do think it's important but frankly it's been too bloody cold to sit on the floor and train. Perhaps that's why he's relaxed. I must advertise to him that I want something for he's less relaxed when we're training than when we aren't even though I try and keep a relaxed body posture and try not to want things from him. Bird training is very zen really. It's when you don't want too much that you make progress.
I'm intermittent in my yoga training. Some days I just don't get to it and feel guilty for not training which is self-defeating I know. But I do want to do yoga as the changes in me are noticeable. I am far more supple than I was this time last year. I think it's helped clear this heavy chest cold that I've had too. The deep breathing but also the inversions. I do a decent shoulder stand but haven't been game to really attempt a headstand yet. Tried yesterday and what used to be so easy felt very awkward and difficult. Will try again today. Did a backbend which I couldn't do last year. I can't stay up for very long but that's because of weakness not because it hurts my back. The Plank with bent arms is still difficult but is easier than it was before. Half Moon is much better. It really illustrates how differently the two halves of my body cope with postures. It's amazing to me that despite being fairly regular in my practice I still feel it in my body the next day. The feeling after being on the mat is tremendous. Yoga really does work all of me, stretches and invigorates.
As for meditation. Well, poo. My ability to concentrate has improved a miniscule amount. A reallly minisule amount. Usually when something is practiced regularly there is some noticeable improvement. The improvement is negligible, so much that I'm a bit defeated.
Had a really great dream two nights ago. Two paintings, influenced by William Blake's The Flea. Haven't seen that painting in quite a while but must have recalled it because of seeing a reproduction of The Red Dragon and the Woman Clothed with the Sun in the book (a horrific book BTW) The Red Dragon. (Almost decided against finishing the book as it is the mental equivalent of pigging out on ice cream and doritos). Anyway, there were two paintings; mine and someone else's - both an old yellow gold on black background of faces of a surrealist nature. I can still see the colours although I can't see the faces. I would like to try and duplicate that colour using pencil rather than pastel. May have a go today. Then again I may whiffle the day away and do nothing.
Sunday, July 4, 2010
The Great Escape, Jack and Dimitri
Three whistling ducks are padding across the paddock. I can often hear them in the middle of the night as they fly over. Flying ducks are quite extraordinary. They are heavy creatures with comparatively short wings which they flap hard yet they are fast, strong and fly long distances in the dark. Aeronautical design seems somewhat deficient yet they overcome this with ease.
I was driving home after dark a few weeks ago and saw a large flock of ducks flying swiftly across the night sky. What did they see from up there? How did it feel with the cold wind of their speed fresh in their nostrils? There was moonlight and I imagine the paddocks and fields and trees and black square blocks with amber lights shining was a thrilling sight in that swift silver silence.
Our whippets, Jamaica and Radar, had a view of the night last night. Sometime around three they sighted a wallaby (we suspect as wallabies have been coming down to feed on the verges now that winter frosts have killed the grass elsewhere). They must have bolted after it and being so fast hardly felt the jolt from the radio collars they wear. We got in the truck and drove the roads but they were no where in sight. They didn't come home at dark. R went to a party we'd committed to while I stayed home and listened for the sound of the sleigh bells they wear on their collars. We'd turned the fence off so if they did come home they wouldn't be zapped on the way in. R got home at 9:30 and they still hadn't returned By eleven, with frost on the ground, they were back, curled tightly in their beds as both had lost their coats. I was so relieved to see them. When I went out Radar did the oddest thing. He got out of his bed, came over with his tail scrunched between his legs and pressed his forehead against my legs. I wasn't mad at him. I wasn't mad at either of them. Disappointed yes, as now we have to chain them at 3 when the wallabies start to wander in, but not angry. Was it contrition on Radar's part, or relief at being home. It wasn't gladness at seeing me as his tail was tucked so hard. I gave him a cuddle. Smelled him. He smelled like wallaby so I can only hope the gamey smell was only because he'd gone bush and not for some more sinister reason. No blood on either of them. Radar has a sore dew claw pad and a ding on his hock. Other than that they both seem fine. Exhausted but fine.
Jack the cockatoo has improved physically. We put him on antibiotics for a week because despite there not appearing to be infection in his foot it was still sore. He's also still on coccivet. Once a poo sample has been examined this week a decision will be made whether to continue with it or not. Psychologically he's a different bird too; far more territorial and aggressive. He was on the ground last week and I went in to give him his breakfast. He wasted no time and went for me, head lowered and running fast. I caught him with my ugh boot and lifted/tossed him backwards, very gently of course but enough to thwart his advances. I had to do it five times, never violently but then again I couldn't let his challenge go unmet either. This morning when I took his breakfast in, wearing my tall ugh boots, he was on the ground. He watched but he did not challenge.
I read in the bird click files about how one woman who had a very aggressive parrot clicked every movement (lifting of the head and neck, etc) that was not aggressive. I am working on that with Jack. There is a small but significant problem; he isn't very enthusiastic about the treats. I'm using almond which seems, by a small margin, to be the most popular, sunflower seeds (which I've just started leaving out of his food bowl altogether) and pumpkin seeds. I break the almonds up into pieces and serve them on a long wooden spoon to keep fingers safe.
Just went outside and he was on the front perch. It's lovely to see him using the entire aviary. When he was unwell he pretty much stayed in one or two spots. Now he's on the ground excavating holes and using all the perches as well as climbing the cage. Losing his second toenail hasn't seemed to make a difference. Anyway, I offered almond treats and he took them but without enthusiasm. Am going to check the bird click files to see what others have used.
As for Dimitri, he's going well. He's been taking millet from my fingers as I sit on the floor. There are incremental improvements in his confidence. Each time I go onto the verandah I toss him some millet so even though he always hops down from his perch and takes off he is quicker to turn around and approach me. He has also let me come closer when cleaning the floor (on hands and knees) before he moves away. These are small things but still encouraging.
A month or so ago R built him a penthouse. Because Dimitri was falling off perches alot we grounded him. None of his perches are more than a foot off the ground. It keeps him safe but is quite sad to keep this bird of the air anchored to earth. I was trying to think of some way we could allow him some height yet keep him safe. The result was The Penthouse. We took an old compost bin, tall, black and narrow, but a wide hole in the base and smaller holes around the sides to let in light. Inside we put in a wooden ladder, cut off the top of the bin and placed a cocky cage on top. Unfortunately Dimitri disdained to use it. Yesterday we updated it; made another large hole opposite the entrance and replaced the ladder, which had a solid light blocking first 2 rungs, with another lighter one. This morning Dimitri had an explore. Was wonderful to see him up high where he could see out, yet safe. With the bottom of the cocky cage intact, save for the entrance hole, even if he jumps in fear from a perch he is not going to fall.
I was driving home after dark a few weeks ago and saw a large flock of ducks flying swiftly across the night sky. What did they see from up there? How did it feel with the cold wind of their speed fresh in their nostrils? There was moonlight and I imagine the paddocks and fields and trees and black square blocks with amber lights shining was a thrilling sight in that swift silver silence.
Our whippets, Jamaica and Radar, had a view of the night last night. Sometime around three they sighted a wallaby (we suspect as wallabies have been coming down to feed on the verges now that winter frosts have killed the grass elsewhere). They must have bolted after it and being so fast hardly felt the jolt from the radio collars they wear. We got in the truck and drove the roads but they were no where in sight. They didn't come home at dark. R went to a party we'd committed to while I stayed home and listened for the sound of the sleigh bells they wear on their collars. We'd turned the fence off so if they did come home they wouldn't be zapped on the way in. R got home at 9:30 and they still hadn't returned By eleven, with frost on the ground, they were back, curled tightly in their beds as both had lost their coats. I was so relieved to see them. When I went out Radar did the oddest thing. He got out of his bed, came over with his tail scrunched between his legs and pressed his forehead against my legs. I wasn't mad at him. I wasn't mad at either of them. Disappointed yes, as now we have to chain them at 3 when the wallabies start to wander in, but not angry. Was it contrition on Radar's part, or relief at being home. It wasn't gladness at seeing me as his tail was tucked so hard. I gave him a cuddle. Smelled him. He smelled like wallaby so I can only hope the gamey smell was only because he'd gone bush and not for some more sinister reason. No blood on either of them. Radar has a sore dew claw pad and a ding on his hock. Other than that they both seem fine. Exhausted but fine.
Jack the cockatoo has improved physically. We put him on antibiotics for a week because despite there not appearing to be infection in his foot it was still sore. He's also still on coccivet. Once a poo sample has been examined this week a decision will be made whether to continue with it or not. Psychologically he's a different bird too; far more territorial and aggressive. He was on the ground last week and I went in to give him his breakfast. He wasted no time and went for me, head lowered and running fast. I caught him with my ugh boot and lifted/tossed him backwards, very gently of course but enough to thwart his advances. I had to do it five times, never violently but then again I couldn't let his challenge go unmet either. This morning when I took his breakfast in, wearing my tall ugh boots, he was on the ground. He watched but he did not challenge.
I read in the bird click files about how one woman who had a very aggressive parrot clicked every movement (lifting of the head and neck, etc) that was not aggressive. I am working on that with Jack. There is a small but significant problem; he isn't very enthusiastic about the treats. I'm using almond which seems, by a small margin, to be the most popular, sunflower seeds (which I've just started leaving out of his food bowl altogether) and pumpkin seeds. I break the almonds up into pieces and serve them on a long wooden spoon to keep fingers safe.
Just went outside and he was on the front perch. It's lovely to see him using the entire aviary. When he was unwell he pretty much stayed in one or two spots. Now he's on the ground excavating holes and using all the perches as well as climbing the cage. Losing his second toenail hasn't seemed to make a difference. Anyway, I offered almond treats and he took them but without enthusiasm. Am going to check the bird click files to see what others have used.
As for Dimitri, he's going well. He's been taking millet from my fingers as I sit on the floor. There are incremental improvements in his confidence. Each time I go onto the verandah I toss him some millet so even though he always hops down from his perch and takes off he is quicker to turn around and approach me. He has also let me come closer when cleaning the floor (on hands and knees) before he moves away. These are small things but still encouraging.
A month or so ago R built him a penthouse. Because Dimitri was falling off perches alot we grounded him. None of his perches are more than a foot off the ground. It keeps him safe but is quite sad to keep this bird of the air anchored to earth. I was trying to think of some way we could allow him some height yet keep him safe. The result was The Penthouse. We took an old compost bin, tall, black and narrow, but a wide hole in the base and smaller holes around the sides to let in light. Inside we put in a wooden ladder, cut off the top of the bin and placed a cocky cage on top. Unfortunately Dimitri disdained to use it. Yesterday we updated it; made another large hole opposite the entrance and replaced the ladder, which had a solid light blocking first 2 rungs, with another lighter one. This morning Dimitri had an explore. Was wonderful to see him up high where he could see out, yet safe. With the bottom of the cocky cage intact, save for the entrance hole, even if he jumps in fear from a perch he is not going to fall.
Tuesday, June 15, 2010
Jack
It's time to introduce a new member of our feathered family. Jack is a male sulphur crested cockatoo of unknown age. He was found wandering on the side of the road on the Sunshine Coast. His rescuer looked for his owner, apparently he was found in an area that wasn't heavily populated, but without success. While he was looking Jack lived in a cat carrying cage. I don't know for how long. Then he came to our friends, G and P who introduced him to their population of rescue cockatoos. All was well until one of the males took a dislike to him. This bird attacked him and kept him from food and water, unless P was present. The sad thing is Jack didn't try and defend himself and what's worse, wouldn't even move while being bitten. P rang us May 23 and asked if we'd take him. Of course we would.
Jack talks, murmurs and occasionally screams which is great as he was completely silent for the first few days. He's lost a toenail on his left foot and has a wound on the backward facing toe of the same foot. The toes don't appear to be infected but we started him on antibiotics a couple of days ago because he's still extremely sore after 3 weeks. So sore that he uses his beak as a third foot to get around. He's allowed me to touch his toes but I don't try and flex them and feel for a break. They don't look broken but they are swollen. Despite the cleanliness of the wounds (there is new pink skin at the wound site) I am concerned that infection has gone up the bone. But then if that were the case he would be sick in himself and he's not. He did have a very bad case of coccidiosis and trichomoniasis when he arrived which isn't surprising considering the prolonged stress he had to endure.
There is another possibility - that the wounds are fine in themselves and the reluctance to move and the pain stems from having spent his entire life in a cocky cage. He will not flatten his toes ie, walk on a flat surface. It obviously causes him pain. Bumblefoot is a possibility. Have just written to his previous carers asking for more information about how he behaved when he was with them. I knew he was sedentary before but what I'm asking specifically is if he used his beak as a third foot before he was bitten.
Jack talks, murmurs and occasionally screams which is great as he was completely silent for the first few days. He's lost a toenail on his left foot and has a wound on the backward facing toe of the same foot. The toes don't appear to be infected but we started him on antibiotics a couple of days ago because he's still extremely sore after 3 weeks. So sore that he uses his beak as a third foot to get around. He's allowed me to touch his toes but I don't try and flex them and feel for a break. They don't look broken but they are swollen. Despite the cleanliness of the wounds (there is new pink skin at the wound site) I am concerned that infection has gone up the bone. But then if that were the case he would be sick in himself and he's not. He did have a very bad case of coccidiosis and trichomoniasis when he arrived which isn't surprising considering the prolonged stress he had to endure.
There is another possibility - that the wounds are fine in themselves and the reluctance to move and the pain stems from having spent his entire life in a cocky cage. He will not flatten his toes ie, walk on a flat surface. It obviously causes him pain. Bumblefoot is a possibility. Have just written to his previous carers asking for more information about how he behaved when he was with them. I knew he was sedentary before but what I'm asking specifically is if he used his beak as a third foot before he was bitten.
Sunday, May 16, 2010
The Grand Illusion and Progress with Dimitri!
16.5.10. My last post unsettled me. Whether it's the voice of instilled conscience speaking I don't know but it seems as though by accepting evil I say I condone it. If the world is illusion, a moving tapestry of thought and emotion woven by consciousness then none of it is real - yet I do think we have, are born with, an innate sense of right and wrong. We are a reflection of Consciousness yet are flawed by our belief and participation in this grand illusion. What is the purpose of evil? Are those that commit it (and that's all of us) still learning the rules of the Great Game? The game being you can be and do anything you want, pretend anything you want and its only purpose is to keep you from remembering who you really are? The only rule of life is to participate. Once you stop breathing, you stop playing. But if you've played through many many lives and tire of the illusion you can go home - if you remember who you Are. The more evil committed the less you remember and the farther away you are from the source of all things. I suspect that someone who is very evil is very lonely. Not in the not having companions sense but in the isolation of the self. He has cut himself off from humanity and also from Self.
I just finished reading Out of Africa by Karen Blixen. I was struck by how knowledgeable she was. Her education was phenomenal. And she read. Widely and deeply. Immediately after closing the book I turned on the television and saw some music video clip. It was all glitz and glamour and sex and as brittle as glass - not one iota of beauty in it despite the perfection of the carefully made up and coiffed girls and the colourful barely there outfits. It was like drinking deeply of spring water and then moistening my lips with salt. But the comparisons weren't all bad. Although many of the references she made to other writers and their works were totally unfamiliar and there was a grace and dignity in her writing which seems to be a result of a kind of innocence that we, who see all, do all, know all, lack - there has been a change for the better in some way. When she arrived she was determined to shoot and kill one of each kind of game. She writes of the joy of killing lions, of the kill in general - and the blase attitude to clearing of the land for coffee. Toward the end of her stay in Africa her bloodlust abated and she only killed lions when they threatened the lifestock of the Natives.
I know people still hunt, still have that bloodlust. Still have that love affair with prey as she termed it. The courtship of the hunt and the consummation of the kill. But we are more aware of the finite nature of the planet and all the things on it.
But I didn't start this blog today to write about my opinions but to wave the flag for Dimitri. I have been trying to teach him to put a chewed wooden clothes peg in a bowl. I've been back chaining - having the peg in the bowl and clicking him for targeting it. When he picks it up and throws it out of the bowl I don't click. Today, for the first time I think he got a glimmer of what we've been trying to accomplish (it's quite difficult to type as I have Matisse, the Siamese cat, sitting on my lap and laying across my right arm). Anyway, he threw the peg out of the bowl and then, by accident or design, got it back in. I gave him a jackpot. (BTW, I'm also using sunflower seeds rather than millet - he likes them and they're quicker for him to consume therefore we get more training done. The downside is he's consuming quite a few sunflower seeds). Then he did it again. And again. So I removed the peg from the bowl - and after a few false tries he got it in again. Oh Happy Day!
I'm also clicking him when he looks me in the eye. Each time I go onto the verandah he scurries away. That's okay as he does turn around and, with encouragement, starts retracing his steps. He knows he'll get a millet spray when I come onto the verandah but now I'm waiting until he cocks his head and looks at me with that warm brown eye. Slowly slowly, agonizingly so but still. I keep in mind how K's corella, after some mysterious event while she was away on holiday, took an entire year to trust again - and he was a velcro bird, cuddling under her neck, trusting her to do anything. So with Dimitri, a wild caught Corella, nine months is nothing.
Nidji, accidentally released two weeks ago, is thriving. He hangs around with a pair of lorikeets, quite scruffy looking compared to him. Smaller too. I suspect one is Silda. They only tolerate him on the periphery and chase him away from the feeding stations. He's getting quite wily however, picking his time for feeding and even pushing the boundaries a bit with how close they allow him. He flies extremely well now. Landings and take-offs are second nature. And, as he's with the other two, his chances of survival have increased as there are two other sets of eyes watching the skies.
I just finished reading Out of Africa by Karen Blixen. I was struck by how knowledgeable she was. Her education was phenomenal. And she read. Widely and deeply. Immediately after closing the book I turned on the television and saw some music video clip. It was all glitz and glamour and sex and as brittle as glass - not one iota of beauty in it despite the perfection of the carefully made up and coiffed girls and the colourful barely there outfits. It was like drinking deeply of spring water and then moistening my lips with salt. But the comparisons weren't all bad. Although many of the references she made to other writers and their works were totally unfamiliar and there was a grace and dignity in her writing which seems to be a result of a kind of innocence that we, who see all, do all, know all, lack - there has been a change for the better in some way. When she arrived she was determined to shoot and kill one of each kind of game. She writes of the joy of killing lions, of the kill in general - and the blase attitude to clearing of the land for coffee. Toward the end of her stay in Africa her bloodlust abated and she only killed lions when they threatened the lifestock of the Natives.
I know people still hunt, still have that bloodlust. Still have that love affair with prey as she termed it. The courtship of the hunt and the consummation of the kill. But we are more aware of the finite nature of the planet and all the things on it.
But I didn't start this blog today to write about my opinions but to wave the flag for Dimitri. I have been trying to teach him to put a chewed wooden clothes peg in a bowl. I've been back chaining - having the peg in the bowl and clicking him for targeting it. When he picks it up and throws it out of the bowl I don't click. Today, for the first time I think he got a glimmer of what we've been trying to accomplish (it's quite difficult to type as I have Matisse, the Siamese cat, sitting on my lap and laying across my right arm). Anyway, he threw the peg out of the bowl and then, by accident or design, got it back in. I gave him a jackpot. (BTW, I'm also using sunflower seeds rather than millet - he likes them and they're quicker for him to consume therefore we get more training done. The downside is he's consuming quite a few sunflower seeds). Then he did it again. And again. So I removed the peg from the bowl - and after a few false tries he got it in again. Oh Happy Day!
I'm also clicking him when he looks me in the eye. Each time I go onto the verandah he scurries away. That's okay as he does turn around and, with encouragement, starts retracing his steps. He knows he'll get a millet spray when I come onto the verandah but now I'm waiting until he cocks his head and looks at me with that warm brown eye. Slowly slowly, agonizingly so but still. I keep in mind how K's corella, after some mysterious event while she was away on holiday, took an entire year to trust again - and he was a velcro bird, cuddling under her neck, trusting her to do anything. So with Dimitri, a wild caught Corella, nine months is nothing.
Nidji, accidentally released two weeks ago, is thriving. He hangs around with a pair of lorikeets, quite scruffy looking compared to him. Smaller too. I suspect one is Silda. They only tolerate him on the periphery and chase him away from the feeding stations. He's getting quite wily however, picking his time for feeding and even pushing the boundaries a bit with how close they allow him. He flies extremely well now. Landings and take-offs are second nature. And, as he's with the other two, his chances of survival have increased as there are two other sets of eyes watching the skies.
Monday, May 3, 2010
Nidji and the Eternal Question
Sometimes, without any exterior cause that I can see, I feel myself slide inexorably into a foul mood. Foul meaning easily angered, simmering resentment and frustration bubbling under the surface. Think of the breath, stay in the moment, bring back the present. Yes, it works to a degree and I'm a little better but it started me thinking. Yes, there are extenuating circumstances. Nidji, my stepsons rainbow lorikeet escaped day before yesterday when Algernon spooked him and the door was open a crack while I removed the food. It never should have happened. I never should have had the door open but I'd done it hundreds of time, the opening wouldn't have been more than 2 or 3 inches - but there you go. He escaped and hasn't returned. Instead he calls from ever widening circles around the property. Pablo calls and calls. He's very unhappy. But Nidji won't come back. It is unbelievable. Wild birds will return the next day to the aviary looking for food which we have placed on top. But Nidji who's been in captivity for 4 or 5 years, hasn't returned. He's flying like a champion. He's covered alot of ground so must be handling the take-offs and landings just fine. There is a huge very 'landable' silky oak tree and a beautiful poinciana, perfect for hiding in, right next to, even shading the aviary. But no, he lingers on the periphery, whistling.
I suppose another reason I've been cranky (besides Nidji and lack of sleep) is the distance I feel from the spiritual world. I feel enmeshed in materialistic thoughts and actions. When I try and pray, to get in touch with the eternal it is like looking into a mirror and seeing only my face on a two-dimensional surface. Small-mindedness.
Much later. R came in and hovered, looking over my shoulder which in the mood I was in I found irritating. Also claustrophobic. I leapt up and went outside. Best thing for me as I've been working on the latest sketch and watering the fernery. My mood has improved. If Nidji doesn't return, he doesn't return. There are enough trees in blossom to feed him. He has a beacon, in Pablo's constant calling, so that he doesn't get lost and food hanging, in plain sight, on the outside of the aviary. I find it odd when other released birds have returned for a time for supplement feeding, that Nidji doesn't. He's been well cared for, never captured or hurt or medicated. He's known only kindness and experienced a huge improvement on his previous situation (cage, solo). I don't even want to capture him, I just want to make sure he's got enough to eat and drink. But it is out of my hands.
May 6, Thursday. Nidji returned for food on Tuesday. R rang me at work. I've been a happy puppy ever since. Okay, I'm a little worried now as the birds went a little wild with alarm calls (hawk calls) and I couldn't find him outside. Assume he's just gone 'to ground' until the danger is over. The hawk has been hanging around for 30 minutes or so. Cruising this neck of the woods looking for food. A couple of years ago there were a couple of goshawks, one grey, one brown, who had the temerity to land on top of the galah aviary looking for an easy meal. The galahs went nuts with fear. Made such a racket we knew immediately what was happening. We'd go out and try and drive them off but they'd only fly to the top of a nearby tree and wait. We had to out-wait them. They were so regular and so tenacious R even talked of shooting them. Thankfully the mice population increased and they looked elsewhere for food. Not that R would've shot them. He was venting frustration. He will shoot dying birds, rats and brown snakes but with reluctance.
Yesterday and today, after a long absence, I finally made it to the gym. Feeling good in the car, listening to the best of Michael Jackson (whose music is life enhancing). All was well in my world. Happy happy happy. And then I saw a dead hare on the road, then I hit and killed a butterfly, then I saw the remains of a pheasant coucal, another road kill. I could feel my happiness bubble deflating. It seemed false and naive to remain happy when there is death and destruction all around. The news is full of disaster. The death of the planet is a real possibility as we can't cure our greed for energy and money. Wars are being fought, children raped, animals tortured. It threatens to overwhelm all that is good. I never used to be this sensitive, bouncing back and forth between euphoria and a mood that is something like grief. I can smile at the shape of a tree and be crushed by the felling of it. I don't know how this generation of children will cope. Is it like the cold war when the end of the world was predicted with the press of one button? I don't remember feeling like the world was going to end. I suppose I missed the worst of it as I was too young to take note. Now I am. Yet I can't let the pessimism get to me. What to do? It came to me as I was driving home: love it all. Love the night and the day, love the dark and light, the disease and the cure. What? I hear my non-existent reader say. Love murder, rape and mayhem? Are you nuts? Maybe so. And I'm not even sure I'm capable of it. I am capable of trying. Is it not all God's creation? Even if we are creatures of free will there is nothing on this earth which is not God if god is the fabric of creation, the ever changing, ever perfect All That Is. Explanations are impossible. I don't know why there is evil and pain and fear in the world. Is it all relative? What I find awful (heavy metal, mass development, dinner parties) other people adore. I abhor having needles, others hardly notice them. Would we all agree that having birds in cages is wrong? Would we all agree that torturing kittens is wrong? Not the psychopath - he would find joy in it. Is his joy different from our own? Does he experience a visceral lift, that 'oceanic feeling' while he dismembers the little furry thing?
The idea of beauty in the Middle Ages has nothing to do with the idea of beauty now. Even the difference between now and the nineteen fifties is apparent. (I watched, for the first time, From Russia with Love with Sean Connery, the other night. The leading lady, who was obviously considered beautiful to be cast as his love interest struck me as a very plain jane made passable with the use of make-up). The Crusades was good and righteous then as the Jihad is good and righteous now - to some people. Perhaps it's a cop out - to love it all or if not to love it to just accept it, embrace it and not fear it. Jesus had a tanty in the temple of the money changers. Even Jesus could get mad. I've often thought of that. An angry Jesus, the lamb of god. Lambs don't have tanties. So anger has its place? It was a good things millions died to defeat fascism but wrong to fight in Afghanistan or Iraq? Hussein wasn't a very nice man. Perhaps personally he was charming. Libya's president, Gaddafi, has even come out of the cold, having a handshake with President Obama. I am such a product of my WASP up-bringing that my idea of good and evil is predictable. Maybe it's just laziness on my part because it is too hard a subject and philosophy is not something I'm good at. Which brings me right back to embracing, accepting it all as the fabric of life. That old saw about how would we ever be happy unless we'd experienced unhappiness? Cold without the sensation of warmth, health without sickness, etc. etc. Speak up against evil and apathy and cruelty when I can, shine a light where I can but otherwise just embrace the lot.
I suppose another reason I've been cranky (besides Nidji and lack of sleep) is the distance I feel from the spiritual world. I feel enmeshed in materialistic thoughts and actions. When I try and pray, to get in touch with the eternal it is like looking into a mirror and seeing only my face on a two-dimensional surface. Small-mindedness.
Much later. R came in and hovered, looking over my shoulder which in the mood I was in I found irritating. Also claustrophobic. I leapt up and went outside. Best thing for me as I've been working on the latest sketch and watering the fernery. My mood has improved. If Nidji doesn't return, he doesn't return. There are enough trees in blossom to feed him. He has a beacon, in Pablo's constant calling, so that he doesn't get lost and food hanging, in plain sight, on the outside of the aviary. I find it odd when other released birds have returned for a time for supplement feeding, that Nidji doesn't. He's been well cared for, never captured or hurt or medicated. He's known only kindness and experienced a huge improvement on his previous situation (cage, solo). I don't even want to capture him, I just want to make sure he's got enough to eat and drink. But it is out of my hands.
May 6, Thursday. Nidji returned for food on Tuesday. R rang me at work. I've been a happy puppy ever since. Okay, I'm a little worried now as the birds went a little wild with alarm calls (hawk calls) and I couldn't find him outside. Assume he's just gone 'to ground' until the danger is over. The hawk has been hanging around for 30 minutes or so. Cruising this neck of the woods looking for food. A couple of years ago there were a couple of goshawks, one grey, one brown, who had the temerity to land on top of the galah aviary looking for an easy meal. The galahs went nuts with fear. Made such a racket we knew immediately what was happening. We'd go out and try and drive them off but they'd only fly to the top of a nearby tree and wait. We had to out-wait them. They were so regular and so tenacious R even talked of shooting them. Thankfully the mice population increased and they looked elsewhere for food. Not that R would've shot them. He was venting frustration. He will shoot dying birds, rats and brown snakes but with reluctance.
Yesterday and today, after a long absence, I finally made it to the gym. Feeling good in the car, listening to the best of Michael Jackson (whose music is life enhancing). All was well in my world. Happy happy happy. And then I saw a dead hare on the road, then I hit and killed a butterfly, then I saw the remains of a pheasant coucal, another road kill. I could feel my happiness bubble deflating. It seemed false and naive to remain happy when there is death and destruction all around. The news is full of disaster. The death of the planet is a real possibility as we can't cure our greed for energy and money. Wars are being fought, children raped, animals tortured. It threatens to overwhelm all that is good. I never used to be this sensitive, bouncing back and forth between euphoria and a mood that is something like grief. I can smile at the shape of a tree and be crushed by the felling of it. I don't know how this generation of children will cope. Is it like the cold war when the end of the world was predicted with the press of one button? I don't remember feeling like the world was going to end. I suppose I missed the worst of it as I was too young to take note. Now I am. Yet I can't let the pessimism get to me. What to do? It came to me as I was driving home: love it all. Love the night and the day, love the dark and light, the disease and the cure. What? I hear my non-existent reader say. Love murder, rape and mayhem? Are you nuts? Maybe so. And I'm not even sure I'm capable of it. I am capable of trying. Is it not all God's creation? Even if we are creatures of free will there is nothing on this earth which is not God if god is the fabric of creation, the ever changing, ever perfect All That Is. Explanations are impossible. I don't know why there is evil and pain and fear in the world. Is it all relative? What I find awful (heavy metal, mass development, dinner parties) other people adore. I abhor having needles, others hardly notice them. Would we all agree that having birds in cages is wrong? Would we all agree that torturing kittens is wrong? Not the psychopath - he would find joy in it. Is his joy different from our own? Does he experience a visceral lift, that 'oceanic feeling' while he dismembers the little furry thing?
The idea of beauty in the Middle Ages has nothing to do with the idea of beauty now. Even the difference between now and the nineteen fifties is apparent. (I watched, for the first time, From Russia with Love with Sean Connery, the other night. The leading lady, who was obviously considered beautiful to be cast as his love interest struck me as a very plain jane made passable with the use of make-up). The Crusades was good and righteous then as the Jihad is good and righteous now - to some people. Perhaps it's a cop out - to love it all or if not to love it to just accept it, embrace it and not fear it. Jesus had a tanty in the temple of the money changers. Even Jesus could get mad. I've often thought of that. An angry Jesus, the lamb of god. Lambs don't have tanties. So anger has its place? It was a good things millions died to defeat fascism but wrong to fight in Afghanistan or Iraq? Hussein wasn't a very nice man. Perhaps personally he was charming. Libya's president, Gaddafi, has even come out of the cold, having a handshake with President Obama. I am such a product of my WASP up-bringing that my idea of good and evil is predictable. Maybe it's just laziness on my part because it is too hard a subject and philosophy is not something I'm good at. Which brings me right back to embracing, accepting it all as the fabric of life. That old saw about how would we ever be happy unless we'd experienced unhappiness? Cold without the sensation of warmth, health without sickness, etc. etc. Speak up against evil and apathy and cruelty when I can, shine a light where I can but otherwise just embrace the lot.
Sunday, April 18, 2010
Dmitri (always) Odds and Sods
It's true. When I paint I don't write. When I write I don't paint. At least I'm doing something which is grand. Have finished the Triumvirate of Crows which actually looks more like the Triumvirate of Gannets but who's judging. It's okay. It's a little weird, I've morphed one of the wings into a hand and the birds flying over the sea play tricks with perspective a bit (intentional) but it works. At least for me and I'm the only one who has to be pleased.
The current work is a face made of feathers with very large eyes. Large staring eyes. It's eerie as I drew the eyes first and have been working outward so this face emerges from the page without an outline as such. I've considered attempting a tromp d' loeil of the face being framed by torn paper. Saw an example somewhere. Really brilliant. Then again, the original idea was having this face transmogrifying from bird into woman or woman into bird. No, that's not quite true. I wanted to work on feathers. Unfortunately although I've the patience to do a sort of overlapping shell I haven't the patience to do individual feathers. While I was preening Marvin's head last night I studied his feathers. They are so complicated yet simpler than what I've been drawing but as I've drawn 3/4 of the face I'll continue with the effect I've started with. It will turn out to be something. No art work I've completed has ever turned out the way I envisioned it. I wonder if that's true for all artists. It's because I haven't the technique but also because the vision is always more complete yet more ephemeral than the actualization.
Rearranged the verandah and Dimitri's abode yet again. A few nights ago, with no provocation that I knew of, Dimitri fell off his perch 3 times. It was dark. We hadn't gone onto the verandah. I heard no unusual noises outside, yet he fell. That was it. Despite the pillows and padding surrounding his perch falling off three times is just too much. Even if he wasn't hurt, and he wasn't, it's a blow to his confidence to keep falling and heaven knows the boy lacks confidence. The next day I removed the tree perch, the food table, the chair and all the pillows, blankets and padding. He has two large and chewable branches, one about 7 feet long, the other probably about 5 feet. The shorter one is before the screen doors to outside propped on a short log with another slimmer branch stuck inside it. This morning I sawed off about 6" of that one because he was launching himself from it and landing awkwardly. He's most disappointed because although he can climb the branches and run along them he is now a floor ornament. But an unbreakable floor ornament.
This morning, for the first time in months, I did some clicker training with him but without the clicker which he doesn't like. Not the noise but the association as I used it when I was pressuring him to 'be friends'. I'm only using my voice. I suppose I'm clicker training each time I reward him with a millet sprig when he steps nearer but this morning I reintroduced the clicker for target training. First with Tachimedes, who remembered what he was supposed to do almost instantly. I ignored Dimitri while working with Tach which had the desired effect of bringing him over to investigate. He beaked it the first time and hung on for the next two times, trying to pull it away. That was good enough for a start. Our worktable will be the floor. I'm quite excited again. Naturally once he was confined to the floor he became worried again. We've taken a few steps backwards. No way would he take anything from my fingers. Yet this morning, as he came within inches of my leg while I worked with Tach, and ignored him, illustrated conclusively that he will come around. Perhaps we'll even get to the point where we can learn parlor tricks together (retrieve, ring on a post etc.)
As much as I'd like this to be a true repository for thoughts, feelings and observations it isn't. There is no way that I can write in here like I do in a handwritten journal. I cleaned this office a couple of days ago and found empty journals of all shapes and sizes, journals I'd collected over the years for future use. They seemed somewhat sad as they are like friends I'll never meet. I may go back to handwriting for awhile as I miss the intimacy and the freedom of journal writing. Even though I have no followers nor am I likely to get any I write in here as though someone was looking over my shoulder - which keeps it inane and boring. Odd at my age to fear the opinion of others but I am still that well brought up girl who was chastised for saying the word 'guts'. And the words of mom still ring in my ears, 'don't ever write down what the whole world can't read'. Words of wisdom she may have learned the hard way. She burned reams and reams of paper in the front of the Sparta house. What were they? fledgling novels, journals, letters, essays? I'll never know but I have a feeling that something she'd written was used against her somehow as she was always very secretive about her writings. I only found bits and pieces after she'd died. I know she was an inveterate writer of something, sometimes had The Writer magazine, had a few books on writing plus Strunk and White but I think her own teacher was her constant practice and inherent talent. The bits I've read have always intrigued me as they were unfinished and I wanted to know what happened to the characters I'd come to know. But the characters died with Mom.
The current work is a face made of feathers with very large eyes. Large staring eyes. It's eerie as I drew the eyes first and have been working outward so this face emerges from the page without an outline as such. I've considered attempting a tromp d' loeil of the face being framed by torn paper. Saw an example somewhere. Really brilliant. Then again, the original idea was having this face transmogrifying from bird into woman or woman into bird. No, that's not quite true. I wanted to work on feathers. Unfortunately although I've the patience to do a sort of overlapping shell I haven't the patience to do individual feathers. While I was preening Marvin's head last night I studied his feathers. They are so complicated yet simpler than what I've been drawing but as I've drawn 3/4 of the face I'll continue with the effect I've started with. It will turn out to be something. No art work I've completed has ever turned out the way I envisioned it. I wonder if that's true for all artists. It's because I haven't the technique but also because the vision is always more complete yet more ephemeral than the actualization.
Rearranged the verandah and Dimitri's abode yet again. A few nights ago, with no provocation that I knew of, Dimitri fell off his perch 3 times. It was dark. We hadn't gone onto the verandah. I heard no unusual noises outside, yet he fell. That was it. Despite the pillows and padding surrounding his perch falling off three times is just too much. Even if he wasn't hurt, and he wasn't, it's a blow to his confidence to keep falling and heaven knows the boy lacks confidence. The next day I removed the tree perch, the food table, the chair and all the pillows, blankets and padding. He has two large and chewable branches, one about 7 feet long, the other probably about 5 feet. The shorter one is before the screen doors to outside propped on a short log with another slimmer branch stuck inside it. This morning I sawed off about 6" of that one because he was launching himself from it and landing awkwardly. He's most disappointed because although he can climb the branches and run along them he is now a floor ornament. But an unbreakable floor ornament.
This morning, for the first time in months, I did some clicker training with him but without the clicker which he doesn't like. Not the noise but the association as I used it when I was pressuring him to 'be friends'. I'm only using my voice. I suppose I'm clicker training each time I reward him with a millet sprig when he steps nearer but this morning I reintroduced the clicker for target training. First with Tachimedes, who remembered what he was supposed to do almost instantly. I ignored Dimitri while working with Tach which had the desired effect of bringing him over to investigate. He beaked it the first time and hung on for the next two times, trying to pull it away. That was good enough for a start. Our worktable will be the floor. I'm quite excited again. Naturally once he was confined to the floor he became worried again. We've taken a few steps backwards. No way would he take anything from my fingers. Yet this morning, as he came within inches of my leg while I worked with Tach, and ignored him, illustrated conclusively that he will come around. Perhaps we'll even get to the point where we can learn parlor tricks together (retrieve, ring on a post etc.)
As much as I'd like this to be a true repository for thoughts, feelings and observations it isn't. There is no way that I can write in here like I do in a handwritten journal. I cleaned this office a couple of days ago and found empty journals of all shapes and sizes, journals I'd collected over the years for future use. They seemed somewhat sad as they are like friends I'll never meet. I may go back to handwriting for awhile as I miss the intimacy and the freedom of journal writing. Even though I have no followers nor am I likely to get any I write in here as though someone was looking over my shoulder - which keeps it inane and boring. Odd at my age to fear the opinion of others but I am still that well brought up girl who was chastised for saying the word 'guts'. And the words of mom still ring in my ears, 'don't ever write down what the whole world can't read'. Words of wisdom she may have learned the hard way. She burned reams and reams of paper in the front of the Sparta house. What were they? fledgling novels, journals, letters, essays? I'll never know but I have a feeling that something she'd written was used against her somehow as she was always very secretive about her writings. I only found bits and pieces after she'd died. I know she was an inveterate writer of something, sometimes had The Writer magazine, had a few books on writing plus Strunk and White but I think her own teacher was her constant practice and inherent talent. The bits I've read have always intrigued me as they were unfinished and I wanted to know what happened to the characters I'd come to know. But the characters died with Mom.
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