The Birds

Nonetheless, I actually considered getting a parakeet.

My daughter called me at work one day to warn me that she had assembled a fairly substantive argument and would like to engage me in a debate about the reasons she should be allowed to get a pigeon.

I could not imagine where she'd found anything remotely favorable in support of pigeon ownership.

When I arrived home and prepared to be debated with by my tween, she became hysterical at her own mistake. She'd meant to debate about the benefits and joys of parakeet ownership. Not rat-with-wings ownership. She'd done her homework. She knew there were problems with birds carrying illnesses. I agreed to go to a pet store to learn about parakeets rather than just refusing outright.

I'd had a parakeet as a child. Pete. Petey. Petey Parakeety as I recall. At least until we got a cat, (Morris, very original) and the gerbil (Daisy) and the fish (Pish) and Petey all had to go, and I gave Petey to the girl across the street and she renamed him Caesar. And he remained Caesar until the day he keeled over on the perch.

But when I was a kid, pet ownership was easy. We just wung it. Pets didn't get regular checkups and tuneups and hair cuts and dental appointments and pedicures. We washed our dog in the drive way with the hose and with Prell and gave him Dentyne or a York Peppermint Patty when his breath stank.

Now, to even adopt a pet (we called it "buying a pet" or being "followed home" by one) you have to successfully clear all manner of hurdles. Home inspections, credit checks, character evaluations, psychological exams, reference checks, background investigations. It would be easier to break in and steal one.

When we approached the aviary at the local pet store, my daughter immediately launched into a diatribe about their care and their features and how you tell a girl parakeet from a boy parakeet (it has something to do with a blue beak...if only today's young people were as simple to categorize), and I grabbed a pamphlet to get the low down on what a "responsible" pet owner will have to do so as to avoid pet abuse accusations and PETA protests on my lawn.

Did you know that a parakeet should be allowed out of the cage for some unspecified amount of time every day? Every day! Now I realize that this is, when you think about it, not unlike letting your dog out to pee every day, but at least a dog has a pretty good likelihood of coming back when you whistle for him. And peeing outside is completely acceptable, and in fact, the preferred peeing arrangement. But a bird? Flying around my house? Peeing? And what chance do I have of getting him back into the cage once he has tasted freedom and is flapping around my home turning it into a cess pool?

And did you know that you can't just bring your parakeet back to the bird specialist at the store to get his or her claws clipped to a safe, reasonable (and presumably flattering) length? You have to go to the veterinarian/manicurist! Every time! I don't even do that for my own nails!

But my favorite caveat about parakeet ownership, according to the brochure, and the pale, flabby, apron-wearing pet store clerk with the flat affect and halitosis, is that if you cook using non-stick surface pots and pans (Is there any other kind????) you should cease to do so, discard them at once and get pans that encourage sticking. (Where from? An estate sale for some recluse who hasn't left the house since the Truman administration? E-bay? The Salvation Army?) Because the non-stick variety produce fumes that are extremely harmful to parakeets (OMG and I let my children eat food prepared on these toxic surfaces???!!!!) and they could develop chronic illnesses.

Really.

I replaced the brochure in the little slot by the aviary and suggested brightly that we get a treat at a local cafe where the ice cream is so outrageously expensive that you need a home equity loan to get a hot fudge sundae.

The parakeet is temporarily forgotten - out of sight and out of mind. Next, a trip to a llama farm.