Unbelievable! I heard the strange noises on the front porch of my evening appointment. I braced myself for what I knew was inside the door. My ears told me it was birds. From the sound of it, I couldn’t imagine how many. I entered the foyer after being greeted by the “parents” of this feathery flock. To the left of me, in what should be a living room, was about a dozen cages. In the center of the room, were large perches where many birds squawked, sang, and chirped. The volume caused me to cover my ears.
As we sat to sign loan documents, we had unusual interruptions, by the birds. One bird was on the clients head, and two large parrots stood next to us on large perches. Occasionally, one of the birds would start shrieking, which would unleash a chorus of sounds from the other 17 birds in the room. The clients would then chastise them as a parent would his child, “Now, Charley, stop, stop. Do you want to go to your room?”
At one point, there was a loud noise from the other room that didn’t sound unique to me, but one of the clients jumped up and said, “Oh no! That was a beak!” After a few questions, I found out that one of the birds with the clipped wings tried to fly and nailed the floor. He was a bit stunned, but my clients attended to him the rest of the evening. He was held in their arms, much like a toddler, and shifted from arm to arm as papers were signed. I sometimes feel like a miracle worker for the situations I am asked to juggle.
As I left the house that night, I felt quite content with my own life, and decided that I was glad I was not called to helping birds. My nerves were frazzled from the noise, but I was left with a fresh awareness of how very unique God makes us. In this case, some much more unique than others.
