Virginia Arthur's Blog - Posts Tagged "call-of-the-varied-thrush"
Varied Thrush
There is a sound you have to hear before you die. Then you have to tell me if the sound does the same thing to you that it does to me.
Living in Alaska means doing your laundry or walking the dog in the daylight at 1 a.m. Yes, you read this right. It is a strange and delicate time. It might make you laugh out loud for no reason. It also might make you cover your windows with throw rugs. You are outside, under the firs, hanging your laundry while a moose ambles by, eying your broccoli in your raised beds. The moose keeps going. You drop your underwear on the ground and bend over to pick it up then you hear it. The sound. The sound that in my mind will always be associated with "summer nights" in Anchorage, Alaska. There is not much to it--it is only one tone but it's the lilting that does it. It lilts in the beginning then lilts at the end and in between, it takes you some place ancient and vast, far away. Whatever I was doing, I always stopped when I heard it because you HAVE to.
The vet told me there was no hope for my old friend, Siggy. I picked her up my last years of college when she ran into our dorm building in Athens, Ohio. A collie-shepherd mix. My companion of the heart as any dog adorer knows. This is where they go--into your heart--and stay. She was 15. She spent her last years with me in Alaska where I was fortunate enough to get a job as a biologist, an opportunity many would kill for. It was our last "night" together. The next morning, the vet was showing up to put her to sleep, a tumor on her jaw that had been removed twice was now growing back. It was the size of a golf ball. The cancer was spreading. Soon, the vet told me, she will be in constant pain.
Around 1 a.m. we left the house in our rural Alaskan subdivision for our last walk together; walking through the rich fir and spruce trees that lined the empty dirt roads, she and I. Despite the cancer, she walked beside me faithfully, well. We walked on then we heard it--the sound, that made both of us stop to listen. Siggy cocked her head. I cried. The sound of Alaska. The sound of goodbye. I said goodbye to my dear friend the next morning then that night listened to the varied thrush alone.
The sound of Alaska is here, on my acre of land in Northern California--the kinglets and the sandhill cranes up high that I cannot see but I can hear. But nothing evokes in me...
Last week, I thought I heard it. I stopped what I was doing to listen then ran up the hill, after it. Nothing. Then I heard it again the next evening. Today I saw it, on two legs, hoping and flying within a flock of robins--varied thrushes--another sound of Alaska. The sound of goodbye.
I cannot express how this sound, the presence of these birds, is affecting me, forcing me into reverie, memories, pain. I see Siggy again, she and I, walking that last time into the eeriness of an Alaskan "night". I remember a fight with a lover when we both stopped arguing, the call of the varied thrush filled the space between us. He didn't notice while I did. Now they are here? On my land in California? I have too much too do. I am teaching this semester. I have papers to grade. I cannot stand on top of my hill and cry. But I did. I will.
And I will be grateful for the sound these birds make, for where the sound forces me to go, for what their presence symbolizes, both spiritually to me, and ecologically. I will stop what I am doing to listen. And once again, face myself.
Living in Alaska means doing your laundry or walking the dog in the daylight at 1 a.m. Yes, you read this right. It is a strange and delicate time. It might make you laugh out loud for no reason. It also might make you cover your windows with throw rugs. You are outside, under the firs, hanging your laundry while a moose ambles by, eying your broccoli in your raised beds. The moose keeps going. You drop your underwear on the ground and bend over to pick it up then you hear it. The sound. The sound that in my mind will always be associated with "summer nights" in Anchorage, Alaska. There is not much to it--it is only one tone but it's the lilting that does it. It lilts in the beginning then lilts at the end and in between, it takes you some place ancient and vast, far away. Whatever I was doing, I always stopped when I heard it because you HAVE to.
The vet told me there was no hope for my old friend, Siggy. I picked her up my last years of college when she ran into our dorm building in Athens, Ohio. A collie-shepherd mix. My companion of the heart as any dog adorer knows. This is where they go--into your heart--and stay. She was 15. She spent her last years with me in Alaska where I was fortunate enough to get a job as a biologist, an opportunity many would kill for. It was our last "night" together. The next morning, the vet was showing up to put her to sleep, a tumor on her jaw that had been removed twice was now growing back. It was the size of a golf ball. The cancer was spreading. Soon, the vet told me, she will be in constant pain.
Around 1 a.m. we left the house in our rural Alaskan subdivision for our last walk together; walking through the rich fir and spruce trees that lined the empty dirt roads, she and I. Despite the cancer, she walked beside me faithfully, well. We walked on then we heard it--the sound, that made both of us stop to listen. Siggy cocked her head. I cried. The sound of Alaska. The sound of goodbye. I said goodbye to my dear friend the next morning then that night listened to the varied thrush alone.
The sound of Alaska is here, on my acre of land in Northern California--the kinglets and the sandhill cranes up high that I cannot see but I can hear. But nothing evokes in me...
Last week, I thought I heard it. I stopped what I was doing to listen then ran up the hill, after it. Nothing. Then I heard it again the next evening. Today I saw it, on two legs, hoping and flying within a flock of robins--varied thrushes--another sound of Alaska. The sound of goodbye.
I cannot express how this sound, the presence of these birds, is affecting me, forcing me into reverie, memories, pain. I see Siggy again, she and I, walking that last time into the eeriness of an Alaskan "night". I remember a fight with a lover when we both stopped arguing, the call of the varied thrush filled the space between us. He didn't notice while I did. Now they are here? On my land in California? I have too much too do. I am teaching this semester. I have papers to grade. I cannot stand on top of my hill and cry. But I did. I will.
And I will be grateful for the sound these birds make, for where the sound forces me to go, for what their presence symbolizes, both spiritually to me, and ecologically. I will stop what I am doing to listen. And once again, face myself.
