The Feather in the Snow

 I've been sitting with this a little while now, but since today is the anniversary of Nugget coming back to me (and also the anniversary of Nugget's unfortunate encounter with a moving ceiling fan a year previous), now seems as good a time as any to write about it. 

We still have the dog. No word yet on any prospective families. Likely we are stuck with one another. 

(she is well cared for, but bored out of her mind. A large spread that would allow her to chase rabbits to her heart's content would be a good fit. Suburbia is not.)

(The Mighty Huntress deserves better.)

(That's ironic, btw)

My heart still has a Nugget-shaped hole in it. I had taken to stalking some cockatiel pages, only to find that a couple of my favorite birds have died in the last few weeks. 

But, I need to write about the feather. 

We had a ton of snow last winter. I had pretty much given up Nugget for lost immediately (even though in my head a nice old lady found him, and they made each other their bosom companions). There was finality in that war whoop and wind-borne flight over the house and out of sight. But I found myself poking around in the plowed snow that abutted the corner of the block of his last known location.  I don't know why--I just thought there might be something, a clue, proof that he was there. 

In March, just as the last of the snow melted away, I saw something in the tracks of melted snow in the street. It was a single white primary covert feather.

All of Nugget's primary coverts were white. And it was the right size. 

I pocketed the feather and kept walking. Thinking about my bird, whether this was just happenstance or the universe telling me he was ok. I didn't see any other trace, just that single feather. 

So odd that I mourn that bird greater than the people I've lost. Or perhaps not, given that he helped mend my broken heart when it needed it most. 

I hope the bird is somewhere mending someone else's heart. He will always have a place in mine.