An old friend posted on their Facebook page that her daughter’s budgie had got out. The colouring was the same as my paternal grandmother’s bird and I couldn’t help think about the time something similar happened to us.
Grandma Marian had a wiry, scruffy looking terrier named Yo-Yo, and a cheeky, talking budgie by the name of Joey. They were adorable together. Joey would walk on the floor like a dog, or ride on Yo-Yo’s back like a little cow-budgie.
My grandmother spent so much time patiently training Joey, that he could talk up a storm. He said things like ‘Joey’s a dirty boy,’ Joey’s a pretty boy,’ and I’m pretty sure he also said ‘Joey’s a cheeky boy.’
Budgies don’t live a long life so there obviously wasn’t always a bird in their life, but there isn’t a memory that doesn’t see that tall cage on its stand with a blanket covering him outside of her bedroom. There isn’t a flashback that doesn’t hear the bird squawking back to my grandmother as she cleaned Joey’s cage in the kitchen, while I snuggled for a few more moments with Yo-Yo.
I know I was equally as devastated when Joey took flight out of our front door one winter’s morning. It’s no surprise that when I saw my friends post, I suddenly pictured my sad 9 year-old sad-self in the dressing room before my hockey game that morning Joey flew eternal into the woods surrounding our Queen Victoria townhouse.
We searched for what seemed like forever, but now my grandmother was gone, and the budgie who we adopted after her death, was up in heaven with her.
I wrote more about my adventures with Joey and Yo in a tribute to my grandparents and their fur babies in I Remember December.
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