Monday, October 17, 2016 Off the road to Lake Wynoochee, Olympic Peninsula, Washington, USA I threw Peaches duwn a gully off Lake Wynoochee. I was headed up there to see the spot. It is raining. It has been raining for a week. It is forecast to continue raining for a week. When I die, I wish to be dumped somewhere in nature. Like Edward Abbey. Like Peaches. --- Giz flew out an open door the wind blew open because I did not latch it completely. Giz, firstborn to Buddy and Peaches, some 15 years ago. This morning, Giz, Chico, and Nineteen came with me into the bathroom and watched me shave. Giz closed his eyes at me several times. He seemed calm, content, loving. Earlier this morning I took Chico out to the alcove, the same one that I failed to latch the screen door to later. Giz and Nineteen flew onto my shoulders as Chico climbed onto my finger. I put Chico on a bamboo pole so he could look out the window; Giz sat next to him, Nineteen on the other side. Giz cocked his head at the sound of a Crow, or Jay, or Hawk perhaps. Giz looked aware of the danger. Why did he fly out? I have left the door open like that, when the wind has blown it open, for many minutes on several occasions already. Why did Giz choose this time to fly out? I remember carrying Giz in a small cage, walking around Seaview looking for Buddy the night he flew out of the motel room door there. Giz was very quiet. I think Giz knew what he was doing when he flew away. I am reminded of lines from Hamlet's "To be or not to be" soliloquy: " ... But that the dread of something after death, The undiscovered country from whose bourn No traveler returns, puzzles the will And makes us rather bear those ills we have Than fly to others that we know not of." Giz flew to ills he knew not of. Giz is smart enough to come back. Go back, Giz! It is raining and cold and you can be fed and warm inside, and sing again with Nineteen, and Chico, and me, and Zephyr ... I love you, Giz. I don't blame you for wanting to fly away. I think the air is polluted in that trailer. It makes me feel sick, like I want to fly away. But go back, Giz. I will find another place. I'm sorry it has taken so long, Giz. --- I should have set up the cameras so I would have a video showing Giz leaving. --- Tuesday October 18, 2016 (Near Lake Wynoochee, on forest road) Gizzy preens Gizzy plucked Buddy, Chico; addicted to feather juice? Gizzy masturbating? on ladder, often with Chico. Nineteen didn't participate. Gizzy head almost stuck in slammed door. He'd been sitting on top. Gizzy sitting on shoulder, with Buddy, or lately with Nineteen on the other shoulder. Gizzy singing duets with Buddy, perfectly in sync as the number of repititions of certain parts of the call changed, starting and stopping together. Lately Gizzy singing with Teeny (Nineteen) and me. --- Gizzy looking at me, in a posture indicating, I think, approval, reminding me of Peach, as I was engaged in singing in sync with Nineteen. --- Nineteen, sitting on top of the front door, on the inside of the alcove, with the open screen door not five feet away, was very calm, closing his eyes at me, crest down, as I came in after discovering the door was open. Chico was sitting on the ladder next to the heater, ten feet away. Chico too was calm, his head in his back, sleeping. He looked up at me but with no panic or concern in his eyes. Later, Nineteen did some contact, panic calls that Giz usually answered. --- Did Nineteen and Chico, and the lovebirds, know Giz had left? Betty was lying front chest down on the heating pad on the counter, sleeping. Did they think: So long Brother Giz, you have chosen freely, enjoy? Or did Giz somehow panic and flew the wrong direction and got disoriented and kept flying in a panic? But when Precious got out, he came back and perched on a tree where he could see the house, and we could see him; Precious knew he could have come back. Come back, Giz! We could tell so many stories! --- Again, cameras would have maybe helped determine if Giz left because of a panic fly, or deliberately, or what. --- I hope to meet Giz again, at the house if he comes back, or in a next life if we are reincarnated ... I try to remember characteristics of his that could survive into a new incarnation: His snorting, his panic calls, his winking, his looking like Peach. --- I drive out to Lake Wynoochee where I dumped Peach. I remember the time we drove out here, all of us, to a rented yurt for two nights. I think we all had fun, and why couldn't we have lived like that all the time? I am sorry, birds, that I was unable to put us in that kind of living situation; in nature, comfortable inside. --- I feel Peach has strong power here. Not far away, feeding into the Skokomish River, is a light-colored rock formation in a darker basalt high-walled water passage. The light-colored rock is smoothly curved into a 15-foot shape that I took for a large bird statue or fossil, lying dead in the streambed, fossilized, perhaps. Like Peach in the other steep streambed leading intonLake Wynoochee, where I left Peach. I feel Peaches' power in other ways: in the bird chirps, in the rain, in the air. I am sorry I could not perpetuate the happy times we spent in the yurt, Peach. Giz panic-cried in the yurt when it rained loudly, hitting the yurt's canvas roof. --- I send Giz thoughts: Go back, Giz. For me. Imagine the stories I could tell! --- I have always wanted to give birds their freedom. I have inadvertently left doors open on many occasions. Giz knew that. He had always chosen to stay inside before. What changed? --- Wednesday, October 19, 2016 Near Lake Wynoochee If Giz made his own free decision to leave, I respect his choice. If he panicked and did not know where he was flying, and then kept going, I am regretful. --- I write this sitting in the car near the spot I threw Peach. I want to go say Hi Peach, I am sorry I couldn't replicate the fun times we had here, remember when I hiked around the lake? I was so looking forward to seeing you Peach on the last leg which seemed endless and I was so tired ... I wanted to tell you about how hard the hike was, Peach, how I had to climb over huge logs and wade across a stream several feet deep ... Giz left, Peach. I love you. --- I stood by the place I tossed the box Peach was in. I meditated, I talked to her, I listened for a sign from her. I exercised. I heards some bird chirps. Frog croaks. A couple of the cries sounded like Peach's signature call. It is raining. I felt a sustained vibration in my right testicle. I asked for Peach's forgiveness. For letting Giz go. I asked her to give me the strength to continue to fight for good. I remember Giz giving Peach contact calls and me responding with a characteristic whistle. I remember Peach making her call and responding to her ... --- Thursday, October 20, 2016 Vance Creek Park, between Aberdeen and Olympia off Highway 12 Talked to Tracie. She saw Giz outside; he circles the trailer. He is smart enough to come back. I will go back to show Giz I think it's okay to go back. --- Thursday, October 20, 2016 Lacey, Wa Giz is hanging around. I've seen him flying, circling the trailer. We took Chico outside and they called to each other, Giz sitting on a tree branch some 30 feet above our heads. Giz then flew in circles around us, getting a little lower than the branch he'd been sitting on but not much. He flew around us several times, then landed on a nearby telephone pole. He sat there calling to Chico and Nineteen for many minutes. Then he flies away for awhile but he's been coming back. He seems healthy, strong. Some of his chirps indicate he's not panicked but enjoying himself. --- Friday, October 21, 2016 Lacey, Wa Giz still outside; we think we heard his call briefly this morning. I remember once Steve and I carried rolled carpet through the living room. Giz panic flew, settling atop a curtain rod crest straight up looking warily at the carpet. I told him it was okay, it was just a carpet. Giz made a two-note call and Steve laughed and said "he said okay!" Later when telling Tracie this story, Giz, sitting on top of the front door now, made the same two-note call he'd made before, when I got to that part of the story.