When you are just a chick and your bullying flockmates bite off your left wing tip and three of your eight powerful sharp curved talons, independence becomes kind of a thing.
You had it when you were born.
But now you don’t have it.
You can’t fly like the other birds.
You need help to get around.
You will never be wild and free – not in the traditional sense, anyway.
This, of course, invokes humility.
It also invokes brave.
It makes you very sweet.
And it also makes you very strong.
You learn to accept help, and you also learn to give help.
You find out – over time and as you are sufficiently aware to notice – that every being has something.
One has lost his home territory and is condemned to wander….until a miracle happens and he finds a forever home.
One gets very sick and nearly dies before a gifted veterinarian intervenes and saves her life.
One feels so sad and lonely and doesn’t like who she is – until she discovers you, small and shy and scared in a local pet shop – and brings her soulbird home to stay.
As it turns out, we don’t get independent in isolation.
We can only truly find our independence together.
From all of us here at Love & Feathers & Shells, Happy Independence Day!
Pearl
Malti
Bruce
Flash Gordon
The Tall Tree
The Small Tree
The large featherless/shell-less being
