Grads and Grosbeaks
Today, the male Black-Headed Grosbeak who has been coming to my sunflower seed feeder and singing in the treetops got tangled in some bird netting my father had set up to protect a bumper crop of cherries.
I don't know why he didn't try to untangle the thrashing bird himself; maybe being the household's Official Birder makes me by default the Official Bird Untangler. Anyway, I was summoned to help and, talking affectionately to the bird (who did not appreciate this), I tried to figure out the Gordian intricacy of bird netting. At first, I thought I could hold the grosbeak still (around his shoulders, so as to prevent him injuring a wing) while I untangled him, but as I tried to get a gentle grip on him, I realized he was deep in a sort of pocket. When I widened the pocket from above he was able to get free and shot off like a rocket, which gives me hope that he was not injured.
As I tried to hold him, he bit me, but not hard. No doubt that beak could do some damage, but for whatever reason, he didn't clamp down. His feathers felt wonderfully smooth and soft and he was lighter than I expected. It was amazing to touch a wild animal, an experience that left me high on adrenaline for hours.
So now I want to work in a bird banding lab. I don't think that's very likely, though, as on Saturday I graduated from San Jose State with a master's degree in Library and Information Science.
My career at UCLA, where I earned my master's in History, is best described as checkered, and since I expected (chimerically) to go on to the Ph.D. I didn't attend any ceremony or pay any particular attention to the M.A.
Without wanting to go into unseemly and boring lamentation, my experience at UCLA was damaging and left me convinced of my stupidity. To have now walked across a stage, received a polyester velvet hood, and been given a pseudo-diploma until my real one can be sent, does make a difference. I don't yet have a library job, but I have redemption of a sort.
As we filed out of the auditorium, the PA system blasted Handel's Alleluia Chorus. Some of the people around me muttered at its explicit Christianity. They had a point. But the expression of joy was, to me, not inappropriate at all.
I don't know why he didn't try to untangle the thrashing bird himself; maybe being the household's Official Birder makes me by default the Official Bird Untangler. Anyway, I was summoned to help and, talking affectionately to the bird (who did not appreciate this), I tried to figure out the Gordian intricacy of bird netting. At first, I thought I could hold the grosbeak still (around his shoulders, so as to prevent him injuring a wing) while I untangled him, but as I tried to get a gentle grip on him, I realized he was deep in a sort of pocket. When I widened the pocket from above he was able to get free and shot off like a rocket, which gives me hope that he was not injured.
As I tried to hold him, he bit me, but not hard. No doubt that beak could do some damage, but for whatever reason, he didn't clamp down. His feathers felt wonderfully smooth and soft and he was lighter than I expected. It was amazing to touch a wild animal, an experience that left me high on adrenaline for hours.
So now I want to work in a bird banding lab. I don't think that's very likely, though, as on Saturday I graduated from San Jose State with a master's degree in Library and Information Science.
My career at UCLA, where I earned my master's in History, is best described as checkered, and since I expected (chimerically) to go on to the Ph.D. I didn't attend any ceremony or pay any particular attention to the M.A.
Without wanting to go into unseemly and boring lamentation, my experience at UCLA was damaging and left me convinced of my stupidity. To have now walked across a stage, received a polyester velvet hood, and been given a pseudo-diploma until my real one can be sent, does make a difference. I don't yet have a library job, but I have redemption of a sort.
As we filed out of the auditorium, the PA system blasted Handel's Alleluia Chorus. Some of the people around me muttered at its explicit Christianity. They had a point. But the expression of joy was, to me, not inappropriate at all.
posted by Kyri at 11:15 PM
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