Idle
My friend Melinda had an African Grey parrot
that, among other tricks, amused itself by calling
the family dog, using the voices of the people
who lived there. Here, Duffer. Come on, boy!
the parrot (Sydney) would say, and the dog would
run around, looking for an invisible playmate,
all tail and smile, until, finding none, he would
settle back down for a nap, and the parrot would
wait still as stone until Duffer closed his eyes,
then start the whole game up again, a happy grey
tormenter, bored and idle-clawed, head tilted and
joyful, which is a great story, but not the one I
intended to tell, which was that we successfully
taught Sydney to tell Melinda's mother, Marty,
that she was a saucy wench, sounding all delighted,
Marty, you're a saucy wench! And we'd all laugh,
and you will never convince me that Sydney didn't
know what he was saying, or that the summer we
passed repeating that phrase wasn't time well spent.
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