Today A Little Bird Really Did Tell Me...Off!

Today on my early morning walk I had one of those moments which remind me it is possible for human beings to be at one with nature. It was one of those moments which remind me that we are not really very much different from animals at all.

Part of my walk is along a bike/pedestrian track. It is quite nice with some parts of it regrown with Australian native plants. This, in turn, has brought back some of the native animals of Victoria and in the early morning, as the sun rises, it is quite peaceful and beautiful. Just past the native flora is a large field used to play rugby and soccer. Normally in the early morning, I walk on the grass and do some additional exercises as well as some deep breathing. It is one of the favourite parts of my walk. Today, though, the grass was quite wet, and since I did not relish traipsing mud and wet grass on to my carpet at home, I decided to walk on the sidewalk. I started pin wheeling my arms to loosen my shoulders and did not notice a low hanging tree which branched over the path. I didn’t hit any branches, but my pin wheeling arms managed to scare a bird who must have been dozing above. The bird squawked, startled, and flew desperately to a near by branch. I thought nothing of it until about six or seven paces on, I heard a squawk of protest. “Squawwwwwwwwwwwwwk” the bird said, followed by a short sharp squawk. These squawks were not shrieked out mindlessly. In fact, they were low pitched and calculated.

I do not claim the ability to talk to the animals, but I needed no Star Trek like universal translator to understand the bird loud and clear. It said, in bird talk: “Up yours!” followed by some bird expletive.

Have you ever had the experience in which someone bigger than you barges into you or does something rude and doesn’t notice or care? You want to punch his lights out but you know if you try, it is your lights that will go out. Human beings, however, must protest at injustice, so you mutter under your breath: “up yours #$%@$.” That is exactly what the bird was doing. Here was this crazy mammal below inexplicably (to the bird at least) pin wheeling his arms. The bird did not know whether to continue to be frightened, or whether to boldly shout out its indignation. Instead, it performed the bird equivalent of muted swearing.

In response I turned around and apologized to the bird. I spoke in clear English, but whether the bird understood me or not remains to be seen. Classical science suggests that we cannot and should not attribute emotions to animals. Many would suggest I am engaging here in anthropomorphising on a grand scale. The argument goes like this. Since I cannot possibly know the mind of an animal, it is unfair for me to attribute human like qualities to that animal.

Technically, this argument says that the animal might have the capability to feel like we do, but we cannot know this and so should not attribute such things to animals. Unfortunately, This argument has been stretched to say categorically that animals do not have human-like feelings and act completely on instinct. This has, in turn, led to animal cruelty on a grand scale. After all, if animals cannot feel, why should we feel guilty for mistreating them in the lab?

But anyone who has spent enough time with animals knows that animals do feel. They can love, get angry, feel hurt, be joyful, and exhibit a decidedly mischievous mood.

I remember watching birds tease my German shepherd black lab cross dog while growing up. A bird would swoop in very close, just out of reach of my dog who would try valiantly to snatch the bird. Despite her best efforts, the bird would fly away gleefully squawking its prowess. The bird would then land on a branch, and then fly off to its neighbours and invite them to the party. Birds would come and the first bird would continue to amuse itself by swooping in for close passes. The more my dog Chanté reacted in exasperation, the more the birds would squawk. It was clear to me the birds found the whole thing extremely funny and entertaining. It was also clear to me my dog did not enjoy being the butt of an avian practical joke.

On another occasion here in Australia, my wife and I were walking to the train station when we saw an amazing sequence of events. For some reason we did not understand (we missed the very beginning of this soap opera), the crows and gulls were at war. Both sides screamed for blood. Gulls were chasing crows who were themselves being chased by more gulls. Gulls and crows performed aerobatics worthy of Top Gun in their efforts to wreak vengeance on their foes. This was tribal fury at its best. There were no crows who tried to sympathize with the enemy gulls, nor were there any gulls siding with the crows. This was species vs. species.

Meanwhile, the magpies thought this was tremendous entertainment. You could see them screaming out to their friends (other magpies) to come watch the festivities. Some magpies actually flew off to get their magpie companions to come along. Eventually, groups of magpies would line themselves up on branches or overhead wires and spectate. They squawked to one another like people shouting encouragement or disparagement at a football match. If these creatures did not possess wings and beaks, one could have mistaken them for a group of human beings who, upon seeing a fight, all rush over to watch. That’s what we used to do in school anyway. Someone would yell out “fight!” and we would come over to watch, and shout for one or the other. And if two girls happened to be fighting, someone would yell out “cat fight!” and we would run, not walk, to watch the action. It was the next best thing to naked women’s mud wrestling – something that wasn’t allowed in the school yard. That is what this was.

As I said, anyone who spends time with animals and really watches and gets to know them, understands that even the simplest animals feel emotions. They may not be able to complete an integral calculus assignment, but they are like us in many ways. The Japanese have a word: kyokan. This word is loosely translated into English as sympathy but it means much more than that. Kyokan means to have a mental/spiritual connection with someone which allows for communion on an almost telepathic and intuitive level. It’s like when you just know someone loves you, or you feel someone’s hurt even though that someone has not expressed anything in words.

You can have kyokan with animals and when you connect with them, you know they are thinking or feeling certain things even though the animal has not actually said anything in words we can understand. When you pet a dog and know it feels content even though it has said nothing verbally, you have kyokan with that animal.

Today I experienced kyokan with a most put out bird. It was probably not the most enjoyable experience for the bird, because after all, this big clumsy oaf of a mammal had scared it into wakeful desperation early in the morning. For me, however, it was a reminder that we are, in many ways, the same as the animals.

Sometimes I think God played a joke on us when he told us we were created in the image of God. We went away from that and thought we were hot stuff. We were something special, vastly superior to those pathetic unintelligent animals we share our planet with. But the more we study animals, the more we realize how much like them we really are. I think this is what God wanted. In the end, I believe that every creature under heaven, and in the sea, is in its own way, also in God’s image. All of existence is in God’s image. Perhaps if we realize that, we might start to have more kyokan with those who share our world, and in doing that, start to care for all creatures great and small.