Last Sunday our cockatiel, Polly flew away. Dh had her outside. He had taken a walk down to our orchard and had set her on the fence. She has been growing her new flight feathers over the past few months and has been experimenting with flying about in the house. I had warned all of the children not to take her outside--just in case. Well, she flew off the fence, swooped down low, gathering up momentum and then up over our house and out of his sight. We spent about an hour or more calling and whistling for her but she didn’t fly back or whistle back to us.
We had planned a trip to the nature center for that afternoon and we left in hopes that she would come back to us when we got home. We had a great time viewing the exhibits and walking the trails but a few of the children were still pretty distraught that our birdie was lost.
When we got home it was pretty late. We called and whistled but still got no response. I was thinking that she could have flown anywhere by now. I thanked the Lord that it was going to be a warm night with the low just under 60 degrees and the much needed rain wasn’t supposed to start until Monday morning. I spent a lot of time thinking of her and praying that He would protect her and send her back to us. I knew that He would have no problem with bringing her back to us if it were His will. Such a simple thing. The children went to bed praying for their lost Polly too.
I figured that the best time of trying to find her would be in the morning when she wakes up and is eager for her “Mommy” to carry her around while making breakfast and getting the children up and going. I am probably her favorite person--we spend a lot of time together. She sits on my shoulder when I am on the computer or working in the kitchen and as we do our schoolwork.
I had Dh open the bedroom window that night in hopes that I would hear her in the morning. Sure enough, as I lay there in bed waking up, I heard her whistle. As quickly as I could, I threw on my clothes and ran outside whistling back. When she heard me she got all excited and started whistling faster and louder. Turns out that she had spent her night roosting on a pallet slat beside the barn. She was very happy to see us and get back into the house.
Hope (10) was especially happy to see Polly. She’s had a bad month pet wise. Her injured chicken that she was caring for died, and our favorite cat Bobbi, who had been missing for about a week was found dead in the barn,. Then the goldfish we had brought in from outside (in a watering tank) died. On Saturday she had exasperatedly exclaimed “what else could happen?” to which Lilly (12) yelled “Don’t say that!!” Then the next day,--Sunday--our Polly flew away. So she was pretty upset and spent most of last night in tears. She is an animal lover like her mother.
I know that it may seem like a silly thing to feel loss and sadness (especially for me as an adult) when something bad happens to a pet--as you look at it compared to all the hurts and evils in this world--but such a comfort to our hearts when God answers our prayers in some of the more seemingly insignificant areas. We know that He still would have been fully in charge of the situation even if we hadn’t found her and would have rested in the knowledge that “all thing work together for our good”. But how sweet it is that He answered our prayers in this happy way.
