Happy Fathers Day

by Nany Diaz
Our bird Pito, a cherished member of our family for 14 years now, seemed to be feeling
unwell. We noticed that he was not himself during the last couple of weeks and wanted to be left
alone. He took refuge inside a towel-coered laundry basket we hae on the top shelf in our laundry
room. He would get inside the basket under the towel and spend many hours there in the dark. He ate
ery little. We didn!t understand this behaior in our normally happy bird. We had a family get-
together to celebrate "ather!s #ay. $ince we were busy with meal preparation, we paid little attention
to Pito until eerybody had gone. Poor Pito, he looked so tired and puffy. %ater in the day he began to
make strange
noises. &ichard and ' had the feeling that our precious Pito was going to die. We tried to make him as
comfortable as possible. (ery time he shook or made loud breathing sounds,
we became more alarmed.
&ichard took Pito into the bathroom and set him on the counter top hoping to comfort him
with the image of himself in the mirror. &ichard watched nerously as the noises Pito made grew
more fre)uent and he got puffier and puffier as time passed. ' could stand it no longer and left the
bathroom resigned to the fact Pito was going to die at any moment.
$uddenly &ichard called for me to come back. *y heart stopped for a second and my legs
grew weak as ' ran back to the bathroom. +%OO,, &ichard said,- and pointed. *y mouth flew open
and my eyes widened in ama.ement. ' could hardly beliee what ' saw when ' looked down.
Our boy Pito had /ust laid an egg0 Happy "ather!s #ay, &ichard, Pito is a girl0