Their voices catch me by surprise—as do their green tails. I stop my running, pull out my earbuds, and look up into the tree to see and hear them.
Well, this isn’t the first time I’ve seen the parrots of New Rochelle, here, next to Trinity school. But it’s winter, so I was not expecting them. I stand under the tree where they’ve gathered, and watch them as they dance above me. They're all feasting on the small buds that line the smaller and very thin twig-like branches.
It was then that I had my “Axolotl” moment (I refer to a wonderful short story by Argentine author, Julio Cortazar). In the story, the protagonist loses part of his own sense of self, and experiences a type of metamorphosis: he adopts the identity of the creatures he’s observing.
In my case, I knew I wasn’t actually becoming a parrot—despite my desire to join in, feast, and then fly with them. But I started to ponder: How do these parrots see me? Here I stand, a white female human with cream-colored knit hat, almost nest-like blonde meets brown curls of hair sneaking out underneath, a red down vest, black leggings and red rimmed socks poking up above my black running shoes. I wonder what they notice and if, in fact, they are observing me observing them.
My story starts several decades ago, when I was hired to do a training in a university in West Virginia. The school had been recently acquired by a Japanese company. At the time, I was working with predominantly Japanese students at Concordia College in New York, and had done some presentations about cultural differences in communication styles of English language learners from Japan. Hence, I was hired to travel to this university to work with their teachers for a couple of days. Little did I realize that I was more foreign to this group of instructors than their new Japanese students were.
I remember I dressed in one of my standard NYC-type suits (we’re talking about the early 90s)—which was a simple black linen single breasted, shoulder-padded waist coat and a matching almost knee-length skirt. I wore ivory stockings, and black Mary Jane heels and a pair of longish Peruvian silver and lapis lazuli earrings that poked out from time to time between my dark brown curls.
When I saw them, I noticed right away that they were all white, mostly quite a bit older than I was then, and more conservatively dressed. The women all looked like Aunt Bees to me (from Mayberry RFD), with grey or dyed sand-colored hair, piled up high. Maybe wearing pearls?
One gentleman, who looked a bit different from the rest of the crowd, sat in the front row. He was wearing a white mock-turtleneck shirt, and a navy-blue corduroy jacket with suede patches on the elbows. His hair was straight and sandy blonde and long, and pulled back into a tight and long ponytail.
“Aha,” I thought, “here is my ally.”
But I was dead wrong.
I told the teachers, as part of my spiel, that their new students might not be as voluntarily vocal as some of their others. In fact, I continued, they should of course encourage all of their participation, but then call on individual students to speak up. Additionally, these students might not answer as quickly as we might like. To this end I advised, when asking questions of their English language learners from Japan, teachers should wait a bit longer for a response.
My “ally” in the front row leaned back, and spoke up:
“What do you mean, wait longer? What are you saying? Is five minutes long enough?” His rapid fire questions were shot off in a sarcastic-meets-accusatory tone.
I tried to rapidly recover from the sting.
“Let me clarify,” I began. “It’s that many of your students may not have had the chance to practice their spoken English, and they will be concerned about formulating the correct answers prior to saying them aloud.”
I went on to explain that English classes in Japan generally—especially at that time—didn’t focus on speaking skills, but instead primarily on grammar and writing.
I didn’t look directly at him, but scanned the audience. The group nodded in what appeared to be understanding. However, according to my memory, that man in the front row with the ponytail and corduroy jacket unthankfully grimaced.
The rest of that workshop is blurry to me. But I do remember vividly that later, at break time, as we gathered next to the large coffee pot, sipping from white Styrofoam cups and eating delicious homemade peanut butter cookies, the Aunt Bees graciously thanked me, and apologized for their colleague’s behavior.
That was when I became aware of two things: I was judging them all based on my personal collection of preconceived notions and, well, they were doing the same thing.
So, what does this have to do with “comerse el coco?” Well, that expression means—literally—to eat your head; to ponder many things at once, and have these thoughts crashing around with jagged edges. Rumination. I think we all do this—especially these days, when so much is going on immediately around us both locally and globally. This pondering is not necessarily a bad thing. But it’s a thing.
I’m back to the present. I’m still under the tree. Suddenly, I feel something lightly tap my head, and think, “Wow! Bird droppings! This could mean good luck.”
I take off my hat to examine, and immediately discover that it’s a small twig.
Still, I feel lucky.
