In 1986, we decided to get a cockatiel. We found a beautiful baby with a cage and brought it home. Now, as you can tell, most of the animals I have had or have been in contact with are not quite "normal". Turkey (the cockatiel's name) lived up to not being normal.
Turkey was a very crazy bird. She loved to "dive bomb" us if we were not giving her enough attention. My daughter JessiAnn was born in 1985, and Turkey adored her. When ever Jessi was in her high chair eating, Turkey would fly over and land on her shoulder, and proceed to "share" Jessi's food. Jessi loved it and would laugh threw her meal setting aside "special portions" for Turkey.
Turkey had the run of the house and was seldom in her cage. If she found herself alone, she would fly over to where ever one of us was at. She would call us by name to get our attention. Turkey had a large vocabulary, if someone came to the door she would ask "who is it?", If she came to us and we shooed her out of the room she would say "fly away fly away". She could whistle many songs, but her favorite was "Dixie", which was my "handle" (name) on the CB radio.
I had gone back to work, Jessi was in pre-school and Jerry was in middle school, when my dad got sick and I had to help out. Turkey had always had companionship, and I worried that she would get lonely being home by herself so much. A friend of mine breeded cockatiels, and she volunterred to take Turkey until my schedule slowed down. I tried to visit as often as I could, and every time Turkey expressed her great joy of seeing us. Things were getting hectic and I couldn't visit for a while. 3 weeks later Turkey died of a broken heart. We will never forget that little bird and all the joy and happiness she brought our way.
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