Lyric Essay published in Death Magazine: A magazine for the enthusiast and non-enthusiast alike.
My mother has become a bit of a delicate bird. Sitting outside a coffee shop in Brooklyn last Spring, I took a call from her in which she benignly suggested I come home for the weekend with some drugs so that, together, we could sit in the woods and I might help her die. It seemed she reached some sort of imbalance. This was, she decided, the best thing to do. Birds as creatures are inherently delicate.
I reacted calmly and took the stance to which I’ve grown accustomed; I defend the act of living. I told her then, one is not supposed invite one’s child home for a picnic with death. It was just inappropriate. It wasn’t just an invitation, she clarified. She was asking for my permission. She wanted to know that I’d be okay. My mother wanted my blessing. In defense of living, I told her that my permission would not be granted. I reassured her that we would find her balance again. I needed my mother, the delicate bird, to live and I would watch her do it.
Birds are innately delicate as their bodies present a housing problem. Immediately after birds hatch parasites invade, striving to survive on the tiny heart that beats within the creature. Fleas, flies, ticks and mites all burrow within the bird’s feathers. Internal worms, flukes, microscopic protozoa, fungi and countless forms of bacteria bounce and surge through the bird’s system. If the balance is upset the parasites take over bringing death to the host. Miraculously, all living birds manage to keep these parasites in balance. Their systems are accustomed to hosting the imminence of death.
Somewhat miraculously, my mother made it to fifty-five before she reached her present imbalance. I know that my life, at least, was enough to keep hers going. My life reminds her that her marriage was successful for twenty years. She had another son and a career. But soon after her divorce from my father, the balance began to shift and death became an option. I moved to Brooklyn. She had only a few friends. She left her career. She found herself alone, an alcoholic, alternately frantic and somnambulant. Bipolar was the clinical diagnosis.
In defense of living, I sat outside that coffee shop in Brooklyn and talked it out with her. I explained that ordinary people think of death as a swift stroke of fate. One doesn’t ordinarily decide upon it, welcome it, and speak of it on a Sunday afternoon phone call with one’s child. At this line my voice cracked just a little. I was illustrating, perhaps for the two of us, the contrast between what should be and what was now playing out. A child should not have to take this sort of phone call, I said.
The problem was I completely understood her perspective. In defense of living, I couldn’t let her know this, not entirely. But I do understand her exactly. The living world swarms with animals that, because of their size, can live inside or on the surface of a host, a bird for instance. The very word “parasite” means “one who eats beside another.” Although most laymen, and even some biologists, look upon parasites with repugnance, the reality of them cannot be disputed. That is to say, they are always there. They wait for an imbalance on the side of death. I couldn’t let her know that her request acknowledged my assessment of reality. Those not going about in constant awareness of death are the fortunate.
For my mother the parasites of life showed themselves more and more. Her co-workers had complained about her erratic and boisterous behavior in the office. My brother grew concerned that she was too depressed to be capable of occasionally looking after his children. When I’d visit I’d harp at her lack of housekeeping. Her messes piled up around her. Her bills might go unpaid. It didn’t take this phone call for me to realize why she had decided upon death. Keeping the parasites at bay could be fucking exhausting.
Still, where I don’t agree with her is that she sees herself, her body, as inherently flawed and unable to find a balance in favor of living. The diagnoses of bipolarity became her uncomfortable perch, a telephone wire. Death meant easily falling to the street below, and always an option. Eventually, at the risk of losing her job, she was persuaded towards finding a medication to correct the imbalance.
My mother saw a psychotherapist and began ingesting a regular dose of Ziprasidone. The pharmaceutical company that markets Ziprasidone calls the drug Geodon, hoping to bring to mind the phrase down (don) to earth (geo) referring to the goals of the medication. The goal was to bring my mother off the telephone wire and to restore her balance.
A bird’s nerve and muscle tissue, the lungs, glands and digestive systems are all habitats for at least one kind of parasite. So delicate are their adaptations that certain kinds of lice inhabit the feathers on the head of the bird, while completely different kinds inhabit the flight feathers. Likewise, bipolar disorders vary among patients. The imbalance of any given patient is less obvious than a louse beneath a wing. There are endless mood disorders defined by the presence of abnormally elevated energy levels, cognition, and mood. There is no clear consensus as to how many types of bipolar disorder exist.
And so with Geodon, we – my mother’s therapist and I, who had become a bird watching duo, kept a close watch and hoped to bring her down to the street, to reinstate her capabilities in flight. The trouble with pharmaceuticals which address mental imbalances are the side effects which can disrupt the balance further. Geodon is known to cause activation into mania in some bipolar patients. At the time I heard my mother’s call, as I sat outside that coffee shop in Brooklyn, the Geodon had begun to take a disproportionate effect. The drug had acted not as a harmonizing additive to the parasitic imbalance, but instead as a sort of poisoned seed that weakened her system. My mother was considering death with shocking ease. Our conversation was lucid and clear. She had opted for death and I was forced to unwaveringly defend life.
I only learned about the physical process of Geodon after I took my mother’s call. It is somewhat confusing as it affects both the basal ganglia and prefrontal cortex of the brain. By affecting the basal ganglia the prefrontal cortex does what is called identity change. This is a process in which enzymes are switched from one section of the brain to another. In short, it attempts to change the makeup of the species. It tries to convert the bird from one who sits on the telephone pole and considers falling to the street to one that flies – a depressed and out of place penguin to a finch or swallow.
Ornithology, the study of birds, was once considered a mere hobby. Birds are pretty little things. But the science of ornithology has evolved to complex studies of evolution, definition of species and behaviors which allow certain species to thrive. Parasitology as a biological discipline is not determined by the organism or environment in question, but by their way of life.
I began to watch my mother and the parasites that she housed with closer observation – less the way things should be versus the way they were playing out, and closer attention to the sound of her calls. I asked her what she’d done that day. What had she eaten? Who had she spoken to? What was she reading? I listened. Bird watching most often involves a significant auditory component. Many species are more easily detected and identified by ear than by eye.
Anyone can point out a louse beneath the wing of a swallow. But there are other cases with subtle shadings in the relationships between parasites and their hosts. Certain animals – such as the protozoa which cause bird malaria – must live as parasites throughout their entire lives and cannot exist apart from their hosts.
But others, notably ticks and mosquitoes, are usually only parasitic at single stages in their lives and spend most of their time in a free state. Some parasites are fully capable of living their lives as free animals. By dust bathing and preening, the host holds down their numbers on the feathers and skin. And with a correct diet, special blood cells and antibodies fight to prevent overcrowding in the lungs, liver, trachea, and blood. Death can be present for the living without surpassing.
And so, rather than attempt to eliminate the presence of death in my mother’s life, I, the bird watcher, would suggest a change of habitat. In the months after her invitation to a bird watching picnic with an arsenic dessert, we moved her into a new home, weaned her off of Geodon, found her a new job, and changed her diet.
In some cases birds and their parasites live together largely oblivious of each other. That is to say, we needn’t constantly be aware of death. Some scientists believe that neutral relationships began originally as parasitic but evolved into truces. My mother’s, and therein my own, relationship with death has largely taken the route of the successful parasite and bird relationship. The presence of the parasite is inevitable. The ideal parasite does not bring about immediate death; if allowed to live out its life, the bird will furnish offspring for future generations of parasites. We must live for the life of others.
What I didn’t let on as I stood outside the coffee shop in Brooklyn was that I needed her to live so I might do the same. Though calm and quiet in tone, and having taken on the role of a birdwatcher rather than a bird, I know too well this taking side with death. I needed my mother to provide an example for me, her offspring. I needed her to evolve, to cope with her parasites, so that future generations might be better able to do the same. We must live to die.
Some academic studies of bird watching liken the practice to a belief in the supernatural. Bird watchers will often proclaim the experience has anxiety-buffering effects. Just as a belief in a supernatural higher power increases in response to the idea of death, bird watching is a place some seek solace and calm, a place to distance themselves from the imminence of death. I’ve been closely watching my mother, the delicate bird, for the last ten years. And like any mother/son relationship, she is where I go to seek solace, where I go to beat off my own parasites, to fend off the imminence of death in my own life. We all need reasons to live and mine is bird watching.
