The Sparrow
Are we born to
do certain things, to perform certain tasks? Are we destined before birth to be
what is planned for us in advance? Many scholars and theologians believe
so. As an adolescent riding a bike down
a country road, you would think that death and dying would be the furthest
thing from my young mind. It was my daily routine as a kid to sit on my bike
under a large maple tree at the end of our sidewalk and watch the cars going by
on the “main” road and then ride as fast as possible down the dirt
road to the bridge two hundred yards away. At the tender age of eight, I found
a dead sparrow near the road, and I came to a grinding halt, throwing cinders
up as the brakes locked the back wheel.
What a sad
day to find a beautiful sparrow, rich in brown, gray and black, lying lifeless
and begging for attention from a passerby like myself. Gently taking the
sparrow to a nearby lilac tree near the road and placing him tenderly in the
green pasture, I knew I had to give this sparrow a proper departure. So, back
at the house, with the assistance of my little sister Mary
Jane, I constructed a small cardboard box complete
with a scrap of cloth that I had found. Soon, we placed the sparrow in the box,
and upon the lid I placed a small aromatic bloom of that wonderful lilac. It
felt good to take care of that poor bird. He did not deserve this death, but he
did deserve this final resting place.
I’m sure I wasn’t the only
youngster who had ever buried a dead animal or bird, but was it foretelling of
things to come? I couldn’t contemplate that now. I had a Little League game to
get to, and as the second baseman, I had to be there on time. It was a fifteen
minute bike ride to the school and the coach would be rallying the team for
tonight’s game.
I would
visit that sparrow’s grave in the days ahead and place a cross on
it made of two sticks and a piece of string. The task had been completed. It
was one more of my life’s ingredients into building a career that in
two decades would be knocking on my door for full time attention for many years to
come.
