A Different Blue(6)

A few kids nodded their heads agreeably. I looked at the clock. Half an hour until I could take

off these jeans.

"You all have a story. It's been written up to this point, to this very second. And I want to

know that story. I want to know YOUR history. I want you to know it. For the rest of the class

time I want you to tell me your story. Don't worry about being perfect. Perfect is boring. I

don't care about run-on sentences or misspelled words. That's not my purpose. I just want an

honest account – whatever you are willing to divulge. I will collect them at the end of the

hour."

Desk chairs scraped, zippers were yanked opened in search of pens, and complaints were uttered

as I stared down at the paper. I ran my fingertips down it, imagining I could feel the lines

that ran in horizontal blue stripes. The feel of the paper soothed me, and I thought what a

waste it was to fill it with squiggles and marks. I laid my head down on the desk, on top of the

paper, and closed my eyes, breathing in. The paper smelled clean, with just a hint of sawdust. I

let my mind linger on the fragrance, imagining the paper beneath my cheek was one of my

carvings, imagining I was rubbing my hands along the curves and grooves that I'd sanded down,

layer upon layer, uncovering the beauty beneath the bark. It would be a shame to mar it. Just

like it was a shame to ruin a perfectly good sheet of paper. I sat up and stared at the pristine

page in front of me. I didn't want to tell my story. Jimmy said to really understand something

you had to know its story. But he'd been talking about a blackbird at the time.

Jimmy had loved birds. If woodworking was his gift, bird watching was his hobby. He had a pair

of binoculars, and he would often hike to a high spot where he could observe and document what

he saw. He said birds were messengers and that if you watched them closely enough, you could

discern all sorts of things. Shifting winds, approaching storms, dropping temperatures. You

could even predict if there was danger nearby.

When I was very small it was hard for me to sit still. It actually still is. Birdwatching was

hard for me, so Jimmy started leaving me behind when I was old enough to remain at camp alone. I

was much more responsive to woodcarving simply because it was so physical.

[page]I must have been seven or eight the first time I saw Jimmy get really excited about a bird

sighting. We were in southern Utah, and I remember where we were only because Jimmy remarked on

it.

“What is he doing in these parts?” he had marveled, his eyes fixed on a scrubby pine tree. I

had followed his gaze to a little black bird perched halfway up the tree on a thin branch. Jimmy

went for his binoculars, and I stayed still, watching the little bird. I didn't see anything

special about it. It just looked like a bird. Its feathers were solid black – no flash of color

to draw the eye or brilliant markings to admire.

“Yep. That's a Eurasian Blackbird all right. There are no blackbirds native to North America.

Not like this guy. He's actually a thrush.” Jimmy was back, his voice a whisper as he looked

through his binoculars. “He's a long way from home, or else he's escaped from somewhere.”

I whispered too, not wanting to scare it away if Jimmy thought it was special.

“Where do blackbirds usually live?”

“Europe, Asia, North Africa,” Jimmy murmured watching the orange-billed bird. “You can find