FORLORN

I am now back home from stomping around Germany and Austria for three weeks.  We had a great time; stories to follow in a later post.

Recovery day today.  I am parked on the porch, beer in hand and exchanging plaintive whistles with a sad little cardinal who visits regularly.  The poor little bugger is absolutely crestfallen.  Its problem, I think is that he/she is a transvestite.  It is tiny.  Baby sparrows push it out of the birdbath.  It has a manly red head but the dull, brown body of a female.  What I know of cardinal social systems is that bigger and redder  males get the pick of females.  As a result, my little buddy sits for hours in the 'phone wire or on top of the bramble bush hollering, "I'm horny!  Wanna do nest?" but no winsome chicks reply.  He has to settle for my sympathetic whistles in reply.  He needs to find a social network and through that a plump, red-assed, brown-headed cardinal of uncertain sexual orientation who would at least hang out with him/her.  Perhaps then he could raise his crest with pride and adopt a couple of abandoned eggs.  I wish him the best.

My forlorn cardinal reminds me of a remarkable soldier who once reported to me in my paratrooper days.  Corporal Vince was a short, muscular man with the bootprints of military life on his craggy face.  Along with his campaign ribbons he wore two medals for uncommon bravery under fire.  He was as tough and intrepid as you could ask, honorable, decent and as gentle or hard-assed as the situation required.  He was also gay.  He rarely spoke of this beyond saying when questioned, "In uniform, I keep my fly buttoned.  I am a soldier and a responsible NCO".  He was.

Vince hit retirement age after a lifetime of soldiering.  He did not want to retire.  I pushed for an extension for him and got no-where.  He departed for Montreal where he grew up, "came out" and attempted to invest himself in the city's gay community.  That community was nasty and unwelcoming.  Vince didn't look or act gay and so he lived a solitary life, friendless after 25 years in a military community in which he was welcomed, respected and even honoured.  Eventually, he gave up.  He stuffed his medals and Service Book in his pocket to aid in his identification, walked to the Jacques Cartier bridge and, in the way of old paratroopers, bailed off the highest point without benefit of parachute.  Exit a fine Canadian hero in a way that only a soldier would understand and salute.

I hope that my forlorn cardinal has a happier ending.  I will continue to offer encouragement.