Celebrating a 21st birthday again

Lately I've been noticing what are called murmurations of European starlings, large flocks flying together in absolute coordination, swooping, dipping, rising, turning. These choreographed flocks vacuum inspect-filled skies. Have you seen this? It is remarkable that hundreds can fly at breakneck speed, precisely, acrobatically, without running into each other. How are these things possible? How are birds able to fly with more precision than our finest jet pilots? Again, it probably doesn't matter, but it's glorious to behold.

I have a tendency to interview folks, even those who carry my groceries from the store to my car. To a young woman helping me I smiled, and asked, "Why aren't you in school?" "Oh, I'm 19," she responded. "I plan to go back to school to become a nurse, but I've got a five-month-old at home, so it will be a while." "Don't ever shelve your plan," I say, even though it's absolutely none of my business. Enthusiastically she responds, "I won't." I'm sure her child is beautiful, but my heart aches.

On another trip to the same store the manager was pushing my full cart to my car, and he said to me, "You don't need to do that." I was walking in front of the cart guiding it with my left hand, a habit left over from shopping with my wife in the midst of her Alzheimer's. She could remain steady, and not lost, as long as she hung on to the handle of the cart, so I guided us, something she did for me for decades.

It's November and many times a day I glance up, drawn to the corner-of-the-eye movement of deer passing in front of my house, usually one or two females (does) being chased by a male (buck). We are in the midst of what is called the “rutting season,” a time when the bucks of the species forego all other thoughts and become obsessed with breeding. The fact that females are running from males makes me uncomfortable and I want to call the season something else. Those who enjoy killing these creatures will pronounce me weak. Guilty.

Next to me, my crazy tortoiseshell cat Luna looks to be floating on her charcoal-colored, Icelandic blanket, her little body on the surface, her legs invisible, like they're underwater, propelling her slowly forward. As she lies quietly, I'm singing to her, a much lower-octave rendition of "Loving You," originally by Minnie Ripperton, and she doesn't seem to mind. While on my lap last night she heard the beautiful hooting of a gorgeously round-faced barred owl in the trees behind the house. Luna's response? Opening her eyes. Oh, to be so cool. This is likely at least a second-generation of owls, as I know they've been up in those trees for at least a quarter of a century.

In a few weeks I may invite some people to a party celebrating my 21st birthday, something that happened a half-century ago. It was my first-time tasting beer, and that's about all I remember about it, which is just as well. In my entire 70 years I've not had a birthday party. My parents didn't have money for such foolishness, so birthdays were deemed unimportant. Do not feel sorry for me, as birthday ambivalence has served me well. So, who would I invite? Perhaps you. And I'll invite old friends, friends who will remind me that there will always be others at the party, soft-spoken ghosts who will appreciate that I have turned off televisions, shut off radios, and tossed cellular telephones into the garbage bin of history, so that we can hug, and talk of love. It promises to be a glorious party.

Kurt Ullrich lives in rural Jackson County. His book “The Iowa State Fair” is available from the University of Iowa Press