This month the topics for the church’s writing group where, sparrows, favorite books from childhood, and how do you strive to be the same or different than your parents. You’re supposed to pick one subject to write about. I choose to write about all three. Here’s what I wrote:
Let me start by telling you everything I know about sparrows. It’s a kind of small bird. That’s it, all I know. It’s likely that a sparrow or two has visited our bird feeders in the backyard. I wouldn’t know, there’s a lot of small birds and I’ve never bothered to look up who’s who.
As you know there is a Who’s Who for birds just as there is a Who’s Who for people. The book for people just lists people who are kind of important – rich, famous, movie stars, politicians, that sort and leaving most of us out. In these days of social media, you could likely just look people up there without buying the book like you had to do back in the day.
Who’s Who for birds in North America is, of course, the National Audubon Society’s Guide to North American Birds. Unlike the book about people the Audubon Society attempts to list all birds, not just the rich and famous birds. I didn’t look up sparrows in that book. Yes, you’d think I would have looked up sparrows before writing about them. I’ll get marked down for that.
While I’m not sure if we’ve been visited by sparrows, I think we’ve had finches. At least we have a bird feeder with finch food in it and a lot of tiny yellowish birds feed on it so I’m just assuming it’s finches that feed on the finch food. I could be wrong. I mean squirrels have been known to eat bird food and I’d hate to apply labels without knowing for sure. I did try asking the cats, but they seem to classify birds as easy to catch, hard to catch, or could eat you (like hawks).
Since I was going to write about sparrows, I did look up the symbolic meaning of a sparrow and checked to see if sparrows are mentioned in the Bible. Turns out sparrows are mentioned five times in the Bible – not bad for a small bird. Sparrows are mentioned in two gospels, in a Psalm, a Proverb, and in Hosea 11:11. In general they are symbols of God’s care and attention to detail. The gospels talk of God knowing everything, including what happens to sparrows and suggests that people are worth more than sparrows. In Matthew, Sparrows are listed at two for a penny, but you get a better deal in Luke where you can get five for two pennies. People cost much more, but an exact price isn’t listed
And apparently sparrows are good at overcoming bad times and a symbol that things are going to get better. According to my sources (all both of them), sparrows also can represent hard work, a positive attitude, endurance, or perseverance. All good stuff.
I blame my lack of knowledge about sparrows on the books I read as a child. I grew up in the 60’s and while we had books back then, I didn’t read much until 1974 when I started reading Science Fiction Novels. Sparrows aren’t a big topic in Science Fiction. I do recall loving the Cat in the Hat book and Where the Wild Things Are. I do recall reading Green Eggs and Ham at a friends house, but couldn’t understand why anyone would want to eat moldy eggs. Some of my fonder memories of children’s books was from Mr. Clark’s sixth grade class. He had a practice of reading us a book every afternoon just after lunch. He was great at story telling. He read books like James and the Giant Peach, Charlotte’s Web, Charlie and Chocolate Factory.
Mr. Clark also read this great story about a 12 year old boy who lived in the Swiss Alps. The boy’s father was a mountain climber and guide and was teaching the boy how to climb. The father becomes trapped on the Matterhorn and the boy climbs up to rescue him. For the life of me I can’t remember the name of the book.
I have tried looking it up, but most of my on-line search results come back with links to a book tilted Matterhorn, which turns out to be a very good novel. It’s set in the Vietnam war where a young Marine lieutenant leads his platoon in a fight on a mountain top they nickname, Matterhorn. It has absolutely nothing to do with the book I remember from sixth grade or even anything to do with this essay. Just thought if you like war novels, you should look this one up. I might still have a copy if you want to borrow it.
Recalling childhood books, I can’t help but to think of my parent’s relationship to books. My father treated all books as almost sacred. He didn’t allow you to write in a book and turning a page down or “dog-earing” a book would land you with a long lecture on the importance and value of books. Strangely enough though, I rarely saw my father read a book. Mostly he watched TV and sometimes read a news paper. He did talk about novels he read while serving in the Army in WWII. He did have an uptick of reading after he joined AA in 1972 and had a small library of AA books and other general self-help kind of books. In our home there weren’t many books other than what we had for school.
My mother on the other hand was a voracious reader. She read constantly, even in the bathtub. I’m serious — I don’t know how she did it, but she’d disappear into the bathroom with a book and read for an hour or two. Every 20 minutes or so you’d hear her run more hot water. She never dropped a book into the water. Mostly she read romance novels. My mother used to trade grocery bags full of romance novels with her friends and I’m guessing that she’d finish two or three a week.
I still have a great sense of reverence for books and never write in them or dog-ear them. Partly out of respect for the book and partly out of fear of my father finding out. I still strive to have his respect for the written word, but actually try to read more books than he did. I don’t read as much as my mother did and never in the bathtub, but I do know that I should read more than I do. I tend to read a lot of stuff on-line, but it can take me months to finish reading a real book.
So when I think of books, I think of trying to achieve a balance between not reading and over reading. In my youth I did read a lot of science fiction, but these days I’m more likely to read poetry.
Well, if you do know any good books about sparrows, let me know. I should probably read them.
Andrew's View of the Week 
Nice post! I like sparrows but I don’t know much about them.
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They’re not a bird people think about much.
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I remember that book about the boy in the Alps, too – we also read it in school. (And I can’t remember its title, either.) But I can recognize sparrows! :-)
I’m firmly in the same camp as your father when it comes to books: No dog-earing or underlining! But, like your mother, I used to read in the bathtub, too (also without ever dropping the book). That’s something I haven’t done for years. Maybe it’s time to revisit that habit.
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Reading in the bathtub is a skill I just don’t understand how it’s done. I’d drop the book for sure.
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I read a lot. And it truly irritates me to open a book (usually from the library) and find someone has dog-eared pages. Grrr. That’s my dog impression. Ha!
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My father would get so mad when he saw that. I never dared to do it.
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The only bird I can recall from the Bible is the dove with its olive branch, but now that I think about it there were likely two sparrows on the Ark. Your parents were just like mine when it came to books. My father read two newspapers every day (the L.A. Times and the “Evening Outlook”) but I can’t recall him ever opening a book. My mother read romance novels and those epic stories from James Michener. She always went to bed with her nose in a book. Like you, I respect a book too much to ever dog-ear. I cringe whenever a dust cover gets torn. On the other hand, magazines are fair game for all forms of destruction. Sometimes I’ll rip out entire articles for later reading. Other times I’ll just fold the page over. I think it’s knowing the magazine is destined for the trash can while a (hardcover) book is destined for the shelves. I’d hate to read a book again someday, only to discover a penciled-in note or a dog-eared page.
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In our house a magazine is likely destined for the art room to be cut up on a collage or something. The dove is a more common Biblilic bird and gets the better roles in the stories.
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We had similar rules about books–don’t write in them or dog-ear the pages. I suppose because we were less of a throw-away society back then.
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Books were expected to last a long time back when I was young.
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I have taken to ‘reading’ audiobooks in the past several years. One of my best purchases ever was a splurge on cordless, sound-cancelling headphones. They serve a dual purpose: protecting my ears from the noise in my shop and allowing me to be entertained by stories or music as I work there. Being that I am up in the shop for sometimes 10 hours or more, they were a delightful gift to myself. I marvel at how they actually DO cancel out the noise. You don’t have to turn up the music or book reading loud to enjoy it. I love mystery and detective stories and absolutely get lost in my books while working. Most times, I finish my work before a chapter or a good part of the story and I continue to listen as I tidy things up, leaving the shop clean and pleasant for the next day. (win/win!) The stories take me away to places and are reminiscent of my days in grammar school when we would have library class and our teacher (Mrs. Wick) would read us stories like “Charlotte’s Web.” I loved reading days and listening to the narrators read is just as pleasant – especially if you get a really good one. Anyway – I am rambling. Thank you for the post.
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I love reading. I haven’t gotten into audiobooks, but I think I might someday.
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They certainly are a nice way to protect your ears when scrolling. :)
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The novel The Nature of Small Birds by Susie Finkbeiner is a delight but I can’t remember whether the bird is actually a sparrow. The one on the cover certainly is. We have a whole condo of House Sparrows in the front bushes. (The noisy creatures leave messes all along the porch rails.)
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I haven’t read that one. We have a few bird feeders in the backyard. Our cats will sit by the windows and watch birds for hours.
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And makes those whisper meows?
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They do!
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As far as I know, ,North America has more varieties of sparrow than any other area, with a good number of fairly colourful ones (by sparrow standards)
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I think you’re correct there. Sparrow is a bird most don’t pay much attention to, but there are a lot of them around.
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……..Chipping sparrow, Fox, White throated, Ipswich, Song, Lincoln, American Tree, Savannah, Swamp, White Crowned, House, and lots more.
Three of which I have seen as very rare vagrants to England…….Song, White throated and White Crowned.
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Andrew, Mary Doria Russell wrote a science fiction book called The Sparrow. My (former) book group chose to read it. It’s about a Jesuit priest and linguist who leads a scientific mission to a remote planet, where they expect to make contact with intelligent extraterrestrial life. The book won all sorts of awards and many people rave about it. It’s psychological, philosophical, extremely depressing, and very violent. Russell wrote a sequel, which my (former) book group then wanted to read. I told them I would sooner gouge out my eyes with a melon baller. Consider yourself warned.
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The Sparrow is one of my favorites. Although favorite may not be the right word. But it is one that remains on my bookshelves and gets re-read every few years. It’s one of those books that I’ve recommended to just a handful of people.
The book raises all sorts of questions – ethical, moral, religious – as it draws out the unintended consequences of decisions large and small.
I didn’t find the sequel nearly as compelling.
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sometimes a sequel doesn’t live up to the standards of the orginal.
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That’s one I haven’t read.
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The Language of the Birds by Alisher Navai
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I’ll have to look that one up.
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sounds good
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