Last week, my dear sweet, precious flirtatious bright green budgie bird affectionately called Wasabi passed away peacefully in the afternoon. In human years she would have been about 100 years old.

I brought her home 14 ½ years ago when she was a mere 6 weeks old, a sweet tiny baby budgie who was a hand fed baby girl budgie whom the breeder told me he thought she would be capable of speech as her Blue feathered father was quite the talker.

Many of you knew her over the years, as she cheerfully greeted everyone at my home. When I awoke in the morning and got up, I would hear her calling me from the kitchen. My bedroom was on the floor above, but she could hear even the slightest sound and would know that soon, I’d be coming down the stairs.

Her incredible social skills and personality had her charming absolutely everyone, especially the guys who came to visit ~ she was outrageously flirtatious !! And all my guy friends and family knew that when they came over to the house, it was VERY important for them to stop and say a proper hello to her. Gosh, it was so funny to see mere mortal men falling in love with her as she clearly chose to communicate her divine sweetness with them, and completely refuse me ( hey, I only cleaned her cage and fed her everyday… she LOVED me, but when guys were around? I was absolutely chopped liver, lol ) She would start to start to bob up and down, her beautiful tail would go up and she would sidle up to where ever she could get closest to the men and cajole them to come near. In my head, I could see her doing her bird version of “ hey baby, baby “ and she just cracked me up. If I went up to the cage while a man was around, she would literally blow me off and stomp away from me and fly to the edge of the cage where she could get closer to the object of her affections.

Gosh, I could name dozens of men she had HUGE crushes on ~ Kevin, John, Allan, Ian, Kenny, Gustavo … it might have been embarrassing except she was SO darn cute about it !! And honestly, I don’t think any of my men friends minded at all.

I’ve been reflecting on the life of my wee sweet budgie and thinking about how it was that she managed to live so long and with so much gumption. She was SO present, in absolutely every moment, she chose to look danger in the face and kiss life back. It wasn’t as if she never had any health challenges ~ she had become obese in her early years, as I was traveling too much and I left too much food in her cage, worrying that she would not get enough food.

The Vet’s and I worked hard to find solutions to moderating her food intake, to switching to pellets, to measuring her food and adding high-calorie seeds only as a topping, removing millet and adding fresh salads every single day. We even contrived an exercise for her by placing a  stone on top of her food so she would have to exercise while she ate, lol. She was required to be weighed in EVERY MONTH at the Vet’s for a year until we got her weight under control, and then the Dr said, well, this is as good as it gets, she’s on the larger size, but I guess she is just a big boned girl. Typically budgies are 25-35 grams. She had gotten up to 65 grams and we got her down to 40 grams.

As she aged, she became arthritic, and I had to rearrange her cage to make it more cushioned, and easier for her to get around, I made her a little hammock under her sleeping perch so she could fall into it in case she fell in the night. Domesticated budgies typically live from 5-8 years old and she made it to 14 ½. That is 2-3 times longer than normal. The Dr said they did not care what I did, I was doing the right thing. Truthfully? I think SHE did the right thing, she woke up every morning and expected the BEST day possible. She sang, she called me, she would call Mia “ Mia, Mia, come here Mia !! “ She said, “ Hi Wasabi “ and she learned to say “ I love you “ and was on her way to learning to say “ Hey Gorgeous “ at the suggestion of one of our goddess friends, Angela.

She was simply a good sport and as I mentioned, she LOVED to flirt with men. She simply did not give up on life, until she simply couldn’t and she quietly slipped away last week. I loved her example on how to live a wonderful life as best as possible, and I think her life legacy was to encourage all of us to take life in our hands and live it as well as she did.

May we all embrace life with as much enthusiasm as Wasabi.

Many blessings and so much love,

Cydney

Happy Cells, Long Life, Forever Young