My parable of the sparrows in the age of fake news — hubris, hayseeds & hope

I hear the ancient footsteps like the motion of the sea

Sometimes I turn, there's someone there; other times, it's only me

I'm hanging in the balance of a perfect finished plan

Like every sparrow falling, like every grain of sand

(Dylan) 

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Quite often, my walk to Astoria Park — a green urban sanctuary on the banks of the mighty East River (which is not really a river, but a saltwater tidal estuary that connects Upper New York Bay to the Long Island Sound, but don’t get me started) — involves me passing gaudy condos called “Pistilli Riverview East” in what used to be the yellowish-tan Eagle Electric plant.

Recently, as I strolled past this eyesore, I took notice of several sparrows nesting in the letters of the condo sign (see photo above). This seemingly benign event set me off on a fanciful flight of reflection and recollection.

“Perfection is Not an Accident”

Even after Eagle Electric became idle, its motto remained emblazoned in ten-foot-tall letters near the top of the structure: “Perfection is not an accident.”

Whenever I’d encounter this dormant building and its self-mocking sign, I was wont to contemplate a post-human planet Earth. You see, when the factory was silenced, its small square windows became an alluring target for rock-wielding youths with good enough aim to knock out the glass roughly 20-30 feet up (a favorite sport of mine, many years ago, I must admit). 

Eventually, however, with not enough squares left to justify the hooligans’ efforts, it was nature that stepped up to the plate. Each of the glass-free cubbyholes (maybe 10" x 10") became home sweet home to a nest proudly guarded by a pair of chirping sparrow parents. 

For these birds, the Eagle Electric edifice was merely part of the landscape — perhaps not unlike a small mountain or immense tree — and thus a logical venue for a cooperative form of feathered dwelling. A reminder indeed, that one day, there won’t be any humans with lawnmowers (each a suburban Sisyphus) to impede nature’s tide.  

Shortly before the transition from factory for peons to file cabinet for yuppies began, I wrote: “Sure, they’ll break ground with much hoopla and sell apartments like proverbial hotcakes, but this structure will eventually face its own mortality, and one day, the birds will return.”

The sparrows currently nesting in the condo sign must be chuckling and chirping at how they’ve been underestimated — yet again

Picking out the hayseeds

In 1851, the future founders of the Brooklyn Botanic Garden set free several pairs of the previously unknown European House Sparrow inside Brooklyn's immense Greenwood Cemetery. 

By picking hayseeds out of horse droppings from the carts used for funerals, these transplanted, tiny birds flourished and are today one of the continent's most ubiquitous and amazing creatures.

They can live as long as 12 years; they can fly at speeds up to 30 MPH; and, if necessary, they can even swim. (FYI: A sparrow has never been known to toil in a factory nor purchase a condo.)

For the purposes of this meandering parable, however, sparrows also provide a powerful and inspirational example: 

When The Powers That Shouldn’t Be can only supply horseshit, don’t get mired in it. Don’t let it drag you down to their parasitic, predatory level.

Instead, we must learn how to discover and pick out the hayseeds that enable and empower us not only to survive… but to thrive.