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Rumpus Book ClubDEAR SUGAR, The Rumpus Advice Column #39: The Baby Bird
Dear Sugar,
WTF, WTF, WTF?
I’m asking this question as it applies to everything every day.
Best,
WTF
Dear WTF,
My father’s father made me jack him off when I was three and four and five. I wasn’t any good at it. My hands were too small and I couldn’t get the rhythm right and I didn’t understand what I was doing. I only knew I didn’t want to do it. Knew that it made me feel miserable and anxious in a way so sickeningly particular that I can feel that same particular sickness rising this very minute in my throat. I hated having to rub my grandfather’s cock, but there was nothing I could do. I had to do it. My grandfather babysat my older sister and me a couple times a week in that era of my life and most of the days that I was trapped in his house with him he would pull his already-getting-hard penis out of his pants and say come here and that was that.
I moved far away from him when I was nearly six and soon after that my parents split up and my father left my life and I never saw my grandfather again. He died of black lung disease when he was 66 and I was 15, the same as his father had, both of them coal miners.
When I learned that my grandfather died, I wasn’t sad. I wasn’t happy either. He was no one to me and yet he was always there, the force of him and what he’d made me do moving through me like a dark river.
“Do you remember how we used to have to jack him off?” I asked my sister one day shortly after he died. We’d never spoken of it. I’d never said a word about it to anyone. I was ready for my sister to say no, for everything I remembered about my grandfather and his cock to be an ugly invention of my nasty little mind.
But she said, “Yeah.” She said, “Wow.” She said, “What the fuck was up with that?”
There was nothing the fuck up with that and there never will be. I will die with there never being anything the fuck up with my grandfather making my hands do the things he made my hands do with his cock. But it took me years to figure that out. To hold the truth within me that some things are so sad and wrong and unanswerable that the question must simply stand alone like a spear in the mud.
So I railed against it, in search of the answer to what the fuck was up with my grandfather doing that to my sister and me. What the fuck? What the fuck? What the fuck?
But I could never shake it. That particular fuck would not be shook. Asking what the fuck only brought it around. Around and around it went, my grandfather’s cock in my hands, the memory if it so vivid, so palpable, so very much a part of me. It came to me during sex and not during sex. It came to me in flashes and it came to me in dreams. It came to me one day when I found a baby bird, fallen from a tree.
I know you aren’t supposed to pick up baby birds. I know once you touch them their mama won’t come back and get them, but this bird was a goner anyway. Its neck was broken, its head lolling treacherously to the side. I picked it up and cradled it as delicately as I could in my palms. I cooed to soothe it, but each time I cooed, it only struggled piteously to get away, terrified by my voice.
The bird’s suffering would’ve been unbearable at any time, but it was particularly unbearable at that moment in my life because my mother had just died. Her death was ugly. She was only forty-five. And because she was dead I was pretty much dead too. I was dead but alive. And I had a baby bird in my palms that was dead but alive as well.
I knew there was only one humane thing to do, though it took me the better part of an hour to work up the courage to do it: I put the baby bird in a paper bag and smothered it with my hands.
Nothing that has died in my life has ever died easily and this bird was no exception. This bird did not go down without a fight. I could feel it through the paper bag, pulsing against my hand and rearing up, simultaneously flaccid and ferocious beneath its translucent sheen of skin, precisely as my grandfather’s cock had been.
There it was! There it was again. Right there in the paper bag. The ghost of that old man’s cock would always be in my hands. But I understood what I was doing this time. I understood that I had to press against it harder than I could bear. It had to die. Pressing harder was murder. It was mercy.
That’s what the fuck it was. The fuck was mine.
And the fuck is yours too, WTF. That question does not apply “to everything every day.” If it does, you’re wasting your life. If it does, you’re a lazy coward and you are not a lazy coward.
Ask better questions, sweet pea. The fuck is your life. Answer it.
Yours,
Sugar
[Editor's note: If you prefer to keep your question 100% anonymous it is best to use the form below.]
June 3rd, 2010 at 12:14 pm
Holy fuck. The most beautiful and affecting column I have ever read.
June 3rd, 2010 at 1:24 pm
Wow. This is a story I won’t ever forget.
June 3rd, 2010 at 1:38 pm
holy fucking fuck. thank you.
June 3rd, 2010 at 2:07 pm
This is just… amazing.
June 3rd, 2010 at 2:11 pm
Touching. Lovely. Thank you.
June 3rd, 2010 at 2:17 pm
thank you.
June 3rd, 2010 at 2:41 pm
Thanks for this.
June 3rd, 2010 at 2:52 pm
Simply fantastic.
June 3rd, 2010 at 3:33 pm
Thank you for sharing, Sugar. Very moving.
June 3rd, 2010 at 4:48 pm
This is another shutter inducing reason why you are brilliant Sugar, dear. You turned an obnoxious bit of a question on it’s head and gave us something worthwhile to walk away with.
You keep me coming back for more.
June 3rd, 2010 at 4:57 pm
Thank you, everyone. I was scared to publish this column. I’m grateful for your kind words.
June 3rd, 2010 at 4:58 pm
Great answer. There is something inspiring to be taken away here.
June 3rd, 2010 at 5:22 pm
I could almost cry because this is so beautiful. Thank you, Sugar, as always.
June 3rd, 2010 at 5:39 pm
Outstanding, visceral, and somehow… poetic.
June 3rd, 2010 at 5:46 pm
Sugar you have a lot of courage. I am glad you are writing because you say things that we need to hear. Thank you.
June 3rd, 2010 at 5:48 pm
Skillful and wise response to what doesn’t even qualify as a throwaway question.
June 3rd, 2010 at 6:25 pm
Sugar, you are so brave. Thanks for sharing.
June 3rd, 2010 at 7:51 pm
Sugar, I need to print out all your columns and carry them around with me as a little booklet in my shirt pocket. Will you be our new messiah, please?
June 3rd, 2010 at 9:35 pm
Gertrude Stein would be proud. Thank you.
June 4th, 2010 at 6:37 am
I’m sitting at my desk, trying to eat a bagel, and I can’t now because there’s a big lump in my throat and my eyes are welled up with tears I’m trying to suppress. I hope no one is looking.
What a powerful, brave and moving piece of writing. Thank you thank you thank you.
June 4th, 2010 at 6:43 am
Tragically beautiful… Thank you.
June 4th, 2010 at 7:06 am
To make something so touching out of something so yucky…that’s the fucking fuck. Congratulations.
June 4th, 2010 at 7:44 am
I don’t even have the words.
But you do – and bless you for it.
June 4th, 2010 at 7:56 am
way to write, sugar. so honest, so from the centre of everything. thank you. that’s trust in action, right there. loved it.
June 4th, 2010 at 8:05 am
God bless you, you sweet, brave, lady.
June 4th, 2010 at 8:34 am
It’s a puzzle to me that anyone would do such a thing with a child. Such men are not my species. But I yelled and called names at my children, so I’m also aware that it’s possible to be crazy and that free will is a fiction. Oh, and thanks for writing this. Sell it to THE SUN magazine.
June 4th, 2010 at 8:44 am
Are there awards you can give to anonymous columnists?
“The fuck is your life. Answer it.”
I’m positive this is the most stirring and beautiful advice column I have ever come across.
June 4th, 2010 at 9:58 am
One of the bravest pieces that I’ve ever read. And your call to action at the end – you’ve given us a brilliant gift, Sugar. Thank you, thank you, for speaking from your soul. Your column is peerless.
June 4th, 2010 at 10:10 am
Not just about the fuck, but for all the boys and girls who grew up to be men and women who survived something like that, thank you. It’s never okay, but it’s a part of who we are. And if we don’t want to get stuck, we have to face it straight on just like you just did. Thank you, Sugar.
June 4th, 2010 at 10:24 am
I’ve never cried at a piece of Internet writing before. Thanks for elevating the form. You amaze me.
June 4th, 2010 at 10:33 am
Beautiful. Thank you, Sugar!
June 4th, 2010 at 11:25 am
I just blew some sugar all over my pants.
June 4th, 2010 at 12:22 pm
Thanks for the reminder that what happens to us as children can be beautiful or horrific, or both, but it’s our life when we are adults and we should be living it the way we would want to be treated.
June 4th, 2010 at 12:39 pm
Brilliant!
June 4th, 2010 at 3:15 pm
Terrifying and animate and brilliant. I wallow in the glory of your column Sugar.
June 4th, 2010 at 5:09 pm
Thanks, I will remember that always.
June 5th, 2010 at 1:06 am
This is the most wrenching Dear Sugar I’ve read. It stayed with me all day and on the 2.5 hour drive to the desert as I watched the mountains peek through smog, leaving Los Angeles. It made me understand the ways in which some of us were always already broken, creepy cock or not. Sometimes you have to kill something you love when it’s helpless because it must be done. This is a merciful act. And, ultimately WTF must be resilient and must be merciful, especially when no one showed WTF mercy. Thank you.
June 5th, 2010 at 8:08 am
Shocking and affecting. Beautiful. You’ve got balls and you’ve got skills. This is phenomenal.
June 5th, 2010 at 8:48 pm
Birds have horrible senses of smell; the whole “if you touch it you kill it” thing is a myth. That said, if you see a baby bird that seems like it might be in danger, keep an eye on it; the right thing to do may be to move it to higher ground until a parent bird comes back.
I know that in some ways this is completely orthogonal to this piece, but I hate to see people perpetuate the “parent birds will smell human on their babies” myth because I think it keeps people from helping birds when they can. Which is one way to keep back the tides of WTF.
June 6th, 2010 at 1:06 pm
I wanted to be moved and touched in my soul and all that, but I just kept thinking about a featherless baby bird being compared to a flacid old man penis and I kept laughing. It is so beautifully written, sort of kicks the ass of the whiner who goes around with a WTF attitude all the time, but still…. Too bad it wasn’t grandpa’s dick in the paper bag. I also thought about not moving a baby bird but didn’t want to comment because it wasn’t the thrust of the piece. “JMS” commented on it instead, and s/he is right. In fact, if you could hold the bird in your one hand, scale the tree with your other, find the nest and put the bird back in it, even better.
June 7th, 2010 at 1:50 pm
Yes, this is it, or the closest it comes. Bless you.
June 10th, 2010 at 8:27 am
Perfect affirmation for the morning. <3 Sugar
June 11th, 2010 at 11:22 am
Buddha’s heart + Stephen Elliott’s mind + Margaret Atwood’s brain = SUGAR; You are the new messiah!
June 18th, 2010 at 8:46 am
Sugar, I am so sorry. I know that doesn’t help; I know that. But it seems like someone should apologize for that not-a-man’s crime. I am just so sorry.
June 22nd, 2010 at 7:11 pm
Wow. When I was 12 I used to pray that when a boy I really liked kissed me it wouldn’t be as disgusting as when my dad stuck his tongue in my mouth – I was so afraid that I would scream in disgust like I did with him – and ruin my chances at real love. I passed up a few cute boys because of that fear – but somehow – the sight of that penis and those balls – well, as disgusted as I was by seeing them all the time – didn’t ruin me. WTF? WTF was up with that? Why wasn’t I sexually ruined? You would think I would be – but NoPe – I wasn’t ruined. Kids are so cool.
June 24th, 2010 at 8:50 pm
Sugar, I needed to read this tonight. Thank you for your honesty and beauty.
July 17th, 2010 at 10:43 am
What amazes me again about you Sugar, is you somehow understood in that moment with the bird, what it signified for you and the kind of closure (since there are no ‘answers’) it could provide for your what the fuck. A bird came to you to offer you closure, and you seized upon it. Quite literally.
August 13th, 2010 at 4:47 pm
Fuck Sugar, you’re an objectively beautiful woman.
September 15th, 2010 at 6:40 am
Holy…
September 17th, 2010 at 1:02 am
Use a sharp knife on a little animal next time. It is quicker and less, well, just less……
October 13th, 2010 at 5:35 pm
Damn. Sugar, you’ve got me for life. You’re amazing.
October 14th, 2010 at 2:51 pm
Thanks, Richard, and everyone else too. I so appreciate your comments. ox Sugar
November 5th, 2010 at 12:23 am
I hate that adults get to do such awful things to us when we’re kids. And I love that we can still live and love in spite of it all. You have so much love inside you and I love that you’re sharing it with us. Thanks, Sugar.
November 11th, 2010 at 9:21 am
I could never do it, smother a babybird like this, i touched one once, i think he died alone slowly or got eaten by a cat. either way, i was really touched by your story, but i think the bird’s story wasnt part of it. you made the bird’s story your own. it can be merciful what you did with the bird, but it was the easiest thing to do than taking it to a vet to kill him in a proper unpainful manner. i am sorry but i find it hard to sympathize with killing a bird like that. i cant help it. i disagree with how you looked at it.
November 19th, 2010 at 8:44 pm
Thank you Sugar. These stories need to be told. I’m working up the gumption to tell my own one day. I hope I can do it half as well as you.
February 13th, 2011 at 2:03 am
I found your site a few days ago and have been reading late into the night your back-posts, savoring each one and rationing them so they last longer because damn you, you numbered them so I know I only have about 40 left. Sometimes I almost skip because the first line doesn’t sound like it will be something I relate to, but every single time, every motherfucking time, you give me something I need. You give me something I learn from and can apply to my life, even if not precisely — but always to the core.
But this one. WOw. I didn’t realize I’d stopped breathing until I started gasping for air at the end. You are so brave to write the stories you share. You are so brave and strong and beautiful and wise. You are everything a memoir or other truth kind of writing can be, because you give us all hope and you give us all your truth and in it all we get to share our humanity. I don’t know if what I’m writing makes a lick of sense, but I’m overpowered by how wonderful you are. In what you’re giving us here, and for what you’ve overcome to write such a powerful letter. I hope that lots and lots of people in your life give you deep generous hugs and are truly thankful for who they’ve got right there.
April 16th, 2011 at 4:34 pm
Amazing how the tattering fabric of things like that drape around us for the rest of our lives.
Your telling of this rustles that fabric, but the strength of your calm in confronting it reassures. There is so much in life that just is. I’ve railed against that for years,insisting that everything have meaning. Fearing that if the bad in life had no meaning, how could there be any intent or significance in the good. Surrendering that fear felt like a denunciation of God and life and everything. But it’s not. In fact, it’s been kinda beautiful.I don’t believe in fate, and I’m surprised how many people that freaks out. (I do believe in probability, but that’s very different than fate.) Thank you for an amazing post. You are a phenomenal creation in the service of being human!
July 1st, 2011 at 5:31 pm
I am weeping, weeping, weeping. Thank you for sharing this and helping us heal the WTF.
July 17th, 2011 at 2:12 am
I am 40 now and I still want to beat him with a bat until he’s taken his last breath. I’m not particularly angry, confused, scared or ashamed, like I used to be. I’ve come to terms with and accepted my fuck. However, if I saw him today, I would take a bat and beat him until he’s taken his last breath. Thank you for sharing.
July 19th, 2011 at 6:00 pm
Sugar, you are amazing. Your reputation is completely worth it, and that is rare.
On a semi-unrelated note, it is an old wives’ tale that you cannot pick up a baby bird to save it. When I was taught this as a child I was told it was because the mother bird would smell human on her baby and abandon it. In truth only one or two birds in the world have a sense of smell sharp enough for this to even be possible, and there’s no proof it makes any difference.
Hopefully one more small but sad misconception dispelled that always seemed horribly unfair to me.
July 24th, 2011 at 11:26 pm
I’m weeping as well. Thank you for your words, Sugar
August 12th, 2011 at 1:47 am
I recently discovered Sugar (by way of a poster criticizing another advice columnist and vowing to only ready Dear Sugar henceforth!). I’m making my way through the articles. I can only read in small doses because I’m constantly finding myself close to tears or trying to block the inevitable emotional floodgates.
It’s tough to explain how vivid the molestations of a family member are years after the event has occurred and how images can pop up unwarranted at the most inopportune times. It’s worse when this person is still in your life and you’ve never breathed a word of it to anyone. It helps to put this down to one of the WTF’s in life and try not to become crippled.
Thank you Sugar. In all the years that I’ve been reading web magazines this is the first time I’ve ever felt compelled to comment.
August 18th, 2011 at 9:40 pm
I came back to re-read this column (again) on the 4 year anniversary of my rape. I found myself ducking into the “What was he thinking?” and “Why did he think he could do that?” and all those questions that are everything about the evil things that people can do, and nothing about the good things that *I* can do regardless. WTF indeed. Thanks for helping me reorient. It meant a lot on that day.
December 27th, 2011 at 11:01 am
Sugar, you are one of humanity’s most miraculous motherfucking writers ever and your spirit is prodding mine to read and write and think and listen and converse like I *know* I can. This column … When I was about six, and also being subjected to a predator’s whims, I too encountered a fallen baby bird … This one was dead, and the sight of it STOPPED me … Finally, here, all these decades later: words for the void, words from you that make sense of it all. What a gift you are. xo