A little bird told me!
That would be Dan’s bird. We never really knew which of the 200 regularly occurring bird species in Ireland, Dan’s bird belonged. It was certainly swift, that is in speed terms. It had no name other than ‘Dan’s bird’, Had the brothers been older, then constantly referring to Dan’s bird might have raised smiles or eyebrows. But it was holy catholic Ireland and we were young innocent children.
You see the Dan’s bird seemed to spend most of the day watching our every movement while remaining invisible to us. All six of us - no matter whether we were all at home or scattered to the four winds of Dublin. The bird knew exactly where we were and what we were up to.
There were days when Dan came in tired and weary from work, with a face as long as he was tall. Those were the days when the bird had pecked on the windscreen of the car, her way of asking Dan to roll down the window. You won’t remember, sure it was long before the days of electric windows in cars. You had to turn a handle in a circular motion to open or close a window. Now the car might seem antiquated, but it was magic too… It had a spare gallon of petrol hidden for emergencies. 
Tales of all kinds of mischief were told. A brother jumping off the roof of the shed at the end of the garden, another ‘boxing the fox’ at Baldy D’s. Trips to hospital for stitches or checking a broken collar bone. I am sure there might have been a wee story about me, but I cannot for the life of me remember what it might have been. 
Dan’s bird was not into all doom and gloom, she reported the good stories as well as the bad. Someone winning a race, or passing an exam got a mention.
We thought that every family had a bird like Dan’s.
Did you have one in your household?
Rummuser said,
June 1, 2011 at 1:20 pm
I don’t recall a bird like that, but the cars with such windows and the spare can of petrol, yes. It was from those days that I became obsessed with never letting the petrol in the tank go below half of its capacity. Many emergencies were attended to without taking time out for gas filling due to that obsession.
Nancy said,
June 1, 2011 at 3:18 pm
No, WE didn’t have a bird like that,GM, but Santa Claus did. He had lots of birds and they reported to him at the North Pole all year long. If you were bad,he heard about it and if you were good, he heard about that,too.
Then, when he was packing his sleigh with toys to bring to the children at Christmas he looked at the list he had made that told him who deserved toys and who didn’t.
You could only hope that you had made the “Good Girl” side of his ledger and would get a toy or two.
I fell for this story hook,line and sinker, but MY kids didn’t buy it at all. They were much smarter than I….
Grannymar said,
June 1, 2011 at 3:34 pm
Ramana - The spare gallon was not in a can. The car at the time was a VW Beetle and you turned a small lever to open the valve to the extra gallon. It gave you time to get to a petrol station.
Nancy - Dan’s bird told Santa all the tales of our misdoings. She must have had great wings to keep flying to the North Pole as well as all over Dublin!!
Brighid said,
June 1, 2011 at 4:09 pm
Birds will rat you out as fast as anything. This is known fact in my family…and our bird is a male.
Grannymar said,
June 1, 2011 at 5:36 pm
Brighid - Does he have a name?
Mayo said,
June 1, 2011 at 5:48 pm
I have 2 birds, they don’t have time for such shenanigans, they are busy making eggs.
nick said,
June 1, 2011 at 5:52 pm
Er no, no such bird in our family. Plenty of dramatic stories to tell though. Like the time I was almost killed by a collapsing chimney. And the time I was almost drowned at Southend. And the time I stole some fruit from the greengrocer and got found out.
wisewebwoman said,
June 1, 2011 at 7:39 pm
LOL in our house it was the ‘visitor’ who was all powerful and had 10,000 pairs of eyes to catch you in the smallest of misdeeds. I was 9 when I questioned it. 9. Gosh we believed anything then.
And I still roll up my windows with womanpower only.
XO
WWW
Grannymar said,
June 1, 2011 at 7:54 pm
Mayo - They are two busy birds!
Nick - You had a very dangerous yet interesting childhood. Glad to know there was no lasting damage.
WWW - Oh the innocence of those yesterdays!
Conrad said,
June 1, 2011 at 9:14 pm
We had a parakeet in a cage when I was a kid! He couldn’t talk or anything. Actually, he just kind of hopped around in the cage as I recall.
Now that you mention it, the car windows were more exciting than the bird!
Grannymar said,
June 1, 2011 at 11:46 pm
Conrad - That reminds me of a car one of my brothers had in his early working days. The windows were worked manually and if you were not careful the whole window glass slid down into the door. He had air conditioning before it was invented!
Baino said,
June 2, 2011 at 8:03 am
I guess we did but I never knew it’s name, just copped “A little birdy told me . . ” So that’s how she always knew!
Grannymar said,
June 2, 2011 at 8:30 am
Baino - Now you know!
Alice said,
June 2, 2011 at 10:05 pm
I think my father knew a few. He always knew what we did that we weren’t supposed to do long before we got home from doing it.
Grannymar said,
June 2, 2011 at 10:27 pm
Alice - When you think about it the family codes were good, since there were no mobile phones, email or Twitter back then.
Grannymar » Home again. said,
June 14, 2011 at 6:50 pm
[...] In the Sensory Garden designed by Joan Rogers in 2002, we sat and enjoyed the sunshine as one story led to another. Suddenly a robin landed on the railing round the pond, and watched and twittered at us. All four said in unison “That’s Dan’s Bird!” [...]