#58 Harry

Pushkin.

Hey, how are you?

I'm okay? How are you?

I I'm okay, I'm okay.

I find you one of our room money.

So you heard the news?

Did you?

Did you read the tweet that I sent you?

No?

Actually I haven't.

I've been working all day and I haven't had a chance to bet.

I can I read you the tweet from the Heavyweight account that we put out. Yeah, okay, it's a Heavyweight as it exists under Spotify will be ending after this season. We're so proud of everything we've made and we're hoping the show finds a new home in the future. Till then, stay tuned, stay subscribed, and thank you all so much for your love and support. Oh no, things are going to be okay. You know what, because it's it's it's show business. You know that song from Bugs Bunny Overtures,

How are you going to go on with the show.

We're going to try to find a new place for it. You know, we have an obligation to our listeners. Why does that make you laugh? I have an obligation to my listeners. Wait, let's let's just sit here together and think about all the laughter through the years.

You're can I hang up?

Can I hang up now?

Okay?

And you know what I'm gonna be okay, and you know you're gonna be okay. We're going to keep on doing this. I wanted to go to it.

This is my this is my I'm signing off.

I don't think you are. I don't believe it. I think you love doing this, am I right? Just admit it and I'll let you go.

Goodbye?

Hey, Jackie, Jackie, Jackie, thank you for these past eight years.

Oh sure, off milking it.

I'm Jonathan Goldstein and this is Heavyweight Today's episode, Harry. Right after the break, our story begins with two people, Ted and Todd or is it Todd and Ted in the plaid shirt. You are Ted, Yes, and you're Todd. That's great, okay, Hi, nice to meet you. Both Ted and Todd are identical twins, but not the Mary Kate Nashley cutie pitituiti type. They're more the slappy, happy, punchy, grumpy type.

If you hit me, one more time.

Case in point. That was the sound of Ted reacting to Todd, who, for no apparent reason, just whacked his brother in the arm. Is that a part of the way that you guys communicate?

Yeah, uh huh.

But if I'm not here, I mean, you don't punch each other?

Right? Not anymore? No, not anymore? No.

Ted and Todd are in their sixties. They both have long white hair and the stoic, deadpan affect of hitmen in a Cormac McCarthy novel. They grew up in South Dakota, surrounded by literal cowboys. Before the interview, they asked if there'd be cigarette breaks. They both smoke Pall Mall's, drink Keystone Lights, and they both work as contractors. They tell me they can't go into a home depot together without being asked the same asinine question, are you guys twins?

Well, just here's a little brother, and that's about it.

To spare you twenty odd minutes of coaxing and cajoling, I'll fast forward a bit to let you know that Scott was a year younger than Ted and Todd. He was the baby of the family and they often ended up taking care of him as older brothers. Ted and Todd were measured and steady. Scott, on the other hand, was fun and colorful.

Oh yeah, yeah, real bright personality. I mean he was just definitely his own individual for sure. Yeah, he got all the personality.

In school, Scott attracted attention, and not all of it good. This because, in addition to his big personality, Scott was gay. From a pretty young age, he was a target for bullying. But Ted and Todd always kept an eye out.

You couldn't go after our little brother because then you're gonna have to deal with that both of us. So one offense you're going to have three events. It's not because we liked it. We were protecting our family.

In spite of the haters, Scott remained a force to be reckoned with As a teenager. He once got into their dad's Lincoln Continental in the middle of the night and drove it almost one thousand miles across state lines at fifteen.

I mean that tells you how independent that he really was. Yeahad.

While Ted and Todd got married and settled down, Scott maintained his impish spontaneity, doing things like buying Ted and Todd's kids the candy they weren't allowed, or once, having promised his seven year old nephew a trip to the circus and then breaking his leg, made sure they could still go by teaching his nephew how to pump the clutch. Scott led a nomadic life. Every so often, Ted and Todd would get a phone call. Scott was in Roanoke, Virginia,

He wanted me to come down and get him now, which was not unusual.

Scott told Todd. He was in the hospital. When Todd got there, he was directed to a special ward.

And pretty obvious something was wrong. And I walked in and there must have been six other beds in there. Probably he was the youngest, and at that point he would have been in his early twenties, and everybody had gowns and masks and gloves and shields, and I mean, it was really bizarre, what is happening? And they said you weren't aware your brother's diagnosis. And then that's when they said, your brother has AIDS.

Scott wanted to get out of the hospital as quickly as possible, so Todd just put him in the car and drove him home. Never did they talk about AIDS or what it meant. They didn't talk much at all. Ted and Todd would call to check on Scott as often as they could. They'd ask if he was going to the doctor taking his meds? Are you taking care of it? They'd say, yeah, he'd say, And for the next few years, this is how it went until the day Harry arrived. Todd was on the phone checking in

Say in the background, It's like what is that.

That was Harriet aka Harry, a red and green parrot, a three foot long macau to be exact. Ted and Todd, of course had questions, questions like what the hell are you thinking? Scott had always loved unusual pets as a kid, He kept a squirrel in the house and even a bat, But there was something particularly worrying about adopting a parrot. It's longevity.

You have this disease.

We don't know how long you're going to live, and you buy an analyst is going to last eighty five to one hundred years.

Even for a healthy adult, such a purchase would mean a commitment that lasts into old age. In Scott's case, it felt like an act of denial.

What Scott did was what Scott always does.

Just I'm gonna do what i'm gonna do, and I like it and I want it, and that's how it's going to be, and it's gonna be fine.

And so Harry was suddenly a fact of their family's life. Wherever Scott went, there was Harry, and in time she won Ted and Todd over with her rowdy antics and foul mouth turns of phrase.

You son of a bit, Scott come here, you know what's for dinner.

Ted and Todd had five kids between them, all of whom adored their cool uncle and his crazy bird. They would take road trips together. Harry glued to Scott's shoulder. When they went to get dinner and left Harry in the hotel room, she'd scream, Scott, you fuck her. Annoyed to be left out of the fun. Harry was loyal to Scott and protective too. She'd nibble at the shunt in Scott's chest like it was a splinter that needed removal. As time went on, it became increasingly clear that Scott's

He just devoided personality, just like, wait, whoa, whoa, I want to talk to you. He goes, I'm just I'm not feeling Todd.

And the last time I talked to him, he just said, I said, what's going on with you? And he said I'm done.

A few days later, Scott died. He was thirty eight years old. Ted and Todd rushed out to California. Their mom, who'd been living with Scott, was devastated.

Because obviously she lost her son and her babe, her youngest at that and then you've got Harry that was making my little brother's voice and you know, would call mom mom.

Harry grew unmoored, getting aggressive with their mother and anyone else who tried to handle her. The only people who she'd let touch her, the only ones she felt safe with, were the ones who most resembled Scott, that is, Scott's brothers.

She was fine with Ted and I.

When we would get there, she would just cock her head and look as she say Scott.

In those moments, it felt like Ted, Todd, and Harry all shared some understanding. That word Scott was like a secret handshake. Before his death, Scott told Ted and Todd he wanted to leave Harry to Todd's eldest son, who was in junior high at the time, but Todd knew that keeping her just wasn't realistic.

I had to tell my son, no, it just it wouldn't be fair to Harry, It wouldn't be fair to you, because tonam a caw. I don't think people fully understand. I mean, they get angry, they can be destructive. You know, if you ever see their claws or their beak. You don't want any party business. End of those that she was chewing into the ceiling, into the attic. I mean, they're a wild animal.

And so they approached Harry's longtime glomer for help finding her a home. She offered to bring Harry to a nearby bird sanctuary or was it a pet store? Ted and Todd were so overwhelmed by Scott's death that they can't quite remember which they do remember though, the day of her departure, how their kids watched in tears as Harry, their beloved uncle's beloved pet, was taken away. Do you remember how Harry seemed to understand what was happening, How she howled.

Her wings were everywhere, and she was and she was yelling at us. It was just it was panemonium. It was heartbreaking.

Yeah, it was.

Tough at this point. Ted and Todd haven't seen Harry in over twenty years. But they do know one thing.

This bird could still be out there.

And so Ted and Todd have come to me with these questions, is she still out there? And if so, did they do the right thing in giving her up? Why do you think you're you're looking for for Harry?

Now, we always took care of our little brother, and that's the one thing we didn't take care of.

Ted and Todd had taken care of their brothers since they were children. Making sure Harry was provided for was the last things got needed from them and it's the only thing they couldn't do. Ted, do you feel guilt?

How about it?

Yeah?

Okay?

Can you say more about that? No, it's difficult to talk about Yeah it is, yeah, okay, So knowing that, knowing that Harry was okay, what would that What would that bring to you?

We'd just be happy to know she's fine. And emotionally, I don't really deal with that.

There's a part of them that doesn't want to talk about it at all.

This is Hannah, Ted's daughter in law. Because Ted and Todd are such a closed book, she's offered to help translate them for me. Hannah tells me that through Harry, Ted and Todd can broach a subject they wouldn't otherwise know how to approach, and doing that might allow them to forgive themselves.

So it's almost like they can talk about Harry in a way that's easier than talking about Scott.

It's kind of like a surrogate. I think there's just a lot of pain in the death of their brother.

Like, what I heard from Chase is that the one time that they've seen their dad's craze when their brother died.

Yeah, this is Chase, Ted's son and Hannah's husband.

They had no control over it.

I'm sure they couldn't make him take his mediciner, do the thing he was supposed to do as far as getting rest or going to the doctors, and like they couldn't go beat up aids.

When it came to their brother's death. Actions finally failed them. In actions, Hannah and Chase say, are the language Ted and Todd have for showing how they feel. Hannah says she can always tell when Ted and Todd have stopped by because some drywall will be sanded down, or she'll notice a fresh coat of paint.

They also always unplug my toaster because they don't want to catch fire.

Oh, I can always tell them.

They've been here because the toasters, they're always sort of taking care of you. You just choked to your house and realize, oh, they've been here, and they's like taking care.

Of some stuff.

Cowboy style.

Yeah, cowboy style, that's exactly it.

Hannah and Chase worry though that in cowboy style too, they suffer in silence.

Because I love them. I hope for them that if we found Harry it could they could heal more from Scott's death.

Yeah.

I think it would just be nice to know that she's doing.

Good, like she's like with people who'd let her cuss and do whatever she wants.

Kind of like an outlaw.

Yeah, live in the life.

Yeah, that's exactly it.

All right, Well, I'm going to do my best here. I'm going to try to find Harry. That would be good, Okay. Armed with an old photograph of Harry, I set out on my search. Since Ted and Todd don't quite remember exactly where they surrendered Harry, I begin my quest to find this bird of Paradise by phoning. Birds in Paradise is a pet store in southern California, not far from where Scott lived. The owner, Lorie, has had the store for decades and is an active member of the Southern

It's completely impossible.

But like, isn't the Macaw community in the area small enough that people would maybe through word of mouth, be able to find Uh.

Now, there's thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands of Macaus in.

The world, and it turns out it's difficult to tell one Macaw from another, even for an expert like Laurie.

And you don't know if you know, something has happened to the bird, if it's been rehomed again.

Is there is there any resources that that you can recommend?

I mean, that's what the Internet's about.

Do a Google search to explain to Laurie that that's what the problem is. I have nothing to Google search for. But Laurie is insistent it's just common sense. She says, with the Internet, you can simply Google search for whatever it is that you should be Google searching for.

With the Internet nowadays, it does make things a lot easier. I mean, say I met a man and I was possibly interested him. First thing I would do if I'd do a search on him?

Okay, okay, I'll put it this way.

I met a man at Disneyland, a few months ago and seemed like a really nice guy and gave me a business card. He was a police officer, okay, And I found out that police officer is married, oh my, and so let him know that I knew he was married, and I thought it was what he was doing. And I never spoke to him again.

But you told him that you confronted him. Good for you.

That's the kind of person I am.

I tell Laurie that while I respect her slew thing, her take no prisoner's style and the Internet as a whole, I don't know that any of this will help Ted and Todd. So Laurie offers one last glimmer of hope they'll find out.

When they die one day and go to heaven if anything happened to that bird.

That's beautiful. In the end, I do turn to the Internet, using it like it's nineteen ninety five all over again. And I just got an AOL complimentary cd ram in the mail. I joined Facebook groups like the Parrot Posse and Lost and found cockatiels and other bird companions. I even bookmark a site called the Big List of National and International Bird Clubs, but that all yields nothing. So as if it's eighteen ninety five all over again. Ahoy HOI. I turned to the telephone.

Thank you for calling Annie's mobile bird for me hi.

Yah and miss scale brad bird choice parent the landing's on parrot sectuary gives the permanent home.

I only have one.

Macau is it read by any chance?

No blue and gold?

Of everyone I speak with, nobody has seen any trace of Harry, and nobody believes I'll ever be able to find her. To what do I owe the pleasure of this invitation? But then one day my producer, Mona puts a meeting on my calendar.

As you know, we've been trying to find this parrot.

Oh I know Harry, I do know that, and.

I've been casting a whiter and whiter net because I feel like the feedback we've been getting is that like it's just like a shot in the dark.

That's a very generous appraisal of what we've been getting, because to me, it feels like it's been more like, no, this is insane. You are not going to find this bird. Stop trying to find this bird.

Sure.

Mona explains that she's been poking around on pet databases and.

I found some other parrots who kind of like had some our stories and looked old. And there was this one. What it came from?

This?

What makes a pair of look old? I think you can tell you're getting too deep?

They look grizzled.

Should I be concerned? Okay, do with me, Mona tells me her deep dive turned up a sanctuary we haven't tried yet.

It's called Oasis.

On the Oasis website, each of the hundreds of birds they house has its own profile page. Mona looked through every single one.

And that is when I found this.

Oh man, uh god, wow, I I don't know what to say.

So this is a red macaw named Harry.

Mm hmm.

Look at the right wing.

I know.

Oh, and look at the rings around the eye. Oh no, even the beak is similarly. Oh, this is compelling. This Harry looks identical to the photo of Harry that Ted and Todd sent me. So you have not called the Oasis sanctuary yet, I have not.

I was thinking maybe now.

The Oasis Sanctuary. This is Janet Trumbull, director of the Oasis. I mean, with great excitement, I explained my quest and his macaw was also named Harry. And so we begin comparing Harry's the Harry who lives at the oasis, Janet tells me arrived there as a Harry.

Yep, he even says his name Harry.

Really yeah, so I know when we walk up to Harry, he.

Always says, hi, Harry. Janet refers to Harry as a he because she's done a DNA test. She says that otherwise it's nearly impossible to determine a parent's biological sex, so it would be understandable if Scott thought Harry or her. I asked Janet, what else she can tell me about Harry.

So he came to us from California.

Oh, not just California, Janet says, but southern California, an hour and a half away from Yucca Valley, where Scott had lived. It seems Harry was taken in by a family with young children who teased and harassed him. In their care, he grew increasingly aggressive, and so they had no choice but to surrender him to a woman in the area who fostered difficult birds. Eventually she brought Harry to the Oasis.

She guessed his age at twenty two. I don't know how okay, okay, he arrived in twenty twenty.

Our Harry hatched in the late nineties, so twenty two in twenty twenty lines up perfectly. Janet, that would be it. Yeah, Oh my goodness, Well this is very unexpected.

Yeah, it's kind of cool.

We found a macaw whose name is Harry, who's the right age and who's from the right place. So I get back in touch with Ted, Todd and the rest of the family. Hi High High, Hi, Hello, it's nice to see you all. I tell them about everything I've been up to over the last few months, the sanctuaries and bird groomers, the pet stores, Lori's, Disneyland, Jigglow, and finally I show them the photo of the Harry who lives at Janet Sanctuary in Arizona. Do you believe that this is Harry? Oh?

Yeah, yeah, I'm sure that's Harry. Yeah, that's firstly I thought.

Yeah, Ted and Todd are convinced this is Harry, But as a freshly minted bird journalist, I can't yet make the call. As Laurie told me, individual macaus are nearly impossible for people to identify. They all look the same. Birds, on the other hand, can tell humans apart just fine, So to truly confirm that this Harry is our Harry, we need to know whether he recognizes Ted and Todd. And for that there's really only one thing to do. I guess what I'm winding up to here is I've

I think with these two.

It's hotter in hell in Arizona in July.

But yeah, after the break, eight hundred miles to see about a bird, all right, we're here. Ultimately there was no road trip. Instead, the family decided to fly to Arizona. Ted and Todd said it was the first time they've flown in nearly three decades. The last had been for their father's funeral. Ted and Todd, Chase, Hannah, Todd's daughter Jessica, and two grandkids all meet me in a Tucson Walmart parking lot, and.

Then Ted and Todd jumped out because they We're anxious to gather KRD smoke.

Where are they smoking?

Where by the propine takes?

Are you serious? By the pro paine takes? Hannah, as it turns out, is serious. I find Ted and Todd sucking down Paul Maul's indeed beside the propane tanks, which thankfully are empty.

Ah humid, it's humid.

As people pass by, they can't help staring a little too long at the two identical men, tall and slim with long white hair. For Ted and Todd, who shy away from the limelight in all of its forms, who hate to be the focus of attention, To be so notable must be a special kind of hell. The Rubbernecker's rubberneck. While Ted and Todd flashed identical expressions on their identical faces, a look of complete blankness. Cigarettes smoked, We all pile

Hi, nice to meet you, Ty Todd.

Janet greets us at the entrance of the sanctuary.

All right, well, let's go ahead and go inside.

So I'm thinking the Oasis is home to twenty two separate aviaries housing hundreds of tropical birds, almost all of which, amazingly Janet knows by name.

Bubbles that he's a Patagonian conyer.

There's Cosmo, Tutsi, Molly, Sammy, Toby, and Modene. There's Oscar, a blue and gold macaw who Janet tells us recently lost her mate, and Congo and Timmy, a pair of African grays. There are two green wings, Tango and Cash, named for the Sylvester Stallone Kurt Russell film about two minus smashed lapd officers. But while that Tango and Cash enjoy shooting off firearms and punching people in the face, this Tango and Cash enjoy eating honeydew and philbirds. Somewhere

Saying, when you guys pulled up, Harry was screaming.

Do you think there is a chance that Harry will recognize these guys.

It's very possible.

It's hard to say, and because he's not a cuddly bird, you know, I'll have to kind of read his body language.

As we get closer to Harry's enclosure, we suddenly hear kill Harry, Harry, Hi.

Harry, Yes, Hi Harry, And there he is shuffling around on a tree branch.

Throughout this whole quest, with all the phone calls and Internet searching, I'd forgotten how beautiful these birds are. Harry's feathers are so vivid, he makes the world around him seem black and white. Harry looks like Saturday Morning cartoons, ten thousand crayons, a sunset, and a room full of gogains, all set on fire. Looking at him, it makes sense that the most colorful brother, which choose a most colorful pet, but seated right beside Harry, almost wing to wing, is

Yep, They're always like that, right together, and you can see he's being very protective of her. They have bonded, very strong bonds, so we won't ever separate those two.

Harry sidles up to Valentina, and as he draws closer, I can see that that while Harry is indeed beautiful, his feathers are ruffled and patchy, and his tail is shredded. Janet says the loss of feathers is something he's done to himself. It's a behavior called plucking.

It's very common for parrots in captivity to pluck.

She says.

Plucking can start when birds are stressed or frustrated or grieving.

They do definitely grieve, Yeah, because their bonds are very deep.

Yeah.

It's hard to tell how Janet's words are affecting Ted and Todd, but I suspect it might be adding to their guilt, exacerbating their own tendency to pluck. That the many should haves and could haves.

Talk to him.

He remembers, you we all step back and allow Ted and Todd's space to approach. All eyes are on them, and with all the self consciousness of two self conscious men who must address a bird before a crowd of family and near strangers.

They begin, Hi, Harry, Hello, Harry, how are you see Yah?

She's responding.

Harry's body language shifts. He leans towards Ted and Todd. See how he's sitting forward. It's okay, look at ams just looking at him?

You're okay?

So I see some recognition there.

It looks like we found our bird. Harry starts to come closer, but Valentina reaches forward with her beak and tugs on his feathers.

It looks like Valentina's keeps pulling him back, is what I'm seeing. Like he does want to engage, but then she says no and gives him a little little nip.

Yeah, she looks like, you get upset it.

We can leave you alone, we can let you be buddy.

Ted and Todd are reluctant to be a nuisance. They decide to leave the enclosure, and we all file out behind them. At last, Ted and Todd have found Harry, and although worse for where, he's okay. Still Ted and Todd don't seem satisfied.

I think I just felt like, you know, you're.

It's just disappointing.

It's like they were hoping for something more, something closer to forgiveness. But what does forgiveness from a bird even?

Look like? Let's go ahead and get out of here. Yeah, I hate everybody watching. I hated everybody watching.

Well shall we go on?

Half heartedly? Ted and Todd acquiesce and Janet continues the tour. She shows us the monk parakeets who look nothing like Tony Shaloub.

Smaller species Kanyer's Quakers.

She shows us the lovebirds, of whom I consider asking Janet if she's ever caught making whoopie bloodbirds can be extremely aggressive, but reconsider, and she shows us a rose breasted cockatoo, the Samantha Jones of the aviary Good bad men a love. While I'm having the time of my life watching Nature's drones all throughout the tour, Ted and Todd LaGG behind. It's only while engrossed by a parrot named Lady Gray and her ability to repeat the word cracker. Did you hear that?

Cracker?

Cracker, that I look around and see that Ted and Todd have disappeared. It's only later on, when reviewing the tape that I realized where they disappeared too.

Oh, welcome to see Harry one last time? Yeah about the hord? Mmm without the hord.

Ted and Todd had doubled back to see Harry without the horde.

Hi, guys, Hello Harry, Hi Harry.

Where does go friend? Though he's.

This time? When Ted and Todd show up, just the two of them, Valentina stands back and Harry makes his way down the branch. He seems to feel safe. Yeah, and Ted and Todd seemed to feel safe too. Without the expectant eyes of the group upon them, they can finally ask the question they really want to ask, that they've flown across the country for.

Do you remember Scott? You remember Scott?

To that.

He's watching.

Harry doesn't respond, but then Todd has an idea.

Harry, son of a bitch.

He starts cursing like a constipated French sailor.

God damn it, Harry, God damn it, Harry. Come here, Harry, Come here.

Harry takes a couple more Leary steps down his branch.

Yeah, sound like Scott.

It sounded like Scott, says Ted. Now at this point, I've listened back to this tape hundreds of times. I'm not sure what I hear. It does kind of sound like he's saying Scott, sort of. But I guess it doesn't matter what I hear. What matters is what Ted and Todd hear. And it seems like they hear forgiveness.

I'm glad you're okay, Hey, leave them alone?

Yeah, probably.

Bye, Harry, say bye.

Bye.

The two near identical men wave goodbye to the two near identical birds.

I'm glad he's going all right. Yeah, that's.

And with that, Ted and Todd go back to the group, and Harry and Valentina go back to living that outlaw life. In the end, Harry has something neither Ted nor Todd nor any human could have given him. He's paired in this world with one of his own. Of all people, Ted and Todd should be able to appreciate that. And so with this last deed for their brother Don, there's only one last deed to do.

Do you have a sagarette with you? Let's go back over here. They're gonna give us so much of ship about it. I don't know to deal with these shirts, no fucking hockets, No this, honey, mad youre always go everything. I gotta mature in the market.

That the furnitures returning.

To its goodwill home. Now that the last month's rent is scheme with the damage to pros, take this moment to do so, if we meant it, if we talk were felt around for five from things Good.

Accidentally, this episode of Heavyweight was produced by Phoebe Flanagan, Mohemy mcgouger, and me Jonathan Goldstein. Our Senior producer is Khaleila holt Our, Supervising Producer is Stevie Lane. Special thanks to mime O'Donnell, Lauren Silverman and Catherine Brewer. And special thanks as always to the one and only Jackie Cohen. Editorial guidance from Emily Condon. Bobby Lord mixed the episode with original music by Christine Fellows, John K. Sampson, Blue

Weaker Thans sign in an empty.

So take a minute.

Sadaze by ninety million long Lean Miles, watch a shadow across you.

We don't live here anymore.

The entirely shocked of the scene it ever airs. If what if this scene ever airs? Oh yeah, I wouldn't think so.