This bird has had several lives that I know of. I came across him in New York City. He was standing on the sidewalk. I offered him a hand and he ran up my arm. Clearly he didn’t like being on his own. I took him to my apartment and put him in the dog crate for the time being.

I have cats and thought I couldn’t offer him a safe home. Some neighbors down the hall said they would put him up him for a few days. They had their own parrot and an extra cage. I hoped that was that and they would decide to keep him, but after a few days they said I needed to find him a permanent home. I talked to someone else I know who said he would take him. He had him for a year and taught him some basic Beethoven and how to laugh maniacally and make the noises Danny DeVito made as the Penguin. He named him Cyrano.

After a year his mother took Cyrano in and his name was shortened to Cyrie. She had the sort of laughter that at times sounds like sobbing. He stayed with her for two years and grew close to a small dog she had. He added her laughing style to his repertoire. He nailed it.

After two years she also could not keep him so I wound up with him. It took very little time for him to capture my all out commitment. I smoked at the time, thus he does a great smoker’s hack. He taught himself how to play the bell. And then he taught me how to ask him to play it. It’s hilarious.

He can be difficult. Although he was banded, meaning he was bred in captivity, he was at heart a wild animal. His type of parrot lives in enormous colonies and they all scream all the time. I think it is much like the Web, only completely benign. His scream is also a weapon. If I were too near to him when he was holding forth, the sound practically zombified me. It made it intensely difficult to think or even move. It is a super power.

I let his flight feathers grow out. It seems so wrong to take that from a bird. I also still have cats and wanted him to have that defense. He made friends with one but the other one kept an assessing eye on him. He likes other animals and appointed himself the spokesman for mine. He would not allow me to lose my temper with them. If I sat quietly and doted on one or the other he would say “Yessss” like he meant it. He quickly inserted himself into all our lives and became part of the tribe.

He loved to go outside and just watch the world, staying on my shoulder, sometimes running with his pointy little feet across my back to the other shoulder. If he was startled into flight he would do a couple of laps around the house and come back. It made me feel like I was in a Disney movie.

In the last week of February we had a two-day warm spell. I went outside with him. It was dense with fog but otherwise warm. He was startled by the garbage truck and didn’t come right back because the truck was taking some time there. That was the last time I saw him. At first I assumed he was nearby and waiting for the coast to clear. But I think he got lost in the fog and the winter landscape is so entirely different from what he was used to seeing.

The weather returned to February including monster winds and below freezing temperatures. I think he is probably alive, though. He is intelligent and does not like to be hungry or cold. He would have found a shoulder and aimed himself at it. I am hoping so, and if anyone knows of someone who suddenly had a parrot push his way into their life I would of course want to know. He is a strutting narcissist and if he found someone to dote on him all the time I would be happy for him. But I miss him. He is a huge presence and left quite a hole in my life.

Melissa Dooley lives in Norwich.

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