My first love… a feathered love

It all started in El Espinal – Tolima thirty years ago, when I was barely seven years old.
Back then my biggest concerns were memorizing multiplication tables… or understanding the biology of mammals, reptiles, amphibians, fish, and birds.

Everything changed when my dad arrived from Aguachica – Cesar, where he grew cotton. That night, the smell of guava and banana coming from the car made everything feel different. In my innocence I couldn't understand why my dad — and everything he'd brought — carried that scent…

Seconds later the mystery revealed itself: he pulled a box from the car, wrapped in a red-and-blue checkered blanket. I stood on my toes to see better; I only understood what it was when he set it on the floor, lifted the blanket, and out appeared a creature I couldn't identify. At first glance it wasn't pretty — fragile, tiny, featherless… but I saw its small beak.

— What's that, Dad?
— A parrot — he said.
— What's her name?
— Maruja!
— Maruja, like Tola y Maruja… from TV?
— Yes!

From that moment I renamed her Marujita.

As the days passed — and after I learned how to care for her, feed her, and teach her to talk — her soft green feathers came in, along with a bright yellow crest, red "shoulders," and vivid orange eyes whose pupils grew wide when she got excited. She was the most beautiful bird I had ever seen… nothing like the illustrations in my biology books or the sticker albums from Chocolatinas Jet.

Maruja was supposed to be the family pet — my brother's too — but from the very first moment it was Maruja and me…

Maruja and me riding bikes around the neighborhood…
Maruja and me walking to the corner store for the liter of Coca-Cola for lunch…
Maruja and me sleeping with the fan blowing in our faces every afternoon…
Maruja and me in every birthday photo and at my first communion…
Maruja and me discovering her favorite fruits (anything with seeds!)…
Maruja and me sharing a love of chocolate with bread…
Maruja and me repeating a word a thousand times until she learned it…
Maruja and me at Christmas, opening her gift: a little basket of fruit…
Maruja and me in the patio with the spray bottle, while she spread her wings in the heat.

I could go on: she stopped being "my pet" and became my friend — a little person with a beak, feathers, and tiny claws. For nearly fifteen years she taught me to love without shame, to care without expecting anything in return, to stop being afraid of tenderness. With her, I discovered love.

Up to here it sounds like a Disney film… but real life isn't. I learned that the day I lost Maruja: I understood grief, and that thought was born — the hardest one to shake — "Better not to love than to suffer the loss."

I was living in Bogotá studying advertising. I'd travel to see her and, sometimes, my parents would bring her in a small padded box.

One night at seven, my mom called: thieves had broken into the house… and among everything else, they took Maruja. Dad told me they'd ask for a ransom. I felt anger mixed with hope.

We ran spots on the radio — my aunt Fidelina is a journalist — we offered money, put her photo on TV, explained what fruits to give her… silence.

Months later, someone told my mom:
— Stop looking. The parrot is dead.
She had suffocated inside a piece of clothing the thief used to silence her.

Hope turned to guilt:
This wouldn't have happened if I hadn't left… if I'd taken her with me… if she'd been in the wild…

There is the root: birds must be where they belong. None of it would have happened if Maruja hadn't been taken from her habitat. Today only her memory remains.

That was my first love. Now Maruja and I live in my dreams: I bathe her, give her fruit, and scratch her little head…

PS: Finding your foundation moved me. I want to support you and, as someone in advertising, to offer my help… maybe that's how I ease the guilt of what happened to Maruja.

Sincerely,
Andrés Núñez

Analysis and reflections from Fundación Loros

The lesson is twofold. First, love that temporarily saves does not always repair the structural damage: a bird raised within walls never fully recovers its freedom or its sense of security. Second, the best defense against future "Marujitas" is breaking the chain of demand. Holding to the premise that every parrot belongs to the forest stops other children from discovering that affection — only to face, later, the emptiness of theft or accidental death.

Turning grief into action means supporting rescues, reporting illegal trade, and educating people about freedom. That way, Marujita's memory will not be tied only to loss, but to a commitment: that no other green treasure ends up wrapped in a stranger's shirt.