Haywards Heath

Throughout the story, birds symbolize hope and resilience amid change. The variety of birds come to represent the many different ways such resilience can look. The first instance of a bird is when Attila first greets Rosie at her retirement home. Outside, he sees another resident “[throwing] crumbs for a lone blackbird” while sitting next to her daughter. This rather melancholy moment hints at how constricted Rosie’s own life may have become, though the fact that the resident feeds the bird suggests that even a narrower existence need not lack for meaning and connection. Later, Rosie herself mentions two types of birds in the garden; as she’s walking with Attila, she says, “People say you can’t have two robins in the same garden, but there’s no truth in it. Look! [...] A wren.” Even in her changed and apparently reduced circumstances, Rosie continues to notice and take delight in simple details like everyday birds in a garden, reflecting both the tragedy of her memory loss and her resilience in the midst of it. Without denying the hardships of age, the presence of birds in the story suggests that hope persists if people are willing to look for it.