Once upon a time, there was a young blue jay named Marvin. Marvin lived in the forest, in a nest with all his brother and sisters. All of his siblings dreamed of one day soaring the skies like their mother. As each of his brothers and each of his sisters eventually left the nest, Marvin stayed home and looked after his mother. Each time another one of her children would leave the nest, she would look at Marvin and ask him, "Marvin, you have such beautiful feathers, much prettier than the world has ever seen, why don’t you leave my side and bless the world with your gorgeous colors?" Each time Marvin’s mother would ask him this question, Marvin would answer, "I look no different than all my brothers and sisters, why would anyone want to see me?" So, his mother would let the conversation die, and go on about her daily life, she simply couldn’t find it in heart to make her son leave. Days turned to months, months to years, and Marvin stayed home with his mother, until one day...

The sun poured over the nest where Marvin and his mother slept. Then a strange noise awoke them. Marvin had never heard a noise like it, and was quite frightened as it droned on and on and got louder and louder. "Mother?" Marvin questioned. "What was that?" "I don’t know," she replied, "but I’m going to find out." With that, Marvin’s mother disappeared behind the trees of the forest. Marvin was alone with his thoughts. "Don’t worry," he told himself, "I’m sure shell be back soon." Marvin waited all day, his mother didn’t return. By the next day, he saw something he couldn’t believe. Huge machines were slowly climbing their way up a hill right toward Marvin and his Mothers nest. All of the sudden, they stopped. Humans were climbing out of the metal monsters about to destroy his home. Meanwhile, Marvin’s mother was only trees away, but couldn’t fly home for fear of being seen by the strange things or the humans who operate them. Just then, a fat man carrying a strange device he held next to his head, walked right past her. He was screaming. "No there is no reason I should not destroy this forest!" He yelled. "Ok ok ok, ill make a deal with you, if I see one thing that amazes me about this place, I wont knock it down." After hearing that, Marvin’s mother knew what she had to do, she believed that if the fat man saw Marvin’s feathers, he might just love them as much as she did. As fast as she could she flew home to tell her son of her great idea. "Please son, it could save our home, everyone’s home!!" She pleaded. "Mom!" He would complain, "I’m nothing special!" So again, she would let the conversation go, and settled on his answer. With each passing day, the machines would grow closer and closer. Finally they were at their front door. They revved their engines and the fat man appeared between the machines and Marvin’s nest. He spotted Marvin’s mother, grabbed her and held her up for all his colleagues to see, "you see," he exclaimed "this is why I do not hesitate to kill everything in this place, nothing amazing lives here!" Just as the machines started rolling slowly forward, and Marvin’s mother had lost all hope of ever seeing her cozy old nest ever again, something bright blue landed on the fat mans shoulder. "What in blue blazes!" he yelped, the fat man stopped abruptly after seeing the beauty that sat on his shoulder. Everything in the forest stopped and went silent, everyone stared at Marvin. The fat man dropped Marvin’s mother, and with his mouth agape signaled another man over. Whispering something in the other mans ear, but never taking his eyes off Marvin. Slowly, the machines stopped, right before flattening Marvin’s nest. The man picked Marvin and his mother up, set them gently in their nest, and with a new twinkle in his eyes and a smile on his face, walked away, taking the whole group of machines with him, never to destroy another home again.

To this day Marvin lives in the same nest with his mother. The only difference is that people come from far and wide to see the most beautiful bird ever to be seen. No longer afraid to leave the nest, Marvin soars the skies truly believing he is something special.