My good friend Dale Estey and I decry the fact that – as we’ve grown older – we’ve come to realize there really is “nothing new under the sun.” There are few stories or facts so amazing or unique or unpleasant that we haven’t heard of them before – in some variation.

It’s a truism nailed in Ecclesiastes 1:9.

“What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun.” Ecclesiastes 1:9

It is true there is little – fantastic or horrific – that shocks or surprises me now. Folks be crazy. So many stories or objects feel like attempted recreations of familiar and well-worn themes. Stories follow well-worn paths to eventual resolution. Products ebb and flow in supermarkets and box stores. There is a certain sameness to them all, in spite of the come-ons promising “new and improved.”

My husband is an artist. For his doctor friend Dr. Marc Blasser, Hank painted a portrait of a rhino in situ on the plains of Africa. The rhinoceros is a special symbol for Marc. (His email handle is “King Rhino” for heaven’s sake. He is clearly committed.)

So when my husband delivered the painting some years back, Marc admired the finished product but, upon closer inspection, stared quizzically at the painting and asked: “Where are my oxpeckers?”

When my husband told me this story, I was a little taken aback. Oxpeckers? Seriously? Well, yes. They are a real thing. See all those little guys on the back of that hippo below? That’s them.

I knew vaguely of a symbiotic relationship that existed among African wildlife with some kind of birds. I did not know – until this recent conversation – what they were called.

Large African animals of many varieties – rhinos, hippopotami, giraffes, gazelle, water buffalo, et. al. – have an implicit deal with the oxpeckers. The large animals tolerate what might otherwise be the incessant and annoying presence of the birds.

The oxpeckers peck away at will on the lumbering beasts to rid their skin of pests, such as lice and ticks, and a variety of other savory and tasty bugs. In return for this favor, the animals do not kill the oxpeckers outright with a swat of their massive tails (like giraffes might do) or eradicate them en masse by suddenly submerging them under water without warning, (as in the case of hippopotami). That would be biting the bill that feeds off them.

It is a symbiotic and mutually beneficial relationship between beast and bird that you might be able to identify with if you’ve ever been covered with unwanted masses of lice or ticks. Personally, I have not.

Inspired by this story and the delightful and unusual moniker of these birds, I set out to integrate them into our life on a more permanent basis. We are in a new house and needed to set up a new internet domain. Oxpeckers Haven, I thought. Perfect.

There won’t be another domain name in the neighborhood to match it and it will likely cause the same sort of delighted comment that I had. Maybe a laugh or two, I mused.

Oxpecker. I admit I did not initially recognize the potentially obscene connotation. As it turned out, oxpeckers would not pass the internet service provider’s censors. Then I thought about it. Oh right. Well, it wasn’t as if I tried to call the domain name “bull’s penis” or somesuch. Maybe that would have made it through. I guess the offense was the suggestion of vulgarity.

I was doomed by the authority of the ignorant and presumptuous ISP censor. I was forced to concede that ours would not be the new internet home of Oxpeckers Haven. We chose a more banal, if personally meaningful to my husband, domain name: PanAmRTW. That may well be the subject of a blog post up the road.

Pity the poor oxpeckers. I sadly came to realize why I would never have learned about oxpeckers in geography class at the conservative and prudish school system where I received my elementary education.

Which, in the humble opinion of this lowly scribe, is bullpuckey.