Death and the Love Birds, Not Necessarily in that Order...

This blog is about a story and the concept of death. Not necessarily connected, you might say. However, everything living is connected to Death. A story is a concretization, through written or oral tradition, of events or occurrences that have some basis in reality. An experience, a sighting, a feeling...our stories are about us, and death IS a part of our lives... This blog is also a result of events and occurrences in my life...

Let's start with the love birds. I have a pair of lovebirds in my house - Senor and Senorita. About ten days back, Senor, an unruly, noisy brat of a bird, had a window of opportunity, literally, or what he thought was a window of opportunity. I had left the cage door open while taking out the food tray. The guy took his chance and off he flew. I hunted around a while, but in vain. I hoped he might have flown away to some better place, and tried to be glad for him.

Until the friend who had introduced me to these birds said there was little chance of the guy surviving - the crows would kill him. I was aghast, as it reminded me of scenario where a kid sets out to explore this absurdly wonderful place called his neighborhood, only to be bullied and beaten up by the neighbor's kid. But anyways, if that was how it was to be, so be it!

Then, yesterday the kids from the hood come and tell me that the guy is alive, in another chap's house. So I rush there, and the little bloke is there, chirpy as ever! Apparently the crows were chasing him, and he sort of flew into this family's house, and the people kept him. He nipped the guy that caught him, of course, because Senor is the perfect example of the Little Sergeant syndrome (about that, in another blog). It was nice of this family to have taken care of him. Of course, he is cute and makes funny faces and sounds...:-)) The people there had even got a female bird to keep the little chap company.

I thanked the kids for looking after the little guy, and there was this procession back home, me and the little chap and a large number of kids. Anyways, finally the little fella is back, and the house is noisier than ever.

The moral of the story - strange things can happen that will make you realise the value of people and stuff you usually take for granted, even little ones...

I couldn't help but think of Senor's brush with death. His static life inside the cage had, for a few moments, suddenly exploded into a dynamic possibility - flight, freedom even (however misplaced that notion might seem, because no one is ever free). In fact, I think everything about our lives is dynamic. Our existence is dynamic, constantly changing. There are, I believe, two constants in all life. I will limit myself for obvious purposes, to human life. There are two constants in our lives - change and Death.

Change is eternal in our lives. From the moment a human life is conceived in the womb (let us take conception as the first event in our lives, for otherwise there is the chance of us getting into a never-ending cycle of birth and existence - you know, before us, our parents came, and before them...you get the drift, I guess...), there is change. In the number of cells, from a single sperm fertilising an ovum to a multicellular complex life form (what we normally call the foetus or baby or child) to multi-faceted complicated individuals (commonly - you and me and everybody else on this Earth). In adapting to situations and thinking new thoughts and ideas. Did you realize that to be a moron also takes an extraordinary degree of complication in the nervous system, for a malfunction to happen?

The other constant in our lives, I know, is death. From the time we are born, there is one supreme ultimatum - we have to die. Our act of living a life and trying to make something of it - achieving success, failure even, is one of the greatest ironies or acts of courage, depending on how you look at it, as a cynic or as an optimist.

So much more to pen down, but sleep beckons... more tomorrow.

A love bird update... ever since Senor's adventure became public knowledge (the procession back home seemed proof of his popularity), there has been an explosion of love bird population in my apartment block. Every kid wants one, however cruel that may ultimately be. The spillover has been that the numbers in my house are now 4, two more came courtesy the landlord's son, who could not look after them properly...