Mischievous miscellany-4 # 368#

The agony of found, lost and critics:

Inspiration and creativity go hand in hand as light and shadow. At times a befuddled mind gets confused to distinguish which is what. More often than not, when an inspiration shows a spark, the needed material like a piece of paper to scribble it on might not be on hand. 

Try to capture it as a point in memory, it plays truant and makes that spark inaccessible. Creativity has no other go but to wait for it to resurface or for another inspiration to make its leisurely appearance. Probably this is the beginning of a writer's block!

The cloud burst or fizzled out rain drops, avalanche or floating snowflakes - an inspired spark can affect creativity, be it writing, art or music. 

Inspiration and creativity pivots around a single objective - admirers. Admirers play the vital role of nurturing creativity in any form.

Inspired imagination makes the child to draw shapes as pleased, admires it as perfect and as an art of a maestro. Parents join only to encourage. A third person might view it as awkwardly drawn lines and a waste of paper and crayon. Here comes another perception in the cloak of a critique.

Creative works by grown-ups is saddled with the weight of carrying the expectations of casual, serious, dismissive readers and critics ready to do a laser surgery. These laser surgeons have no kindness toward a budding creator. The critics might be thinking about ways to reduce the clumps and clusters from the market.

The disheartened creators, hope for another brilliant flash of inspiration. Now, it is the chance for that inspiration to play hide, scoot and then seek in the mind. Words become reluctant not to form into sentences. They have to be dragged out or scratched out to start afresh.

After a few scratched attempts, the surviving sentence reads anaemic lacking the punch. The artist goes through a similar experience with palette and paint on the canvas. The inspired hues do not come out, the picture in the mind refuses to come to life and so on.

Song writers suffer splitting headache by looking at a blank paper, without the words to rhyme with rhythm.  In effect the song writer has to play the role of a word arranger even before a music arranger gets to work with meters and notations that are only symbols to the song writer.

Yet these passionate individuals trudge, toil and produce a work product. In fact, if some experienced writer takes it up to write about their struggles, it would come out as a best seller.

The irony haunting a budding author or artist or song writer, is the indigestion of admirers or appreciators, when it comes to spare a nod, a read or a clap. Their reasons might well be - shy to shake hand with the unknown or have already burnt candles and fingers in an earlier attempt to extend support to a budding clan or thinking why at all to bother with.

The seven layers of “Can we do it?”:

 Taken at face value, a very friendly inviting sentence. Behind the scenes a few traps might be hanging.  If we can peel back the layers, we might get to know the real intent and purpose of this inviting "Can we do it?" 

Layer one: 

Unsure or not having a S O P, the inviter floats a balloon to attract willing minds to help out. The invite might end after shaping the S O P, if further help is not needed. 

Layer two:

It must be something beyond the S O P. Probably to draw willing minds into a brainstorm for the sake of friendship or relationship. Might or might not end here! 

Layer three:

After the brainstorming, the inviter might be aiming to co-opt the energy of the willing mind and hands, in the name of synergy in executing the S O P. A subtle hint that you may have to dirty your hands. 

Layer four: 

If the inviter is after a name for self, a carefully couched, 'I think, I can handle it from here onwards, thanks' to signal a ‘now, get off the train.’ 

Layer five:

Fearing an egg on the face, the inviter cheerfully declares, ' If you don't mind, can you complete it?'. Rejoice. You have been chosen as the eggshell breaker! 

Layer six: 

“Yes, you have the right approach and I fully agree.”  When the inviter does not want to do it but is saddled with the task, then whatever you suggest will be accepted with alarming magnanimity. This is a warning signal to beat a hasty retreat and if you drag your feet, then headache is all yours. 

Layer seven:

This is where you do an introspection. Why did you rush to respond? Why could you not assess the implications of the invite, which could have actually meant a ‘can you do it or ‘let us do it?? Why did not you walk out, when the intent has become clear? 

Don't reply that you are distancing yourself from the above questions! Remember you are not a politician. 

Talk in the park:

Bystander was pleasantly surprised at the beauty of the renovated park. He had been away and thereby a long gap fell between him and his favourite park. Butterflies winging on their flight paths over the flower beds, grasshoppers practicing high jumps and few dung beetles beating their drums with mandibles and antennae gave the atmosphere a kind of serenity. During a leisurely stroll, the flood of memories about many friendly and sometimes heated discussions that took place here, filled his mind. With these thoughts, he started searching for at least one familiar from among the many populating the park.

He was in luck. A friend from that discussion group was sitting on a bench, at the other end of the park. He hurried, brimming with joy, to meet greet and exchange some old yarns. But the not so happy face of the friend stirred a bit of concern in him. This particular friend was always cheerful and tried to lighten the dark moods in others with a bit of humour, satire and philosophy.

Bystander reminisced -

Once, this friend asked, “What is common between a fisherman and a cricketer?” The others present did not reply but with serious faces asked,” Do tell”

With a childlike glee he answered, “Glums, it is the net-practice and catch!”

Another time, parted with this advice to another friend, “Before deciding to criticize someone, better walk a mile in their shoes.”  Puzzled, the other man asked, “Why should I do that?”

Twisting a proverb in to a satire he sardonically replied, “That way you will be a mile away and will have the shoes too!” Needless to say, the irony or satire was lost on the assembled friends.

On the other hand, his philosophy was neither the metaphysical nor materialistic.  Once questioned, this friend had quipped, “You can see something as a material but cannot visualise the underlying metaphysical concept in it. The beauty present in one may or may not be felt by you in the other, is it not?”. 

Bystander noted the absence of these traits and as if the friend wanted to remain reticent, and felt the need  to ferret him out of the rut, even by force.  Settling down, Bystander asked him, “Why are you looking so glum?”

“How else should I look? You are well aware of the struggles I had undergone to get them off on to a good footing? If not willing to acknowledge and appreciate them, at least they should not attempt to begrudge and write-off my efforts as bad loans. 

Bystander understood that this unbecoming attitude of his son and daughter had deeply hurt his friend. Maybe, after enduring all the hardships, he might have been expecting at least an acknowledgement, if not praise. Not to leave his friend to wallow in this pit of self-pity, he hastened to engage him with general platitudes without hurting his feelings further more.  “We think someone needs our help but in reality, they may not. In a family, the medal of appreciation is not given for a valid reason. It is to discourage continuing with such activities beyond a point. The crux of the matter is to find out the “why”. Is it because they themselves did not get appreciated for their current efforts or have they chosen to go in denial mode overwhelmed by envy that you have done it and they could not." 

His friend calmly looked at him and said, “Are you speaking in general or after understanding my family matrix?” 

“My understanding of your family matrix has nothing to do with whatever I have just said. But coming back to the issue, I have only this to say - be more interested in the future as you know the past is not a wall clock that could be reset at will!” 

His friend refrained from asking, “whose future?” fearing another load of future-wise sayings. Changing the topic, his friend asked, “Why people who start with an ideal, pursue it for some time and then abandon it altogether?” 

Now it was Bystander’s turn to blink. Unknown context made him to hesitate, but his nature did not allow him to remain silent. He thought about “How to comfort a person valuing perception over acceptance? Why is he finding it difficult to accept that all the perceptions and emotions border on the metaphysical discipline?” 

Gearing up, Bystander said, “It is like digging a pit and then trying to close it up, without thinking about what to do with the soil that would surely be left-over? When an ideal is pursued and then abandoned, surely that person has to deal with helplessness like the left-over soil. Had the pit digger foreseen this possibility, would we be talking about it now? An ideal should remain locked in the mind, till such time the plan to execute it flawlessly has not been firmed up. Maybe, you would be comfortable with this explanation!” 

Bystander continued, “None of us could understand this unreadable googly and yet cannot remain passive. Think of these two things – How could you get the oil out, without digging a deep well? In reality, can any of us tell the universe to mind its business? How incognizant it would be?” 

The friend regretted   opening the can full of condescending worms. He did not understand any of the above explanations as to content or context. He played dumb and asked, “In this situation what you would have done?” 

Bystander’s reply was prompt and confusing. “I would get off thinking like this. My own head would not be the reliable place to hear things that I have been refusing to hear.” 

The friend did the next best thing possible. He bade a hasty goodbye and left Bystander wondering “did I annoy him?”

The friend thought to himself, “I should have told him that a person standing on his hands should not be carried away by the thought that he is holding the world in his hands!” He dismissed the idea as it was too long even to say it within himself. But by that time, he decided to say it aloud, Bystander was a diminishing figure in the distance.

A bridge over the generation gap: 367

ChintaMany is driven by two things. Worries in the first place and curiosity coming in the second place. When getting tired of worrying about worries, he turns his attention to curiosity to relax the frayed nerves. Curiosity time took him on a visit to the realm of science & technology and the subject it picked up was on bridges. Dismissing further suggestions from his curiosity, he chose the Chenab rail bridge to let his mind to dwell up on the world's highest railway arch bridge. Looking down from it, he stared at the 359 meters drop to the flowing river and from the riverbed. From the ground up, he knew it stood 35 meters taller than the Eiffel Tower. Its span length of 1,315 meters and includes a 785 m arch span. A bridge bridging the gap with steely determination. 

Built to withstand extreme wind speeds up to 266 km/h and engineered to withstand major earthquakes up to magnitude 8, blast loads equivalent to 40 t of TNT, function in extreme cold down to -20°C with an estimated service life of 120 years. Along with other major engineering structures it completes the Udhampur-Srinagar-Baramulla Rail Link (USBRL) for operating train services across the region to connect people and trade. 

The arch span of 785m and the longevity of 120 years under severe service conditions, set him to think about the bridge of a different kind.  He repurposed his curiosity to explore the characteristics of this bridge built with human emotion and, if fortunate, having the possibility of serving generations up to 120 years during the constructor’s lifetime. 

Grandparents have been acting as the bridge between their children and grandchildren, spanning over the generation gap. The bridge on the Chenab might be the tallest engineering marvel but looks ordinary when compared with any grandparents’ biological marvel. 

This biological bridge conjured up by the grandparents is built with emotion and is by far better than the one constructed with cold, feelingless iron over the river Chenab. Water flows under the Chenab bridge while feelings of love and care engulf the bridge itself. ChintaMany imagined that at the most 3 sets of grandparent-grandchildren combination will be using this bridge. The question of how it is possible was deftly answered by him, “Considering the parents of Mother and Father of the children the head count of grandparents increases thereby improving the probability!” 

The bridge of the grandparents has its positives and headaches. With the free pass a grand child gets from grandparents, the child finds itself in the world (universe might sound a bit cliche) of toys, books, dresses. The grandparents are ever ready to fire this time-tested missile, whenever the grandchild finds itself in lukewarm or hot water – “at that age while toting a lighter schoolbag what did you manage to do, better than this? The truth that the parents might have done better just got devalued to come out in support of the grandchild. 

On becoming a parent, the same child which enjoyed many grandparental parachuted bail-outs and having had a free run during the academic years, straps this “now” child in a rollercoaster. For this ‘now’ child, the after-school hour timetable becomes longer than the school schedule. Here is where, the ‘now’ grandparents chose to step in to give a breather. "Don't rob the childhood in order to catch up with the buses you had missed. You plodded through a lighter curriculum. Standing on the shore, you cannot judge the depth of an ocean and likewise don’t try to fathom what a child thinks!"

This “now” child on becoming a parent, after enjoying as many free runs as the grandparents allowed, now tries to secure the child in a warp drive zipping onwards on the academic travel. The child finds the coaching classes and competitive exams take more hours than a day has and wonders whether to borrow or write it off. When off key academic performances and overstaying in the realm of Smart devices disturb the parent, the grandparents provide an umbrage – “Cool your jets. In your times neither you nor these devices were smart.  Don't rob on the silk too much, static charge might sting!" This safety net of a Kevlar vest and an Iron dome defense very effectively takes care of the bullets and drone attacks launched by the parent.

For this child of the warp drive fame, it is change of guard time. On becoming a parent, invoking amnesia the parent subjects the child to a regimen of academic processes. This quarter-master sergeant turned parent gets out ranked by the child’s grandparents wielding overruling batons. The grandparents metamorphose and swoop in like a transformer character to help the child in distress. “Don’t you people know that times have drastically changed from your textbooks to the ‘now’ books? What you struggled to understand in college, now they do it in 5^th or 6^th grade. Help the child to grasp and cope up without pouring out your vintage gripe”

For good measure the grandparents asked. " Will not the present ‘now’ become the later and carry this forward? Do you want that the later should become the now, starting an unending cycle!" The child did not grasp the grandparents’ convoluted philosophy, but it appeared that they are intent on keeping the bridge passing overhead of a generation, without bumps for a smooth drive. The child wondered to which parents’ side of grandparents this philosophy will get attributed to?”

Grandparenthood could happen at the age of 55-60. If this being the case, ChintaMany felt the need to work out the math to find out whether this emotional bridge will last 120 years as he had thought earlier. Losing further interest in the curiosity, he picked up the worry where did he go wrong?

Are the grandparents trying to correct how they had dealt with their children?  If feelings belong only to that person, can someone else scrutinise it? Is an emotion valid only if someone allows it to be shown? Who can judge the act of a loving someone, without demanding anything in return, as beneficial or not? Don’t they have the child’s mental wellbeing also in mind?

Are the parents trying to implement what they had been subjected to? Or the overly concerned parents appear to act tough to secure the child’s future?

Whether the “now” children will ever think of following a different approach? Who would know, what this ‘subjected’ child thinks?

Iterating everything in his mind, ChintaMany came to the conclusion that it is best to leave it to the grandparents and the parents who think and act with the best interest of the child in mind., hoping the child would make the best use of both!

The road to nowhere: 359

The sweltering heat made it impossible to have his forty winks, drenched in sweat. Imaginch did not know who and what to blame – the El Nino or La Nina. Both being Spanish citizens, continental hopping did not appeal to him.  He did the next best thing- squirmed left and then right and then left on the bed, curled and stretched to end up with cramped leg muscles.

Getting nowhere near the comfort zone, he blamed the very reluctant and delayed onset of REM cycles. Subconsciously, he had used the operative word ‘delayed onset’ preferred by weathermen to be vague in order to escape from the heat of the population being scorched by relentless heatwaves. The weathermen did not dare to include “what has gone up would come down eventually or try forcing the clouds to shed the hoarded rain, if you could?” in their bulletins.

Somewhere in the no man’s land between El Nino - La Nina combine and the REM cycles, the ‘delayed onset’ of sleep reluctantly enveloped him. His last thought before drifting off in to sleep was about the probability of a power outage playing spoil sport. Not wanting to look in the mouth of the gifted horse, in this instance - on falling asleep, Imaginch promptly sidelined his concern about probable power outage, to let the REM cycles do the rest.

Since he had lost track of time, he did not know how long he had slept. As a super senior citizen, he could sleep when he wanted to, eat whenever hungry and do it in whatever order he wanted to. He had no office to hurry to and no schedule of activities to follow.

He had a reputation in the family - to dole out stinging comments right out of an acid bath. The family members suffering under similar spell of El Nino-La Nina induced REM cycle disturbances, and ‘delayed onset’ syndrome became wiser and simply let him have that much freedom. Sanity sans sleep was not a comfortable option for them!

At the fag end of a particular night, Imaginch picked up a slight change in the atmospheric pressure around him. Still not fully awake, an audio-dream started playing in his mind. His interest perked up as he heard his friend intoning, ‘Don’t expect the road to take you wherever you want to go; instead take that road which goes wherever you want to.’

Hearing his friend’s voiceover forced his subconscious mind, caught there in the no man’s land between the layers of dissolving sleep and wakefulness, to ask, “Are you awake, what is time now?” Instead of a straight answer, he heard his friend saying, “If you have not asked me, I know what it is. Since you have asked, I do not know how to explain it.!”

Still struggling under layers of sleep, Imaginch’s subconscious mind became curiously irritated, to hear the explanation that was sure to follow.  That much his subconscious mind knew about this friend, while hedging its bet on whether it would be about time or something else.

Predictably, the recital started with “As a kid, I used to imagine that the road in front of the house would take me to unknown places filled with amusements. The windowsill provided a perfect perch to watch it whenever I wanted to. At that time, this ruse helped me to postpone doing the homework. But the road had other ideas and the only place it took me was to the school and back. The amusement part was an occasional sighting of a vendor with a stock of balloons or sugar candy in different colours. One exception was the ice (frozen water) in orange or brown colour and the milk-ice (milk powder+ water?) on sticks. The vendor blew a horn which always sounded funny and off key to my ears.”

Imaginch sleepily murmured, “Why this story at this time?”  Turning philosophical the friend said, “Clearing your doubt may not bring clarity but it may leave you with an appearance of clarity”.  Concerned about his friend’s frame of mind, Imaginch waited for the narrative to continue 

“Secondary and higher secondary education meant another school and travel by a different road.  I had hoped that change would take me to places but it turned out that I had to ride a cranky old bicycle to school. A puncture or the chain jumping the rear gear or chainring, was all that the road had in store for me.

In front of the school, vendors sat or stood with push carts selling Indian black berry, Indian jujube or plum, wild date, strips of raw mango cut to resemble a linear gearwheel and fried or steamed ground nut in paper cones dispensing more paper per ground nut. The local ice factory products came in insulated boxes mounted on bicycles. I could only yearn for any of them as the concept of pocket money was not encouraged in my house! Window shopping was the only amusement I enjoyed.

During that grind of schooling, I upgraded my focus to dream about a college set among sylvan trees and the branches of well grown trees forming an arch of welcome on the road leading to the campus. Where I got enrolled, that college sat inside a dusty bowl of earth and only overgrown thorny bushes stood on the sides of the road watching my progress to the campus.  But this desolate geographical feature did not deter me from hoping that there definitely would be a road, to take me to places where I wanted to go.

With a degree in hand, I aspired to land a job that would throw open the routes to take me to foreign countries. I had a bag full of these dreams dwarfing the efforts an avid philatelist collecting rare stamps or a phillumenist colleting label of matchboxes. The job market, breathing like a beached whale under global economic stress, threw up a position. I grabbed the offer as it was from a subsidiary of an international conglomerate.  The company gave me a hand grip loaded with samples, brochures, a box of classy looking business cards and an order book. You guessed it right, as a sales rep.

Weighed down by the grip and with a heavy heart, I trudged along the roads, climbed stairs and gave my spiel singing the praise of the company’s products. Whether the order book got filled up or not it helped me to improve my oratorial skill.  To keep my dreams alive, I took the logo of the parent company as equivalent to an international travel visa and the stairs I climbed as the travel to exotic places in foreign countries.

The food laden carts on the roadside, take aways from crowded joints and a mess hidden away in bylanes became substitutes for food courts, cafes and restaurants filling up the gaping blanks. My hopes kept crashing like waves on those beaches in those foreign countries. I don’t know where I had missed that road that would take me to places where I wanted to go?”

By this time, Imaginch understood where his friend was going with this rant and still was eager to know about the roads that have not taken him to where he wanted to go.

His friend continued, “A few years after toting the grip of a representative, I decided to strike out on my own. I was confident that my combined Technical, Commercial and Sales experience would surely put me on that road. It did but within the same localities where I had studied and worked as a rep. I understood the mistake only after painting the ledger book in red. An unmistakable signal to actively search for opportunities in a foreign country to once again become an employee.

But other events like marriage and kids intervened. The desire to find that road that would take me to places had hit a roadblock. The ledger book in red slowly grew into an economical nightmare. I took a diversion and found the route to fly into a country sitting over lakes of oil. Settling down in the job, I thought this would be my dream opportunity to let the roads there take me wherever I wanted to go. After a few months I brought my family over to collectively sit over lakes of oil.

I belatedly understood that the fragile world economy was not built to tolerate hiccups.  Regional flare ups, blockades and missile hurling overhead gripped the world in fear of an economic hardship, spreading like a cold without immediate cure. The triggered cascades weakened the financial foundation of countries, though a few managed to reap some windfall gains. But in ordinary households like mine it hung over an inconvenient and incurable cold. The cautionary signal blinked a warning, urging me to take another road that might take me somewhere but not to where I wanted to go.”

Becoming partially awake Imaginch, asked him, "Why this call, all of a sudden?" 

"Not getting sleep with all those aerial disturbances. I regret chasing a dream and landing here following currency signs instead of road signs." 

Why the audio-dream from the friend, who rarely contacts? Is he also affected by El Nino - La Nina effect along with the aerial show? Is the audio-dream a trailer and request to listen to his further woes? Imaginch could not hold it any longer. Since his friend had disturbed his sleep with this audio-dream, he wanted to unsettle him. 

"Initially you followed a road map that did not lead where you wanted to go. Afterwards you tried to follow another road map that took you where you did not really want to go and now you are standing at the crossroads.  why don't you reconcile and believe that the roads have taken you wherever you wanted to go? Why don't you call it a dream come true?  Imaginch finally fired the question, “Why don’t you come back?” 

Imaginch being a close friend, there was no scope to misunderstand the advice, delivered with shades of anger. The friend replied “Now, having understood that roads by themselves do not take you to wherever you want to go, I will decide soon.”

With the last layer of sleep dissolving without a trace, Imaginch got up to invite the new day! He wondered, “Was it a midsummer’s night dream” or Shakespeare’s “A midsummer Night’s dream”?  Was the audio-dream a reminder of his own failed dreams or because he was closely following the international conflicts wherever they were taking place, to keep his time ticking through the day?

From the pigeon’s post: 358

The Rockface pigeons under discussion, have happily shed the tag of “living in pigeonholes” and the centuries old word 'pigeonhole’. The high-rise buildings offering rent free spaces, why would they settle for less? With them focused on a mission in life to survive and proliferate, it becomes next to impossible to evict these two-legged squatters.

Reluctant to go outdoors, I decided to study the roosting pigeons by adopting this observation-questions -published information technique - a Q&A with self-study. I chose three all-weather observation posts, with guaranteed visibility, that are within a few steps of each other for this purpose. The O.P1 is on the sunshade, below an outdoor ac unit of the opposite apartment, with a view from my bedroom window. The O.P2 is on a similar sunshade of the same apartment, just in front of my standing room only balcony, though sighting is through defensive nylon net backed by a grill work intended to keep away pigeons. The O.P 3 is on a sunshade of a neighbour’s apartment, with an anytime view from the common corridor.

The male pigeon struts around and waddles on the sunshade moving its body from left to right, bobbing its head back and forth as if practicing its own brand of ramp walk. On the other hand, the female, smaller in size, appears calm, unhurried and cautiously moves around. Sometimes, for the fun of it, both keep tracing imaginary circles, without their bodies touching each other like the spools rotating in a tape deck.  To impress the female, the male flutters its wings and puts up an impressive airshow with take offs and landings.

Physical attraction having been established, the pigeons start working on the body chemistry and then move on to biology classes. Intuitively knowing the purpose of their life, the pair selects a location to build a nest with slender reeds, sticks from broom, fibrous material or simply use any depression on the surface of a sunshade. Their objective is to have a nest with protection from the elements and a safety net for the eggs from rolling off the ledge. The roosting pair has to remain alert to danger from the cheeky squirrels. These fury-tailed villains think that the unguarded eggs, or squabs are fair game, for fun or pizza.

I gave up identifying one pair of pigeon from one another as it was like saying this and particle is different from that sand particle. The pairs of pigeons come home to roost at the same location, driven by the motto -   Familiarity breeds squabs.

The twin mysteries, why they choose to rest - perched precariously on drainpipes, edges of sunshades, and other uncomfortable niches and in this position how do they manage to sleep without falling over?  The pigeons must have gone scientific by adopting a unihemispheric sleeping technique, where one-half of the brain is resting the other half stays awake & alert to threats and falling off from the perches.

To be on the safer side, I confirmed with the published materials that my observations cum conclusions on gender identification, distinguishing pairs and their courting rituals are more or less correct.

The story from O.P 1:

A pair of pigeons made several flybys to select the sunshade under the outdoor ac unit. Their logic must have been to make use of some of the machine generated heat for use in hatching the eggs. Since this Observation Post was not under my constant surveillance during courtship and the delivery of eggs remained like an unread   chapter to me.  Returning home after a few days of absence, I noticed a solitary egg, carefully set amidst some trash material. One of the pigeons was maintaining the line of sight while the other kept the egg warm.

Given little more time, I would have understood that the pair shared the duties in the nest. The single egg was a pointer towards two possibilities. The female is yet to fully mature and build up stamina or has past its prime with depleted strength. Due to my inexperience, I had missed the important physiological indicators like colour of feathers or other physical characteristics.

Left to its own devices, when the parents were away from time to time, the egg had started to change position every day till the shell started developing hairline cracks. Finally, when the shell broke into two halves, I was able to view the dark lump of a squab. An ominous development occurred when a squirrel emitting squeaks had decided to investigate the site for its own nest, on the wall mounting bracket behind the outdoor unit.

By this time, the pigeons thinking that they have done all they could do, started to keep irregular visiting hours. Unaware of this lurking danger, the squab in the eggshell continued to shift around. The squab residing in the broken shell must have presented a tempting opportunity. Emboldened, the squirrel seized control of the situation. Belting out loud ‘squeaks’, it scurried down on to the sunshade a few times, to assess and plan its move but tactfully withdrew sensing my presence.

Next morning, alerted by the unusual noise, I hurried to the window. The agitated pigeons were flying over the spot where the squab should have been.  The loss of the squab must have formed an emotional storm and waves of distress in their tiny brains. They could do nothing but aimlessly walk on the sunshade and emit repetitive moans, which sounded tragic & forlorn. The grief-stricken pigeons were trying to understand what had gone wrong, probably thinking that their agitated pacing would bring back the squab well and alive.

Oddly, the metallic sounding squeaks and the squirrel have gone silent. I could only guess that either the squirrel has pushed out the squab in the broken shell, to prevent the pigeons from disturbing its nest or might have feasted on a free meal.  A heart wrenching sight for any human observer. I watched them for some time lost in thoughts as to what could I do to console them.

The story from O.P 2:

The neighbours did not pay heed to my concern about the health issues attributed to these squatters. Unable to sleep under the unrelenting heat wave, I migrated to my stamp sized balcony to appeal to the clouds to stop debating and start raining. Undisturbed by my presence, pairs of pigeons clung to drainpipes, wall mounted brackets, exhaust fan frames, windowsills and sunshades as their sleeping quarters.

Next day morning, I noticed a pair of pigeons busily engaged in spreading sticks of a broom, on the sunshade opposite to my apartment. Correcting my earlier mistake, I easily identified the male pigeon by its body build, strutting, loud coos and puffed out neck and chest feathers. To actively court the partner, he attempted to dazzle the female with bright iridescent feathers on his neck. 

The sleek female pigeon, with not so iridescent neck feathers, participated enthusiastically. At times she refused to play along by crouching down flat on the sunshade to discourage further entreaties. After some more cooing and ring-a- ring-a- roses dancing, the female pigeon playfully attempted to adhere to the wall.

 Piqued by this act, I stood rooted to my spot, recollecting the published facts that being monogamous and in their prime, the pigeons continue with the courtship which triggered the ovulation cycle in the female pigeon, signaling her readiness to start a family.

After a few reruns of this episode, the pigeon playfully attempted to adhere to the wall, delivered an egg after a few days and by pure chance I happened to witness the egg being delivered, in real time. Then, using her beak and legs she started to nudge the egg around to keep it safe behind the barricade of arranged broom sticks.

I geared myself to clock the arrival of the second egg and chronicle the hatching event. Unaware of this developing situation, a squirrel was sprinting up and down, along a vertical drainpipe with whatever mission it had in its mind. I called it a day after verifying that the second egg has not been laid yet.

The next morning, the vacant space told me the sad story. The egg and the sticks of the broom have been swept off the sunshade. The clueless pigeons, vainly searched for the missing egg and the sticks of the broom. Tragedy notwithstanding, the female pigeon was on a clock to lay the second egg within 48 hours, before it gets air dropped. Their plan to hatch a male and female squab at that place going terribly wrong, the heartbroken parents might have departed in search of another location.  

Who stole the egg and removed the sticks of the broom? Whether the second egg was laid in time, in another place? Mysteries fit to be solved by Sherlock Holmes! Needless to say, I closed my observations with a heavy heart.

The story from O.P 3:

This neighbour had refused to clear the debris and fill the shallow pit on his sunshade. I had even pointed out the pair of pigeons eyeing the shallow depression and debris for a possible hatching site. For good measure I reminded him that that a pair of pigeon or the bulbuls chose the same place again, perhaps for sentimental reasons after having completed a successful batch. I drew his attention to the bird droppings already on the sunshade to drive home my point.

After a few days, my apprehension became a certainty. The female pigeon was calmly doing sentry duty guarding two eggs. The debris, the depression and pigeon droppings had become home for the eggs.

Whether the pigeons counted the days or not, I did. In the interim, I learnt that a mature female pigeon is a fast breeder reactor, brooking no delay or disruption in her egg laying cycles. She can initiate her ovulation cycle at will. Typically, she delay-starts the hatching process by 2 days, to match with the arrival of the second egg.

Within 4-6 weeks and at times even when the hatched squabs are still in the nest, she is ready to lay the next clutch of eggs. I started to wonder whether the pigeons are targeting to achieve the maximum number of hatchings like the possible number of New Moons or Full moons in a calendar year!

With such energy consuming activities ahead, the parents share the workload in nest keeping duties. The female stays with the eggs/squabs from late afternoon till about mid-morning and the male takes over for the midmorning to the late afternoon shift. This shift rotation allows the female pigeon to recuperate and refresh.

On the fag end of the 3^rd week, the broken shells announced the increase in the population of pigeons, with at least one female squab. A squab of Rock face pigeon starts as an indistinguishable lump, with pale yellow or yellowish gray coloured feather, at birth. As it matures the colour gradually changes to gray.

The squabs must be feeling lucky as both the parents take turn to feed them with specially secreted crop milk. As the squabs age, the frequency of parental visits becomes sporadic as the squabs have been fed with enough nourishment.  The parents have done their best. The infrequent visits and hunger make the squabs to leave the nest early. The absence of the marauding squirrel remained a puzzle, but it had helped the eggs to survive, avoiding a heartache to the parents.

After building up sufficient strength to survive on their own, the fledglings fly away, probably vacating the space for their parents to start the next batch, though I am yet to confirm this. In the world of pigeons everything has to run like the parts of a Swiss clock.

The squabs mature in about eight months. But within 4-7 months, the yet to fully mature female pigeon might start laying one egg per clutch signaling the arrival of another fast breeder reactor. Older or under nourished female pigeons adopt this one egg per clutch rule to ensure survival of the hatched squab.

No doubt, the pigeons proliferate and use our premises as their washroom facilities. The stink arising from their droppings and fallen feathers ranks alongside the foul smell that assails travellers as the train approaches the outskirts of a typical metropolitan city.

Setting aside my deep-rooted pathological aversion to the pigeons to take a closer look at their life cycle was immensely rewarding.  It forced me to learn published materials, become a Zoolinguist and an avianliguist to understand their feelings on my way to become an indoor ornithologist!

Toeing the line: 347

 Imaginch had this eerie feeling of being suffocated by an unwashed blanket. If he ever thought like this aloud, he would have been summarily court-martialed and sent to a solitary confinement cell. Why?  His better half is a stickler for hygiene and except the structure of the house everything inside of it must get disinfected, drycleaned and irradiated by IR and UV for the heck of it. She is a martinet, holding a firing range and a boot camp on permanent lease, to punish non-compliance, be it a person or an inanimate object.

As he is scared of solitary confinement (he likes the freedom to move around) and afraid of the firing range (she never scored a bull’s eye in all practice sessions) and the boot camp (he is stamina deficient), he goes to a park or some such public place to air his views.

The elected or selected elders or youngsters, without gender discrimination, take to this toeing the party line very seriously. Not only they get to stage a walk out in protest against this or that but earn bonus points for adhering to their physician’s advice. As a small fee, they have to assume as if they are standing on the party’s plank and recite the party lines like parrots before walking out.

Imaginch is not worried about Netas toeing party lines, but he was concerned about parties willing to turn “double the Nelson’s eye’ on the happenings that affect the nation and stay focused with three eyes on their electoral prospects. “If Opposition is not for walk outs, then what is democracy?” a one liner he favoured and unsuccessfully tried to popularise it.

His mind was racing against his thoughts to spew out more one liner, parallelly thinking about selling them to willing political parties for use as their slogans during election times.  Becoming prolific, he came up with “No publicity is like a walkout publicity.” “No win is like a walkout win”. “No order is like an order being expelled for disruption”.

What struck him odd was the elders sitting among youngsters and vice versa. Was it by design, to have young voices to vociferously protest and energetically walkout to allow the elders to catch their breath and trail behind to show their commitment & solidarity.?

Though immersed in his thoughts, the din a group of parrots were making did not escape his attention. The green winged and red beaked parrots stirred an imagery of the elders and youngsters engaged in heated debates as law makers! His mind started to look for similarities in the behaviour of humans and avians of interest to him.

He imagined that the parrots, in the wild or in captivity, would be communicating vital social, safety, and emotion related information with their flock members. Their context would be clear with specific vocal calls, regional dialects, and body language (he would love to watch one such performance!) aimed at maintaining social bonds and ensure survival of the flock.

Coming back to the elders and youngsters without gender difference, he did not strain his imagine much. The path followed by them mimicked, in toto, the parrots as far as the social bonds and their own welfare measures are concerned. The print media accounts and trolls in social media are validation enough for the above parallel drawn by him. He was sure that the body language of avians mostly might be benign (with one lark not making the summer type excuse) but when it comes to our elders and youngsters. While they vehemently agree to disagree (papers, mikes and wooden furnitures bearing the brunt) the same benign outcomes cannot be guaranteed. See, they are not averse to use their might to fight for their rights. Oops! He had missed to be the author of this powerful one liner!

When a parrot repeats some words what has it understood?

Parrots that are out of social contact with other parrots try to fill this gap by considering humans as their flock. They learn to use human speech and other familiar noises to interact with them. Often, they “practice” and perfect these sounds by talk to themselves or to other pets in the house.  By mirroring the daily chatter of their human household, they adapt to their caged environment with as much comfort as possible. These parrots repeat exactly, what someone else has said about something or someone, without thinking and often in a mocking tone!

Imaginch expected a better behaviour from the elders and youngsters. But they have found a survival mantra in emulating the parrots. They repeat exactly what someone else has said about something or someone, often mockingly or without thinking. What the parrots did not have which these people have is the fall mechanism – misquoted, quoted out of context, work of unseen hands with gloves(foreign)or without gloves(local). When the political heat raises, the flock of the same feathers of elders and youngsters try to construct barricades, fortresses around the offender.

The caged parrot would like to have some of the freedoms these uncaged elders and youngsters enjoy. To roam and to invoke ‘slip of the tongue, quoted out of context or misrepresented or blame the involvement of one or two foreign hands. It could only wonder why for the same slip of the tongue,  gets it jailed (caged) and these out of context wallahs get bails!

When they walk out, what is the issue and what they do?

Even if a parrot gets incredibly disappointed, frustrated, unhappy, overwhelmed with dislike or upset about a situation, it exercises its absolute right to "protest" and walk out or fly away refusing to interact. It protests with loud, screeching noise, raises the wings and lunges at the opponent. If it turns bitter and violent, the caged parrot could destroy toys, paper, or furniture by poking holes in the upholstery.

Imaginch was not surprised to read or watch a similar outburst from the elders and youngsters. The malady of following in the footstep of the parrots. Small disappointments, frustration or upset about issues, the elders and youngsters become “sick as a parrot” and promptly stage a walkout, knowing fully well that they could come back after a few minutes. If overwhelmed by frustration, they can tear papers, throw mikes all over and upend or break furnitures. After a brief suspension, come back to the benches or seats.

Unless the caged parrot has a political leaning, a walkout or destruction of property means, it would be the end of its story. This is the oceanic difference between the parrot’s unpaid-for walk outs (no party line to toe) and elders and youngsters staging their paid-for walk outs (fearing the noose of the party line)!  Given the choice, the caged parrot also would happily toe a party line!

The last laugh: 346

 Once a powerful public figure, an acerbic orator and a go- to politician for fixing internal squabbles or for slinging mud on opponents, he had done it all. Instead of blood, loyalty ran in his body. Blind faith, instead of acumen ran his career. But on the question of loyalty, he took it as a sky lark. Was loyal to whoever was powerful at that time.  

His versatility flowed from his ability to switch loyalty from ‘A’ to ‘B’ and back to ‘A’ like a servo motor. For both the traits – loyalty and blind faith, he had chosen the navigation chart with clarity of mind which could cut sharp corners, where there was no such thing in the statute books. If needed, he did not hesitate to give new meanings and if not available, he wrote his own chapters and books. 

A smooth sailing in others' troubled waters combined with the faith of the masses in deliverance on the expected promises will be fulfilled. He did not stay long in that party to face the same electorate. He changed   his constituency as easily as getting into a new shirt. 

His road to success was laid over and again by gauging the changing winds or sensing the infinitesimal changes in the rising heat, due to his hoarded wealth. Now you understand the frequent loyalty-blood transfusion and travels from ‘A’ to ‘B’ and then back to ‘A’? 

He reaped twin benefits - one in his personal advancement by swimming in multiple currents, and two being accepted in any other party at any time. Anticipating the black day that would surely come, he had compiled a dossier of ‘bargainable’ intel, wherever he was active as a powerful public figure. 

If merciful, a work horse of the party is always put to pasture when its output diminishes. Otherwise, it gets sidelined and the party waits for an opportunistic moment to offer it as a sacrifice, to save the rider! 

His pre-emptive measures to delay the inevitable kept on tinkering with the loyalty-blood pressure and the muscles of the heart and kidneys. Constituents of the body started deserting the assembly. 

As this internal battle was going on, the suppressed conscience rose like Phoenix from the ashes to demand its over dues. In his prime, he had defaulted on many payments at will, shielding himself against penal actions by loyalty cum turning chameleon gene expressions. That trick did not work with his conscience.  

Silently, the DNA was expressing itself by generating a host of other illnesses to remind the politician who was the supreme boss. Under the shadow of these expressions, his conscience became hyper active to torment him without let. The internal and external heat becoming unbearable, he sought refuge and succour.  

Then he remembered the word-of-mouth whisperings "you will find the money well spent. No one will bother you as they don't allow visitors and you can plan your next move from the comfortable CICU instead of hiding in some hell hole.” 

He would let all the others to think, whatever they want. He knew where aces and rabbits are kept hidden. He had the source code to unlock the deck (playing cards) and the warrens. He did one thing that no one expected him to do - as per prearrangement, had an upcoming Vlogger tagging him behind the ambulance.   To make sure, he had waved a thick black colour folder at the Vlogger’s camera. For a telling visual effect, he had even stuck a yellow rose bloom with stem in that folder. 

Going by the word-of-mouth, he had chosen this multi-specialty hospital.  Yes, true to the name, specialists have been visiting him, scribbling something in the case sheet and leaving in a hurry without even uttering a hello to him. He wondered whether they are aware or ignorant of the fact that his stay costs him a hefty sum every day, leaving his nose bleeding?  

When the news of him occupying a bed in CICU made its way into the media (he had engineered it by another leak), his detractors sharpened their sound bites and the IT cell of his current party got busy in planning an AI generated obituary. But postponed its release fearing the expose’ in the form of that black folder stuck with a yellow rose bloom with stem. 

The ever-hungry media headquartered in glass towers or the freelance tubers churning out from kitchen shelves, ate and regurgitated the diet meal from the CICU. Few enterprising astrologers eagerly submitted hourly predictions competing with the hospital's health bulletins. 

For the once a powerful public figure, the CICU reminded him of solitary confinement with tubes and monitors pinging away for his money’s worth!  His mind was in a turmoil recounting missed deals and half-brokered deals. The question of succession has been addressed to some extent but grooming a protege to safeguard the chosen successor stood at the crossroads.  He berated himself for waiting too long to tie up all these loose ends of his political legacy. 

The wily political hyena packs remained at a distance, smelling something fishy but hesitating to untie the parcel. For now, they decided to keep vigil, on the patient as well as the other opponents. The once powerful public figure, after coming to know of this vigil, laughed at himself first and then at the hyena packs. 

The rest in CICU has rejuvenated his health and spirit. He got the clarity that even though once a powerful public figure, now, "holding a thick file adorned with a rose bloom on its stem, is the key to any power vault" is still unbeatable! 

He had another hearty laugh and discharged himself out, but not before shredding the papers and disposing of the emptied folder. The hospital staff gladly obliged, in lieu of a negotiated future favour. 

He would let the wily pack of hyenas keep guessing. He had pen drives, SD cards and so many other storage pouches. The black folder might have done its job, by now! He could surely come up with another decoy, if another occasion warranted it! 

He fully understood that the word-of-mouth whisperings "you will find the money well spent. No one will bother you as they don't allow visitors and you can plan your next move from the comfortable CICU instead of hiding in some hell hole." It was insanely true and based on sound logic. He laughed once more at the exit of the hospital, before getting into his chauffeured limousine. 

The vlogger captured his quiet departure, wondering what happened to that black folder? He was not alone, the wily hyena packs once again smelling something fishier than the last time, stood transfixed, wondering about the same missing black folder!

Battle of creaky bones: 351

A battle-scarred grandfather, wanted to send this request to his grandchildren – “leave my old bones alone!” He was tired of wearing protective gears, even while asleep. The children habitually ganged up to invent novel tricks to tie him in knots. They thought his experience will automatically get expressed as innovative thinking and face whatever tricks they could come up with. The parents safely stood aside to let the issues get sorted out among themselves. They were wary of the creaking bones and his weighted average shrapnel like comments. 

Alas! The metabolism and mechanism in his body have not been designed for the onslaught of the second generation (children, grandchildren). Like El Nino and La Nina, he came under the influence of Nil Nino or Ill Nina. Though figuratively different, his nil and ill brought the same environmental effect- extreme discomfort! 

At 70+, managing a ragtag army of grandchildren, once considered a gift, tested his energy reserves and frayed nerves. Like everyone, ‘youngsters thought that all those around them are also young, while the elders thought that all those youngsters are old enough to take care of themselves’. These youngsters are fast and furious. Their conversations echo like a rapid-fire questioning round.

The creaky bones, in the old body wondered from where they got this style of speaking! As they were growing up, he had seen them watching only innocuous cartoons. Little did he know that they have quietly graduated to some serious stuff like the minions, paw patrol, Masha and the Bear, kung fu pandas and the fire breathing dragons spewing out crispy dialogues. He had lot of catching up to do!

His personal experience was ‘nothing worked in his favour without a resultant reaction, if it happened by chance’.  While discussing about various languages, he had inadvertently asked them the tongue spoken in the God’s own country. They replied with a mischievous smile, "geographically speaking, it must be Malayalam!". Nodding in appreciation, he made the mistake of pointing out that it has the distinction of being a palindrome. Explanations that followed settled the issue for them. Suddenly, they asked. "Whether palindrome exists in numbers?" 

To buttress their point, they showed him a series of numbers - 6116, 3773, 393 and so on. Caught in the web of his own over enthusiasm, he had to hurriedly make an exit, to dive into the realm of numbers. For once, luck partially favoured him - they did not zero in on and asked about palindrome in imaginary numbers. During his student days, he had difficulty to understand the real numbers themselves, and imaginary numbers did not fit in his scheme of mathematics. Frantic calls went to …Google help me! His call for help was answered, in the affirmative, by Wikipedia. 

What they intended to do was to showcase their curriculum bound general knowledge and willingness to think beyond those classrooms. Is it not too much for the creaking bones - to struggle and remember or revisit and learn anew? Since he only had himself to blame, he kept quiet. 

Sensing that the grandfather had somehow wiggled out of the number game, they sprung another trap. “The mother cat moves her assets - the newborn kittens, from place to place to safeguard them. Now, tell us whether “the birds also change the nestlings from one place to another? If not, why?" 

Weary bones are not; he had to scramble and scratch his brain to formulate a logical answer. Feeding them with an off the cuff explanations will be a boomerang, sure to come back with more tough questions! 

Wondering where from they have acquired “assets”, he tested the water with trepidation and said, “The cat has a wide mouth to pick up and redeposit its assets, in another nook or corner. Why does it do it? To prevent predators accessing its assets! Moreover, a cat does not fancy itself as a builder. Instead, it makes use of the flexible mouth, teeth and the thick, fleshy "scruff" on the kittens to ensure safe transportation. 

Birds on the other hand, being arboreal, out of necessity build nests and really do a good job while at it! Coming to your question, since birds have rigid, sharp beaks, meant to be used as tools for feeding, preening and nest building, find it unsuitable for handling living creatures. Nestlings are incredibly delicate with hollow bones, often featherless and have no scruff to hold onto. This is the technical difficulty. Moreover, the birds cannot open their mouths wide enough to accommodate the size of the nestlings, which grow very fast and often weigh about half as much as the parents, within two weeks. 

Hence, the bird parents cannot safely carry the weight of their babies.  The parents are driven by instincts and generally do not move their fragile hatchlings. Instead of hurting the nestlings, they keep and guard over them in the same nest!” The grand old man silently thanked his stars for having studied about the red vented bulbul and its nesting habits. 

As expected, the boomerang came swishing through the air. “Why, the birds are not able to or engineered to open their mouths wide? After all what is required, other than a collection of elastic muscles and hinges at the junction of the neck and head!” 

Really a tough question on evolutionary biology and unfortunately for him t his uncomfortable situation of today had evolved about six decades ago, when he had opted out of studying biology, leave alone the evolutionary biology! As a grandfather, he felt proud when these kids with indomitable spirit boldly offered suggestions on ways evolution could have modified the mouths of birds as a multiple utility tool!  

With some mid-day moonlighting, he had refereed, collated and assimilated information with which he would be able to wing it. An apt modus operandi for this situation on avians, where he found himself floundering like a fledgling bird and hoping to land on solid ground. 

“Flight is a biological imperative that demands a lightweight and a streamlined frame. The small, feathered, carnivorous Theropod dinosaurs was the template. Building on this, around 150–165 million years ago, the avian species per se started evolving as a specialized subgroup of Theropods. 

Thus, the birds can be considered as the living dinosaurs and descendants of bipedal, reptile-like ancestors. In the bird’s family tree, their immediate ancestors were the small, agile and feathered dinosaurs such as Dromaeosaurids and Troodontids. By the late Jurassic era, the species with a mix of dinosaurian traits (teeth, long bony tail) and bird-like traits (feathers, wings) had evolved. 

After spending over tens of millions of years in body size shrinking exercises, these ancestors repurposed the feathers of the dinosaurs and ended with hollow bones, a Wishbone (furcula), and the three-toed limbs to suit the needs of perching, holding and flying. 

While being shrunk in size and repurposed, the birds ended up with small mouths and sharp beaks only as tools to feed and survive. Today, these birds carry a 66-million-year-old dinosaur lineage, which miraculously survived the catastrophic Cretaceous extinction event. 

You are all familiar with the red vented bulbul and taking it as an example let us see why birds do not lift heavy, squirming nestlings. A nestling may weigh up to 10 to15gm. Consider this - the bird has to take to air with a nestling, fly through wind resistance and against gravity. This effort requires immense strength and specialised gripping tools, which an adult bulbul simply does not possess. In this condition, even lifting an egg, weighing just 2-3 gm, itself will be a herculean task and where is the question of the bird shifting the nestlings? Will this not be a tall order for an adult bulbul, itself weighing about 40 to 60gm? 

They are not alone in this regard. Even powerful birds of prey, like eagles and hawks which have strong, razor-sharp talons do not attempt to grasp a fragile chick.

The kids had one last question. “Is there any exception in the avian world?” 

“Yes. But like that saying, ‘one lark does not make the summer, if at all some birds do shift their nestlings, though it would be the rarest of rare occurrence.” 

The grandchildren were wonderstruck and confused in equal measures, unable to digest or decide why they troubled him with that boomerang question. They thought, “All along he had been feigning ignorance by pointing out at the level of education he had received. Was it a smoke screen? Or, is he trying to hoodwink us with overflow of information, which could be relevant to us only after another 4 to 5 years? Or is he trying to scare us, wanting not to be burdened with us during summer holidays? Or is he trying to learn things in the pretext of clearing our doubts? If doubts can be cleared while answering other’s doubts, then why many don’t try this technique?”

After a day, the grandfather came to know the real purpose. The grandchildren were chit chatting among themselves, thinking that 'with his not so sharp hearing’, he may not come to know of the content of their discussion. They did not realise that a gentle breeze blowing towards their grandfather became their villain. The breeze carried the conversation into the ears of their grandfather, clearly but not loud enough, who strained himself to catch every syllable that came his way 

The eldest in the gang grilled the younger kid, “Why were you asking questions, particularly about the birds and their young ones? The kid with an innocent aplomb replied, "Don't you know that school will be reopening tomorrow and grandpa will be leaving shortly thereafter?" 

“What these have to do with your questions?” 

“Dummy! I have to submit a short write up on some aspect of life form!” 

“Then why should it be about birds and not on sharks or whales?"

“Our grandfather had been telling me many times, that he is afraid of depths. Why to frighten his old bones? The birds appeared to be a safe bet.” 

“Suppose he had been telling you, that he fears heights, then what would have you done?" 

“Easy peachy. I would have settled for earthworms! I had options!” 

After hearing the entire conversation, the old man understood that they did not ask their doubts to clear their or his doubts but to collect material for a write up, based on his sound knowledge! 

Then he thought, why do we do what we do? Will Google or Wikipedia help?