He did enough to draw her attention; there were others vying for her but she found him the best among all - active, smart, jolly and dignified and fell for him. They tied the knot and decided to go the family way head-on as the nature lofted their hearts. First thing first - they looked out for a tiny place –cosy and safe. It was primarily his responsibility to find one and giving the final nod was hers. He peeped through - “ah! the exact place we need ! The entrance is a bit cramped but I can comfortably get in and out – she is smaller, she shouldn’t have any issue— and that adds to privacy and safety.”
She came and had a look and after few initial petty complaints said okay. They moved in and got busy – he frequently moved out and each time came back with items of her choice and she worked with. It turned to a sweet cosy home in a very short time.
The winter was not cold enough and as expected the weather had turned very dry from late February; brief showers with thunderstorms that lash naturally at the beginning of spring were still few weeks away. The gutsy wind blew up dust and temperature started soaring. With windows shut it turned very stuffy inside. “It is time to switch-on the air cooler.”– I thought, but then decided to wait for few days as I noticed some twigs and fragments of broomsticks protruding out of the air baffle of the machine and felt that chirpings in the morning and in the evening were emanating from right inside the cooler and occasionally the switched-off machine made sounds too, like ruffling of feathers.
I decided to have a check and rang the service man. He arrived quickly, went up the ladder and carefully removed the long bottom cover piece of the machine. Wow! Tucked inside, resting securely at an end of the cover was a nest with three chicks; the chicks were absolutely just born with eggshells still around and their eyes not open yet – so freshly born that they were not even able to cry for food. The parents were not around – perhaps happy at being free from sitting in incubation had flown to neighbours’ nests to share the news of arrival of their babies – worry free as the nest was securely out of reach of creatures of prey through the strategic entry; the little space between the gas conduits from the outdoor unit to the indoor unit of the machine and periphery of the hole on the wall for the conduits made the doorway to the nest through which neither a crow could poke its beak nor a cat could throw a paw.
With extreme care we placed back the nest with the chicks where they were and refixed the machine cover. I decided not to run the cooler for atleast thirty days. I was almost sure it were sparrows as other small birds around like robins and bulbuls prefer trees for nest and the passage was not passable for house-myna, the other bird which prefers nooks of houses for nests.
I kept a close eye – yeh! it was a pair of sparrows. They remained busy all day frequently bringing for the chicks whatever bit of eatables possible on their small beaks: the hungry kids would cry for more and the parents would fervently try to satiate them moving in and out of the machine paying no regard to my discomfort in the ever soaring temperature.
After about fifteen days, on one dusty noon, I saw five of them emerging one by one from the tunnel and flying to the nearby mango tree and just before dusk saw five of them reenter. Five more days and there was no more chik-chik, no more sound of ruffling of feathers from inside the machine.
“So, the chicks are grown and gone.”-- I climbed up the ladder, removed the cover and looked at the nest – it was empty and perhaps abandoned,-“ The parents must have by now found another safe place in another machine at another household to bring up a fresh batch of nestlings.”
I cleaned up the machine and switched it on for a cool and comfortable afternoon siesta. But thoughts crossing my mind kept sleep at bay – in that small space the birds made a cosy home and brought up the offspring to their wings and we humans – a big house- one room for each member and still hankering for space and toiling and toiling to make it a home. The birds ever free, ever spirited, enjoying life to the core with just whatever they have and we humans-- ever bounded, ever sorrowful, ever complaining about ‘too little’ of anything and everything and unable to drink the elixir of life till the last breath. What else makes life fulfilling other than happiness! And birds far outweigh human on that count.
Oh God ! in my rebirth --if there is ever one-- please make me a bird.