In Nature's Lap

Hi there!

It’s been 3 days that we’ve landed here. Nothing much has happened, except for a short trip to Globals & Schnuks, to pick up some specific items(‘matki’, marker pens etc. such diversity!)

However, we’ve been out on our morning walks, around the lake area & the complex, as a whole. They say a picture is worth a thousand words, but even this snap of Kalpe on the walkway & the almost zero traffic at this hour, can really convey the actual situ. It’s quite cool at this hour, and the clean air, neatly cut lawns, well maintained walkways etc. set the mood.

To add to this, everything is green now. We just missed the flowers, ’though Chicago, having a later spring, does have some trees in bloom. That doesn’t take away the beauty, because the road dividers are in full bloom with Roses, the corners blooming with Asters. And the best part is, that it rained early morning, so it’s still cloudy, very pleasant and Nature is on show.

Besides my old friends at the lake, the ducks(Mallards) & the Canada Geese(not very friendly right now because of the babies they have), I have been able to spot the Robin (State emblem), Starlings & Sparrows. The last mentioned are identical to what we get back home, but healthier! Speaking about Starlings, there’s one family right at the end of Janu’s  verandah, in the eaves, and the parents are on the job of feeding the chicks, right from sun up. The Squirrels, so tame that they actually walk up the stairs,  in the hope of a tidbit.

I also encountered the Cardinal, in all it’s scarlet finery, Blackbirds & surprisingly, a Hummingbird! If you don’t pay attention, you can mistake it for a Bee! The Turtles, as yet, still prefer to remain in the lake.

Above all, there is so much quiet here, it’s almost unnatural. That’s because we are so used to noise & more noise, that the silence is perhaps frightening! And you would want to thank those people who have gone about their jobs, unseen, silently, while we have been sleeping, and making a part of the town, so neat & tidy!

But if we were to rewind to  a few years back, of our childhood, you will be able to recall such  moments of quiet, when you were out on a picnic, a site visit, even those moments of  silence in the middle of an Army exercise. To find yourself in a moment of total inactivity, yet so many events are taking place, right in front of us. Ants, carrying some foodstuff to their nests, buffalos, lazing away in the squishy mud or clouds racing along to an unknown destination, constantly changing shapes, a kite(‘patang’), lying limp entangled in the wires, sporadically making movements, as though to indicate it’s presence! Remember.

It’s such moments of quite, when you are not bound by time, that we realize, how much we are missing out. I am not trying to preach any kind of change your lifestyle sermon, but just sharing with you, what I felt today. And I have experienced it quite often & loved every bit of the ‘loneliness’.  

And, you don’t have to be on a  holiday, that too overseas. You can do this, right in your home/street or neighbourhood.  Just look/hear  for the  signs. In today’s  so-called life in the fast lane, I find it strange, that we cannot spare 30 seconds, just to return a ‘phone call! And when Nature calls, she doesn’t expect you to call back. You just listen!  As the poet  Hillaire Bellock says at the end of “Leisure”…a poor life this, if full of care, we have no time to stand or stare!

Till the next one, TC.

Ashok