First published in Parenting in 1992. Magazine no longer being published.
A Rickety old lift crawled up to deposit us into our new habitat : a cramped seventh floor flat perched within a concrete jungle of multi-storied honeycombs. The only hope the flat offered was a tiny balcony opening out to a polluted and starless Delhi sky.
Other than a roof the one bonus the premises held out was hordes of pigeons that cohabited with the human species. Mita, my wife, trucked in a few potted plants in one corner of that balcony and spent, along with our three-year-old son, Joy, a lot of time trailing the birds in flight; possibly a recompense!
By and by, our smiles grew weary, till such time as the bond with an odd pair of pigeons developed. They would hop in to feed on food Joy spread out. With the summer getting intense, he would insist on leaving the door ajar to keep their access to war open.
Soon the female laid two eggs in one of the pots. Joy marveled at the feat as I took it upon myself to put him through the paces to hatching. His attempts at getting closer invited ruffled feathers from the mother. It did not take long before two tiny feathered beauties rolled out to trip and topple around the pots, delighting Joy. Their shying away from him provoked passionate responses. His attachment with them grew, none the worse for their apparent rejection of his overtures.
I watched as the one-sided relationship gathered moss. He was dejected when they resisted his attempts at force feeding; angered, because they would not come to him. It took weeks for the little ones to gain strength and I dreaded the moment when the two of them would fly away. As I tried to prepare Joy, the pre-ordained day dawned without my having been able get him ready to cope with it. On returning home from office that evening. Mita gushed, “They have flown away.”
Joy was on the bed. I picked him up and walked out to the balcony. There was only the odd feather desolately worming its way around the pots. Joy shut himself away from it, burying his face in my chest. I was at a loss, quite unable to cheer him up till I noticed two small pigeons in an alcove along the balcony across. As I gradually got him to turn around, the little ones took flight. They flew in an arc, flapping desperately to draw closer and closer to us, finally settling on the adjacent balcony.
That day, I couldn’t get him to face the truth. The pigeons flying away had shattered his world. He adjusted in a few days and the whole episode was buried under layers of new experiences that every child gathers. Our life rolled back to its rigid routine, quite in tune with the regular geometric contours of the buildings. We were looking for something new to bring the flutter back.
Weeks later the whole house was agog again. A pair of oldies had started hopping in for food that Joy spread out.
Before long, two tiny eggs shone, followed in due course by the toddlers. A wizened Joy was coaxing, cajoling, talking to them to drive it home – never, never leave.
I waited resignedly for the day they would break the ties. One evening as we watched Joy sorely trying to extract a promise, Mita broke : “they won’t? won’t they”, she remarked, knowing the answer only too well.
“Will he, won’t he too ! Someday?” I found myself asking.
- SK Chatterji
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