Tuesday, February 28
I was commuting to work today on my old and dejected scooter. It has borne more disappointments than I have in my entire life. Anyway, the commute to my workplace includes a 15-20 minutes drive through a short-cut that’s a little narrow and experiences quick yet infrequent traffic. Right after I took a left from the railway crossing cross roads, I happened to see something lying on the narrow pathway. I kept driving on but I realized someone might crush it unintentionally since people drove fast around here. Moreover, a car driver wouldn’t notice it.
It was a pigeon. I was 20 seconds ahead of where it lay. Parked my scooter on the side, carefully traced my steps back to it. I touched it’s fragile body hoping to check any signs of life it may still have inside. The left wing had a deep lesion. No one flew kites in this season, perhaps it must have been some predator that was after it. The predator’s efforts were in vain because the pigeon had lost the fight but still won it. It couldn’t feed on it. Anyway, the pigeon was dead. What would be right – if the predator fed on it if it was meant to die anyway or that it gave it’s life to protect itself from its aggressor?
There wasn’t much time. I had to hurry to work and drivers kept on honking as I sat there in the middle of the street examining a dead corpse of a pigeon.
I decided I needed to give it a fitting burial. I picked up it’s fragile body as unclumsily and with as much reverence as I could. Took it on the sidewalk where I had parked my scooter. Dug a grave with a sharp rock lying nearby and covered it with as much sand as I possibly could in 5 minutes. I was sad because the pigeon was dead. I was sad because he had lost the fight. But that’s how mother nature works – death eventually gets us all. But warriors do deserve a fitting burial. Even without the ritual, if we had in our hearts the reverence for each warrior and I don’t mean ones at the border kind, I mean each individual who fights with his/her demons inside. We all deserve a fitting burial just like my unknown friend who died a lone yet brave death today.
Anyway, I won’t be eating chicken for at least a week now.
Posted Originally on 11:57 PM