Morning Walks Revisited: Love it, Love it!

 

24 August 2017 saw my second blog on Blogger titled “Morning Walks: Hate it, Love it!” https://www.musingswhileunlearning.com/2017/08/morning-walks-hate-it-love-it.html 

A little more than three years later, in a different location and under different circumstances, due to the pandemic, I decide to write about my morning walk today. These days I walk on the terrace, early morning; anytime between six and half past six!

We live in a gated community of five, five storied buildings and even though I live on the fourth floor on one of them, I do use the elevator up to the fifth floor before taking two flights of steps to the terrace. (I shudder at the thought of all those steps I used to climb to reach the Air Traffic Control Tower to get the Flight Plan signed when I was serving in the IAF and even at my fittest best- a comparative term-I used to huff and puff and had no energy left to blow anything down! Somehow, the ATC had a great sense of sardonic humour which put up posters like “Are you tired?” right at the top!!) Well, the terrace, here, is opened at six in the morning and usually all, including the neighbouring terraces, are empty if I make it by that time. As I catch my breath and open the grilled gate to walk into my preferred terrace, I am filled with a beautiful sense of bliss, gratitude and peace for the beauty that awaits me. There is indeed magic all around us if we look close enough! These days, a veil of mist, a nip in the air and a blanket of tranquility engulf me as I step into the wet terrace which has mini puddles, here and there due to the uncharacteristic, incessant rains at Hyderabad during this time of the year.

The terrace is even smaller than the grounds I described in blog 2 and I avoid some corners which have the sewage lines running, so one round makes less than a 100metres! I just check my watch and walk 30 minutes with music playing in my ears. This I stop from time to time, to listen to the birds and it is a treat.

Credits: birdsoftheworld.org: black cormorant

I am into tarot cards and readings and this leads us to angel numbers and so on and so forth and interestingly, it talks about animal totems and spirit animals. You’d be surprised at the range of information that is available on the net and I just get to know about it all in my 46^th year! Once I get into something then it takes all my time till I am satisfied with it. So, these days I am into all the animals I can see and find their message for me! It sounds crazy, doesn’t it? Precisely why I love it!! I am suddenly into ornithology! From cormorants to magpies, I have started identifying birds, taking pictures and making tiny videos with my phone which I then find out from Google Lens and what a joy this whole exercise is.

Credits: ebird.org: oriental magpie-robin

When I was a kid, crows, sparrows and mynahs were common but now they are such a rarity that it fills me with delight if I spot one. Usually, it is just pigeons and more pigeons. And yet, that was because I wasn’t really observing. One morning, a few days ago, I saw a single crow cawing away to glory, waiting for her partner. That very same day, I saw a lone magpie (I didn’t know it was a magpie when I saw her/him but I checked it out later- an oriental magpie -robin, to be precise) and then the white dotted pigeon, a pure black pigeon, a brown pigeon and the usual lot of grey pigeons. I also saw two pairs of pretty little birds which I now know to be scaly breasted munias (from the finch family). I got back home to find out what these birds were and what spirit had to say! Turns out that seeing a single crow or a single magpie is bad luck but seeing a flock of the same is a great omen. Fortunately, that didn’t have an effect on me for I was in sheer delight of seeing and identifying so many birds. I’d been weaving a love story between the grey pigeons that live across my balcony and the new and aloof black stud that has been living with them for more than a month now, replacing the white and black one. Now, with my research I find that my prior knowledge was no knowledge at all! That the white and black is a roller pigeon and the other variety of pigeon are not just males while the grey ones, females. I also learnt that it is common for different types of pigeons to mate with one another.

Credits: en.wikipedia.org
Indian silver bill

This very morning, I was treated to a pair of black cormorants flying high in the perfect synchronicity as birds almost always do. Add to it, a single pair of scaly breasted munias, a lone Indian silver bill, the lone crow ( she has been making a trip every morning since I spotted her and this morning she was busy with something relatively large in her beak), a lone majestic hawk, circling far above, letting the world know what power is and the surprise of four beautiful green parrots, which stood out against the whitish background of the morning. I also love watching dragon flies galore and they are early risers unlike the gorgeous, colourful butterflies, who turn up only when the sun is out and a certain warmth has touched the air. I was astonished to see them a week ago for I didn’t know they flew this high. Last on my list today was a lone bumble bee and a katydid which I saw on the stairs.

Credits: en.wikipedia.org
Scaly breasted Munia

I have always been intrigued with and in awe of the animals on this planet and have always loved going to the zoo and national parks but I never have been so taken in by birds except budgerigars and peacocks, as a kid. Today, I love watching them and can spend a long time looking at their antics and cooking up stories around them! And no, not just for the spirit message for it turns out no one has spirit messages from munias and Indian silver bills, for they possibly don’t know of their existence!

If I told you, that I wait to jump out of bed every morning to walk on the terrace and meet my chirpy little friends, I’d be lying for even today it begins with a struggle of whether I should go or stay in bed. Yet, the struggle has got to do with my sleeplessness at night more than the inertia to go up for a walk.

Credits: m.youtube.com: katydid

Morning walks are a great way to start the day and preferably alone, where you can be one with Nature and enjoy the silence except for the melody of the birds. For those of you who are raising an eyebrow at the music plugged to my ears, well, I’d slow down my walk and stand in a corner observing without movement if not for the music and my primary intention is some form of exercise!!