Birdwatch

I sat in my cubicle at work which is probably one of the better ones for it gives me a view of the world outside even if a blue-tinted picture. As I glanced up from my world of pixels and absent-mindedly looked through the floor to ceiling blue panes which are kept spotlessly clean by our house-keeping personnel, my eyes lazily followed the two specks tracing a pattern against the blue and white canvas that is the sky.

As my mind slowly slipped away from trying to wangle a solution for the problem I was working on, my nerve cells diverted their energies to the two tiny specks. And the ignored signals from my optic nerves got their due.

The two specks grew steadily larger as the two white-necked eagles that often rest on the balcony rails outside our blue-tinted windows flew nearer. I threw back my head and rested my neck on the backrest of my chair and stretched my legs, all the while continuing to watch the soothing rhythm of the eagles flying in circles. How come one doesn’t get dizzy watching them fly round and round I wondered lazily. As their flight-dance sequence moved closer to the building, I could make out the slight bends of their wings and the gentle tilts of their bodies as they fly. Their movements are graceful and seemingly effortless.

I noticed their heads were bent facing down, then I realized they were looking for/stalking their prey from above. I couldn’t but marvel at their sync even as they kept their eyes on the ground.

“What did their sharp eyes spot on the concrete roads and mosaic pavements in the IT campus when I haven’t spotted a single seed or stone in all my three years here?” I mused.“Maybe some rats on the garbage dump behind the foodcourt.”

One of the pair disappeared out of view suddenly as it swooped downward, probably zeroing in on its target. The other continued to circle even as it moved slightly further away. The first one had probably scared away the other potential targets as it stealthily and in one swift motion grabbed its unsuspecting prey.

“Ah! To fly! To spread one’s wings and glide!” I thought wistfully. “You aren’t the first to wish that dear”, said another part of me with a slight chuckle. I smiled to myself.

Pondering on my chain of thought a few seconds back, “The life of an eagle probably isn’t as romantic as it looks”, I thought. “Food wouldn’t appear as if by magic every mealtime. Every morsel of food has to be hunted out, probably flying for hours under the hot sun. Its nest requires even more labour.”

But then, the eagle does have something to show for its efforts. All the grueling hard work goes towards gaining something solid, something tangible and something meaningful.

Even to the unintended spectator, it gave a stunning show and a relaxing break from the mundane. Wonder how many of us can claim of such an achievement!