Seeker and finder !

We have had heavy rains in our area for the last five days. There are reposts of loss of lives and property in different parts of this state. The flooding has left several villages, townships and roadways submerged with rivers overflowing and landslides blocking roads. We suffered without power for a day. 

The bird visitors to our garden were fewer during this week. I noticed a Barbet flying into the Guava tree to find its feed during a short spell of respite from rain.  In a few minutes it arrived at a spot where one Guava looked ripe enough. 

The careful inspection that followed was what caught my inspection. It took time to have a good view of the fruit by inspecting from different angles before it reached out with its beaks for a taste. 

The determination to seek and find was explicit in the Barbet's behaviour! 

Another Barbet arrived shortly after the first Barbet left following a sumptuous feed. 

This interesting sight brought a reminder about the avian behaviour. They seek and find by the habit of overcoming difficulties. 

The old garage adjacent to our cottage has been the office of ASHIRVAD for the last thirteen years since Anna and I relocated to live in our cottage.  The activities of ASHIRVAD in child development and rehabilitation remain confined to publication of books, a weekly on line professional forum for clinical discussion and an on line consultation of neurologically challenged children for the advantage of Paediatricians working in mission hospitals in North India. The other focus of ASHIRVAD on Integrated Living continues with involvement to have seminars on Mid life formation, transition and vocation, Parenting presence, and Life, Living and Learning. Every time there is a long spell of rain, the garage suffers seepage of water. It happened again yesterday. The garage is about seventy years old with a tiled low roof located lower than its surrounding. While I was getting the garage tidy yesterday, it reminded me of the attention the garage needs to improve its sturdiness.  

The interior of the garage is a hospitable place during normal seasons and I find it a place of comfort to spend most of the day doing the writing and reflecting. I have often felt the joy of the transition of a garage to a work place that looks decent and comfortable. I wanted a simple facility which is what I found in the garage. On its wall, there are the pictorial representation of activities of ASHIRVAD for fifty years. They remind me of the journey of seeking and finding. 

One painting on the wall, given to me by a resident, Dr Jayanthi in 2008, when I retired from CMC Vellore, is a moving depiction of my biography. She captured the essence of 'seeking and finding' !

A Barbet seeks and finds its daily needs. 

For Anna and me, the journey has been to seek and find ways to engage in 'Taking sides' of parents and their developmentally challenged children  for the last fifty years!  It was this which became our vocation. We feel that we have been given an opportunity to live fulfilled in this vocation! 

The garden around our cottage brings messages of encouragement and affirmation for which we feel grateful!

M.C.Mathew(text and photo)

Behavioural trends !

The Barbets arrive at the feeding station in our garden, when other birds have left after their feed. The Bulbul and Mynah birds do not appear comfortable when a Barbet is around. They accommodate the presence of a squirrel. 

The barbets have other fruits to feed on such as Guava or Papaya in our front garden.  

I notice one or two Barbets perch in the Cable and watch the feeding station and often fly away looking for fruits elsewhere in the garden that they are more fond of ! 

My own observation since we have the feeding station in our garden for ten years now, is that Barbets keep away from other birds, whereas Mynah and Bulbul birds are sociable. Even the Sun birds are seen present around the feeding table when Bulbuls are present. They tolerate human presence and would call out for attention! 

We tried having two feeding stations to allow some birds like Barbets who seek privacy to come to. The parrots are the other species which are similar in behaviour towards other birds. 

I become more aware of traits in human behaviour when I watch these behaviours in birds. 

Yesterday, I met a senior citizen in the local market, who knew my parents. He referred to my parents as those who were thoughtful towards others. He talked about an incident when he received help from my parents when he was in need. 

My parents moved to this village one hundred kilometres away form their native place, soon after independence of India, when the newly started local school needed teachers. Their response to uproot themselves and live in an altogether new place, made all the difference to their lives and others others in the village. This was a transcultural journey leaving the familiar place of their origin and the net work of family and friends.

Anna was born and brought up in Pune and I spent my medical college years in Nagpur. Following our marriage, we began our life at Pune and Sevagram, and then moved to Nagpur. We spent twenty eight years in Tamil Nadu and had a short time in Pondicherry. For thirteen years now, we live in the village which was the adopted home of my parents. 

Most birds are travellers and some are migratory in behaviour. They get formed by these experiences. 

I feel that people who have inter-cultural experiences contribute to enlarge themselves and educate natives of each place about something different from what they are used to. 

The honey bees and the Butterflies pollinate the flowers they visit. 

Now in our mid seventies, Anna and I look back at what we have left behind through our migratory presence in different places in India. We still have meaningful contacts and conversations with some in these places. 

The Barbets are more insular than other birds. They do not join in with other birds for the morning cacophony that is special in our garden! 

There is a self-transcendence which provides a relational dimension to social living! Others come into our lives as formatters and companions. I look back to see how marriage made us more complete; and how friendships and relationships have been formative and transformative to our way of living! 

The social media is largely event and cause centred. But relationships are life-centred to bring out a deeper experience of shared living!

M.C.Mathew( text and photo)

 

Guests in our garden!

This female Butterly, Southern Birdwing also known as Sahyadri Birdwing was seen for a short while this morning flying between flowers in our garden. Its colourfulness and size surpassed the features of a usual butterfly. It is among the largest butterflies found in this region.  

In my search I found out that this is officially designated as the state butterfly of Karnataka. Its habitat is normally in the Western ghats and peninsular region of South india. 

It is a protected butterfly as it is popular with butterfly collectors due its colourfulness and size. 

It was drizzling in our garden. That did not hamper the  movements of other butterflies in our garden. 

I had a sense of awe and wonder seeing the colourfulness and designs on the wings of the butterflies! 

We ought to be doing everything possible for our environment to stay healthy and hospitable for every living being to flourish!

M.C.Mathew(text and photo)

 

Restful living!

The flowers in the garden bear different attire after a rainfall. Some flowers look clothed wet with drops of water on the petals and some others having only scanty drops and few others looking dry! My suspicion was that wind and sunshine would have made the few flowers look dry. 

How true of the way we endure difficult experiences in our lives! Some of us live bearing the marks and scars of our difficult experiences and some others move on behaving well with little indication of the rough times, that  they have been through.

There is something in the petals that are protective. There might be the restoring touch of sunshine and the wind !

The intrinsic resilience and the extrinsic protection! 

One family got subsumed by illness that has taken all of their attention. Another family in a similar situation stays communicative and relational! It was while being in touch with both these families, I got a sense of how their response to situations were different! One family found the experience difficult and draining because they lived relationally distant from others. The other overcoming family has been used to living socially and relationally. 

In a conversation with a younger friend recently, I realised that some people live satisfied by engaging the social media. As long as life is in order, the social media is good enough. When life brings unexpected situations, even the social media fails to sustain people, because it offers entertainment, opinions and connectivity, and not intimacy of communication or sense of belonging in most instances. 

The other family who is through a difficult situation is used to having trusting friends and relational engagements.  Life can be lived at these two lanes- a general social connectivity or closer net work of companions! 

This Bulbul pair above gave an indication of the composure and alertness in thier body language!

The experience of restful living prepares us to be alert in challenging situations! 

The restful living is a relational way of living! 

M.C.Mathew(text and photo)

 

Sunday morning visitors!

After three days of sunshine, the butterflies wee back at the flowers in our garden. I was not able to capture the images of those who were flying around in the air moving between flowers !

They have the skill to be still while not gathering nectar! That stillness escapes our attention ! It is their fluttering movements which announce of their presence. 

The still presence is part of their rhythm!

The still presence is the opposite of a straining presence! 

Jesus of Nazareth referred to straining presence in His Sermon on the mount : "... Do not be anxious for your life....Look at the birds of the air, that hey do not sow, neither do they reap or gather into barns and yet your Heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not worth much more than that ?" (Matthew 6: 25-26). 

It is during the last week of incessant rain, I noticed the truth of this saying of Jesus even more vividly. 

The Mynah birds came to the feeding station in our garden in between the rain spell and emptied the bowls of food. They looked ready for more! Theirs was not at all a straining presence as much as I could make out from the body language! 

In fact what Anna and I experience from the birds is the singing presence. Some of the birds visit us regularly. 

The Bulbuls perch in the nutmeg tree opposite our front door and sing the morning chorus. The Mag pie Robins come even closer by perching in the electric cable and sing till they notice us in their vicinity! 

Thanks to the Butterflies visiting our garden today morning! They introduced the theme of still presence. The Birds brought the message of singing presence. I sensed  that what we needed was this message. In fact these birds do not stop singing when it threatens to rain. It is their morning and evening ritual! 

I felt that they educate Anna and me about grateful presence in response to what we have been blessed with in our mid seventies. Anna had a visit this week of a contemporary at Medical college, who keeps in touch regularly. This time she and her husband spent a morning with us in our home, which brought many memories of people who blessed us with their  grateful presence inner lives. 

Yes, Still presence, singing presence and grateful presence become the calling for us ! The still presence leads us to God consciousness; the singing presence reminds us of the mindful way of living and the grateful presence creates an inward ambience of humility! 

M.C.Mathew (text and photo)