I posted a peacock video that I took today (10/31/2014) on youtube. If you don't want to read my write-up then just go look at the video.
Yesterday (10/30/2014) was a sad and yet a very joyous day in my life. One of my peachicks was taken away by an owl and thus the peachick lost its life. That owl must have had a good dinner eating my peachick.
That peachick had some congental problems. Amongst the 5 peacocks that I had, this one had a right ankle problem (it was inverted). That deformity hindered with its gait from its birth. It probably had mental retardation as well. I think that peacock must have had a congental syndrome of some kind. Because it could never gain weight and muscle mass like the rest of them. It was substantially lagging behind in growth compared to the rest of them. While the rest of them had gotten about a kilo or so in weight in three months, this deformed one was just few hundred grams. I knew that it couldn't fend for itself from a predator and hence I was watching it like a guardian angel so closely. I made it a habit to hand feed it couple of times a day. Yet, it kind of was apathetic towards food, never ate much, never gained much weight. Its gait only got worse as its ankle problem extended to its knees and hip. It would drag itself with its good left leg and in turn made the left leg worse. It had a bunch of scratches on its right leg from dragging it on the floor and bled quite a bit on and off. Thus it was not only severely malnourished, underweight and failed to thrive, but it was also anemic.
Anyway, yesterday was a fateful one, at least for that defective peacock. I fed them all some bread at about 8:45 PM and at around 10 PM, when I went to the backyard after hearing some commotion I found that the deformed one was missing. I heard a prominent owl sound coming from the lofty big cottonwood trees in my acreage. Further investigation revealed that the owl (probably a northern hawk owl) must have swept the deformed peacock from the ground and must have consumed it. You would wonder how an owl could do such a dastardly act on its own avian kind all just to appease its hunger, while there are plenty of vegetations around for it to assimilate on this mother earth. But the thing is, just like the way some of the species are made as purely carnivores, like a lion and tiger, these owls survive entirely on meat diet. Unlike vultures, these owls don't eat carcasses of dead animals. They need fresh non-agrarian produce, like, perhaps a malformed peacock that had blunted senses, and instincts, and major physical disability like my peacock.
If you need further reading about this matter about how good of a predators owls are, please see this youtube video of an owl killing a man's chicken. That man is amazing in his narration and I learnt a lot from him.
Life is a gift that we get to live only one time. We learn the greatness of life only when we pass through various stages of life. I am a firm believer in the four stages of life iterated by Sanatana Dharma (ie, bramacharya - student life, grahastha - married household life, vanaprastha - retired life, and sanyasa - renounced life). You would never understand and enjoy the greatness of life and God, unless you have gone through all the above said four stages of life.
I never knew I would enjoy being a father. But now, after having 2 children, I do. Today, Halloween day, when my 9 year old, Ovea, dressed up like a "pirate" for her cosplay, I was so joyous for her. I dropped her at school this morning at 7:40 AM in her pirate costume. She suddenly changed her mind in the evening before she went trick or treating. She didn't like the pirate costume anymore and hence took her grandfather to Target store and bought a bumble bee costume and changed her outfit. I laughed so hard looking at her innocently divine childishness. I never knew I had a father hiding inside me, but now I do. Being a parent is just one more aspect of life and you learn a lot from it.
And similarly I never knew that I had an animal lover inside me until I got my first dog in 2011. And now, along with my dogs, the peacocks walk with me in my property and they teach me life every day. Amongst the four stages of life that I said above, there is nothing explicitly said by Sanatana Dharma about raising pets in your house. I want to add that slight burden of raising a pet on all of us to complement the various stages of life to comprehend "life" in its full form. Everybody should find some member of another species, bring them as a pet, and learn to love and nurture the other species either just briefly or perhaps all along their life to learn the beauty of this world. People like Shankaracharya, those that are inducted into the ascetic life without going through the stages of life might have the capacity to learn life by reading scriptures from sacred books. But a commoner like myself could do the same thing all by just bringing in a pet into my life and just loving it unconditionally.
And here is the philosophical gibberish that you are going to hate me say. I have also realized that "the mind" does not really care about anybody else apart from itself. Yes, that is very true. When you see a pet lover, for example a owner who allows his dog to sleep in his bed at night, you might wonder that he was a great person to show that kind of love towards his dog. But, that is just not true. What I realized from my own pet experience was that, each time when I fed the pet, it almost felt like I was feeding myself. Because all that I saw was "myself" getting gratified in fulfilling the hunger of the pet and it almost appeared that the pet didn't matter at all in this.
When a person says "I love my dog", there are two nouns in that sentence, "I" and the "dog". And do you know amongst the two nouns what the mind cares the most? The word "I". It ascertains the age old philosophical question of "when a tree falls in the woods, does it make some noise or not?". As for as the mind is concerned how does it matter if some tree in some woods fell or not? The "noise" is the perception of having something to do with the tree - some little connection between the mind and the tree. And that would only happen if the tree existed in my own own backyard giving "me" happiness.
Thus it is the "me" and "I" that keeps us all going in life! And there is nothing wrong in realising this utterly selfish nature of the mind. For Pete's sake, this is the pivotal logic that keeps the universe from functioning. Whether I loved myself so much, or if I really loved the pet so much, how does it really matter? The matter of fact is that one little hungry pet got fed and loved, while it could have stayed famished and abused, which is the alternative to love.
Without this "pet therapy", I couldn't imagine how life could be complete. If you absolutely loathe other species, and could never possibly bring such a life into your house ever and live with it, then please do one thing for me. The next time you see a silly little frog or a grasshopper outside your home, just think and wonder if that other life-form had a good meal and had its hunger satiated. Pray for the peace of the other life-form at least just briefly, perhaps a split second! After all, he is your brother because God does not discriminate one form from another (be it with or without life).
Do I feel sad that the malformed peacock (whom we had named as sprite) is dead? I sure am. But then why did I say in the 2nd paragraph that I was joyous about its death? Because, that peacock was born with a defect and I knew that it couldn't live too long. I am glad that it could enjoy at least 3 months of life in this maya world.
Its karma was to be born to live just briefly and then serve as a food to an owl. Nobody could beat fate and so why gripe about the peachick becoming dead at such an young age? What is there to be sad about the peachick succumbing to its predetermined fate (which eventually would engulf all of us one day anyway)?
Om, shanthi, shanthi, shanthi!
Lakshmi M. R. Kaushik.
www.lmrkaushik.blogspot.com
Yesterday (10/30/2014) was a sad and yet a very joyous day in my life. One of my peachicks was taken away by an owl and thus the peachick lost its life. That owl must have had a good dinner eating my peachick.
That peachick had some congental problems. Amongst the 5 peacocks that I had, this one had a right ankle problem (it was inverted). That deformity hindered with its gait from its birth. It probably had mental retardation as well. I think that peacock must have had a congental syndrome of some kind. Because it could never gain weight and muscle mass like the rest of them. It was substantially lagging behind in growth compared to the rest of them. While the rest of them had gotten about a kilo or so in weight in three months, this deformed one was just few hundred grams. I knew that it couldn't fend for itself from a predator and hence I was watching it like a guardian angel so closely. I made it a habit to hand feed it couple of times a day. Yet, it kind of was apathetic towards food, never ate much, never gained much weight. Its gait only got worse as its ankle problem extended to its knees and hip. It would drag itself with its good left leg and in turn made the left leg worse. It had a bunch of scratches on its right leg from dragging it on the floor and bled quite a bit on and off. Thus it was not only severely malnourished, underweight and failed to thrive, but it was also anemic.
Anyway, yesterday was a fateful one, at least for that defective peacock. I fed them all some bread at about 8:45 PM and at around 10 PM, when I went to the backyard after hearing some commotion I found that the deformed one was missing. I heard a prominent owl sound coming from the lofty big cottonwood trees in my acreage. Further investigation revealed that the owl (probably a northern hawk owl) must have swept the deformed peacock from the ground and must have consumed it. You would wonder how an owl could do such a dastardly act on its own avian kind all just to appease its hunger, while there are plenty of vegetations around for it to assimilate on this mother earth. But the thing is, just like the way some of the species are made as purely carnivores, like a lion and tiger, these owls survive entirely on meat diet. Unlike vultures, these owls don't eat carcasses of dead animals. They need fresh non-agrarian produce, like, perhaps a malformed peacock that had blunted senses, and instincts, and major physical disability like my peacock.
If you need further reading about this matter about how good of a predators owls are, please see this youtube video of an owl killing a man's chicken. That man is amazing in his narration and I learnt a lot from him.
Life is a gift that we get to live only one time. We learn the greatness of life only when we pass through various stages of life. I am a firm believer in the four stages of life iterated by Sanatana Dharma (ie, bramacharya - student life, grahastha - married household life, vanaprastha - retired life, and sanyasa - renounced life). You would never understand and enjoy the greatness of life and God, unless you have gone through all the above said four stages of life.
I never knew I would enjoy being a father. But now, after having 2 children, I do. Today, Halloween day, when my 9 year old, Ovea, dressed up like a "pirate" for her cosplay, I was so joyous for her. I dropped her at school this morning at 7:40 AM in her pirate costume. She suddenly changed her mind in the evening before she went trick or treating. She didn't like the pirate costume anymore and hence took her grandfather to Target store and bought a bumble bee costume and changed her outfit. I laughed so hard looking at her innocently divine childishness. I never knew I had a father hiding inside me, but now I do. Being a parent is just one more aspect of life and you learn a lot from it.
And similarly I never knew that I had an animal lover inside me until I got my first dog in 2011. And now, along with my dogs, the peacocks walk with me in my property and they teach me life every day. Amongst the four stages of life that I said above, there is nothing explicitly said by Sanatana Dharma about raising pets in your house. I want to add that slight burden of raising a pet on all of us to complement the various stages of life to comprehend "life" in its full form. Everybody should find some member of another species, bring them as a pet, and learn to love and nurture the other species either just briefly or perhaps all along their life to learn the beauty of this world. People like Shankaracharya, those that are inducted into the ascetic life without going through the stages of life might have the capacity to learn life by reading scriptures from sacred books. But a commoner like myself could do the same thing all by just bringing in a pet into my life and just loving it unconditionally.
And here is the philosophical gibberish that you are going to hate me say. I have also realized that "the mind" does not really care about anybody else apart from itself. Yes, that is very true. When you see a pet lover, for example a owner who allows his dog to sleep in his bed at night, you might wonder that he was a great person to show that kind of love towards his dog. But, that is just not true. What I realized from my own pet experience was that, each time when I fed the pet, it almost felt like I was feeding myself. Because all that I saw was "myself" getting gratified in fulfilling the hunger of the pet and it almost appeared that the pet didn't matter at all in this.
When a person says "I love my dog", there are two nouns in that sentence, "I" and the "dog". And do you know amongst the two nouns what the mind cares the most? The word "I". It ascertains the age old philosophical question of "when a tree falls in the woods, does it make some noise or not?". As for as the mind is concerned how does it matter if some tree in some woods fell or not? The "noise" is the perception of having something to do with the tree - some little connection between the mind and the tree. And that would only happen if the tree existed in my own own backyard giving "me" happiness.
Thus it is the "me" and "I" that keeps us all going in life! And there is nothing wrong in realising this utterly selfish nature of the mind. For Pete's sake, this is the pivotal logic that keeps the universe from functioning. Whether I loved myself so much, or if I really loved the pet so much, how does it really matter? The matter of fact is that one little hungry pet got fed and loved, while it could have stayed famished and abused, which is the alternative to love.
Without this "pet therapy", I couldn't imagine how life could be complete. If you absolutely loathe other species, and could never possibly bring such a life into your house ever and live with it, then please do one thing for me. The next time you see a silly little frog or a grasshopper outside your home, just think and wonder if that other life-form had a good meal and had its hunger satiated. Pray for the peace of the other life-form at least just briefly, perhaps a split second! After all, he is your brother because God does not discriminate one form from another (be it with or without life).
Do I feel sad that the malformed peacock (whom we had named as sprite) is dead? I sure am. But then why did I say in the 2nd paragraph that I was joyous about its death? Because, that peacock was born with a defect and I knew that it couldn't live too long. I am glad that it could enjoy at least 3 months of life in this maya world.
Its karma was to be born to live just briefly and then serve as a food to an owl. Nobody could beat fate and so why gripe about the peachick becoming dead at such an young age? What is there to be sad about the peachick succumbing to its predetermined fate (which eventually would engulf all of us one day anyway)?
Om, shanthi, shanthi, shanthi!
Lakshmi M. R. Kaushik.
www.lmrkaushik.blogspot.com
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