Talking to animals

Today while I was walking back to office after taking my lunch, there was a crow seated on one of the hand rails on the entrance to the railway station and it was crowing loudly. First I stared at it and the crowing got louder. The old instincts got the better out of me and spontaneously I wriggled my face and brought out the voice to crow back at it and said "what do you want". For a moment I forgot that I am at a public place and never expected anyone to see my act, but when I lifted my head to see the railway station guard staring at me. I just couldn't do anything than to just walk away as if nothing happened. Now I just pray that when I go for lunch tomorrow I do not bounce in to this person or even better if he cannot remember my face.

When this happened I just realized that I have had this habit from childhood.Starting from imitating the cukoos and making them scream continuously to the days in which I talk to the cats at home, I've been doing a lot of talking to animals. While schooling, I am usually the last to leave home. My list of activities in the morning was to leave our cat outside and lock all the doors, switch all the lights off and then leave home. The cat was an absolute brat, specially on rainy days she hates to be outside. So its always a struggle in the morning to leave her outside. So I got in to the habit of taking her outside the house, leave her food there and then spend some time playing with her so that she gets comfortable in the 'new' environment and then leave her by saying a nice bye to her. It became a routine such that the bye was a firm verbal bye synchronous with a wave - being said to a cat. I know its weird but then some habits are uninterpreted. On one fine morning I went through this routine and waved a big hearty big to the cat and to my utter surprise our two neighbor akkas' were on the way to school and had seen me wave bye through the gate and replied back to me with a bye - they assumed it was for them. I was utterly shocked and to cover my embarrassment I ran inside the house and didn't look back. Up to that point I would go to their home speak to teacher, sir and the ayyas but seldom spoke to the two akkas, I was at the age in which we boy school kids go through this mind set of being; scared of any girl.

Unfortunately for me on the next day the story was out that I had waved bye to them and ran away shyly. So all of them joined in to bully me saying that I waved bye and now not accepting it. When I said I waved bye to the cat no one was willing to buy that story. Although once bitten, weirdly the habit has continued and still at times the old instincts come back and you feel like looking at the animal's eye and speak to it - which I repeated today. I do not know whether other people too go through this syndrome or is it only me. Even if its only me I am sure I would do this again. Its one of the beautiful things in life.