Monday, April 14, 2008

Death of a Dog....

source of the image :www.appleblossomart.net
He was a bundle of flesh and black fur when I stole him from the litter of eight, all comfortably snugged together and dozing under the shade of the jamun tree in the ajith's compound.The mother had probably gone out to look for food around..I managed to sneak, commit the crime and not get caught...I was just not guilty..

He was still and did nt even whimper when i got him into my bedroom, hiding from mom- busy talking to the neighbour across the garden...Using an old T-shirt which i dished out from my cupboard, I made a warm bed for him, put him on it and patted him back to sleep...I pushed the make-shift bed with tipu- thats what i decided i would call him...Names like "Bravo" sound so videshi na- under our own cot hoping that mom would never ever notice..Everything went on perfectly as i could manage to smuggle in some milk into the bedroom and keep the pup engaged and content...
As was usual at ten thirty, we were all into bed..Trouble started at around quarter past twelve, when parents woke awake stratled by yelps from under the bed...Hell broke loose when they realized the source..Dad's four "chooral" hits on my calf and half an hour of tearful cajoling was all that was needed to convince them to allow me to keep Tipu...No cost benefit anlaysis or techno-economic feasibility report was needed here..
From then on, Tipu became the fifth member of our small family...

Those days,we used to live in the defence colony quarters .The establishment had to be protected from the enemy air raids and was so camouflaged using a lush green forest cover and surrounding hills.Added to this, life as such was insulated from the outside fast paced world. So ironically though close to the metro, we lived a country life, breathing fresh air and relishing leisure...So we had this big garden around each house and a tiny scalable hill in the backyard which we used to explore every evening after school hours...We were a team of four..Four weeks into- Tipu became the latest member of our daily explorations.But as time passed we realized that it was us who were members of his explorations...An old water tank built by the British was his favourite exploratory lab. The huge tank although looking rusted to ruins, stood still strong, reflecting the strength of the British Engineering fundamentals.The name metaphored him so well, for he was a real bravo leading us to so many of those explorations through thick underbushes, narrow paths and some real dark scary structures.Such explorations usually do not yield anything tangible but to the explorersits just the thrill of discovering things new that drives them to it..Bushes, flowers, fruits,spiders,lizards, snakes, butterflies, animal skeletons and what all....

Months passed and whether any of us fell ill or had to change the routine Tipu never grew tired and made sure he never missed any of these explorations.

It was on one such routine evening just before the summer was to start thathe broke his routine...He looked tired and clearly to be under some pain and enquiries to mom led to the fact that he had been avoiding food for the past two days..The neighbour who himself had a pet dog diagnosed it a result of worms and prescribed a tablet which we crushed and fed him with some rice which he ingested very unwantingly..The medicine started acting fast and seemed to tranquilize him. As usual he sat at my foot as i watched TV and slept....

He never woke up for his daily routine..

We took him to the hills and buried him near the tank...

It was different that night..
I think I heard Dad weep that night..

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