Doveye gets pigeoneyed

No more doves or pigeons for me! A stray pigeon sitting on my window sill slipped and landed on my head this morning around 4.30 am while I was dead to the world. Instinctively in my sleep, I touched my head to hear a loud flap of wings. I jumped and sat on the bed and woke up my brother. He had no idea what happened and reached for the light to see the cause of the noise.

The ruckus that followed would have qualified for prime time entertainment. We took turns to drive the bird away but in vain. We opened the curtains for it but it refused to leave. We sprinkled water to scare him but that didn’t help either. Tarun threw his red tshirt at the bird, his logic being that pigeons are afraid of red. My brother should keep his logic to himself. The pigeon sat on tubelights and on the bed. We tried poking it with a stick and it flew in the closed balcony. We opened the balcony window and drew the curtains but the bird didn’t go away. It then flew and sat on a photo frame. The poor animal was shivering terribly but we just wanted him to leave so that everyone could be at peace. My already annoyed, sweating n sleepy brother then threw socks at the pigeon after which the latter sat on the fan blade. Tarun then said that we should allow the bird to rest for 2 mins as it would be tired. Don’t ask! Anyway, that seemed like a decent idea because we were all jumpy and the bird was trembling n pooping all over. We thought we’d give the stranded kabutar a small merry-go-round ride to really force him to leave us but seems our aves friend was not in for such rides. Next was the disco lights trick. You switch on and switch off the lights in quick succession, purely to irritate someone…as if it would be of any use against a pigeon.

As a last resort, Tarun gets my 1000 page copy of Oscar Wilde’s short stories and plays, wholly believing that if thick books scare and drive him away, they would have the same effect on the bird. Our sense our humour reaches new heights when we’re scared and sleepy. Obviously nothing happened.

Finally, Tarun gave up. He muttered some curses and closed the room door. The bird had now settled on Tarun’s pillow and would get some sound sleep looking at the stars on the ceiling while my brother and I settled for the comforts of the living room floor without any pillows or blankets, saved by yoga mats and sofa cushions.

We had an adventure filled night. We laughed at ourselves and our one-liners and our collective fear of trespassing members of the animal kingdom. Little did we know then that pigeons are also afraid of the dark and hence the bird wouldn’t leave us. My brother blamed my mop of hair for attracting the bird and so I got a hair cut. If it didn’t look like a bird’s nest earlier, now it does and for a while at least I’m not talking to doves or pigeons.