It's been more than 5 weeks late and they are not to be seen anywhere!

I am getting worried day by day.

Suddenly this morning the moment I sat with my cup of hot green tea and newspapers, I saw them making noisy chatter.

I was suddenly relieved. My free pet Love birds were back!

Yes!

I have a pair of Love birds who actually live every monsoon in my balcony.

The rendezvous started around in May 2007. In the 2nd week of May two Love birds started making flying visits of my balcony on 8th floor.

Initially I thought they were simply flying from one balcony to another.

But by the evening I was forced to think more.

The two of them had started collecting dry twigs, leaves and straws and parking them on my balcony.

I was angry yet all smiles and asked my maid to clean the whole thing, not knowing the reasons. But by the evening there was double than what she had thrown!

This repetition started to intrigue me. I perched around the balcony doing my writing, keeping an eye on the balcony. This time I did not ask to throw away the twigs and fry leaves. 

By the afternoon, I could see the two tiny, hardworking flying souls incessantly building their nest. I was pretty pleased to see the whole process like an episode from Nat Geo!

In the evening when my hubby came home, I was too excited to let him take his shoes off and pulled him to show the creation. But to my own bewilderness, that incomplete nest was nowhere to be seen !

It had transformed into a beautiful small nest with a tiny opening right on top of the balcony shutter!

How on earth could these two tiny birds build their nest in just one day! Had I not been throwing away their raw building material, it would have been done a week back. 

After appreciating the art, it struck to both my hubby and me that how on earth are we now going to shut the shutter! We decided to keep the other door locked now and not disturb the birds.

One week later, monsoon started. Now the birds did not leave the nest much.

A few days later I could see female Love bird not going out much and they made sure never to leave the nest alone. I assumed they had laid eggs by now. And was woken up to the noisy chirps of babies in the nest.

I was strangely feeling blessed. 

I followed their routine where mostly the female bird was now around the nest always feeding 24X7.

I got accustomed to having these birds around. One day the birds left the nest. I called for my hubby again to help me clear out the nest which had by now become a mess. I can recall it was after the monsoon that these birds departed my balcony.

Two years back they forgot to build the nest! And started laying eggs on top of the grill! Damn! Every morning there would be one egg broken on my balcony floor. When it happened for the 3rd day, my hubby and I built a support for the nest using  an Adidas shoe box. And by evening they had built the nest on top of it, unlike what we had planned i.e. inside the box.

 This ritual happened for last 5 years. 

 This year that is May 2012, I was not around in Pune and when we did come back I did not see the birds making any flying visits. I thought may be they have finally shifted to another balcony. May be they like to see a populated home, before they built the nest. The feeling was not good. I called my hubby and we actually discussed Love birds for 20 min on STD. Though STD is now a mental block.

 This morning I saw my Love birds back! Flying hurriedly and I guess trying to assess which part or which side of the shutter gate they will build their nest now!

And then something important struck to me.

These birds knew that that monsoon was nowhere to be seen in June and that's why they did not come in the month of May! So now that they are here to build the nest, I should hope and conclude that monsoon will be here in 1-2 weeks from now ! 🙂