Knock! Knock! Who is there?

Knock! Knock! Who is there?

It was a nice spring morning, I was taking a casual morning walk. Down just ahead, along the edge of footpath something small moving thing caught my eyes. A tiny, shabby rat was scampering slowly. It was looking sick and injured. It appeared to be looking for a safe place rather than for nibbles. As I stood and watched this little clumsy creature, I noticed that few crows were perched on the tree nearby and already watching it, crowing and keeping their crow eyes on the rat.

One of the crows took lead and came down flapping and started chasing the rat, he inched towards the rat slowly and cautiously,  poked his beak on the back of the rat, then backed up smoothly, waited for the response from rat and then poked again, the rat struggled to save himself from the crow’s hits and moved forward and sideways limply.  With his slow but clever and cunning moves, the leader crow seemed assured to win the feast of the day.

This game of prey and predator continued for around 2 minutes. Suddenly, the rat became out of my sight as it had fallen off the footpath. I could still see the crow moving his head and beak. I moved near the scene hoping to see the end game,  but to my surprise, there was no rat, the crow was crowing in harshest of his voice in despair. I looked carefully, there was a small water drain hole in the sidewall that elevated footpath from the road. The rat had fallen right in front of the hole and without wasting a second squeezed himself in and secured a safe place.

The crow was continuously peeking in the hole, trying his best to get hold of the poor rat, Crow waited outside for a few seconds. Peeked again 2-3 times, for almost 2 minutes crow tried to get hold of the rat, then flew away in despair and joined the fellow spectator crows on the branch of the tree.

The crow had lost an opportunity which seemed just perfect to him, so close, so sure but it just didn’t work for him. Interestingly, the rat also met an opportunity accidentally, and unexpectedly that turned out to be his lifesaver. Had he not been fallen from the footpath right in front of the drain hole, hadn’t he noticed the hole, wasn’t quick in action, he would have missed this opportunity and the good luck might have turned into his misfortune.

We can call it a rat’s day. Being present at the right place at the right time with the right attitude made him lucky. He fell near the drain accidentally but his promptness and willingness to escape the crow turned things in his favour.

Life keeps throwing opportunities to you, you miss some and you catch some. Opportunities may poke out heads at a very unexpected place and at a highly unexpected time. Be prepared to meet them! Be Lucky!