The first week of September

 

It is the first week of September. It has been a dry August. Very hot. They have now air conditioners in the village. There might be some cool moments inside but the exhaust leaves it burning outside at night. Earlier, we had tolerably cool nights at this time of the year.

It is late evening. Fluffs of clouds are tinged orange by the setting son. A shikra is perched on the top of an electricity pole. A wiretail swallow is whoozing around its head. It flies dangerously close to its head with agitated chip-chip sounds. Maybe the hunter is after its chick that they are training to fly.

A perfect half moon is visible in the sky. There is a commotion in the street. A big rat snake has been sighted. It is hiding under a narrow duct in the small open water drain by the street side. People cannot believe that such a big snake is harmless to the humans. Three huge bullfrogs are wallowing in the muddy water near the duct’s end. Maybe they are very confident that their size is beyond the range of a rat snake. They can easily see the snake peering at them from under the duct just five or six feet away but they are not bothered about it. Sometimes big size helps.