{"id":52292,"date":"2026-07-24T17:39:16","date_gmt":"2026-07-24T12:09:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ferozepuronline.com\/?p=52292"},"modified":"2026-07-24T17:39:31","modified_gmt":"2026-07-24T12:09:31","slug":"a-pause-in-the-park-gurjeet-singh-chowdhary","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ferozepuronline.com\/?p=52292","title":{"rendered":"A PAUSE IN THE PARK – Gurjeet Singh Chowdhary"},"content":{"rendered":"

A PAUSE IN THE PARK – Gurjeet Singh Chowdhary<\/strong><\/p>\n

After the early morning larks have left the park, before sunbreak and the night owls are still recharging their batteries in dreamland; this was the perfect time for a quiet walking in park before my 9-5 office routine. There is dusk and there is dawn and there is this period which is like none other, a calm soothing no non-sense period. Where you can just hear only the birds chirping, an occasional gentle breeze, the overcast skies but still no rains; What\u2019s with the weather? (the monsoons had again been poor this year), blanking out my thoughts; just walking briskly, round and round in my small park. Sometimes when you want to have that Me- moment, this is it.<\/p>\n

Few of my neighbour\u2019s would sit out in the balconies with a tea cup & the devour the gory news of the world which was their present concern. Luckily, i dodged behind the hedge & continued my lonely & brisk walk. But was i really alone, no humans -yes; but then creepy and not so creepy living things were there. I never imagined, plants, trees and shrubs were living, in their own way! Did you know that plants are sensitive to touch? They way that \u2018touch me not plant \u2018mimosa pudica, leaflets fold inward upon touching, that is an evolutionary defense mechanism. Gardeners swear that talking or singing to plants make them grow faster or tilt towards the music.<\/p>\n

It was then that i noticed that a squirrel, almost came under my foot later, two of them crossing their paths riding in front of me zigzag, left to right, hiding behind the tree barks! Was this a coincidence or were they playing me? I was enjoying this hide and seek. Their behavior, i learnt, was an evolutionary survival instinct & they perhaps were also expecting a nut or two to bite upon. Also, the five longitudinal stripes, on the Asiatic palm squirrel, on acting as a disruptive coloration helping it to blend in the forage. As i was escaping from the urban chaos in the little green park, so were the squirrels were from me. Gradually as my walks became more frequent, i noticed those same very squirrel\u2019s would stop, even if momentarily, and look me in the eye. They had now started to recognize me, so i started bringing those nuts and they just devoured on them with their sharp teeth. Did you know these teeth grow upto15 cm\u2019s a year as thew gnaw upon hard objects. Now they approach me and look forward to getting small eats. I have now got them fresh fruits, nuts, seeds and if I am not taking my walk they survive on the insects and caterpillars in the park. But if you are on the other end of the rainbow and feel they are a menace, a few tips would help. They avoid peppermint oil, vinegar, garlic, coffee and green chillies.<\/p>\n

Sometimes you need these walks, these me-only moments to rejuvenate, to recharge, to just pause. We all need some downtime to reboot rethink and reshape our lives there is so much life around us(i didn\u2019t get to the creepy stuff)enjoy your precious moments, but pause from the roller-coaster to enjoy your life.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A PAUSE IN THE PARK – Gurjeet Singh Chowdhary After the early morning larks have left the park, before sunbreak and the night owls are still recharging their batteries in dreamland; this was the perfect time for a quiet walking in park before my 9-5 office routine. There is dusk and there is dawn and …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":51907,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-52292","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ferozepuronline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52292","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ferozepuronline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ferozepuronline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ferozepuronline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ferozepuronline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=52292"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/ferozepuronline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52292\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":52293,"href":"https:\/\/ferozepuronline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52292\/revisions\/52293"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ferozepuronline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/51907"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ferozepuronline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=52292"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ferozepuronline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=52292"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ferozepuronline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=52292"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}