Omens

Recently, in the span of three days I saw two snakes at home and a dead body passing down the road (here, corpses are transported in the beds of trucks, capped with glass toppers so people in the community can say a final goodbye before cremation rites). As unsettling as each sighting was, here in India they are each considered good omens.

Then, just last week while engaging in a spiritually-centered conversation with a dear friend, as I was yearning for some sort of a sign about the topic we were discussing, I noticed a praying mantis sitting in the windowsill by my side.

(I’ve only seen a mantis one other time while living here and, coincidentally, in the days prior I had just been wishing I could come across one again…it reminded me of the time I was desperate to find salamanders before moving out of my old farmhouse and as the thought was leaving my mind, I looked down to see I was standing next to an entire jumble of eggs, some transparent enough to see some form of their bodies).

The mantis didn’t move all day, and by the following evening he had only made it so far as the top of a curtain. The glow of our conversation had worn off and I mentally returned to past histories that were better off buried. The next morning, I found only the head of the mantis lying on the divan. I’m sure one of the house lizards had gotten to it as I had feared.

Although, a few days later two lizards met their own doom after crawling inside of an electric wall panel just above where the mantis was found. Not a good smell with summer temperatures heating up to nearly 110* this week. Thankfully Debu-da, the electrician, was able to come over the same day he was called and fished their bodies out with a stick.

All of these omens, good and bad, made me think of the past couple of years when I’ve spent more time at my childhood home than probably all of my time combined since I moved out before college. It seems every time I visit, I stumble upon a dead bird. Wren in a kiddie pool. Woodpecker on the trail. Cardinal near the garage. Each one buried with a song and a prayer.

Do omens mean anything? Who knows. But here I am, waiting and listening.