the black cat

The incident goes back really far in my memory.

I was studying in class IX. We had a very nice home in Khandwa and had spent some of the best moments there.
The events in last few months were not going in our ways. We had some family issues; my dad was facing lot of pressure on the work front. My mom was not having best time with health; she faced one accident also.

Suddenly there came another bolt form the blue; one big incident and we all were totally shattered. It looked like we were under spell of some curse. We were not able to digest the fact that these all was happening with us. Mind you, my family (including me, even I was very religious then) is a religious one, so we never expected that we might have to suffer so much.

In the time of pain and sadness, our conscience and logic takes a beating. The same happened with my mom (and later with me). There was black cat in our surrounding. She used to roam around for food in the whole area. One fine day, my mom realized (or recalled) that she saw that black cat every time before some bad thing happened with my family. Initially her inner voice did not allow her to come to any conclusion. But slowly, the fear overpowered the logic and beliefs.

She became sure that this black cat was a messenger of some bad news. There was a fear in her mind every time she saw the cat. Being a pious lady, she could not think about doing any harm to the poor cat. So only thing we did was, whenever we would see the cat, we would make her run away from our home. I would always do that. I dint mind it, as long as my mother was not getting tense in apprehension of some bad thing.

But as the time passed, even I started to fear by the look of the cat. I still don’t know if the fear was only because of the turn of events, or the infamous myths associated with a black cat. But I did start fearing the sight of the cat.

Time passed by, we shifted from Khandwa, to Indore and then I came to Bangalore for studies. I never saw a black cat again.
Some days back, I saw the black cat again, and again I was shivering. I feared so much that I could listen to my heart pounding. I could not believe that I was behaving in such a way. But I have to accept that I did feel the fear. I tired to relate some of the recent bad events of my life with the same. But I could not convince my inner-voice. So I gave up the fear.

This time the black cat has given birth to three cute kittens. So she has taken shelter in our neighborhood. As the time is passing, I am getting used to the black cat.
But still in one corner of my heart, I have a question.
Is the cat really an omen?
Is she giving me some clues or news by her sudden appearance in my life?

I will never know, may be she is an omen. How ugly an omen though!!