{"id":431,"date":"2020-09-13T14:45:21","date_gmt":"2020-09-13T09:15:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thetoad.in\/?p=431"},"modified":"2020-09-13T14:47:04","modified_gmt":"2020-09-13T09:17:04","slug":"a-brave-robin","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thetoad.in\/index.php\/2020\/09\/13\/a-brave-robin\/","title":{"rendered":"A Brave Robin"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"western\" align=\"justify\"><span style=\"font-size: large;\">A flock of robins lived on pine trees. They would begin their day with singing.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"western\" align=\"justify\"><span style=\"font-size: large;\">With first light, the birds would sit on the branches in ones and twos and sing. The chorus was mesmerising, calling each creature around to rise.<\/span><\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_434\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-434\" style=\"width: 788px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-434\" src=\"https:\/\/thetoad.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/robin-1-239x300.jpeg\" alt=\"\" width=\"788\" height=\"989\" srcset=\"https:\/\/thetoad.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/robin-1-239x300.jpeg 239w, https:\/\/thetoad.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/robin-1-480x603.jpeg 480w, https:\/\/thetoad.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/robin-1-398x500.jpeg 398w, https:\/\/thetoad.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/robin-1.jpeg 607w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 788px) 100vw, 788px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-434\" class=\"wp-caption-text\"><span style=\"color: #ff6600;\"><strong><em>Illustration by: Zainab Shah<\/em><\/strong><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p class=\"western\" align=\"justify\"><span style=\"font-size: large;\">One day there was an unexpected development. The singing of the robins woke up a bat, which lived in the hollow of a tree.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"western\" align=\"justify\"><span style=\"font-size: large;\">The black creature of the night was angry.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"western\" align=\"justify\">\u201c<span style=\"font-size: large;\">Your singing disturbs my sleep. I have been tolerating you for a long time, but not anymore,\u201d he shouted.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"western\" align=\"justify\"><span style=\"font-size: large;\">The singing ceased abruptly and the robins went quiet. Not a word was said in response.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"western\" align=\"justify\"><span style=\"font-size: large;\">The next morning, there was no singing. The bat was happy that the singing had stopped for him to sleep peacefully.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"western\" align=\"justify\"><span style=\"font-size: large;\">The bat\u2019s happiness, however, did not last long as he heard a voice. Not the one to be cowed down, a young robin continued singing.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-433\" src=\"https:\/\/thetoad.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/bat-1-1.jpeg\" alt=\"\" width=\"847\" height=\"860\" \/><\/p>\n<p class=\"western\" align=\"justify\"><span style=\"font-size: large;\">On hearing the voice, the bat rushed outside to see who was singing.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"western\" align=\"justify\">\u201c<span style=\"font-size: large;\">Did you not hear me yesterday? Are you not afraid?\u201d he asked.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"western\" align=\"justify\">\u201c<span style=\"font-size: large;\">Yes,\u201d said the robin.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"western\" align=\"justify\">\u201c<span style=\"font-size: large;\">But I chose to be brave. Those who are brave face their fear. Everyone is afraid of something.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"western\" align=\"justify\"><span style=\"font-size: large;\">The bat was surprised on seeing the courage of the young robin.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"western\" align=\"justify\"><span style=\"font-size: large;\">But the bat still did not give in. \u201cDon\u2019t mess with me. I will harm you if you do not stop disturbing me,\u201d the bat threatened.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"western\" align=\"justify\"><span style=\"font-size: large;\">The young robin smiled.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"western\" align=\"justify\">\u201c<span style=\"font-size: large;\">Singing is what makes me a robin. If I am forced to be someone else, I will not be happy. So, I choose to be brave. You can choose to be wicked,\u201d said the robin.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"western\" align=\"justify\"><span style=\"font-size: large;\">All robins were keenly listening to and watching the conversation between the two.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"western\" align=\"justify\"><span style=\"font-size: large;\">The bat was left speechless. He had realized that his threats won\u2019t work anymore.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"western\" align=\"justify\"><span style=\"font-size: large;\">One by one, the other robins also resumed singing. Soon, there was a chorus which scared the bat. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"western\" align=\"justify\"><span style=\"font-size: large;\">He had to finally give in.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"western\" align=\"justify\"><span style=\"font-size: large;\">The bat stepped back and left the robins alone. <\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A flock of robins lived on pine trees. They would begin their day with singing. With first light, the birds would sit on the branches in ones and twos and sing. The chorus was mesmerising, calling each creature around to rise. One day there was an unexpected development. The singing of the robins woke up&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":434,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[16,9,35,15,11,8,34,33],"class_list":["post-431","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-stories","tag-amusing","tag-children-stories","tag-courage","tag-inspirational","tag-kashmir","tag-kids-stories","tag-robin-and-bat","tag-robin-story","enable-dropcap"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thetoad.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/431"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thetoad.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thetoad.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thetoad.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thetoad.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=431"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thetoad.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/431\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thetoad.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/434"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thetoad.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=431"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thetoad.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=431"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thetoad.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=431"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}