PUNCTUATE YOUR LIFE!
A significant part of my life in this city has been spent traveling to office and back in autos, buses and trains, much as it is with all of us. Getting into and out of them leaves you with little or no time to notice what’s happening around you, what with you having to negotiate your way through people, traffic, hawkers, animals, ditches and then some more.
As luck would have it, life took a turn for the better and I was bestowed with a vehicle and a chauffer to drive me to office and back home, which took some time getting used to, I must admit.
One bright sunny morning I got into the back seat of my car as usual, rolled down the window panes, allowed myself to relax while feeling the cool breeze gently caress my clean shaven jaw line ( Not that I had a sculptured one at that), and chose to look out of the window rather than indulge in the usual flipping through of my morning newspaper. What I saw out of the window of my car that day brought with it a realization that never ever occurred to me before. I SAW HILLS. Yes I saw hills beyond the sky scraped concrete jungle that so uncomfortably enveloped my life up until then. Hills? So what? Haven’t you ever seen them before? What’s so unique about them hills?
Well the difference is, I had never noticed those hills before. In all my years of traveling to and from office, all I ever noticed was trucks, cars, buses, peoples faces, buildings, malls, green, orange and red lights. But that day I took some time off and looked up and around, the green sheet of cover across their huge beings, topped with misty cloud covers made them look so majestic and powerful. I was unaware of their presence around the city I live in, that moment I was overwhelmed by the fact that they were there all along waiting for me to take notice of them and acknowledge their existence; and here I was cruelly ignoring their towering presence around me. I smiled to myself and thanked god for teaching me my lesson in punctuation. Today I make it a point to slow down, take some time off and look at them hills everyday as if to say thank you for being there, and seeming like a protective shield and making me realize that there is more to life than just our immediate surroundings.
All of us have at some point of time realized the presence of something in our lives, which existed all along but didn’t get our attention because of the pace with which we go about our daily chores. Punctuating; our lives just like this sentence, allows us to slow down and take note of what’s happening around us. Try it, slow down, after parking your car walk back home a little slower than you usually do, you might notice something new. Take the stairs up to your floor instead of the lift you might meet new people and may even strike up a lifelong friendship. Look around, stop a little and the beauty of creation and people around us will enrich our lives even further.
-Fabian Cowan
Monday, February 22, 2010
Monday, February 8, 2010
Interview with a 5 year old
The loud noise in the background was that of my son, he was talking to his cars, sometimes shouting then yelling and smiling at times, yes 5 year olds do things that sometimes seem insane to us older lots. While I watched him do so amidst the cool breeze that was brushing past my stubbled exterior, I challenged my mind the traveler that it is to take me back in time to an age when I was a little boy. My mind zipped past in reverse, counting the years backward with efficient speed, my first step in Mumbai, the days back college, all through school, the playground in the backyard with the guava tree towering above the little man made pond, the fishing bouts with my friends at the lake, the jelly fish bite on the beach, the beating we got as kids near chikku wadi, and then suddenly it came to a grinding halt where I found myself to be all of 10 years old, on my blue cycle with white tyre rims, zipping down the pass near bushi dam. I tried but failed to latch myself to a straw that would pull my mind back a few more years to a point when I was 5 but I failed and gave up. I wanted to know how I felt when I was five and what my son now feels right now. Having tried and failed I decided to observe him much more closely, by doing so I taught myself a few lessons that are gems in their own right.
5 year olds I am told live in the “here and now”, they take delight in the things that are happening around them at that very moment. If they are playing with cars, they put on the mask of drivers, if its nuts and bolts they are playing with, they are efficient engineers, if it’s a puzzle, there ain’t no amount of chocolates that can distract them, I tried alluring him with chocolates once while he was deciphering the pooh puzzle, and learnt another truth, there is always time for a quick bite of the dark sweet temptation that we all call chocolate. He had his chocolate and ate it too and went right back into his creative maize.
What surprises me all of the time is the challenging times our kids live in. In our concerted effort and attempt at getting him admission into a new school we both my wife and I took him to the new school and sat in the admission head’s cabin, after the customary hello’s and a few signatures on a some very important sheets of paper we were asked to leave the room, so that she could interact with the child one-on-one. I was hesitant, as any father would be, how can i leave him alone, he needs me’ he always has. I requested the lady if one of us could stay as he might feel intimidated, she sternly said “LEAVE” now. We left, shoulders drooping, and slumped ourselves into the sofa in the waiting room. The sofa was too comfortable any lower and our bottoms would be touching the cold concrete floor below us. The next 10 minutes seemed like an eternity, we were tensed, anxious, and extremely emotional. How could a 5 year old deal with a situation he has never been in, fielding questions from a stranger, answers to which would define the path his life takes here on end? The images of his little fingers, his tiny toes, his first gurgle, the first steps he took and the many others I helped him with flashed against the, by now weak walls of my mind, and it was brought to halt all of a sudden by the loud shriek of the door bell that rang from inside the cabin. We had been called, I was a nervous wreck by then, what would she tell us, how did my son do? I had conditioned myself to hear the worst, but the smile on my sons’ face and the pleasant contours of the teachers face brought some delight to mine. He did well. That was my proudest moment yet, I must say.
My lesson in life; Even a five year old has his moments of truth, even 5 year olds need to take a stand, adapt, compete, deal with stress, and deliver. As a parent you can be as protective as you want to be, teach as much as you can, hold on to them as long as you want, but then there comes time when you need to let go and hope they live life by the lessons you have taught them. Memories are made of these, and lessons are there to be learnt every moment of our living lives.
My son learnt his, while I learnt mine.
5 year olds I am told live in the “here and now”, they take delight in the things that are happening around them at that very moment. If they are playing with cars, they put on the mask of drivers, if its nuts and bolts they are playing with, they are efficient engineers, if it’s a puzzle, there ain’t no amount of chocolates that can distract them, I tried alluring him with chocolates once while he was deciphering the pooh puzzle, and learnt another truth, there is always time for a quick bite of the dark sweet temptation that we all call chocolate. He had his chocolate and ate it too and went right back into his creative maize.
What surprises me all of the time is the challenging times our kids live in. In our concerted effort and attempt at getting him admission into a new school we both my wife and I took him to the new school and sat in the admission head’s cabin, after the customary hello’s and a few signatures on a some very important sheets of paper we were asked to leave the room, so that she could interact with the child one-on-one. I was hesitant, as any father would be, how can i leave him alone, he needs me’ he always has. I requested the lady if one of us could stay as he might feel intimidated, she sternly said “LEAVE” now. We left, shoulders drooping, and slumped ourselves into the sofa in the waiting room. The sofa was too comfortable any lower and our bottoms would be touching the cold concrete floor below us. The next 10 minutes seemed like an eternity, we were tensed, anxious, and extremely emotional. How could a 5 year old deal with a situation he has never been in, fielding questions from a stranger, answers to which would define the path his life takes here on end? The images of his little fingers, his tiny toes, his first gurgle, the first steps he took and the many others I helped him with flashed against the, by now weak walls of my mind, and it was brought to halt all of a sudden by the loud shriek of the door bell that rang from inside the cabin. We had been called, I was a nervous wreck by then, what would she tell us, how did my son do? I had conditioned myself to hear the worst, but the smile on my sons’ face and the pleasant contours of the teachers face brought some delight to mine. He did well. That was my proudest moment yet, I must say.
My lesson in life; Even a five year old has his moments of truth, even 5 year olds need to take a stand, adapt, compete, deal with stress, and deliver. As a parent you can be as protective as you want to be, teach as much as you can, hold on to them as long as you want, but then there comes time when you need to let go and hope they live life by the lessons you have taught them. Memories are made of these, and lessons are there to be learnt every moment of our living lives.
My son learnt his, while I learnt mine.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
