I have been wanting to write about the last fortnight but am still not in a grip of the days so that I am composed to write.
First, it started with a sudden decision to travel to India that was not in my plan, and it kind of disturbed the whole work-plans for the week; travel was hectic and then the schedules at home wasn't any different as I had to make the best of it since I am already here.
What did I like more, other than the fact that I am with my family?
I visited my home in Kerala for two days. Perhaps that was the best of experience out of the ten days I am here. It's always good to travel by road, and that too what a wonderful and inspiring sight it offered when the dark charcoal screen of night-sky is slowly lifted for the saffron drapes of morning hours to be unfurled at the horizon, welcoming a new and fresh day, seen through the tiny threads of rain oscillating in front - smiling; the fresh smell of morning in the air, and the visuals of shining clean green of grass blades and shrubs along side the roads, yellow, pink purple and white flowers - I don't know their names, but what's in a name - added to the meditative beauty of the morning as our vehicle criss-crossed through the bends and turns and straight stretch of roads cleaned in previous nights rain leaving behind silver patches here and there on the way.
What was also heartening to watch was the golden shade of water in the ploughed paddy fields with silver reflections of sky, and to see from distance the thick white blankets of fog slowly uncovering the green hills and mountains as the time aged. There was a time when 'tractors' was looked at with amusement, where bullocks were used to plough the fields; raincoats were unheard of, and workers wore big round 'thoppi-kuda' (an innovation combining umbrella and a hat, the size of an umbrella that serves as a a special hat and at the same time the purpose of an umbrella, made of palm leaves - a craft of its own).
This time of the year is when you have a lot of rain that one can enjoy especially when you are coming from a place like Iraq where weather is at its peak of summer. There were plenty of it. The rivers were flowing to the brim of its banks, muddy in some places with the whirlpool of current beneath, greenish in some other places of which the reasons I am unaware of; it was a sight to behold, to see 'kunthi puzha' of Mannarghat - once a river that was flowing gracefully as a broad silver chain flowing through the silent valley with her silent whispers , for long been dry, now seen as dancing through the bed of rocks and flowing its way majestically. I remembered my schoolmate Srikumar in whose house I had spent a few nights trying to learn and understand how I can get some marks in maths good enough to pass in my board exams ! I remembered those days, getting down the bus and walking through the paddy fields and crossing a little stream and walking up the stairs leading to his house built in the middle of arecanut trees and coconut trees and tapioca plantations. I was just recently sharing that story with a friend of mine, remembering those good old days from school.
I was writing about Kunthi Puzha - the river flowing through Mannarghat; the river near my house too wasn't any different, flowing filled from both sides of the banks; I carry a lot of fond memories of this river, memories of all seasons. There are times when a few friends would take an evening stroll, and either sit on the rails of the river-bridge, and watch the river flow and the low-lying branches of trees romancing with the flowing river bending down to touch as she flow; we sit there listening to the silence of the river's flow interspersed by the sound of vehicles that pass by through the bridge - there weren't many vehicles then, compared to how it is now, or we would sit on the river-banks eating roasted nuts and sharing the big little things of life that attracted us or bothered us, singing songs that never was a song, imitating dialogues of the heroes that influenced us from the soundtracks of movies that was then famous.
We've seen that river dry, we have seen her flowing, filled to its ridges as now; it has fed the lives around it, it has taken lives, too.
When I am at home, I will hear from mom many such stories of the struggles of life of ordinary people around us. The life I live, when I hear about them, I begin to think as very cosmetic, and experienced from the peripherals of it. I don't get to hear these stories of struggles from where I live and through the angle of life I see - the stories of deaths and ailments, the stories of divisions and separations, the stories of misfortunes and miseries; there are no interactions with relatives, neighbours or society at large, and that limits my life's experience to the very basic of the daily events and the corporate goals that we struggle to achieve, in addition to the prime support one has to extend to the immediate family. And when I begin to listen to these struggles some of them go through, I find it hard to understand the proverbial 'this too shall pass' and 'everything happens for good' statements we so often hear when we go through minor struggles and reflect on them sitting in a Baskin Robbins outlet !! What explanations would justify their struggle when perhaps they had believed for years that 'this too shall pass' and it never did, or that they were told that 'everything is for good' and the definition of good was never what they thought it is !
In between all that, there was one thing that made this trip a pleasant one. What riches in this world can substitute the warmth of one's mother's presence !! I spent two days with her. She raced against time to prepare the kind of food that she knows I love. From as simple as chilled buttermilk to all the other different food that one can have in the waking hours in between that two days, all flavoured with love that is one that made all what she made so special in this world. Every mother in this world is perhaps sharing this one quality of how they express their love for their children - the keenness to make for them what they love to eat, perhaps from the conscious attempt to feed them from the day one she knew she has conceived.
There was plenty of rain throughout the day, making it pleasantly cool compared to the weather of Chennai, to have enough inspiration to dislike everything else and love and live in those moments; I wanted to spend hours and hours perhaps days and months, reading and writing, and do nothing else but that. It was such a short trip, that I was too tired to stay focused, and the other matters that needed my attention didn't give the luxury of time either; yet, there were moments when I sat down looking a the rain that has always given enough of inspiration flavoured with some nostalgic memories, and the leaves that was falling in plenty from the trees that surrounds my home. May be because they didn't notice my presence in the verandah, there were many birds too outside in the courtyard, different types of them; where did I read once what we must learn from birds, that it's only them who will be off their nests searching for their food - their goal for the day - regardless of whether it is shining or raining.
When I was bedridden for a few months following my surgeries, there was this rain, and the birds, and the books and my pens, and the fog and the green grass and the dews on them, and all what is inspiring me now; but then, I longed to walk, and be out in the midst of the world. I sometimes do not know what to wish for.
And sometimes I realize that the goals I set are meaningless; though at times they are inspiring, as in the moments when I listen to Sir Ken Robinson or the people of wisdom as him or work hand in hand with leaders who inspire, when I am pulled to walk through the rough patches of life being experienced by the real ordinary people around me whom I hardly see except in such occasional visits, I question the goals I set, and the purpose it serves, and the alternatives on offer !
I have the answers, if only I was not depended upon.
Shahir
July 27, 2011
