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Sunday morning is the long workout day. I haven’t been feeling upto it for sometime now. It’s been too muddled up in the head recently. Anyways, I’m nursing kind of a lover’s tiff with running , but it is pertinent to move myself for more reasons than one at the moment. So yesterday, to make my Sunday morning feel more normal,I decided to cycle.

 I kept cycling loops around two main roads near where I stay in South Delhi for 4 odd hours. Its funny how even when you are moving physically in one direction,your brain can still go another way.I was cycling but in my head,I had so many things flashing by.

By the time I had finished my first loop,I saw this guy on the road, an “apparent mad man”.He sent my mind on an overdrive. Well, we see these mad people on the roads…some of them even stark naked but surviving the streets of Delhi and still living on. No authorities will take them away or put them in  an asylum. Their plight seems worse than the stray dogs. Yesterday on my ride,I also saw a MCD van full of stray dogs---probably being taken to be spayed/neutered. Hence the comparision came up as I type this.

 This mad man I saw was wearing a pair of shabby torn trousers and nothing else and walking on the street( it appeared more like he was dragging himself)-at first I thought it was just another drunkard on the road. But it wasn’t so. He was either crazy ,as if he had lost his mind totally or was on the verge of it.He had a lot of bruises in his elbows and back ..the bruises were fresh and bleeding. Well I rode past him and didn’t think much.

But next loop he was there again,he had succeeded in moving about 200-400m forward in the 30 mins that I took to get back to that place. Now I wondered WHY he was moving so slow to go whereever he wanted to go because he seemed to be walking okay..no bones broken,no deformities. That’s when I realized he just didn’t believe he could walk. He was crazy or so he believed. I shook my head,felt pained to see the guy this time and went on. 

Next loop …he was sitting on the footpath…just where I had seen him earlier.Okay…stop going on a downward spiral seeing this guy’s misery,I told myself. 

Next loop— he was actually trying to drag himself forward on his elbows and back(that explained his bruises) .I don’t know why he was doing that because I knew and saw he COULD walk. I screamed at him and told him to get to one side unless he wanted to be run over by a speeding vehicle. Oh my God, I don’t know why , but seeing him like this made me angry with myself and life and everything else.

 My ride was all but totally ruined. But just then the  rains started-first drizzling then a heavy downpour….typical hour long Delhi showers. I cycled on and felt trifle better. The rain was so heavy that I was almost blinded by the water falling on my eyes. But I could carry on because it was a Sunday,there was hardly any traffic and all the two wheelers had come to a halt because of the rain. I did two more loops  before I returned home. The crazy fellow was on his elbows and back,looking skywards and blabbering and howling. He was complaining to the Rain Gods I suppose.

Naah, I wasn’t a good Samaritan. I didn’t stop to help him. I didn’t stop to ask him what was wrong. I was not in the frame of mind . On a good day,I would have probably stopped and handed him some money or fetched him some food at least….but not yesterday. I was low on empathy! I was riding to help me out of my own misery,not to help anyone else.

 But yes, I kept remembering the loony. 

This morning, I willed myself to run a 10k on the same loop and almost expected to see him there…but there was no sign of him. I made no mention of him to my friend., with whom I was running. But now I am thinking more clearly .

So it strikes me now how we tread on the thin line between sanity and insanity. How we busy ourselves, day in and day out with so many things -some important, some irrelevant,but mostly mundane stuff and don’t realise that we are all in danger of crossing the line. 

Actually I think many of us keep jumping over that line every now and then completely unaware of the same. Then we find our way back to the safe zone and hence don’t think much of it. All you need is for the darkness(read stress ,anger, depression ,sadness or any other intense negative emotion ) to overshadow the light and there you are ,on the wrong side of the fence.

 I find myself there often,I KNOW when I’m there and I keep willing myself back to where I think I belong-the safe sane zone!!I am nowhere as strong as I would like to be but there are times when I feel so overwhelmed that I feel I won’t be able to find my way back. I haven’t been able to clearly express these feelings to myself or anyone else till date. But this guy I encountered yesterday made me think hard….about so many things!  And for now,today,this rambling is helping. Thankfully,I am still managing to handle the two states of mind …but that poor fella had crossed the line and ventured to a point of no return I suppose.I have myself experienced intense light followed by blackest nights. But so far,there has always been light in the end. I need more of that light and I need to park myself in the light longer. I find my resources dwindling so many times and it scares me!

It’s all too tough!