My friendly foes

                                                         

On a short trip to the hills recently, sitting in an inconspicuous little restaurant,as my boys waited for their Maggie to arrive , I chanced upon this-

            

           'The ways'

To every man there openeth ,

A way , and  ways, and a way!

And the high soul climbs the high way,

And the low soul gropes the low;

And in between, in the misty flats,

The rest drift to and fro.

But to every man there openeth

A high way, and a low

And every man decideth

The way his soul shall go"

                  -John Oxenham

As I drift to and fro,on the misty flats,today the mind is on an overdrive. I think I love and nurture these demons in my head as much as I hate them.They won't leave me, and I have kind of made peace with this fact.

With help from these good friends in my mind,  I understand the futility of the arrangement of this life, yet mostly, I'm spending time caught up in all the trivial segments.I end up caring,caring too much and then gloat over that being my kind of thing.And then I reprimand myself because I would like to be this woman who doesn't give a damn-about anything! The good,the bad or the ugly!!I want the graph in my head to remain at a straight line.I guess I have extreme expectations of myself and hence get nowhere!

For some reason,I find myself trying to find something beneath the flesh,bones and mind. I don't quite get anywhere,but I keep searching. So much flesh and bone and mind everywhere ,where are the souls?Where's mine? Isn't that supposed to be part of the deal too ?When the rules are set  and decided for morality,societal norms,manners-everything;how do you gauge the soul value? Or is it inconsequential really ? Why can't I find that soul?

Everything seems to fill up fast-houses, hospitals, graveyards, junkyards, city dumps.  But nothing else fills. The real gaps remain there-unfilled and unfulfilled!

Sometimes someone will come along and restore the spright in your stride, help you love and laugh again, and  make you ignore your friends in the head for a while. Then again you realise, the gaps are there and  gaping wide. Your friends haven't left and will not leave.

However, considering that I am passing this way just once,this toilsome world, I might as well take it in my stride-sprighty or not! Let me show some kindness and care to someone when I can,let me do a good deed or two to a suffering fellow being ,let me be honest, let me play fair, let me do a thing or two without hurting my conscience as I pass this way!

The demons may know better and tell me otherwise mostly,but there are days I win too!

In this age of distraction maybe it's not a bad idea to sit with my friends in the head every now and then. They keep me in touch with the hard truths even as I struggle and want to keep that spright for ever!

                 

Just another day for me (and you) in paradise!

Last night I went to bed remembering some unpleasant things from the past and I ended up overthinking, like I usually do! Ta-da! It didn’t do much for my sleep of course,but I got off the bed in the morning looking all chirpy for the world to see. Sonny boy has his mid term exams happening after-all and today was English. I was to go for an early morning run,come back and wake him up for school. I did no such thing. Actually, I  got off bed,all grumpy, just in time to wake him up and then decided to go see him off to school.And yes, before leaving home, I talked myself into going for a 5k after dropping him off .

 So  I managed to go run my 5k pretty late by my standards. The sun was out in it’s full glory . I ran in a biodiversity park in the neighborhood and 500 m through my run,I found my mood changing for the better. I found myself feeling lucky that I had such a nice trail in the neighborhood to run in , I felt blessed for the shaded parts of the trail , I actually started feeling pretty joyous. Just 30 mins later ,I was no longer the grumpy woman who had  woken up 2 hrs back, cursing herself and feeling stupidly upset . When the endorphins had done their job , I was the me I like once again.

On way to work,I chatted up with the cab driver . I was curious since he appeared much older than the usual lot of cab drivers and was extremely well behaved. A truly gentleman driver. He told me he  was relatively new with Uber( had joined after retiring from his  regular driver's job in some company) and works for  longest possible hours everyday so as to earn the maximum he can. He has no place to call home in Delhi. He belonged to Sonepat and while in Delhi,the car is where he sleeps in, like a nomad!!! He visits his family back home once a week. 

At one point,I looked up from my newspaper to find him saying some prayers as he drove.He must have some big responsibilities back home. I was really moved and counted my blessings once more for  my own cushy life. I marveled at this gentleman and realised his life struggles had to be much harder than mine!

At work, I could sustain the peace I felt and my good mood. I managed to be in good humor with all kinds of patients- even the ones who try your patience !! My job ensures I get all kinds of them-the illiterates,the not so literates,the outright downtrodden,the really lower middle class and then the ones who are moderately well off.There was even a mentally retarded 20 something patient today.He’s been doing the rounds of my out patient department in the last week.I cannot understand a word he says,but his smile is disarming. My guess is he lives in one of the slums nearby and is used to going through his days almost like the stray dogs we find in the streets.Today, I realised he had come to my room just to try and talk and establish some contact. Maybe not many offer him a seat and humor him every day. But today , I did! And yes, that’s when I counted my blessings once more !! I realised I have no struggles in life compared to this young man.

Later in the day,one father who was getting his young son treated in the department,told me his son looked dapper in the clothes I had given him.I didn’t remember the kid by name or even by face ,but I keep giving my son’s old clothes to these kids now and then and he must have got some too. I pretended like I remembered of course.The father then requested me if I would see his daughter too, out of turn,because he had taken his day off and lost his wages for the day in the process. Also,two visits to the private dentist meant half his monthly salary. So he couldn’t afford to take her to the private dentist in the evening.Well, counting my own blessings yet again, I conceded and did the needful for his daughter in the afternoon.He was so thankful and his 9 year old daughter so cooperative a patient,  that I felt happier than usual attending to this patient. Of course, this father’s life struggles are way harder than mine!

Today was just another day for me in paradise really…I just wanted  to ramble here to remind myself once again not to be silly like last night. I know I am going to sleep better tonight. I just remembered something I read recently ---“That is how life happens. It mostly takes care of itself; it really isn’t as big a monster as we make it out to be in our minds.”

Amen!