prized companion

This incident shows how we all love them more than anything else… it comes first .. without which we may be missing something. The role they play in our lives is much more than anything that anyone can ever think of.

More often than not, even a morning doesn’t pass  without him chanting aloud an “Om Swamiye Sharanam Aiyappaa…..” or an “Anatha natha…naga rakshaka.. bhoooloka naaaathaa…..” which can be heard a few hundred yards around but today it was the loss of a beloved … that subdued his chants, his normally rationalized thinking .. as a matter of fact.

This is what happened. He had been out for his normal walk and returned with her  and entered the house, only to find that he had lost her …. His only companion  … it was just after a few minutes of entering the house he realized it but a wee bit too late.  What began as a normal search for the most loved companion at his age of 77 beginning from the house to the rooms and other places we would normally find his love lying around, enjoying the solitude, space, and peace, went on for the next ten minutes with the neighbours being woken up on a lazy winter Sunday today to enquire if the dhobi or the milkman had come in and at what time so he could understand where the companion could have gone!  As it didn’t yield results, it turned into an inquiry with all the watchmen at the front desk of our tower to understand the number of people coming in at that time of the day near our floor so if in case anyone could have seen his companion with someone maybe we could have back.

When he concluded that it could be the  dhobi“washer man” who could be the culprit who had picked her up without giving it a second thought or asking for permission it was too much to accept. He rang up his other son who lives nearby to inform him of his bad luck and sad news… the loss was too much to bear.

After bathing, lighting the lamp was always the normal ritual with chants of “anatha natha … bhoolokanatha..” and “ swamiye sharanam aiyappa” but somehow his thoughts were not able to accept the loss and thus it subdued his prayers just asking God to return his loss .. so it was a silent prayer that day just similar to mourning the dead. No one could hear chants and there were few words spoken.

The next day God answered his prayers by sending the “washer man” and also making him realize and accept his mistake who acknowledged the crime and promised to return his important companion.

That set his mood on track bringing his smile and happiness back after a whole day of mourning. He could not contain himself and kept calling up his sons and others who were with him during his hour of sadness.

 That’s what technology does nowadays … the craze and the addiction and not to mention the dependency on it..  He recovered his lost and prized possession THE MOBILE! GOD BLESS !!!

this post was an immediate write up after observing the incident happen in front of me...in 2012

life of pi

Had a chance to view the Life of Pi. Sometimes we try to find hidden meaning in it. 

It portrays the storms that come in your life. We all sail in our boats expecting our life jackets around us in times of troubles. Pi too sailed the seas weathering the thunder and storms that came in his life and even though he lost his close family to the seas he came around to living  his life and move on in his life. Sometimes life gives you so much of troubles that it looks like God is trying your patience and endurance so much that you lose faith in yourself. Its therefore necessary to take everything in one's stride and go ahead in life, facing pains and pleasures with a pinch of salt.

Even as Pi is marooned in an island with a tiger he finds himself working out solutions in life and trying to find modes of survival without eating into each other's space and yet help each other.  Its how the animals try to out do each other in the same way as we all do in our day to day lives eating up the other who tries to compete with us  in the process of standing first. As we all try to fight in order to survive we don't realize that we are all a part of the same orbit. In the end of the fights only the two survive but they decide to help each other by not eating into each others space but being with each other in troubled times. 

Most of all when the journey ends after many days of wandering in the sea, when they reach another island where they get enough to eat and drink pure water there is a difference. The water which they find is pure in day seems to turn acidic by night thereby rendering it useless for the animals nearby. They seem to run for shelter as it turns night. When Pi decides to leave the island back he calls out for his friend the tiger who is not keen and runs back to the jungle. Pi says he could not even tell a good bye properly to his friend what it means is that we always judge the  others and take people for granted. In the process we all become attached to small things which become a part of our routine and life such that suddenly when it or they leave us we feel lost. When we should be grateful to others for what we are today and also to the society to have made us, we should thank each one who has helped us and especially our dear ones who unknowingly or knowingly help us in many ways by grooming our personality and life. 

As he says he lost his family his mom, dad and brother in the storm he never got a chance to say a proper goodbye. We all have a chance.. It's upto us to take it or leave it.