The sun is reminding me of the villain of the latest movie I have seen, who in comparison to the standard of oppression of the sun, now looks very innocent and in the clear. All the wind from the atmosphere, looks like, has been ripped away from the earth by some astronomical enemy. Yesterday I read in a geography book that fall of water at enormous speed vertically is known as a waterfall; I wonder, as I wipe the moisture down my brow, what name should I give when sweat possesses similar properties. Maybe salty-waterfall!
In a state of motion beneath me is my green Hero Sprint Duke, an old bicycle I bought a year ago; on my back is clung a neon blue bag; on my mouth a nonporous mask; and around me blankets of heat – as if all the heat on earth has been forged into a capsule and plastered around me.
Presently I am heading for home from a bookshop from where I have purchased for myself some stationary and some textbooks which fill the bag on my back. The incongruous bookshop timings are responsible, I chew in my covered mouth and shake my head in disappointment. The road is bumpy, which furthers my irritation. At this moment, a fat white car passes by me, the heat wave from its air conditioner soaking me in more temperature than before. I wonder what other scorching thing can await me now: a volcano? A forest fire?
Some minutes travel by. My body starts feeling laxer. Negative thinking is spent, but still consumes enough room, barring the positive thoughts. For a flick of second, I have the notion that in no time, people will find me passed out in the middle of a road. I can’t help thinking strange things. People coming out of cars, picking me up, sprinkling water on my face. Then offering me something to drink (like a foreigner in a desert, the water in my water bottle has been consumed). But then it seems this thinking is too far-fetched and unlikely. People are not going to come out of car ACs; they will only show sympathy through the glasses!
I shake my head vigorously, and the biker overtaking me gives me a look of distrust. It dawns upon me that that heat has started working my brain. I am just exaggerating things excellently.
So I decide to make the reform. No, this heat is not that much oppressive! I tell myself with conviction. I can’t allow you to welcome negative thoughts anymore. Tightening my grip on the frictional handles, I rev up the peddles and imagine the amount of satisfaction I am going to have back at home, however short-lived. I remind myself of all the things I have learnt at camps and workshops about optimism. This half-cures me immediately.
In a split second, I see the difference.
This little reform has worked like a charm. I am beginning to find good things in heat, in the sweat on my forehead, and in the bumpy roads. I no more envy those who are inside the cars.
But as quickly as I transitioned from negative to positive, I start returning to the starting point, making full circle.
I get tired, returning to that state of unparalleled complaints.
But the soul of the world knows better. If I have recognized that negative thinking has to be shunned, and take a small, fugacious initiative to conquer it, nature steps in to give me reward for my step, to help me further.
At a small distance is a square, marked by a set of traffic lights. In my state of fading positivity when I pull the brakes, stopping at the sight of red signal, I am surprised to see a sudden shade covering me. It is cool, it is therapeutic, it is spectacular. My first thought is that clouds have closed the sky, but when I look up, I find that I have incidentally stopped at the shadiest place beneath the canopy of a tree planted two feet away from where I stand.
The journey back home is quite a silent, clean and pure one.
0 comments:
Post a Comment