IT DID NOT HAPPEN TO ME...

This morning, I had left home at 7.45. As usual, like everyone else, I too was in a hurry. I got into the first waiting auto and off I was towards my workplace. Just some distance had gone by, there was a sudden commotion a few yards ahead… a motorcycle had fallen right in the middle of the busy street, its wheel still running in full speed, a few steps away lay, on the street, one of its occupants, maybe the one who was riding it, and next to him, in great pain, lay another young man, probably the one who was sitting behind. Their bags were tossed to the sides, the lunch boxes had spilled out their contents… There were a few currency notes scattered here and there... and their ID cards, as well. 

My auto was just some distance behind…

What was miraculous was: a BEST bus had come to a standstill just an inch away from the motorbike! The bus driver seemed to be in a daze… and, even from that distance, I could read what was going on in his mind… “What if the two young-men had come right under my tires?”

A crowd gathered… Some men immediately helped the youngmen-in-pain to the sides, some lifted the motor bike and cleared the road… and, the action, now, moved to the sides of the street… The traffic had come to a standstill… Everyone was in a hurry, including myself… So, the moment the road was cleared, everything became normal… everybody went about his way… including myself.

In my office, I described that incident to one of the visitors. “In this big city, such things are very common,” this man reacted casually, “As we speak here, someone somewhere has come under a speeding train or truck or bus… It is just common. We cannot live in this city being so sentimental about it.”

Well, he was right, probably. We can not live in this man-eat-man city wearing a thin skin. We had to be a little thick-skinned, bit tough, to survive here. 

I kept quiet!

Last morning, my wife had heard what Deepak Chopra had to say. “Every morning, when you wake up, remember five things to thank for,” he had said in that video. We had exchanged randomly five things… five things my wife had to thank for… and five things I had to thank for…

That was last morning!

This morning, when I saw that freak accident - in which not only the two young-men had survived, but also that elderly numbed-bus-driver – I had only one thing to thank for: “Thank God, it did not happen to me!”
 

But, it happened to someone, and it happened right in front of my eyes!

That visitor was telling me, “Learn to shut your eyes! You are safe, that’s enough for you to be happy!”

No, I wasn’t ready to accept this logic. 

My happiness hadn’t come 

from ‘shutting my eyes’… 

but, from ‘opening my eyes’… 

This morning, 

there was only one thing to thank for…

and, only one reason to be happy…

Even though all the ‘bad things’ had happened to someone else… and, somewhere else… In this big-bad world!

GERALD D’CUNHA

Pics.: Monica Valdar