AM I STARTING ALL OVER AGAIN?

 


“A smiling face, after a certain age,

is a triumph of the human spirit.”

Efrat Cybulkiewicz

 

Recently, I have started stepping out of my house on some very important and urgent work. Obviously, taking all the Covid-related precautions. I really had to pinch myself to check if a life, such as this, was real!

It was!

Yesterday, in the autorickshaw in which I was commuting, the driver was a young man. I struck a cordial conversation with him. “It’s pushed us back at least by two years,” he said, “Personally, whatever I had planned and worked for, now two years behind schedule!”

I thought about myself: “I am 62… How many years behind schedule I am?”

I really do not know… But, one thing I know: a lot of what I had meticulously planned and worked for has been pushed behind… Like the stranger who drove the auto, I, too, am behind schedule…

But, then, who prepared the schedule? Who planned, and who was working towards those plans?

Did the schedule get disturbed- pushed back – because of any of my own personal flaws – like my laziness, poor time-management or any other self-destructive habits?

No, I am a very disciplined, organized, committed and hard-working man. So, my own personal flaws are not responsible for the state I am in today… Pandemic was beyond my control… Just like a tsunami or a war are!

If my plans have been pushed back by a couple of years – or, even flattened to dust – let me learn to say, gracefully, ‘Thy will be done’!

But, it wouldn’t – and shouldn’t - stop there. “I am working harder now, as if I am starting all over again,” the young auto-driver said, yesterday.

“What about me?” I asked myself… “Am I, too, working harder now, as if I am starting all over again?”




If my Life is mine, it’s for me to make its schedule… It’s okay if a Pandemic pushes my schedule back by a couple of years. Today is a new day… All that I pray for is: the zest to get up, dress up and show up…

Yes, I am working even harder now, as if I am starting all over again!

 

GERALD D’CUNHA

 

Pic.: Robert Collins

 

Video: Guzar - The Versatile Poet

 

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