LOOK SON, CAN YOU SPOT YOURSELF THERE?

 



“The chief proof of man’s real greatness lies

 in his perception of his own smallness.”

Arthur Conan Doyle

 

Well, there are these super-wealthy, who are hailed as connoisseurs/patrons of art, and they are ready to buy a piece of art – a panting in particular – for any astronomical price. But, you see, the painting has to be a ‘original’…

So, when an original painting of Picasso, Michael Angelo or M.F. Hussain goes for millions and crores, a thought hits me:

“Who, in deed, is the original artist – the real Creator?”

To grasp the depth of my question, just stop on your way home, this evening, and have a good look at a few stray cats… Behold the colours of their bodies, their eyes… every hair – the softness, the teeth and the paws of those little creatures. Ask: “Who made them?”… A Picasso, a Michael Angelo or a Hussain?

So much for our great pride in feeling, that we are the original creators. Look, we, at best, can be the ‘original duplicators’. That’s it…

You and me, here on this earth, are too small creatures… Our achievements and accomplishments tend to make us bloated-heads…

I heard, once, Sudha Murthy explaining this tendency in an interaction… The question was about Ego - Infosys’ success story, and Murthy family’s rise to fame and wealth. She was describing, in her own inimitable style, to the star-struck engineering kids, what I am paraphrasing here…

“In this vast Galaxy, there are many Milky ways... In one of these Milky ways, there is Sun... Around the Sun, there are many planets... Earth is one of these planets… In this planet, we have our continent… In this continent, there is our country… In our country, there is my state, Karnataka… In my state, there is a little town called Hubli… In this town, there is a small house… In that house, I happen to be just one of the many members… Can anyone spot me from the outer space and tell how great I look?”



A few days ago, as Sunita Williams and Butch Wilmore were being safely brought back to Earth (after getting stranded at a space station for over nine months), most of us had held our breaths… Some of us anxiously remembered the Columbia (space shuttle) tragedy (2023), which had killed all seven astronauts on board, including Kalpana Chawla… Just a few miles before the touch down, the tragedy had unfolded!

So, many of us were praying… Remembering God, who is, always, our ‘Venkat in sankat’… “Lord, have mercy!”

Yes, despite the mind-numbing scientific achievements, man is just a ‘discoverer’ like Columbus, or an ‘original duplicators’ like Picasso…

Who holds the Intellectual Property, Sir?

My Christian fellowmen proudly share what Butch Wilmore said: “I was saved by the grace of Jesus Christ, my Lord.”




My Hindu fellowmen proudly say, that Sunita Williams had carried little Ganesha to the outer space. So, it was the Vigneshwara who protected her…

But, didn’t Kalpana Chawla and her fellow-astronauts – the entire world alongside - pray hard, too, when they couldn’t make it?

In Life, some of us make it, some of us don’t…

Grace is that invisible  something, which takes man up into the space, time and time again, to ask him: “Look son, can you spot yourself there?”

 

GERALD D’CUNHA

Pic’s: www.hdwallpaper.in

Video: 1. Mohammed Ahsan's  2. CBN News

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