It was quite a normal evening. A brief siesta had already dragged my energy to the bottom. Still lying on the bed I was wondering what to do next! Conditions were still overcast but I had a choice to plunge out of the bed and leave for the outing. Thanks to the paltry monsoon because it wasn’t raining outside and an impulse of thoughts that led me to my old companion. These sorts of impulses sprout out every now and then in my mind and am grateful for Shiva Sir for reviving the ‘joy of cycling’ again. Soon I was on my way enduring the signature chaos of Jintur Road.
It took me five minutes to get ahead of Visava corner and soon the picture of chaos had been replaced by the greeneries. Even though the monsoon had yet to bloom, few showers in the past had everything to assume that they might have brought back the charm on the faces of farmers. It was indeed a visual delight to see the green crops dancing on their feet as if they are welcoming you by waving their hands.
It might have been somewhere past 6 pm, I was riding slowly. Few four wheelers, fondly called kali-pili in this part of the world were passing by like a bullet. Auto rickshaws were also very common with uncommon load of passengers they were carrying. A trait of adjustment in the blood of we Indians was quite evident when a man was riding his splendour carrying two men on pillion and a kid on the oil tank came into the picture. His speed wasn’t great because his bike was wiggling a lot. After realising that I’ve been feasting their pain enduring circus since a while, he shrugged his shoulders with a generous smile as if he had been confessing, yup this is it! It didn’t take too long for me to off my eyes from that bike only to realise that something was lying and moving on the road.
Even though it was dusk, I could figure out a snakelet was struggling on the road getting back to its shelter. It seemed that, a four-wheeler and who knew even a three or six-wheeler vehicle had tyred it. I couldn’t resist to inspect. It was a creature of almost two feet length, greyish black and yellow strips with black spots running along the length of his body. Hard to believe but it was my first encounter with any free snake ever for more than five minutes.
Soon a bunch of thoughts on conservation of biodiversity, conservation of farmer’s friend and off course humanity, equality, blah blah blah were started to hover over my mind. Though snakelet was lying at the edge of the road, it had chance to get off the road and return back to the bush, there was still an element of uncertainty about its fate. There were equal chances that it might get crushed down again by another vehicle and also possibly get stuck in two-wheelers too by sticking to the tyres. But what if, it would get stuck onto the tyre and thrown on to the following person on his bike. The chances of probability and subconscious mind were convincing me to mind my own business. Nevertheless, conjuring up every worst possibility, I manoeuvred it off the road (obviously) with a stick.
Movements were still apparent with snakelet however; any snake’s characteristic agility wasn’t there. After sparing few min and assuming that snakelet would find its own way, I was back on to my cycle again.
I rode past to Dharmapuri and halted for a while at the bridge which was just near to the Podar International School, since it was very hard to resist the temptation of savouring the weather. However, realising the creeping night, I decided to return back.
My slow ride journey was same again with the reversal of pictures. I had completely forgotten the snakelet incident but coming back to the same site stimulated my curiosity. I stopped to check out the progress of snakelet’s struggle. Night had already on the verge so it took me to torch out the ground. Snakelet was still lying at the same place with meagre movement where I had left him. It was sure that he was about to die. My attempts appeared to go futile. I had no reason and liberty to stay there and wait until he carries forward his journey, so I rode back.
While riding back, my thoughts were still ruminating the struggle of snakelet whether it would survive or not!
Didn’t that picture was relevant to our own struggle with life!
Didn’t we face similar situations where circumstances felt as if they were going to crush us out, wipe us out from this heaven!
But didn’t we realise, we found someone who owed nothing to us, still came to rescue and uplift us amidst the hostility when no was standing by us!
He or she could be anybody, someone among our parents, teachers, mentors, colleagues, pals, siblings, school-mates, college-mates, distant relatives, neighbours, the protagonist whom we love to read in the novellas we adore, the beloved writer who pen down these characters and even the actors who portrays the character on silver screen through the impression left on us.
There are likelier chances that, we have been definitely backed up by someone somewhere in the past misfortunes. The struggles of uncertainties have had often masked our faces to realise how fortunate we are to find these saviours by our side when no one was! What becomes our responsibility is to stand by our own self and extrapolate their efforts. If we do not appreciate their efforts and invest in our own, their attempts of backing us are destined to go futile.
I don’t know whether snakelet died or survived but definitely it had no liberty to make excuse to struggle back to life. If it had to survive it had to struggle.
The equation is very simple, ‘if we cannot stand by our self, no one can and if we cannot fight for ourselves certainly who ever will!!’
There are millions of people who might have been struggling with their lives. Some of them might have been stuck in catastrophes, poverty, war, racial discrimination, border disputes, trafficking, governmental crisis, corruption, inequality, gender bias and to the worst some of them might have even be on the death bed counting on their last breaths. Bearing in mind the severity of these calamities why don’t we feel privileged not to have faced either of these experiences!
Considering the struggles of life, we often neglect to feel grateful for the parents to whom we are born, mentors who taught and guided us well, siblings and buddies with whom we enjoyed growing up, everyone who loved and cared us more than they could have done for themselves and how can we deny to be born in such a beautiful and colourful country in every sense!
We just don’t have the liberty to keep on brooding out our past misfortunes when we have myriad of fortunes in our hands.
But the greatest fortune I feel one can ever realise is simply of being alive.!!!
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