An Encounter with Life

I have been staying away from my home town, for some 10 years due to my job requirements and so have always been staying in apartments, for want of privacy.

Due to the daily busy schedule, I have never noticed or been involved in the society’s activities and so have never thought about what entails in our lives. Our houses are closed behind the doors of our apartments, confined behind the doors, within the four walls, lies our activity arena, unable to hear and see what people are doing nearby you, your family is the only spectator of what you do.

Then comes this COVID -19 which has granted us the most unwanted holidays and more isolation. Deep silence and deafening peace all around, comes as a trespasser in our lives.

Born and brought up in a joint family, surrounded by many people and having a house in the heart of the city, with growing years, my need of being in the crowd has been on an upsurge.

Being at home in the current times of lockdown, one day I realized where is Life! It happened so, that last year, during winters, I had to stay in my hometown for about a month due to some urgent work. We have the usual independent house in a colony with common walls with neighbors. It was my daily routine, to get the milk from the milkman, paper from the hawker, bread, and butter from the seller on the bicycle. While carrying out all these chores, I also happened to meet and greet the uncle and aunties of the neighborhood, everybody involved in their morning activities, still chattering all over with each other. A faint smile came across my face and made me realize the true LIFE.

This is what LIFE is……. in the sunlight coming in my verandah, in the neighbor’s kids playing on the terrace, in the gossips with the ‘bajuwali aunty’ across the common wall, in the rounds of tea with the uncle across the road, in the sound of bells of someone’s puja, in the hawker’s noise of throwing the paper, in someone calling out the next door bunty, pinku, etc on the top of his voice, in the various vendors passing by throughout the day, in the galika cricket and sitoliya, badminton without a court, a lot of noises coming from here and there and everyone peeping in your activities…all these made me feel so alive and  I  actually had an encounter with LIFE.