Skip to main content

Life and choices



Indian Bloggers



 It is when I actually constructed a house for myself that I learnt how I could have made a better house at less cost.  It is when I reach the autumn of life that I learn how richer life would have been had I made different choices.  But neither can be undone.  The construction of a house is a one-time accomplishment.  At least, one’s life is a one-time affair.  There’s no going back.

Life is a cruel game of the gods if they exist.  Christopher McDougall’s gazelle and lion that wake up every morning in an African forest and start running for survival are poignant symbols of that cruel game.  The graceful gazelle has to run in order to save its life from the feral lion.  And the lion has to run and capture the gazelle for its own survival. 

The conqueror and the vanquished keep running in the wicked game of life.  Could I have chosen to stand out of that game and watch?  Even that wouldn’t save me because I wouldn’t be able to bear the heartlessness of that game beyond the initial moments.  Could I have chosen to be a conqueror and gone on rampages defending my holy cows?  My DNA would have revolted.

So I end up as one of the many vanquished ones.  Like a piece of the flotsam and jetsam cast ashore by the endless restlessness of the ocean whose craving is at once boundless and circumscribed.

Flotsam and jetsam.  Nice imagery.  And it brings to my mind the music band, especially their song, Life is a Mess.  “No way back from here,” begins the song.  Just go on.  Take the ride.  “And your troubles will still be here / Troubles will still be here, troubles are here....”

Let me give the link to that song before I sign off for now and carry on my ride.

PS. This is written specifically for Indispire Edition 129: 

If you were the writer of your own story - Your Life. How would you have altered it? #choice




Labels:

Comments

  1. BushraAugust 6, 2016 at 5:01 PM

    There's no going back.. how true! Lovely post :)

    ReplyDelete
  2. UnknownAugust 6, 2016 at 5:23 PM

    Life is a one time affair.....and we have to use it well ...cautiously.....Thats a good thought sir

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalAugust 7, 2016 at 7:49 AM

      Life is a series of lessons... Happy to see you here, Tony.

      Delete
  3. UnknownAugust 6, 2016 at 8:33 PM

    The gazelle can ogle at juice of the grass, like the lion can have a timid moment with the lioness.
    Moments make life and moments have a life of their own.

    ReplyDelete
  4. incredibleopinionsAugust 6, 2016 at 10:56 PM

    Very thoughtful - Life is a one time affair!

    ReplyDelete
  5. Anita SabatAugust 7, 2016 at 11:57 AM

    I guess we need to keep going & making the choices on the way.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalAugust 7, 2016 at 2:09 PM

      Yes, that's all what we can do. But the irony is that all the lessons we learn will be in vain... If only some of those lessons could be learnt as a child.

      Delete
  6. indu chhibberAugust 8, 2016 at 7:45 AM

    Yes we all tend to reminisce as we grow old.
    My conclusion can be viewed here http://jeeteraho.blogspot.in/2016/07/the-crossroad.html

    ReplyDelete
  7. sunaina sharmaAugust 9, 2016 at 3:38 AM

    It will go on....and on....and on.....it's like the more we know the more we don't know....I remembered Waiting for Godot after reading your post.....you made me want to read that play again....it is one of my fav.....:)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalAugust 9, 2016 at 6:17 AM

      Nobody dramatised the naked absurdity of human life as well as Beckett did.

      Delete
  8. Swati BatraAugust 9, 2016 at 11:34 AM

    Life is to be lived well. No quitting no looking back. Just do your task and move on.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalAugust 10, 2016 at 11:32 AM

      I'm sure everybody wants to live well. But often the system stymies us.

      Delete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Adventures of Toto as a comic strip

  'The Adventures of Toto' is an amusing story by Ruskin Bond. It is prescribed as a lesson in CBSE's English course for class 9. Maggie asked her students to do a project on some of the lessons and Femi George's work is what I would like to present here. Femi converted the story into a beautiful comic strip. Her work will speak for itself and let me present it below.  Femi George Student of Carmel Public School, Vazhakulam, Kerala Similar post: The Little Girl
47 comments
Read more

Re-exploring the Past: The Fort Kochi Chapters – 4

The footpath between Park Avenue and Subhash Bose Park The Park Avenue in Ernakulam is flanked by gigantic rain trees with their branches arching over the road like a cathedral of green. They were not so domineering four decades ago when I used to walk beneath their growing canopies. The Park Avenue with its charming, enormous trees has a history too. King Rama Varma of Kochi ordered trees to be planted on either side of the road and make it look like a European avenue. He also developed a park beside it. The park was named after him, though today it is divided into two parts, with one part named after Subhash Chandra Bose and the other after Indira Gandhi. We can never say how long Indira Gandhi’s name will remain there. Even Sardar Patel, whom the right wing apparently admires, was ousted from the world’s biggest cricket stadium which was renamed Narendra Modi Stadium by Narendra Modi.   Renaming places and roads and institutions is one of the favourite pastimes of the pres...
11 comments
Read more

Re-exploring the Past: The Fort Kochi Chapters – 3

Street leading to St Francis Church, Fort Kochi There were Christians in Kerala long before the Brahmins, who came to be known as Namboothiris, landed in the state from North India some time after 6 th century CE. Tradition has it that Thomas, disciple of Jesus, brought Christianity to Kerala in the first century. That is quite possible, given the trade relationships that Kerala had with the Roman Empire in those days. Pliny the Elder, Roman author, chastised in his encyclopaedic work, Natural History (published around 77 CE), the Romans’ greed for pepper from India. He was displeased with his country spending “no less than fifty million sesterces” on a commodity which had no value other than its “certain pungency.” Did Thomas sail on one of the many ships that came to Kerala to purchase “pungency”? Possible.   Even if Thomas did not come, the advent of Christianity in Kerala precedes the arrival of the Namboothiris. The Persians established trade links with Kerala in 4 ...
10 comments
Read more

Five Microtales

1.        Development             Chamar, Lohar, Mehtar and many others stood at a distance, along with their families, and watched their huts being pulled down by a bulldozer. They were asked to leave the place where they had been living for decades. “The government has taken over this land for development works,” an officer said. Chamar, Lohar, Mehtar and the others spread their bedsheets under a flyover over which flew opulent vehicles of development.   2.        Impersonation             The old woman went to the Women’s Welfare office. She wanted to register herself for the Prime Minister’s monthly welfare scheme for the old and unemployable women. She placed her thumb on the scanner for Aadhar authentication. “Not matching,” the officer said. She was arrested for trying to impersonate. Sitti...
8 comments
Read more

Re-exploring the Past: The Fort Kochi Chapters – 1

Inside St Francis Church, Fort Kochi Moraes Zogoiby (Moor), the narrator-protagonist of Salman Rushdie’s iconic novel The Moor’s Last Sigh , carries in his genes a richly variegated lineage. His mother, Aurora da Gama, belongs to the da Gama family of Kochi, who claim descent from none less than Vasco da Gama, the historical Portuguese Catholic explorer. Abraham Zogoiby, his father, is a Jew whose family originally belonged to Spain from where they were expelled by the Catholic Inquisition. Kochi welcomed all the Jews who arrived there in 1492 from Spain. Vasco da Gama landed on the Malabar coast of Kerala in 1498. Today’s Fort Kochi carries the history of all those arrivals and subsequent mingling of history and miscegenation of races. Kochi’s history is intertwined with that of the Portuguese, the Dutch, the British, the Arbas, the Jews, and the Chinese. No culture is a sacrosanct monolith that can remain untouched by other cultures that keep coming in from all over the world. ...
7 comments
Read more