Family Legend 1

My Dad used to fly a plane.

It was a small four-seater; a lake amphibian with the nifty ability to land and take-off from either water or dry ground.  Apparently, I flew in it too, although I was too young for me to remember it now.

One fine day, my father effected a perfect water landing at a big fly-in shindig.  The lake sparkled, the shoreline teemed with other flying enthusiasts, and the planes shone in the mid-morning sun.

A boat appeared from somewhere to ferry the new arrivals to land, and my dad and mom began to disembark.  My Dad's mammothly long legs carried him easily to the waiting watercraft.  Of shorter stature, my mom had more difficulty, first tentatively placing one foot in the boat, while keep the other firmly planted in the plane.

As she planned her next physical maneuver, she had a disturbing inkling that something was going wrong.  The inkling became an impression, and then the impression became a conviction, as it became clear that the boat had decided to begin sliding away from the plane.

Not usually one for flexibility, on this occasion, my mom's growing split convinced the crowd that she must be a gymnast of olympic quality.  There was unmistakable strain at the seam of her pants and unambiguous pain in the grim look on her face, and yet the course of the boat continued to drift in the wrong direction.  A collective hush fell upon the crowd as the scene reached its climax: the legs in a completely horizontal position, freezing there for one of those hold-your-breath moments......and then?

KAFOOOSH!

Down she went.

Crossroads

Two roads did diverge, and I did choose the one with markedly fewer pedestrians.

But does it follow that my decision was the correct one?

There was no precursing flash of clarity, no spark of exuberance; just a grudging, reluctant commitment because a decision had to be made.

If the results of the decision are supposed to be any indication, then they too are baffling: some rejoicing positives, many soul-shattering negatives.

I'd be more than happy to do the right thing every time, if only someone would tell me what it is. 

"If only I could freeze this time of the day and live in it for 8 hours."

That's what she thought to herself as she hurried up the side street leading from her corner of the city to its main road.  It was just pre-dawn, and the unparalleled noise and congestion that characterize India were still just a muted rumble.  In the dusky light, few people were about, comparatively speaking, and even fewer noticed that she was a foreigner, or had the gall to shout it out to the rest of the pedestrian world.  It was a welcome respite from the usual onslaught of stares and comments in her somewhat provincial city.  Since it was only March, the weather still had the courtesy to cool down a bit at night.  So, although it would hit the mid-90s again today, for the moment the air was brisk, refreshing. Despite being laden with its normal potpurri of burning trash, fumes emanating from the poo field nearby, and exhaust, it was the kind of air that made you want to do something, made you feel you could act, could matter.

Find a rick, catch it, and get to the station in time for her train; those were her immediate tasks.  A year ago, she would have been terrified to be doing this alone.  She was still furious with herself for how little her Hindi had progressed since she had hit the turf here a year and a half ago.  But, she had to admit, she must have made at least a modicum of progress, for now she could complete this journey with few qualms.

She was convinced that allowing yourself to again become incompetent, dependent, and laughable was one of the greater sacrifices of moving overseas.  It was like being a teenager again, struggling to figure out how to accomplish things and be respected by the world...and she had never wanted to revisit those years.

A rick rumbled up beside her pretty quickly this morning, and she wedged herself into it among the four people and driver already inside.  "Another skill I've developed: pretzeling.  Too bad I can't put this on a resume, or get my friends back home to appreciate just how admirable it is," she thought ruefully.  Reaching the station, she extracted her limbs and coughed up 10 rupees.

As she climbed the steps up, over the tracks, and then down to her platform, she couldn't help but see the usual array of beggars, littered on the stairs and tossed into corners of the fencing.  Old, dirty, one younger guy with missing legs.  She had once seen a man with a bit of intestines poking out of his stomach, catching his waste in a filthy rag as it dripped out of his gaping side.  Her friend had explained that this was the procedure reserved for those who couldn't afford a colostomy bag.  It had made her shudder.

All of this still made her convulse a bit internally, although she had mastered a level of the acquiescence that is required in order to cope.

 "I almost hope they have mental disabilities too," she thought, "so that they don't have to realize just how terrible their lives are.  Is it awful and inhuman to hope something like that? Probably. I don't even know anymore....I'm losing my objectivity."

She was there doing social work, and she believed that she and the rest of the team at their start-up NGO were beginning to make a difference, perhaps bringing some pinpricks of light where there were none before.

"But it's just one rupee in 100 million crores worth of suffering in this world.  How desperately we do need our Great Hope."