The Sentimental Idiot !

"What was the last thing on your mind when the car went out of control"? My wife asked, ending the long silence in the our room. I thought about it for a few seconds and spoke softly to keep our son from waking up. "I was worried how mad you were going to be at me when I got home". This was the truth and it made her laugh. I could feel my facial muscles stretch realizing this was the first time I smiled after the accident. It was a stressful and sombre day for everyone at home. I looked out the window and the snow was still falling although much more gently. My wife slowly drifted off to sleep while I stayed awake playing the events of the day in my head over and over again.  By the next afternoon our insurance company had been notified, the car had been towed, and the police had filed an official report.  After talking myself out of it several times, I ultimately braved the cold and walked to the site of the crash. Our neighborhood looked as though someone had take

I like to think of a life as a river. When I  compare various facets of a human life to those of a river its hard not to draw parallels. Let me explain. At their origin, when they are only headwaters such as a bubbling spring, a pile of melting snow or a large downpour of rain, no one knows what is to become of them. Some stay exactly as they are, some of them coalesce and become bigger, growing into rivers as they go along. A few rivers run far and deep, coursing through hundreds and thousands of miles creating wonders along the way, branching out into tributaries that provide life sustaining water to millions of people.  Other rivers, are shorter and shallow.  Similarly, no one can predict the full potential of a baby at its birth, or how their actions will influence the world in big or small ways. Every single individual among the the billions of people on earth follows their own unique path that together build, sustain or destroy this place we call home.  Its not easy to alter the

Jyotsana is a fairly common Indian name. Loosely it translates to 'radiant light', such as that of the moon.  When you think about it, names that mean moonlight are quite popular in many cultures & languages. In spite of having lived in India for nearly 30 years, I have only known three Jyotsanas thus far, only two of whom I have been acquainted with in person, one in each of the schools I attended growing up. Jyotsana Singh was my classmate for 3 years before her father - an air force officer got transferred to a city in North India.  This was several years ago & as you can imagine many details in my memory are lacking. A few things about her though, I will probably remember forever. I didn't realize it at the time but Jyotsana was the first non-conformist that I have had the pleasure of knowing. She wore a bright sky-blue skirt to school everyday that was noticeably different from the our navy blue uniform.  This shade of blue was so unique that one could easily s

From the very first time I met Joel - way, way back in 1995, I knew that he was a special kid. The only reason I am able to recollect specific events from those days is because my memory of Joel is associated with a sense of loss.  It is unusual to have such emotions as a child but truthfully it's not really a sad memory, its actually beautiful in a way, perhaps that is why my mind hold on to it tightly even though so many years have gone by. In 3-C-the loudest, most misbehaved of the three 3rd grade classrooms, Joel stood out like a sore thumb.  Not for anything wrong, but for all the right reasons. You see, 3-C was an anarchic class, I don't mean to peddle a conspiracy theory here, but for the longest time I have held that the principal and his deputies had purposefully filled 3-C with the biggest misfits that had applied to the school in the preceding years. Yes, not all of us were 8 years old, Alagarajan the paper eater was clearly older, he was nearly 5 ft tall, and he lit