Hit the road
Ever tried expressing through words the gamut of emotions you feel when you go for a ride on your bike on a rainy day? Here's my attempt...
You mount your trusted vehicle, and begin the journey ahead. You watch the greying blurs whiz past on the desolate road. The rain-drops make their watery presence felt on your helmet visor, while the air feels pregnant with possibilities, if not just with moisture. Who is with you? Physically, no living entity is with you. But the air feels alive, and you feel the atmosphere cackle with electricity. The hungry beast you're on eats up mile after mile of the tarmac steadily. You could be among a crowd and feel alone, and alone here in the wilderness and feel the communion with the world.
The fire within you makes you wander, while the machine-beast is propelled on by the literal fire inside. Is it a commonness of purpose?
After you get accustomed to the ride, you and the vehicle become one. Turnings on the road, obstacles, uphill roads and downward slopes; you go through it all as one. You also take time out on the go to notice the birds flying nonchalantly overhead, or sit mindlessly on the power pylons. The angry rain-clouds form a malevolent sheath over the benign sky, as the distant rumblings predict to the world below of the events to happen. The trees sway and bend in the wind, to survive this rough patch. All the sentient beings prepare for the storm ahead by rushing to their shelters. Survival isn't a simple game.
In the clearing which suddenly swings into view, you see an expectant farmer with his oxen in yoke amid his swaying crops, with the weight of all his experienced eyes scanning the skies. Your mind goes out to him, and in the mind of your minds, you can feel the expectant thoughts of the farmer. What greater risk than to sow your seeds, which will determine your living, and trust nature to let you live? What will you do when and if your crop fails?
Your reverie is broken when you bounce over potholes on the watery road. The sleets of water look so enchanting that your mind dives into them before you could know it. Did the rain-drops get 'briefings' about where they were destined to go, from their rumbling heavenly abode? Yet, they fall freely, to get bashed against the unforgiving earth, to join with rivers, to fall onto hot coals, none of which is more desirable to them than living with dogs would be to cats. Didn't you complain to Him that i wasn't ready for this kind of life, and you hate it because it happened this way? A fresh and more forceful shower of rain makes you shiver in your driving suit.
For a brief period, nothingness reins in the mind. A part of your mind sticks onto each and every sight you see, before the beast takes you on further. You want to turn and go back, but no; has the beast acquired a mind of its own?
But ah…I relax. I know that this couldn't go wrong. The beast is telling me how to live life, in all its speedy glory. "Let go. Breathe in the surroundings, and feel alive."
The beast feels more sentient and capable than you these days, whenever you think of the day you drove through the wilderness far away from it all….
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09-25-2008, 02:30 PM
.. lol.
