It’s easy to solve this equation (1+x)^n rather than understanding life….so don’t try to understand much and enjoy more….

A man who dares to waste one hour of time has not discovered the value of life.
Charles Darwin

All life is an experiment. The more experiments you make the better.
Ralph Waldo Emerson

All the art of living lies in a fine mingling of letting go and holding on.
Henry Ellis

Any idiot can face a crisis – it’s day to day living that wears you out.
Anton Chekhov

Believe that life is worth living and your belief will help create the fact.
William James

But now I have come to believe that the whole world is an enigma, a harmless enigma that is made terrible by our own mad attempt to interpret it as though it had an underlying truth.
Umberto Eco

Do not dwell in the past, do not dream of the future, concentrate the mind on the present moment.
Buddha

Don’t go around saying the world owes you a living. The world owes you nothing. It was here first.
Mark Twain

Every man dies. Not every man really lives.
William Wallace

Everything has been figured out, except how to live.
Jean-Paul Sartre

Everything in life is luck.
Donald Trump

Fortunately analysis is not the only way to resolve inner conflicts. Life itself still remains a very effective therapist.
Karen Horney

God writes a lot of comedy… the trouble is, he’s stuck with so many bad actors who don’t know how to play funny.
Garrison Keillor

He who has a why to live can bear almost any how.
Friedrich Nietzsche

Here is the test to find whether your mission on Earth is finished: if you’re alive, it isn’t.
Richard Bach

I arise in the morning torn between a desire to improve the world and a desire to enjoy the world. This makes it hard to plan the day.
E. B. White

I have a simple philosophy: Fill what’s empty. Empty what’s full. Scratch where it itches.
Alice Roosevelt Longworth

I love life because what more is there.
Anthony Hopkins

I still find each day too short for all the thoughts I want to think, all the walks I want to take, all the books I want to read, and all the friends I want to see.
John Burroughs

I think I’ve discovered the secret of life – you just hang around until you get used to it.
Charles M. Schulz

In three words I can sum up everything I’ve learned about life: it goes on.
Robert Frost

It is not length of life, but depth of life.
Ralph Waldo Emerson

Life consists not in holding good cards but in playing those you hold well.
Josh Billings

Life does not cease to be funny when people die any more than it ceases to be serious when people laugh.
George Bernard Shaw

Life has meaning only if one barters it day by day for something other than itself.
Antoine de Saint-Exupery

Life is a dream for the wise, a game for the fool, a comedy for the rich, a tragedy for the poor.
Sholom Aleichem

Life is a long lesson in humility.
James M. Barrie

Life is a series of collisions with the future; it is not the sum of what we have been, but what we yearn to be.
Jose Ortega y Gasset

Life is but thought.
Sara Teasdale

Life is half spent before we know what it is.
George Herbert

Life is never easy for those who dream.
Robert James Waller

Life is something to do when you can’t get to sleep.
Fran Lebowitz

Life is wasted on the living.
Douglas Adams

Life itself still remains a very effective therapist.
Karen Horney

Life loves the liver of it.
Maya Angelou

Life must be lived as play.
Plato

Life well spent is long.
Leonardo da Vinci

Like all sciences and all valuations, the psychology of women has hitherto been considered only from the point of view of men.
Karen Horney

Literature is mostly about having sex and not much about having children. Life is the other way round.
David Lodge

Understanding how these holes form will help them better predict the electrical storms that cause power grid blackouts and the aurora, activity that will peak in 2012 as sunspots hit their maximum level.

Scientists at the American Geophysical Union meeting in San Francisco said they had been entirely wrong about how solar particles that cause the storms were entering the Earth’s magnetosphere.

The magnetosphere is a bubble of magnetism that surrounds Earth and protects us from solar wind.

Scientists once believed that the particles entered when the sun’s magnetic field was aligned opposite to that of the Earth’s. But findings presented at the meeting show that 20 times more solar particles enter the Earth’s magnetic field when it is aligned in the same direction as the sun’s magnetic field.

The alignment causes the two magnetic fields to connect and tears holes in the Earth’s magnetic field over the poles.

“What we observed was the breach in the levee,” said Jimmy Raeder, a physicist at the University of New Hampshire. “This has taken us completely by surprise.”

In June 2007, NASA’s five THEMIS spacecraft probes flew through one of the tears just as it was opening. Sensors recorded a torrent of solar wind particles streaming into the magnetosphere, said Raeder.

“The opening was huge — four times wider than Earth itself,” said Raeder. “This kind of influx is an order of magnitude greater than what we thought was possible.”

Most of the particles are deflected back into space, but some circulate in the magnetosphere, get energized, and cause electrical storms that trigger power grid outages, cause problems for aircraft flying over the poles, and can damage satellites in geosynchronous orbit.

“There’s a bigger risk because we have more stuff in space now,” said Raeder.

Scientists said that the majority of solar storms take place midway through and on the tail end of the solar cycle. This 11-year cycle of activity is at its minimum now and electrical storms will be at their peak in 2012.

http://in.news.yahoo.com/137/20081217/776/tsc-holes-in-earth-s-magnetic-cloak-let.html

I just woke up from this demented dream and I tried really hard re-collecting what it was about for the next 3 minutes. There were actually 3 episodes (dreams often occur in episodes, like a twilight zone series) in this dream of which I could remember only 2. But suddenly, in a flash of second, I remembered what that missing episode was. Anyway, here they are and my analysis on probabilities of why I had this dream:

Episode 1: My un-eventful wedding
The dream: It’s my wedding on 19th. I don’t know which month and which year it is but strangely, only the date and 19th is nearing by. I did not invite anybody, not even the closest of my friends. It was not a deliberate decision but because I did not think it was that important and nor I was excited about the wedding day. Me and my parents were unaware of the approaching date and we almost forgot the wedding date (the way we sometimes forget our birthdates till that very date) and only on 19th morning did we realize that it was my wedding date. So, in a great hurry, the preparations began. We got a call from the bride’s home that they will be arriving by evening, as the wedding was in our place. I started getting all dressed up and I was neither excited nor depressed, but just indifferent to the entire process and very very tense about how I should reveal this rude surprise to my close friends that I got married without informing/inviting any one of them and pissed at myself and my parents that we forgot my wedding day.

We were ready for the show by evening and when the muhurtam time came, we realized that there were no guests, not a single soul. We were shocked and finally made a decision to post-pone the event.

My analysis: I never gave a serious thought to marriage till now or should I say, I gave so much serious thought to it that I convinced myself that marriage is not for me. The reasons for this will take a whole new blog (sometime soon). Anyway, the point is that I have been trying to avoid my marraige and in my last trip to India, I had a very tough time convinincing my parents on canceling a marriage proposal they brought to my attention. I assured them that I will get married but the time is not now. In every one of my phone call to India, my dad somehow tries to bring this topic into the discussion and I always find a way to avoid it. And I have this strong gut feeling that if I get married just for my parent’s sake, it is going to be a disaster. But, I don’t spend too much time thinking about this topic in my daily life. Probably, the few minutes of my phone call to India revolves on this topic and I forget it immediatly. So, there must be something lurking in my sub-consious mind that unleashes in the form of this dream. Was the dream seconding my gut feeling that my marriage will be a disaster?? I don’t know.

Episode 2: The nosy neighbour
The dream : I was in my small and little home in Vijayawada with a friend. It’s actually a joint complex of 4 homes where I lived all my life. We live in the first portion and rented the other poritions to families. Apparently, we sold our house to this guy and now we are living in what used to be our home by paying rent to him. Anyway, I don’t know who this guy is but my friend told me that he is a very nosy guy and he wants to know everything that goes on in everyone’s personal lives. We were playing , is it caromboard or chess I don’t remember, and we thought it would be good idea to close all the doors, windows so that he would not hear us. We were just talking about some stuff and I realized that the back door was slightly ajar and there was a guy standing behind. I immediatly realized it must be the owner though I have never seen him. Since even he knows that I don’t know him, I thought it won’t be problem if I yell at him. I yelled and he left and I closed the door. We resumed our chat and now this guy was peeking from the side window. I got furious and yelled at him again. Then he came in and told us that he was just wondering if we needed anything to drink or eat. He also warned that we are loud to which I got very angry and disgusted. This used to be my home for god’s sake. He called his wife, who came with her little daughter who could not be more than 3 years old but all dressed up in a school uniform.

I observed that she had no legs. Her mom called me and requested my help in pulling her leg. I said “What” and then she lifted her daughter by the shoulders and told me that her legs are inside her body. I saw them and it was a very weird sight. Her legs were stored inside her body and once we started pulling them, they came out and then she started walking. The lady then brought us some iced tea with whipped cream (Yes, it is weird).

My analysis: We still own our home. It’s only in my dream that we sold it to this unknown guy. But the thing is that we are in a financial limbo, where we might have to sell our home to meet some other needs. I always opposed my father in his decision of selling the home and tried to find some money in meeting the goals. The reason being that I love that home though it is of no use to us now. I lived all my life there and all my memories of childhood and early adulthood are tied to that home. This is the place I want to stay in during my last days.
So, is the dream an indication that we should not be selling our home? I don’t know.

Episode 3: Tryst with Tarantino
The dream: Again, it’s in Vijayawada and it is near Urvashi center. I was driving in a car (though I never drove one in real life) and was trying to find a place to park. I happened to see the people in the other car in the parking lot. They were Quentin tarantino, Oliver Stone and one guy, let’s call him G, from our office. I thought they must be there for the premiere of W. I don’t know why but I felt a combination of a great excitement of seeing QT and jealousy on seeing them with this guy called G. G would not know squat about movies and what QT and Oliver stone mean to movies. If there’s anybody who should be hanging out with them, it should be me. Anyway, QT gets out of the car and I give him a smile and he returns it. I go near him and offering a hand shake and I tell him ” I am a big fan of yours” like every other guy who meets a celebrity and CUT..Time to wake up.

My analysis: I am huge huge huge fan of QT and to an extent I like works of Oliver stone, whose “Natural born Killers” is my all time favorite. I always wondered on what I should say when I meet QT as there are so many things I want to ask him and so many things I want to tell him about how his body of work has impacted me. The reason being that I now live very close to hollywood and I often to go to these theatres where this a good chance of celebrity spottings. QT being a regular to those theatres, there is also a good chance of bumping into him.
So, when I think about what I should say when I meet him, I am usually left with a feeling of despair. If I say something cliched like “I am a big fan of yours”, I will be treated like every other guy who saw his movies.
Also, QT and Oliver stone don’t see eye to eye as they had a big fight over natural born killers. But I love both of them and often wondered what it would be like if they get back together.
The only part I am still concerned about this episode is, what has Mr G got to do anything with this?

http://kishankakarla.sulekha.com/blog/post/2008/10/weird-dream-s.htm

Life is a beauty…..praise it.

Life is a challenge…..meet it.

Life is a duty…..perform it.

Life is a love….enjoy it.

Life is a tragedy…..face it.

Life is a struggle…..fight it.

Life is a promise…..fulfill.

Life is a game….play it.

Life is a gift….accept.

Life is a journey….complete it.

Life is a mystery….unfold it.

Life is a goal…..achieve it.

Life is an opportunity…..take it.

Life is a puzzle…..solve it.

Life is a sorrow….overcome it.

Life is a spirit….realize it.

http://chetanchopra.sulekha.com/blog/post/2008/10/what-is-life.htm

http://geometrix.sulekha.com/blog/post/2008/10/globalization.htm

The man sat and watched the cocoon for several hours as the butterfly struggled to force its body through that little hole. Then it seemed to stop making progress. It appeared as if the butterfly had gotten as far as it could, and it could go no farther.

The man decided to help the butterfly in its struggle. He took a pair of scissors and snipped off the remaining bit of the co coon…and the butterfly emerged easily.

As the butterfly emerged, the man was surprised. It had a swollen body and small, shriveled wings. He continued to watch the butterfly expectating that, at any moment, the wings would dry out, enlarge, and expand to support the swollen body. He knew that in time the body would contract, and the butterfly would be able to fly…but neither happened!

In fact, the butterfly spend the rest of its life crawling around with a swollen body and shriveled wings.

What the man, in his kindness and haste, did not understand was that the restricting cocoon and the struggle were required for the butterfly to be able to fly.

The butterfly must push its way through the tiny opening to force the fluid from its body and wings. Only by struggling through the opening can the butterfly’s wings be ready for flight once it emerges from the cocoon.

Sometimes struggles are exactly what we need in our life. If our Higher Power allowed us to go through life without any obstacles, it would cripple us. We would not be as strong as what we could have been…and we could never fly!

Spread your wings and prepare to fly,
For you have become a butterfly…

http://poorva22587.sulekha.com/blog/post/2008/09/the-cocoon.htm

The only discipline that lasts is self-discipline.
- Bum Phillips

If I can stop one heart from breaking, I shall not live in vain; If I can ease one life the aching,Or cool one pain, Or help one fainting robin Into his nest again, I shall not live in vain.
–Emily Dickinson

Talent is God given. Be humble. Fame is man-given. Be grateful. Conceit is self-given. Be careful.
- John Wooden

Life is a great big canvas, and you should throw all the paint on it you can.
- Danny Kaye

We must all hang together, or, assuredly, we shall all hang separately.”
- Benjamin Franklin at the signing of the Declaration of Independence, July 4, 1776

Fame always brings loneliness. Success is as ice cold and lonely as the North Pole.
–Vicki Baum Austrian-US novelist

The measure of success is not whether you have tough problem to deal with, but whether it is the same problem you had last year.
- John Foster Dulles

A smile is the lighting system of the face, the cooling system of the head and the heating system of the heart.
–Unknown

We enjoy warmth because we have been cold. We appreciate light because we have been in darkness. By the same token, we can experience joy because we have known sadness.
–David Weatherford

Do or do not. There is no try.
-Yoda (Star Wars)

Even a smile is a Charity
-Prophet Muhammad

We come to love not by finding the perfect person, but by learning to see an imperfect person perfectly.
-Sam Keen

Sometimes, I wish I had never met you. Then I could go to sleep at night not knowing there was someone like you out there.
-Anonymous

This may sound selfish, but, I hope that I die before you do, because I never want to know the pain of what it’s like to be without you.
-Unknown

How on earth are you ever going to explain in terms of chemistry and physics so important a biological phenomenon as first love?.
-Albert Einstein

Love can heal the deepest wounds, but it can also create them.
-Unknown

If I could give you one gift, I would give you the ability to see yourself as I see you, so you could see how truly special you are.
-Unknown

A friend is someone who can see the truth and pain in you, even when you’re fooling everybody else.
If I could give you one gift, I would give you the ability to see yourself as I see you, so you could see how truly special you are.
-Unknown

History will be kind to me for I intend to write it.
-Sir Winston Churchill

A prisoner of war is a man who tries to kill you and fails, and then asks you not to kill him.
-Sir Winston Churchill

I am always ready to learn although I do not always like being taught.
-Sir Winston Churchill

the object of war isn’t to die for your country but make the other poor bastard die for his
-Anonymous

Don’t frown because you never know who might be falling in love with your smile.
-Anonymous

The world is a dangerous place to live, not because people do evil, but because people sit by and let them.
- Einstein, Albert

Success is how high you bounce when you hit bottom.
-Anonymous

You always pass failure on the way to success.
-Anonymous

Most success springs from an obstacle or failure. I became a cartoonist largely because I failed in my goal of becoming a successful executive.
-Scott Adams

I like to be against the odds. I’m not afraid to be lonely at the top. With me, it’s just the satisfaction of the game. Just performance.
-Barry Bonds

How on earth are you ever going to explain in terms of chemistry and physics so important a biological phenomenon as first love?.
-Albert Einstein

Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.
-Winston Churchill

While there’s life, there’s hope.
-Unknown

Patience makes lighter What sorrow may not heal.
-Unknown

Failure is the condiment that gives success its flavor.
-Truman Capote

Be not afraid of life. Believe that life is worth living and your belief will help create the fact.
-William James

It is always right that a man should be able to render a reason for the faith that is within him
-Sydney Smith

Hope, like faith, is nothing if it is not courageous; it is nothing if it is not ridiculous.
-Thornton Wilder

Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear – not absence of fear.
-Mark Twain

Better hazard once than always be in fear.
-Thomas Fuller

Do what you fear and fear disappears.
-Anonymous

Keep your fears to yourself, but share your inspiration with others.
-Anonymous

It’s faith in something and enthusiasm for something that makes life worth living.
-Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr

If I were dying, my last words would be, Have faith and pursue the unknown end.
-Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr

Believe your beliefs and doubt your doubts.
-F F Bosworth

Faith is to believe what you do not see; the reward of this faith is to see what you believe.
-Saint Augustine

Desire, ask, believe, receive.
-Stella Terrill Mann

Most folks are about as happy as they make up their minds to be.
-Abraham Lincoln

The true test of character is not how much we know how to do, but how we behave when we don’t know what to do.
-John Holt

Weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning.
-George Weiss

To bear failure with courage is the best proof of character that anyone can give.
-W Somerset Maugham

Be not afraid of life. Believe that life is worth living and your belief will help create the fact.
-William James

Sow an act…reap a habit; Sow a habit…reap a character; Sow a character…reap a destiny.
-George Dana Boardman

Character cannot be developed in ease and quiet. Only through experience of trial and suffering can the soul be strengthened, ambition inspired, and success achieved.
-Helen Keller

Life is a great big canvas, and you should throw all the paint on it you can.
-Danny Kaye

Man is a rational animal who always loses his temper when he is called upon to act in accordance with the dictates of reason.
- Oscar Wilde

When a man assumes a public trust, he should consider himself as public property.
- Thomas Jefferson

It has been said that man is a rational animal.
All my life I have been searching for evidence which could support this.
- Bertrand Russell

http://poorva22587.sulekha.com/blog/post/2008/09/a-compilation-cool-quotes.htm

If love is artistic, so is hatred.
Unless you know how to love, you wont know how to hate.
And if you think love and hate are two different phenomena, you are absolutely mistaken.
Love and hate are same energies occupying two different ends of the same pole. They have different polarities.
It is the same energy that travels from one end to another.
When love stands upside down it is hate.
When hate stands upside down it is love.
Never ever mistake them for two different energies.

When you love someone, you love whole heartedly. You simply dont reserve anything. Either it is total or it is simply absent.
There is no room for a compromise when it comes to giving everything that you are capable of.

Have you noticed, when it comes to hatred, some how we are forced to compromise.
But the same yardstick is not applied to love. We want more of love and no one persuades us to stop half way through.
But when you show hatred , people intervene and advice to shake hands.
They say it is not healthy to develop a hatred for some one.
Somwhere, the whole of the energy which piled up in the process to hate some one has been scuttled halfway through due to extraneous influence.

People are totally mistaken.
They have buried your hatred prematurely.
They have not known that the intervention has only resulted in temporary suspension of the hatred. Remember it has not completely vanished.
It has not been eradicted or exterminated.
Its Just suspended for a while and will resume at the trivial trigger.

Have you noticed, only people who have loved inveterately can hate one intensively.
I have seen, when two lovers fight they dig into the past to cull out each others flaw to score a point against the other.
If you camly witness the whole scenario you will realize that they are only attempting to reach the same level of love in the escalating process of hatred.
The process of reconcilliation or the compromise almost takes the same time period which one took to reach the optimum level in love.
People who have perfected the art of loving and hating can never nourish any ill wlll against the other.
Equally there is no disappointment either.
What ever temper and anger that is exhibited is just momentary and it is a matter of time before the transition from one to other takes place smoothly and inevitably

Love and hate or so essential and an integral part of your character.
We have not been created only to love.
Neither can we simply hate.

They are present in the right measure
And to experience them is a pleasure.

http://harshalawyer.sulekha.com/blog/post/2008/09/the-art-of-perfect-hatred.htm

of alchemical ingredients. Mercury has been taking horrendous shapes and these shapes have been

attacking him fiercely but whenever he took courage and tried to grab these shapes as a matter of defiance,

they just melted into his hands & then took even fiercer shapes.

He remembered his past exploits when he was young man and full of enthusiasm. It was along time ago that he realized that in order to comprehend the alchemical processes, he had to delve into the secrets of natural laws and thus became engrossed in natural processes around him. He observed that the stones littering across the landscapes had a deeper reality of their own and the books had told him that like the human body the earth had a heart, liver and spleen. He realized that in metaphysical sense stones were like heart circulating the lifeblood of the earth and so had to be an ingredient of the alchemical process.

He had seen how the different seasons of the year affected him, bringing in something unknown which we are too reluctant to accept at their face values and the trouble was that our ordinary thinking man always takes over from our feelings and instincts pointing to something new and life enhancing. Soon the robotic

element of our logic takes over stating ‘I know the best, leave everything to me’ and then we go into a sort of comfortable limbo and leave everything to the robot. He also noticed that we always seek the unknown through the windows of known and hence we never find it. We may build superstructures of logic to justify

us but it is always in vain. You need a different approach to search for the unknown and perhaps an element of chance was involved in it.

He knew that alchemy was an art of not only making gold but of the transformation of the human consciousness as a sort of spiritual purification and development, an insight into human psyche. One had to wrestle within oneself to understand the connection between the inner and outer realities and it seemed to be something parallel between the two. Furthermore one had to seek the guidance through the dreams, aspirations and sort poetical visions to decipher the signs in nature.

Sulphur was the ‘stone that burns’ and when it burnt its pungent smell was as necessary as that of mercury with its silvery fluidity the ‘water that shines. Other candidate for this transformation was Arsenic ‘the poison that kills’. Theses were the strange combinations which one had to understand the many sided dimensions of the nature and that of being.

Mercury became a shining naked sword, which plunged through the air, aiming straight at his heart. He woke up in a scream, the perspiration bathing his whole body in hot sweat. He felt relieved even through his madly palpitating heart.

2.

Pale morning light was peeping through the chinks of his door & trying to dispel the darkness within

the room. He wanted to find some relief from his ordeals and memories of night and decided to get up.

He went out. Against the soft blue skies, tufts of cotton wool clouds were chasing each other in a

playful mood. Skylark was doing an energetic morning dance with its zigzagging movements.

A cool breeze touched his feverish face & Sharat let out a sigh.

Since long his ambition has been to become an alchemist. This weird ambition could not be traced

back to the reveries of his childhood as no one in his family was ever familiar with the notion of alchemy.

He went from village to village trying to find a teacher. It was not easy an easy matter as the science of alchemy was vouched in a secret language of Sandhya Bhasya or the twilight language. A teacher will not disclose his knowledge until he tested the pupil to the limits of his suitability, through hard & degrading trials. He spent considerable amount of time, travel and money to search for such a teacher.

In the end, with someone’s help he found such a teacher and for number of years carried out laborious learning exercises as the first steps in acquiring the secret knowledge of that coded language.

3.

Suddenly a wave of despair came over him and the universe dissolved into a fog. A coldness entered his soul and slowly crept into all the corners of his brain. A suffocating breath began to choke him turning him

into a sort of a standing stone amidst an indifferent landscape. Slowly this rock began to enlarge till it filled the whole universe. A huge rock- uniform, dark without an edge and he realized that there was no escape. The whole universe became a massive stone, which aimed to crush his mind and body.

He felt dizzy and fell to the ground but slowly picked himself up and took the road to the river, which flowed outside the boundaries of his village. He was unconscious of his surroundings. He paid no attention to the cows grazing in the fields or to the chattering monkeys jumping overhead in the canopies of the green trees.

Eventually he reached the river and stood on its banks. The muddy river invited him to come in. Vapours of

moisture arose, hit his face, and hit the rock within his brain. He just wanted to remove that crushing burden.. He will end his existence and may be the existence of the damned rock within his brain. He stepped into the inviting river.

The water came over his feet, to his knees, to his neck. His eyes could see the murky darkness within the river. Water forced its way into his nostrils and bubbles of his breath escaped drawing out his life force. The water entered his brain crushing the rock into dark coolness. It was so soothing and a nice oblivion to embrace. And then there was nothing.

4.

Through misty eyes he saw that he was lying on the bank of the river with wet sand plastered all over his

face. A strong hand was pressing his back and then there were few loud thumps and he vomited, a lot of water. ‘Spit it out you foolish man’ – a strong female voice instructed him. He tried to turn up but the hand

pressing him down was too strong for him to struggle and he surrendered to its force.

He vomited again. The sun was strong and he felt empty. He turned on his back and looked up. A tall woman in green sari was bending over him and cursing him for his foolish ways, of trying to kill himself.

He felt like a stupid infant being instructed by the teacher in the classroom. He was just a coward to end his

life in such a way.

The woman picked him up and put him over her shoulders, with his head dangling over her back. All the time he was coughing and spitting water and phlegm. After about ten minutes walk, she entered a small

cottage and then a room, which was in, total darkness. He was dumped on a cot. Exhausted he fell asleep.

It was evening when he awoke. The last rays of the sun were trying to paint the room with orange and red colours. The sky was ablaze with the rage of the dying day.

Through the corner of his eyes he saw the woman cooking something. A copper vessel was gargling above

the fire and she was dropping some herbs into it .A pleasant smell arose. His encroaching loneliness was pushed back momentary by the presence of another human being. He began to shiver in his wet clothes.

The woman noticed his shivering and began to take off his wet clothes. He protested but to no avail. She

wiped his body with a piece of rough cloth and then vigorously messaged his feet, his palm and then his whole body. A little warmth began to run through his body. She covered him with a blanket.

Warm herbal broth was brought to him with few pieces of bread floating in it, which he ate and enjoyed. All that kindness was new to him and so overwhelming and he began to cry. He extended his arm to touch the woman and pulled her gently towards him.

The woman lay beside him and enclosed him within her warm strong arms. He felt like a child and hungered for even a closer contact and began to kiss her hands, her face and then his legs entwined her. He felt at peace and surrendered himself to sleep and warmth.

5.

Another morning arrived. He looked around and there was no sign of the woman. He conjectured she must have gone out to work. He had noticed her tools of trade. She was a stonebreaker doing a hard dusty job. Suddenly he wanted to escape, as he felt disgusted with himself. He has slept with a woman of low cast, below his social status.

But that was ridiculous, she was the only person that has shown any kind of concern for him, perhaps closer to love .She had saved a total stranger from jaws of death. Anyway who was he to judge people like that? He was a man who could not even manage his own life.

Suddenly he felt that he did not belonged to any caste or creed anymore. He was just an outsider. A wretched man without a name, without a caste; rejected by the world, and even by the death. He felt that has lost an infinite world. He will go out and loose himself into the vastness of India, Unnamed and unknown.

http://durlabh-singh.sulekha.com/blog/post/2008/09/alchemist.htm