THE GREATEST lESSON

GreatestLesson

The way life teaches you lessons at times is miraculous. We in our self-styled glass houses feel we are living a worthy life, having achieved something and thinking we are doing the right things expected of us as a son ,a husband,a father,a brother , an employee or a citizen. Every night when we hit the sack, we dream up a "holier -than -thou" image of ourselves, linking it to some presumed "good" thought or deed we would have done during the day. Then with a smug smile on our lips we doze off to a pleasant sleep. I am sure this is true of many of us. I feel very contented and happy if during the day I have done something, which in my eyes is a good deed, be it donating a small sum to charity, bringing a smile on the face of an old woman on the street when I fished out a Rs 5 coin from my purse (which of course, contained notes of higher denominations as well) or some such "great thing".Never have I stopped to think if the "great thing" I think I did was something which was the best I could have done with the comforts which God has been kind enough to give me. Have I ever set a minimum standard of "do-goodness" that I should be doing to the less privileged ones? Even when I roll up my car windows at a signal junction to avoid a begging hand or shoo-away an urchin who peeps into my car just out of childish curiosity, I justify my actions with the thought that I had to do it "as encouraging begging was not right"! When I see a child worker being punished by his employer or when I see a poor, street-side adolescent girl being teased by hooligans, I look staright ahead a drive away, thinking I am not the moral police. I cofess I have not lost my sleep on account of such sights. But I have always felt happy at small,very small deeds done, well-within my means, in fact much less than what I really could have done.I have always been content with the philanthropy and compassion I have shown all these years.Yes, always,until the day after Mumbai was inundated by floods in 2005.

The day after the floods, when I went for a stroll on the water logged high way near my home, I could still see miles of jammed vehicles, full of tired looking, frustrated, worried occupants who had spent more than a night in the waters. I did offer my cell phone to some to contact their families and did get back home and bring some bread and fruits left in our fridge. Even these deeds made me feel like a good samaritan par excellent.But the sight of the small urchins, may be from the nearby Dharavi slums, from where the flood waters still had not receded, going around with plates carrying steaming paper tea in paper cups caught my sight. The occupants of the cars were eagerly stretching out through the windows to get the cups.

Suddenly I saw a six year old boy handing over several cups of tea to the occupants of a BMW wedged between the flyover wall and the other jammed vehicles. Obviously the occupants couldn't have got out the entire night and that morning.The thankful look in the eyes of the car's occupants showed how much the tea meant for them. But when,after taking about five cups, the man at the steering offered a hudred rupee note to the urchin, I was amazed to see the boy returning the note without a thought and even tapping the man on his arm, as though to console him!!! The man was aghast and I could see tears welling up-tears of gratitude and may be shame? But tears welled up in my eyes too, just as they are welling up as I type these lines. I was overwhelmed by the sight of this small urchin, refusing a hundred rupee note for a service he had rendered-the very same urchin whom you and I would have on a normal day would have shooed away from our car-window or ignored at a signal junction. All the "good deeds" I would have done,all the good thoughts I would have carried were no match to that single great sight of the small,impoverished child returning the currency note and tapping the arm of the BMW driver! Thank you God, for making me realise how small I am before that child, making me know how much more scarifice and self-lessness I have to build in me to match that child.God, was that child You Yourself, teaching me this greatest lesson of my life?????