Lots has been happening all around me in the last ten days or so. First there was this call from my cousin in Trivandrum to tell me that her husband (a recently retired rocket scientist from the Indian Space Research Organisation) suddenly felt dizzy and passed out in their drawing room after returning from a long drive. He was taken to the hospital and it turns out that he had had a heart attack so an angiogram was ordered and that showed atleast three 90% blocks on the main Coronary artery of the heart. It was decided to go in for an open heart triple bypass operation which incidentally has just gotten over today. For now, all seems well. What perhaps must be a huge blessing for this cousin and her husband is that all costs of the operation are borne by the ISRO health plan to which they were subscribed. These are the small mercies of working in India's public sector.
Then one evening last week there was this call from a school friend of mine who was almost in tears at the other end of the phone as she broke the news to me that her younger sister, just 41 years old, was diagnosed with a Stage IV cancer (Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma). Suddenly, one's whole life flashes before one's eyes because it just doesn't seem plausible that someone so young, whom I had seen a couple of days earlier, is suddenly dealt this bolt from the blue. It dawns upon you that life can be very unfair and there are no guarantees whatsoever in life. The impermanence of life itself makes one wonder why we fight and compete so hard in life when it may be that you are not around tomorrow to enjoy the fruits of your fights. All of a sudden my friend's life and that of her sister's seems to have been turned upside down and the dreariness of life seems to mar what used to be the brightness of life for all these folks. When, cancer hits so close to home one is somehow unnerved by the closeness of it all - it could have been me is the constant refrain in my head. Well, I guess there are no guarantees in life.
Then one evening last week there was this call from a school friend of mine who was almost in tears at the other end of the phone as she broke the news to me that her younger sister, just 41 years old, was diagnosed with a Stage IV cancer (Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma). Suddenly, one's whole life flashes before one's eyes because it just doesn't seem plausible that someone so young, whom I had seen a couple of days earlier, is suddenly dealt this bolt from the blue. It dawns upon you that life can be very unfair and there are no guarantees whatsoever in life. The impermanence of life itself makes one wonder why we fight and compete so hard in life when it may be that you are not around tomorrow to enjoy the fruits of your fights. All of a sudden my friend's life and that of her sister's seems to have been turned upside down and the dreariness of life seems to mar what used to be the brightness of life for all these folks. When, cancer hits so close to home one is somehow unnerved by the closeness of it all - it could have been me is the constant refrain in my head. Well, I guess there are no guarantees in life.
Don't take life seriously ....... you're never gonna get out of it alive anyways !!!!
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