THE Metaphor

 What would be the best metaphor for life? I have three ideas 'roaming' around. Let me explore them. 

The first one is six months old. In June, I was in the Himalayas. Yamunotri was such a tough trek, lovely vistas surrounded the narrowest strip of a winding-to-eternity road. One wrong foothold during a step, and in the Devbhoomi, one would have to be with God! Or the trek to Kedarnath, never-end-ingly long, where everything any second might go wrong, from which luckily God spared me. 

I loved both. Like the bouncy Ganges at Gangotri and the grandest scenarios there, they all still haunt me, constantly call me. May be, they are the best metaphor for life. After a tough, arduous journey, one meets the ultimate, 'the satyam, the shivam, the sundaram', the truth, the purity, the beauty of existence. 

The second one is six hours old. To my brothers', I went. Raju stays beyond Sakal Nagar, Sanju at Hinjewadi. The morning journey, the 'to' of the 'to-n-fro' duo, was okay-ish. There WAS traffic, but moderate, given the fact that one is talking of Pune. Perhaps it could be the week-end feel, people were yet to wake up, may be.

While returning though, it was sheer havoc, narrowest unknown roads, given the metro detours, the huge rows and columns, without any sensible pattern, of cars and  every other possible wheeled vehicle  zigzagging, the cacophony of horns, the overarching nonsensical behaviour everywhere, in the bus, on the roads, the red eye of the angry signal constantly ignored leading to sick 'jams'! 

May be, such travels cum travails are THE metaphor for life, confusing, irritating, disturbing, without any pattern, any direction, any meaning! 

The third possibility belongs to six days later, is from the future. This Friday, an inter-stellar comet, yes, from far beyond our solar system, is approaching us. It has interesting characteristics, no gravitational pull, huge carbon dioxide emissions. As usual with such 'accidents', will this, too, pass us by? Fables (that is, both, fabulations and takes with morals) are flying fast. Each is true and every one is false.

 Is that the ideal metaphor for life? Mysterious, menacing, miraculous! Or is life all the three metaphors, inextricably inter-linked. "Neti neti neti," as the Upanishads put it. Not fully understood, may be, yet thus to be lived!

Pratima@The truth of the matter is that "life will throw obstacles at you to make sure you want it," as Maxime Legace puts it.

Quote of the day:                                                        "If you do not like the road you are walking,"  argues Dolly Parton, "start paving another one." 

Word of the day: Metaphor.                                    A metaphor is a figure of speech wherein two dissimilar ideas/issues are compared, but without the comparison being openly stated/explained.