Hectic morning. An unusual Monday.
I'm sitting by dad, watching him breathe heavy. The nurse, a young thing, takes her time adjusting the IV fitting on his wrist. The lovely physiotherapist walks in. She coaxes him with sugar coated words to sit up and do his daily exercises. Stuff he once could do with utmost ease but now needs to relearn once again. He responds as if in a daze.
Window curtains are drawn apart, to let in golden gleams of sunlight. I can see the buildings in the far distance. A construction's going on somewhere.
My mind reverts back to the hospital room. Where a body's being reconstructed back to optimum use again.
Pin drop silence.
Dad, limbs awfully thin...he's a shadow of his former dynamic, restless, always on the go self.Hard to believe he's the same man.
Mom meanwhile, has forgotten her own ailment,
busying herself with selfless service to one and all.
It made me wonder on the brevity of our lives. Who knows what we would be tomorrow. Or where would we land up. We boast of pompous tomorrows. Big ambitions, big plans. But life throws in sudden surprises, speechless shocks. An accident, a
gruesome illness. We're gone. Like vapour. Like morning mist on dew drenched grass. Like a beautiful red rose, so admired while it was day. Evening arrived, it faded. Torn apart petal by petal by bored hands. To be remembered no more.
Or even the green grass that is fresh and evergreen one day but mowed down by the irked gardener the very next day.
We kind of forget the fact that one day we will get old too. Wrinkled skin, bone thin fingers. Sagging muscles, droopy body.
I observe young wannabe body builders....spending years in a gym, to get those washboard abs..those rippling muscles that threaten to burst out of those shirt sleeves.
I watch powdered women with made up eyes , manicured nails and straightened glossy hair... I wanna ask such, do they spend as much time beautifying their inner selves?
Developing character, maintaining purity. Paying attention to things that really do matter. Aren't we so frivolous? Concentrating on temperory pleasures, when graver matters crave for our attention.
It is the inner man that matters and not what we appear outside.
I have seen moms going in a frenzy trying to make her little princess a Miss world. Actually she's so spoilt and pampered by them she'd really believe she'd have the world at her feet within no time. She bags bucketfuls of oohs and aahs from all.
And there are wannabe mother Teresa's on the streets busying themselves with seemingly inane duties like serving the sick and the dying. Unseen and unappreciated. But beautiful on the inside.
It all bogs down to what our life priorities are. Is it to be a appealing and attractive externally?
Or be clothed with a meek and quiet spirit in our inner man, a fortified spirit cultivated through undiminished hope and a rock like hardy faith in the almighty that can weather all life's storms.
What do we choose? Beauty that's skin deep or that which radiates from the inner recesses of our heart flowing with life giving waters?
For charm is deceptive and beauty is vain but a woman who fears the Lord....
she's the one who refreshes like much awaited rain.
