Twilight

“Science may have found a cure for most evils; but it has found no remedy for the worst of them all — the apathy of human beings.” – Helen Keller

It has been exactly 907 days ago that I last found myself in this similar office setting that characterizes most white collar jobs and it can go without saying that I am being flooded with memories from the last decade, some with wistful nostalgia and some with the renewed resolve not to ever subject myself to such distasteful experiences that the very memories almost want to make me bolt out drenched in perspiration and puke, but it all makes for a good telling someday. My back is screaming out from the contusions of my vertebrae, but as usual I will still soldier on, despite the pain because it goes without saying that there can be no pain without pleasure.

So much has taken place between my birthday (a couple of weeks ago) and now, and truly it just seems that in all reality, life’s most significant changes occur in the space of moments but the question is that most times, we are so blithely unaware of the changes that we spend the rest of our feeble days toiling with the effort of trying to grasp the changes that have been so magnanimously wrought on our behalf. I am so not concerned with my lack of ability to do so many things because, life is much more fruitful when I concern myself with those things that I can still do with this weakened but yet living body. I began the year on a good note and I still intend to stay true on that path…..recuperating from a sudden bout of allergies and the seemingly gradual route towards getting better care for this body are things that I hoist above my head and this movement disorder, try as hard as you may, I am not yet done.

Talking about change is a subject that is as vast as time itself however when these changes are wrought by no willful choice of mine, then it usually seems to be a mite harder to cope with but what makes for difference is that change is inevitable but what we do with that change is our own signature trademark that we have passed through this life not just as an inanimate pawn but as a piece who is aware that life is one to be lived. I was in the company of one of the nicest orthopedic surgeon and nurse on this side of the continent and he remarked that he was blown away by my personality (as a child, I thought that superheroes were always super cool anyway but I guess it is a thing of choice or else why would there be villains) but I explained to him that we always have a choice to either complain or just make the best of whatever life throws at you. Now this was no carefully scripted media piece but one borne from my experiences as an individual struggling with a rare, incurable neurological disorder. We can choose to see life as a suction pump inexorably sucking out our juices and leaving us with so much bile that we are indifferent to the lives that surround us every day or we can choose to see life as a funnel with which we can share as much of the goodness, grace and blessings that we inexplicably receive each day. Again, it is a choice to be made.

One of the very first idioms that stuck with me all through childhood is that regardless of how thin a slice of bread is, there are two sides to it. Now the question that haunts me especially in my dealings with majority of people is why the vast majority of us are so stuck in twilight zone that we feel obligated to infect others with as much as gloom as possible. Where has all the love gone to? Smiles back in the days were free as in the word free, what is with all the false warmheartedness that so thinly conceals gall and bitterness in today’s world. I always deem to stick with the two simplest rules – love your Creator with all that you have got (it was a gift anyway) and do unto your neighbor what you would wish done to you (if the shoes were reversed), and from my candid opinion, it can not come any simpler than that. Life is like a leaf gently being blown in the winds of spring and just when you think what a splendid time the leaf is having, a gust throws it down the drain and its gone for good. We will never know what number our days will be but we can choose how we number them – making each moment count for the good of someone else because it is only in giving that we truly receive. The best thing to do in times of despair is to give as much as we can and feel a sense of elation and lightness that we not only did but that we were able to.

Would I have done things differently without the scourge of this disorder? I dare to say that I am privileged to be in the position where I can say that pain has no hold over me, it may just make me do things a lot slower but it sure gives me more drive to do the very things  that make just that other person a little better. It has given me the rare opportunity to realize and acknowledge that family is not based on blood only, but in the ability to reach out and acknowledge that each of us is here on earth for a time such as this. Does it suck as much as it sounds? Yes and more, but being able to pick myself up everyday and refuse to remain in the twilight zone where indifference is the theme of the period is what I choose to do each and every day. Being indifferent has never gotten anyone anything, it is definitely not going to change now and so whilst it may seem like the normal thing to do, shake off those eerie chains that so tenaciously yet invisibly hold you back from being a productive you and be different, take a stand for something, dream something and work at achieving it. Stop being bound by the isolation of your office work space and the confines of your work hours (which you most likely hate) and do something else that screams out ‘I am here and I choose to be purposeful’.

Break out of that mould that you have placed yourself in and begin today, it is better late than never. Do something nice for someone else who may never be able to repay you back and watch the seed you have so bravely planted, blossom into such a thing of beauty. Cut a swathe of cheer and happiness as you walk through life and see the gloom of the twilight dispel in your face. Now is the time to make hay because very soon the sun will go down as it must and then you can truly be glad that you did.

lמסתדר טוב עד שניפגש שוב בזמן שלו

Adios!