Roller coaster rides I wonder why people deliberately choose to go on a roller coaster! If you ask me, life offers enough roller coaster rides! I wish I could go on a passenger train, which chugs along at a steady, sedentary speed, stops at every station where you have sleepy porters and little urchins running after you for a tip or leftover food. Instead, here I am travelling at breakneck speed, alert 24x7, as I am the person behind the steering wheel of a fast-moving locomotive, which is shooting through a dark tunnel, which never seems to end and also, one is not really sure what is actually there at the end of the tunnel! I have been on this journey for almost seven years now, when my family started to go through turbulent times. The turbulence would rock me time and again and I would swim against the tide, gasp when I seemed to go underwater, but surface again, refusing to give in. Each time however, the currents came on stronger and stronger and each time, I would think it was the last time before I would go under. It is not that I claim to be a very strong person or anything. Just that resilience does come to me naturally and I am a fighter. But of late, I have found the fighting spirit giving way to acceptance. Is that what it is all about I wonder? That I need to accept that these squalls as part of my life and understand that I am attracting the contraindicative factors in my life because I am a seasoned fighter? If that is so, then I also need to know whether it is okay not to fight, so that I do no attract this energy anymore. I need to understand perhaps that even though I feel I am running standing in the same place, I need to refuse to entertain doubt. I need to tell myself that this too shall pass, and that there would come a day when I would not be getting up, wondering what news the day has in store for me; whether I am going to sail through, or sink… Mohana narayanan August 9, 2010