LOL

It was raining and i did not have an umbrella.I had my iphone open in one hand and blackberry in the other as I tried to take an address from my calendar in the blackberry and stick it on the map on my iPhone. I had just realised that i had walked 15 minutes in the opposite direction. I also knew that I was 20 minutes late already. Sid was waiting for me. I would have taken a cab, had i any cash on myself. In short, I was a mess.

That is when i heard him walking on the sidewalk next to me.

'Country? country?' he said looking at me. In his early twenties, he was thin with a little beard on his face.

I made a face at him and pretended to not notice. I walked as fast as my heels permitted.

'Country? country?' he repeated walking faster to keep pace with me as the rains lashed on.

'India' I said.

A moment's silence.

'I can give you my number' he said after a pause.

I mentally LOL-ed.

'And what would i use that for?' i said unable to stop myself.

'You can call me' he said in a matter of fact voice.

I must have still looked questioningly for he felt the need to explain further.

'You can be my friend, you know' he said benignly.

I made a face at him.

'I am a manager' he said ' a big, big manager' he said as if that would definitely make me change my mind.

I looked at him both the phones in my two hands ringing as the rain pelted down.

'I am married' i said to him.

He stared at me for a moment, blinked once or twice and then without a word about turned and walked away.

LOL.

The problem

The problem is that while we all know that we will die one day,since we do not know when that day will be, we don't think too much about it. This is the present and we think and live in it. Death is but a distant event.

That, I have realized, is the problem.

Because if we were very aware (and by aware I mean really, totally, every-cell-of-my-body aware) that there was only limited time on the planet would not you and I have used 'today' better?


Live!

Love
R

Twenty seconds with a legendary batsman

So there I was, late evening , at the Heathrow airport ready to fly to India for a 4 day trip (it royally messes with the body clock , by the way, to travel to india for a 4 day holiday but more on that later) when i saw him.

Busy day at work, followed by frantic packing and then a hurried cab ride to the airport- I was fairly tired and all that i wanted to do was to get on the plane and doze off .(No, as luck would have it, I did not sleep even one bit on the plane)

So, well, there was the man who had just caught my attention. He seemed oddly familiar.

It took me a few seconds to realise that the slight man standing but a few feet from me filling out some form could be the legendary batsman, Mr Sunil Gavaskar. Sid and I walked past him but we were still not sure.

I went back to grab a sandwich and spotted him again. This time i saw a random Asian guy pass by, come back to him and touch his feet. Maybe it was him, after all, i thought.

What i did not want was to do was to gallop happily to a man who was not Mr Gavsakar.

So this is what I did.

I walked back and when face to face with Mr Gavaskar, I in my politest voice, said this to him:

'Excuse me Sir, but do you just happen to look a lot like Mr Gavaskar or are you indeed Mr Gavaskar?'

His eyes grew bigger with mirth as the man standing next to him started smiling as well.

'Well' he said ' You know, I am always being confused with Mr Gavaskar! Always' he said seemingly quite stricken.

By now he was laughing as was the man with him.

I extended my hand towards him ' It is a pleasure meeting you, Sir' i said politely and shook hands with him.

He smiled, nodded his head and walked off.

I then did what any self respecting woman of the 21st century should do at such occasions. I updated Facebook ;)

Love
RP