Wednesday, February 4, 2015

Why did I do it?

It was travel time yet again. I was to represent the entire family to attend Priyanka's - my cousin's daughter - wedding. My sisters couldn't make it because one's school was being inspected by their bosses from Bangalore while the other was tied up with her daughter's interview. My mom was not quite ready to travel and therefore, Lekha needed to be with her.

Anto dropped me at the railway station at the appointed hour. After buying my ticket, while I was buying the day's newspapers, two guys had selected their choice of the day's newspapers but had hit a roadblock, in that, they didn't have a rupee which the vendor was insisting upon. Their attitude seemed to be - must confess that it was my conclusion - "Aw come on, don't bother about a silly rupee". The shopkeeper was made of sterner stuff, he continued to insist upon his coin.

That was the time that I was handing over my dues. Quite uncharacteristically, I paid up their one rupee too. Why did I do it? I don't know. It just happened on the spur of the moment! They accepted the help as though it's the most natural thing and mind you, I never knew them from Adam. But what surprised me the most was the reaction of the vendor - he was very, very cross with me. Wonder why?


Tailpiece.

I never saw the duo during the entire journey. And no, I wasn't expecting them to be ever-so-obliged to me. The question as to why I'd behaved like that kept coming back at me. Reached my dad's place by 1500h. It was while travelling on the Kollam - Kuri Halt segment that I realised that I'd gone on the same route to join the flying training school at Mohammedabad Bidar, 39 years back!

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