Different walks of life...

It was 9.30 pm as I descended at my stop from my office bus. It will usually take me about fifteen minutes to walk to my home. I hurried most of the time, just stopping by when I had to cross roads. It was according to the popular line “Children walk to school, but run back home”. I usually rush back home once I get down, just to have a quick dinner and relax (I have already told this in my previous post). Just as I started walking down the road, I saw a husband and wife walking. The wife seemed worried. Something was bothering her very much. It was very much evident from her face. The husband was talking to her in an advising tone.
I have a habit of walking fast. At least faster than the people’s average speed of walking. But when I crossed the couple, I heard the husband say “why don’t you see the good things”? It was as if he had asked me. I suddenly noticed that I had slowed down. He had told his wife in some other context, something for which she was upset.
It was then that I started seeing things around me. As I walked some distance ahead, I saw a man carrying a small child for a night walk. The kid was so small and cute. I was pretty sure, it was so young, but the man kept talking to him. Then I remembered that, kids start hearing things from a very young age, and if good things are told frequently, they get registered in their minds. I just thought how much the kid would enjoy this walk every night, whereas I was walking like a dead man.
Then just a few blocks I saw a group of boys having pani puri. They were just back from a cricket match. The tiredness in their face and the bat and stumps they carried told the same. They were chatting and laughing loudly. It was as if the fun had just begun.
Few blocks away, I saw a family back from beach. The family of four was squeezed in the hero Honda bike, driven by the skillful by the family head. As they got down from their bike before their house, they dusted off the sand from their legs, but they would have surely liked to carry the memory forever. It was kaanum pongal day, a day which most of the families spend at the beach.
A 15 minutes walk on a road can bring many different things before our eyes, is what I realized on that day.