Tuesday, October 07, 2008

There was something in that moment...

That day, I saw two spectacular sights. Sometime before, I had recounted the first one. Now let me tell you about the second sight I saw that day.

I saw a girl looking out of the window and talking on the phone.

Yes let me repeat - I saw a girl talking on the phone while looking out of the window. And that's what I saw. That's exactly what I saw.

Now what the hell is earth-shattering time-halting spectacular about that, you might ask.

So to defend my statement, let me tell you what I really saw.

They say a painting tells a hundred stories. In a window in the building opposite my house, it was a painting that was formed that day. Who was the artist that day? God? Life? Whoever the painter was, the painting was really good.

Firstly, for benefit of painting the picture in the reader's mind, the physical setting of this scene must be well described. This window in the building opposite my house is rectangular and fairly large. A field whose length is neither too less nor too large separates these two buildings. Thus the sight that I saw was not too distant from me, and yet I remained an unobtrusive spectator.

The time of the day was important - the sun was setting and the bright yet soft light of approaching dusk bathed the window from the west. The blinds were drawn up almost completely at this window, and their contribution to the painting were a few white lines across the top. The visible back of a book-case filled up the right corner of the painting. And the back of a book-case, however nice the collection of books arranged in the front may be, is just plain wood or card-board.

These were the prosaic parts of the painting. And then in the left side of the frame, there was the girl . The girl was pretty - which was a fortunate thing. And yet, it was not the main thing. The important part was the story that her eyes told. (And this is like saying that a movie was great and that the heroine was very beautiful. The two things are independent, and if they co-exist together, that's just a great thing.)

Of course, I could not see her eyes up close. Yet, there was something in the way in which she stared out into the horizon, that said a lot. The girl was talking to someone on the phone - and at that instant, she was probably listening. Her look was one of absolute peace and calmness. Maybe I imagined things but I was sure she was talking to her beloved. There was love in that stare; the eyes, as they gazed out through the window, were hopeful of a bright and happy future. And in that moment, the sun's glorious presence seemed to be a fitting tribute to the moment. Possibly the sun's rays carried a message from her lover.

I saw the painting for a fleeting instant. Yet it got etched into my memory. I remember it with the fondness with which I remember seeing other spectacles of nature, other creations of God. Why? Because what I witnessed that day was nothing else but Man's greatest creation, a creation more primal and important than window-blinds or book-cases or cell-phones, - Love.