An evening, a summer evening. Warm but not so warm that would keep one away from walking in nature, still maybe an hour away from sunset.
How could one miss out on such a beautiful sight? To witness the beauty of nature, the town constructed a bridge about 112 years ago; the bridge was precisely 312 feet above the water which made it the perfect spot for sun gazing or sightseeing. The river mirrored the serene skies. It was just the perfect place, maybe a paradise?
The bridge saw thousands of people over the 112 years of its existence. Every morning and evening, the people of the town would pay a visit to this beautiful spot; eventually naming it ‘Paradise’ But, as years passed, there was a generation gap, and the number of people who visited diminished. Today, only a handful of townspeople still visited. Fortunately, the bridge had one loyal visitor every evening. He would visit every day at the same time and sit for a couple of hours and then head back home.
A few days later, a boy arrived to find no one around. He was surprised. He thought to himself, “This is my opportunity.” The boy gathered courage as he climbed the bridge and sat on its railing. Fear set in once again. To assuage himself, he swung his legs back and forth. Just as he decided to dive into the river he heard someone say, “Hello?”
The boy snapped back to reality immediately as he heard the voice of a man. “Hello, good old sir. I’m sorry I didn’t notice you behind me.” It was the same old man who visited the bridge every day. He was surprised that he finally found company today as no one visits the place anymore. “Not to worry, I sensed someone was here so I couldn’t help myself from finding out. Not to be rude, I’m just glad you are here, this place is quite lonely most of the time,” he said.
The boy was confounded and started to wonder why the old man said that he had sensed him instead of seeing him. The boy started to notice the old man and he found the old man wearing black sunglasses and using a walking stick.
“So, what are you doing here? Do you come here often?” asked the old man to the boy.
“Oh no… I think this is my third time visiting this place, I’m quite busy with college so I don’t come here often, but I just needed some air so I dropped by today,” said the boy.
“Oh, I see you, but you must come here often, nature has its ways of calming you,” said the old man. “I will try my best to drop by often.” The boy noticed the red colour marking on the walking stick and came to a conclusion that the old man was blind. He gathered the courage to ask the old man with no means of offending him.
“Ummm…. What did you mean when you said that you sensed me rather than see me? Are you a wizard?”
“Ha-ha-ha. You’re a funny young boy. I am blind, that is why I can only sense someone.” The young boy was guilty of indirectly making fun of the old man for being blind, but how was he to know? The boy replied “I’m so sorry, I didn’t know you were blind. I didn’t mean to be rude.”
The old man said, “Not to worry, kid. There was no possible way that you could ever know anyway.” Silence prevailed for a minute. The boy came to terms with the fact that the old man was blind.
The boy sensed another opportunity to dive into the river as he found out the old man was blind and no one would find out anyway. He prepared himself. Gathered courage to jump again, just before he was about to jump after finally fighting himself, the old man said“Beautiful day, isn’t it?”
“Ummmm…. I guess so. you could say that it is a beautiful day.” The boy replied in a sort of confused manner because never before had he admired the beauty of nature; so there was no way for him to know what beauty as a term truly meant. The old man replied, “Could you do me a favour and describe how things look right now?”
He replied, “I suppose I could.” The young boy gets off the railing of the bridge and moved closer to the old man and sat next to him.
“So, the sunset right now is emanating an orange and reddish colour; the clouds forming around the sun have turned orange as well due to the reflection of the sun. Usually, the clouds are white and the sky above the clouds is blue. The water is colourless but it takes the reflection of the sky above us, so the river is somewhat orangish right now. The trees are green and there are so many surrounding us; also the birds are chirping and singing whilst heading back home.”
The old man was amazed at how the young boy explained everything to him, “Wow, that sounds beautiful, how would you describe the colours you mentioned right now? The green, blue and orange.”
“I think the best way to describe blue would be that it is a colour which is very easy on the eye; the blue colour feels like an endless and infinite colour as the sky has no limits and ends.”
“As for orange, it is a colour which brings an immense amount of warmth and hope within oneself.”
“As for green, it fills our heart with pure love and complete satisfaction and oneness.”
“Most of the birds are black, but the colour black feels like darkness and complete emptiness. It can be associated with melancholy.” After his elaborate explanation, the young man asked “How long have you been blind?”
“I have been blind ever since I was born. I’m sorry, although your explanation was beautiful, there is nothing I can do to understand what you have explained because there are no visual images in my mind. I love to listen to how people describe and try to perceive them in the best possible way but I fail every time. The desire to understand stays strong but all my mind can see is a constant of nothingness but there are times when there’s a light shining and that’s all there ever is and that’s all I ever know.”
“It’s the same with you. What I spoke of could not be understood by you. Some things are never meant to be understood, they exist merely to only exist. You can try as hard as you wish, but they’ll never change.”
The boy was speechless but he could not leave a man who spoke such sense without a reply so he replied, “I think you’re right; I cannot understand you and you cannot understand me but that’s okay because at least there’s someone to listen to us as we speak.”
The old man had a broad smile on his face. “Aren’t you a young man?” asked the old man to the young boy. The boy replied, “I am 18 years old, what about you, if I may ask?” asks the young man. The old man responded, “Such wisdom at such a young age? The wisdom at such a young age comes from a lot of suffering. You must have been through a lot. I am 61 years old.”
The boy thought he was never understood throughout his lifetime but at that point, he knew a blind man who saw what he himself couldn’t see in him. They kept the conversation going for a few hours that evening and the boy forgot about the feeling he felt and what he was going to do before the old man arrived.
As his suffering seemed to have no meaning to him, almost perfectly the man arrived at the bridge at the perfect time and at the perfect place to guide the young boy out of misery. The boy started seeing things for himself. The old man had unlocked his eyes for him to see the world in a bigger picture, live in the present and appreciate the gift of our senses.
“Today was amazing, there are not many people coming here these days.” the old man said.
The young man replied, “How about we meet here every day at this same time?” The smile of the old man was the answer the young boy was looking for. The young boy has been appreciative of life and shifted his perspective ever since this incident.
About the author
Kunal Snehi
Hi, I'm Kun. I love nature, nights, music and reading these are my sources to write.
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