The Week I Began To Live Life
Until three years ago, I have been determined and fierce, even to a fault. I was taught that acceptance into a prestigious university and employment in a stable, high-paying job is essential in life. For 10 years, this has been the goal of my life.During summer of 2015, I flew to Hyderabad, a place in India, by myself to visit my grandmother. Two days after I arrived, my grandmother took me on a week-long trip to the beach with her ex-colleagues and friends. They were seniors aged anywhere from sixty to eighty - something that concerned me. I thought to myself, “How was I, at 15 years of age, supposed to have fun at a beach with a group of people in their eighties”?
Once we arrived, several taxis took us to our hotel; a few shabby, run-down houses by a dirty road. The rooms we were assigned were dark and damp, the bed sheets somewhat worn-out. The hot water tap in one of the bathroom was broken and we were constantly troubled by the mosquitoes. I was convinced this trip was one enormous mistake.
However, I reluctantly followed the rest of the party to see the beach. During the short walk there, I was surprised at the energy of the old men and women. They chattered about the next day's events and discussed politics and the upcoming Olympic Games. Every once in a while, there was a burst of laughter. At the beach, they helped each other up the rocky hill, still joking and laughing. I was shocked to see these old folks happy together, thinking of what grandma had told me about their pasts. Some of them were in the military, which even included a Lieutenant General, whereas others had been normal workers. Some were college level professors and yet many more were laborers who barely graduated high school. How was it possible that these people, with such different lives could get along? As I looked around me, there was absolutely no way of knowing who was a professor and who was a laborer.
The next few days were similarly surprising and fun. The way they turned everyday into something adventurous amazed me and before I knew, all my worries were gone. On an evening before the last day of our trip, we all sat around the dining table and everyone was asked to talk something interesting about them. What some of them told shocked me as they were nothing like what I had expected them to be. Some of them had handicaps like deafness and a few others who were in the army were injured. One of them as I recall, was broke for almost a year! Yet even as these grandmothers and grandfathers told me of all their hardships, they smiled at me from faces filled with countless wrinkles, encouraging me to strive for my goals and to value my youth.
I could not smile back.How could these people still laugh and sing as I had seen them do for the past few days when their lives were so imperfect? I couldn't even begin to imagine what it would feel like to be deaf, or to not have a body that could do whatever I wanted it to. To never hear laughter or music ever again; the idea was simply beyond me.
The expression of shock must have showed on my face, for one of the kindest grandfathers - precisely the one who was almost deaf - smiled gently at me. He said in Hindi, “yah anivaary hai ki jeevan aapako kathinaiyon aur baadhaon se nipatata hai” meaning that it is inevitable that life deals you hardships and obstacles”. Sometimes they are enormous and it may seem impossible to overcome them, but you always have to try. He pointed to his own ears as an example. There was no way to fix them, he told me. But he stressed this point ‘being miserable about it wouldn't change a thing. So why not be glad that I can still hear something’?. After all this, I thought about myself, how I used to weep over small things, like when I lost an online FIFA game with my friends, I used to cry for hours back then! I used to lock myself up in my room whenever and not talk to my parents for days whenever they didn’t buy me what I wanted. As I looked around the table at everyone’s happy faces, I started to realize that our grades or the University we study in wouldn’t matter unless we cherish each and every moment of our lives. There is no way that I could ever be that happy when I was so obsessed with little things. Seeing the smiles on their faces despite all that they’ve been through was one of the most beautiful things I’ve ever seen. Suddenly our hotel room didn't seem so bad.
The following days after the beach trip just got me thinking how I desperately wanted to be like them. That was when I decided that I would never hurt my parents by being a ‘good’ boy and not cry over little things. There would always be problems in our lives, but beside them are also all the good things; they are simply overshadowed. It's just up to us to find them.
