Faith Amidst Fear And Despair

Over a hundred days have passed since the dreaded word Corona entered our lives and started dictating so many don't and do's we had hitherto not heard of nor cared for. It brought the very wheel of life to a screeching halt and the eerie silence prevailed. Everything we valued, cared for, had always lived with in normal parlance came to be stand still. Literally became the 'cruelest' month, breeding despair and fear, mixing apprehensions and desires..just that there was no 'stirring (of) dull roots with spring rain'. Unimaginable thud hit us hard and suddenly all things valuable, precious started to seem of little use, all relationships sort of put on hold, all aspirations to be or do this and that bore no meaning. Home became the only safe place to be. We witnessed suffering of horrendous kind when channel after channel showed hundreds of thousand people walking on foot bearing the brunt of scorching heat of May to a place called home. We were shaken and suddenly started loving all the more the four walls of our homes, our safe houses. All the things big and small which we had always thought could give us joy in familial or social way like eating outs or sojourn in lands distant became distant dreams and almost meaningless. We waited patiently for the wheel to turn and bring life back to normalcy, unlock our freedom to do and be. 

The wheel of life started moving with passage of time but everything about life has suddenly changed with no mood to turn back and be the same again. We wear masks 'to meet the faces that we meet' and look at all and all look at us as potential carriers of the dreaded virus!! Everything- a piece of paper, a door handle, the seat we sit on, the car we drive in or are driven in, the lifts we have to use-in short everything we use fills us with fear and is potential threat to our safety, security, health and danger to life itself! We have become prone to despair and vulnerable to an extent we could hardly ever imagine. 

We have tried to believe 'we shall overcome' and that this too will pass; we have wanted and desperately so to trust that we would not be hit by the dreaded virus and so relentlessly we have believed that 'tomorrow shall be better....'

The iconic figures' seizure by the Corona has further enhanced the fear despite their exhortations to us not to lose hope or fall in the pit of despair. Its the most difficult thing in the world to live with fear of one kind or the other. That's not the way of life for any of us. To be happy, jovial, normally living with sense of freedom and self dependence are our basic needs. Our faith is shaken but as Christian Bernard felt before the first heart transplant: 'from despair thoughts lead only to one direction- hope'. For sure, we are in dire need to inculcate hope, trust and yes, faith that we are strong, resilient and strong enough to pass this difficult test of time; for sure, we need to build on our strengths, count our blessings, be vigilant and extremely careful and guard ourselves against the negativity which is writ large everywhere and can engulf us if we let it happen to us. It is when things seem to fall apart that we need to be brave enough to hold on to the centre because it's we alone who can build again, move on, keep our morale high and face the travail of Time boldly without letting our confidence be shattered. The time is tough and we have to be tough to get going. 

'Let's go then you and I.....'