Thought 1

The other night when I was hugging my Shonu and sleeping off, I felt that the things which give so much physical comfort and body warmth is the life within us and also our health...

Because we never sleep next to a dead man/woman's body, hugging him/her tight...it is quite an eerie and frightful feeling...we always embalm such bodies, at the most, touch their feet or ruffle their hair, or give them some farewell hugs in our tearful state...and prepare those bodies for their last rites...for the simple reason that these inanimate bodies are lifeless...

So the life within us makes us breathe so much of warmth into each other's bodies, and we enjoy the physical comfort of touching, hugging, petting and cuddling...

And, also a healthy body determines our physical proximity because we don't cuddle and sleep tight with people who have festering wounds or bed-sores or leprosy, however much they be our loved ones...because of the pain and mutual discomfort, the patient would experience as well as we...at the most, we offer our comfort to them through a healing hand or a loving touch or a soft caress...

Thought 2

The other day, you told me on the phone that as you are elder to me, so you have more experience of life...may be it holds true in your case, also for my parents and even your parents...but that set me thinking...does Age always predetermine one's Experience ?

And I found myself saying: No

May be, that little homeless boy on the street has gathered more experience than children like Sunny and Shoma who are given a sheltered life by us...

May be that rag-picker woman who has to struggle daily to make both ends meet and live with dignity in a man's world, even though she may be years younger to me, life may have taught her much more because of her harsh experiences...

May be that street-hawker, or that riksha-wallah, or that beggar, even though they may be years younger to us...yet life has added years to their life...for they learned it the hard way...

Even if we compare the same SES (socio-economic status), a man or a woman who has travelled the world, mixed with various cultures, stayed at different places, mingled with people of all races and studied their lives, irrespective of his/her age, would certainly have a more varied experience than Me or my Shonu based in UK for the last 7 years...

So I conclude that Age could be a predisposition to Experience, yet not necessarily an essential ingredient for a person to gather his intelligence and wisdom of what life has to offer him...

A short life can be full of varied experiences and a long life can be devoid of many experiences, depending on the circumstances which befall the person, how his fate governs his life, and how he adapts to struggle in this world of Survival of the Fittest.

So Mental Age is always independent of Chronological Age.

That's all for now...

Quite a long mail...

Happy Pondering !

I'll keep coming back to you in this cosy 'thinking-pad' of mine, to share my thoughts with you, may be daily, may be weekly, may be fortnightly, may be monthly...Life is Unpredictable, So Am I !

as always,
Aparna