Gratitude from latitudes

There is often a lot of gratitude I have been expressing recently in my life. It started slow but surely and now I cannot see anything besides it. It is an amazing feeling, being thankful for everything from my friends, food I eat and the work I have to the larger things of my mind and body being in good enough health, my life being stable and my future still being reachable. So, like any curious and investigative person, I tried to find the basis for this change in myself. It took a long while (in terms of the thinking world) but finally I realised it stemmed from the beginning of this academic year when I had just come to the full realisation that my parents would now be leaving India for the time being and that I was truly living away from home and that I had to fend for myself. To get a clearer understanding, in the past I used to live at home with my parents but would stay in the weekdays at my apartment and then make the trip back to my parents’ place on weekends. However with my parents gone, I was finally a young adult staying away from home.

It was a different experience that generally involves a lot of adjustment and getting used to. But for me I fit in easily as I was always used to being by myself. However all of this changed one day, when I got on to the bus and when trying to pay for my ticket, I realised that I had no money. Now I was far away from my college and my home. So no one could come and pick me up. This was a little late at night and I was hearing from others that this would be the last bus for the night. I couldn’t contact anybody as those who lived near had no means of transport or were close enough to give me money and those who had transport lived far away. I panicked and was almost going to bluff for a pass, hoping the conductor wouldn’t catch that when the person next to me, just took out some money and gave it, stopping to ask me where I wanted to go. I was astounded. There was no reason for this old man of mid 50s, wearing Indian formals with an untucked shirt and chapals to help me out. He had never seen me before nor have I. Yet he took out that money as it was nothing and when the conductor was about to bill the ticket, he suddenly realised the situation I was in, handed the money back to the man, said in Kannada (which I later found out) “Once in a while, it’s fine.” I didn’t know what to day. In the span of 2 minutes, two complete strangers had just assisted me and helped me reach my place and I had no way of appreciating them, apart from my awkward thank yous that bordered on irritating. And I thought that was over…

Two months down the line, I got onto the morning bus as usual, with no cares or qualms about the world. It was a regular day except that it was also exam time. Yet I realised that the conductor was the same I had met that day. I tried getting his attention but failed. And I automatically said “Pass” when he asked for me to pay and my socially awkward self couldn’t go pay him the money I owed then. Instead, I sat down defeated and gloomy (with the exam stress added on to that), and suddenly I saw a person to my other side having the same face I did that late night. Without thinking, before he or the conductor said the word, I took out 20 rupees out of my wallet, handed it to the conductor and in between asked the boy, “Where do you want to go?” He told his place, all embarrassed and so and then thanked my multiple times. I said welcome back in a half mind but the other half paid attention to the smile that had formed on the face of the conductor. It seemed some memories do stay on. And from that day onwards, being grateful and returning the favours given to me in different ways has been second nature. Because I learnt two things – one that we can always pay back the favours given to us, and two, the only way to do it is to make your own situations.