Elementary My Dear, After all it is life!!

For sometime now, I have been wondering about the senior citizens and their insatiable drive to do things.
I would like to narrate at least three examples of 'Perisu' doing things which only made me envious of them.

There is Mr Subra - the youngest old-man of Singapore cricket. Here is a guy who has been involved in cricket since independence - Indian Independence that is - been playing, umpiring, scoring, administering, scolding, admonishing, praising, fighting, clowning with cricket for all these years. Of course, he is a retired teacher and that could be seen in all his correspondence... pedagogy at its best.
Until recently, for years together he had been running the Singapore Cricket Association's (SCA) website (http://www.cricket.org.sg) and ensured that it was up-to-date in all aspects. As if it was not enough, he was the administrative manager of the SCA before he decided to take it easy at the ripe-young age of 76!
Oh, by the way, the old ticker inside has not been behaving well for the past few years, but who cares?
But it does not stop there... Recently has taken to that crazy 9x9 game Su-Do-Ku (http://www.sudoku.com/). He probably became so good that he qualified for the nation-wide age-group finals crunching those numbers.

Then there is my friend's mom.
The lion-hearted lady in her late sixties, has taken to adding credits on her spiritual side of the life-ledger and for that she found the best way was to learn Sanskrit and recite the Vedas/Gita/other Hindu scriptures in the divine language; not just chanting - but to understand what she is chanting.

A small digression here: I have found the teachers of Hindu scriptures to be uniformly of one type nowadays. They insist on you to learn the chanting of the various works. If you chant properly, the aural vibrations will do good to you and your surroundings and your family and the world etc etc.. But having been brought up to question everything's logic, the immediate reaction is - what is the meaning of this sentence or word? How does this praise the Lord? What are the lessons that I can learn by understanding the meaning of the scriptures? The questions are countless. Answers not forthcoming. Not to much avail.
THOU SHALL LEARN TO RECITE FIRST; THOU SHALL NOT NOT ASK QUESTIONS.

Coming back to the story, what does she do?

She goes and learns Sanskrit.

With a great devotion (to the Almighty and to learn the language), she is said to have mastered the language now and is able to converse fluently with her friends and teachers - much to the chagrin of my friend who has to either speak to her in Tamil or in Hindi (yuck!) or in English (yuckier!!)

Of course, there is the small matter of her suffering from this eye condition called Retinitis Pigmentosa (Affecting night and peripheral vision; 'Maalai Kann' in Tamil) for many years now. And recently, the doctors have certified her as 'legally blind' meaning that she can get assistance due to her handicap - don't want to go there further. But you get the drift, I suppose.

Next is my father-in-law. (I know that I will get a lot of points at home for this particular section - no inner motives for putting this here!)
After retiring from civil service in India, he also took to the spiritual side and has been involved so heavily in the related activities that he is busier than he used to be when he was in service! Of course, old age brings its own share of ailments... but he told the doctor, "Don't worry, Doctor. I will be alright. I know how to get things under control!" While a majority of us are looking at the doctor for succor for anything and everything, here is this guy comforting the doc who was a bit blue after seeing his patient's (?) sugar readings.
Foolhardy? Perhaps. Positive Attitude? Definitely.

The list is definitely endless.

Senior citizens are perennially worried about a few things:

• Health [BP, sugar, heart, loss of memory, medicines - oh! they are the best... medicines have replaced food for break fast, lunch and dinner; my dad cleans up 25 a day and mum about 15!
• Money [when they need not !]
• TV serials and their characters [Sorgam and Nimmathi on Sun TV are the best!!!] I can understand your sympathy here :-))
  

For every such senior citizen out there, there is at least one, if not more, who decide that enough is enough!

Let me go and grab what I have missed all along. I have to live this life for myself!


Be it the missed temple, the odd concert, the trashy movie, long-lost friends, help-the-needy, the hidden book, the exciting Dhoni innings... they are there everywhere enjoying every bit of it!

I have a manager who has this great positive attitude about jobs - My dear! After all it is a job!

The true understanding of this axiom puts you in the unique position of running the job to the best of your ability and still enjoy it. The moment, the job becomes enjoyable, the entire battle is won!!! Mind you it is not half-the-battle, the ENTIRE BATTLE!

I have to say that the senior citizen sample above and all those millions who are not mentioned here possess that unique brand of positive attitude:

AFTER ALL IT IS LIFE!!!

Keep running guys! We are proud of you and will try to emulate you as best as we can when we reach that station!!!