Aab does not feel a generation gap with people much younger than him. He has lived with so many generations that age and time no longer have any meaning to him. He knows that the old has to give way to the new, the elders will beget and then bequeath the world to the young. He also knows that the young will become old, sooner than later. In this cycle of life, while time goes in a linear fashion, Aab’s thoughts go back and forth. He can think of people and incidents gone long back, in the present tense. He can visualize those who are full of life and aspirations today, as part of history.
What he still continues to be amazed with is the insistence of each person to cling on to life, the intense desire for survival at any cost, the desperate attempts to turn the clock back. He wonders why people crave youth, when youth was the time of the greatest blunders, a blur of undesirable activity and hasty decisions, a passing phase of exploration and wandering. It is age that brings serenity and understanding that become valuable assets till the last breath of a human.
Aab laughs at how people want the respectability of being Senior, and yet do not wish to be called Old. They want the wisdom of experience and yet enjoy the pleasures of youth. But Aab knows that time moves only in a linear fashion, and looking back into the past only makes the present unpalatable. Aab loves to live one day, or one moment, at a time. He wakes up and packs his bags, in case the journey beyond has to begin that day. And he knows that the migration rules allow precious little to be packed in those bags – some dreams, a few hazy memories, the warmth of someone’s love, and the even warmer sensation of loving someone.
Aab invites many friends every day to share this party of celebrating Today. But he rarely has guests obliging him – they are too busy brooding about yesterday or worrying about tomorrow.
