Light
My word for 2022. A response to a prompt by Filza Chaudhry
At precisely 8.45 am, every single day, for 10 years of my life, all of us school children lined up in the quad, and recited a prayer. The prayer had nothing to do with religion. It was about learning, truth and humanity, which forms the basis of every religion.
One of the lines of the opening verse says, ‘Lead me from darkness into the light.’ This is a prayer that finds an echo in all prayers in all languages. It is meaningful both literally and metaphorically. In our school morning prayer, it referred to the light of learning and education, eradicating the darkness of ignorance.
And so, my word for this year is light, and all its related connotations. Like ‘illumination’, for instance. And ‘enlighten.’ And ‘Nirvana’, ‘enlightenment’. And ‘luminous’.
The last two years have turned everything that we know, or thought we knew, about ourselves, and other people, on its head. 2020 was the the beginning of unending darkness, lightless, and terrifying. And inhuman.
I remember an incident at the beginning of 2020. Everyone was terrified of the virus, and what it could do. No one seemed to have any knowledge that stood up to questioning.
In an apartment block, a district away, an eight-year old child was ‘diagnosed’ with the dread disease. Two ambulances came screeching to a stop outside the building. The doors opened and people looking like aliens, covered from head to foot in protective clothing leaped out of them. They stood at attention. The child, terrified, trembling and in tears, crept out of the building gate, looking in terror at the people around him. No one came close: but everyone clicked pictures on their mobiles. Someone came running out of the building, with a small carry all, which he dumped near the ambulance and scurried away. The child looked pleadingly at the adults around him. No one responded, by word or look: they were busy posting the pictures on social media.
The child, with hanging head, picked up the carry all, and with lagging steps, climbed into the ambulance and was driven away.
As long as I live, I shall never forget that incident and the helplessness of that child.
In some house within the building, a mother must have been sobbing, her heart breaking: and a father must have been weeping tears of blood into his ravaged heart.
I had followed up on that story, and heard that it was something known as a ‘false positive’ or something, and the child was kept in quarantine, and then brought back to his parents.
Those were dark spaces and dark times: the classic example of a little knowledge being a dangerous thing. Thankfully, and fortunately, now, there is a little more light, and a little more knowledge percolating down to everyone. And I can see more smiles on people’s faces now. Smiles that had been absent for two years.
The best way to infuse light into a person’s life is to actually physically call them up. Ask them, “How are you feeling today?” Ask them, “Have you eaten?”. And ask them these questions as if you care. Instil love in your voice. Remove the indifference.
Let these words be a seed we sow. Let care and sincerity be its sun and rain. And what a rich harvest of light, love and laughter we will be able to reap! If we plant a little light in people’s lives, we can create light throughout our small world, and cause other worlds to reflect them, too.
So this is my word for 2022.
Light.
©️ 2022 Suma Narayan. All Rights Reserved.
This is the story and prompt that inspired me to write this piece. Tagging the story by Filza Chaudhry:
