A Wheeled Vision

I want to write about a significant transformation from recent past, but life’s so intertwined that it becomes difficult to cut a long story short! So, as usual, let’s start from the start.

My laziness; this is one endless topic, but the only reason that it finds a mention here is that some four months back I started reading a book, which I am yet to finish. In the opening chapter, the author wrote ‘In a car you’re always in a compartment, you’re a passive observer and everything moves boringly in a frame’. He was trying to emphasize upon the connection with one’s immediate surroundings that can be enjoyed better while riding than driving. Though I thoroughly agree with the sentiment, yet of late  I have discovered a different connect in this regard; one that is formed through the windshield and depends more on the choice of seat than anything else.

It took me all of four years to gather just enough confidence to climb into the driving seat all by myself. And whoa! A whole new world was waiting for me right outside the window. Everything remained the same, yet felt so different. Same old routes were now heading in a different direction. Same old landscapes had new spectacles to exhibit. Even the honking cars and huge trucks seemed atypical. The fact remained that none of them had changed, just my viewpoint had.

The view through my windscreen was magnificent, not because I was driving through the best of terrains, but because ‘I’ was driving. Independence tastes so awesome and the flavour was enhanced further by the fact that I had achieved what I was beginning to think of as ‘impossible’. This tiny step had opened up new forums for my ever-thinking mind. The floods of thoughts that ensued were overwhelming enough to set the practical half worrying. Even a hundred meter of lonely stretch on the road was sufficient to get my mind (and eventually the car) drifting in all possible directions. In recent past, this had been by far one of the most sought after experience that I was struggling for. Once on the road, I saw the fellow cars as the senior more experienced lot, found the SUVs to be intimidating, thought about the bikers as the free birds and realized that trucks & trailers were the most courteous travelling companions.

Of course, in due course of time many of these generalizations have been replaced by more generic classifications, but the most persistent feeling has been that of enthrallment. These twenty minutes of driving in the morning are so refreshing that despite all the honking and chaos on the road, they instill in me just enough joy to start the day on a high note. And for the records, I even found ‘my first’ traffic jam quite delectable!

Though driving has become more of a routine now and sometimes complacency tries to seep in, however, there is a particular view which has retained its exclusivity till date. Most of the roads that I pass through are flanked by high voltage transmission towers. There is a particular left turn, where due to the discordant traffic it becomes obligatory to look into the rear view mirror before turning the steering wheel counter-clockwise. The timing in this activity is normally such that I end up looking at a giant power supply tower intersected right in the middle by a mirror reflecting everything I have left behind. 

This tower speaks a million words to me and every day I hear a newer version of its tale. Some days it’d talk about my childhood. Sometimes it’ll be about the present life. On other occasions it’d set me thinking about the different mindsets and our secret monologues shall carry on. Every day that I bid adieu to this tower, I find myself making a different excuse for not clicking it yet and yet another promise of taking a snap soon enough. Somewhere deep inside there remains a fear that our tete-e-tete might lose its magic if I tried to capture it any more than is appropriate, like a soap bubble perhaps.

Another mesmerizing moment that I enjoy truly and which I’m afraid might become the root cause of a future accident, is the deep blue sky littered with fragments of white clouds. Even though it seldom rains here, yet the kaleidoscopic clouds are always at their best and this beauty gets magnified tenfold when watched from the driver’s seat. After zigzagging through the city traffic towards the highways surrounded by wilderness, littered with trucks and reaching out towards the horizon where only ships and cranes can demarcate the boundaries between sea, land and sky, the sudden change of view is a pleasant surprise.

A typical journey would start from jostling amidst the vegetable market right outside the colony and is followed by a sprint between Auto’s, few more trucks, a decent amount of traffic trying to move in or out of the railway station and myself. After this sprint, most of us find ourselves suitably placed upon the road and moving with the uniformity of a conveyor belt. The view during this mechanized part of the journey comprises of concrete buildings on one side and an under-construction flyover on the other. However, by the time we are nearing this factory’s exit, the world’s perspective begins to change.

Similar to a child in her formative years, we are gradually introduced to wonders of this planet. The amount of concrete surrounding us decreases sufficiently to be just stroking the wheels and the sky thrusts upon us its entire enormity. Interestingly, despite its vastness, the sky never seems intimidating. The beautiful hues of blue almost always make me want to hit the brakes right in the middle of the road. Fortunately, the howling compatriots save the day for me.

The sad part about driving is that it needs me to tame the wandering mind. As a result, I no longer observe the transformation bridge; instead I am on a lookout for the speed breakers. More aware about the obstacles than the end results, my wheeled vision keeps me grounded as well. Striking a balance of course remains to be the prime concern, but independence is definitely worthy of this all, and more.