A joy a day!

Driving through the snarling road to his house, a gust of wind smote his face. The cold chill of a December evening, made him shrivel, even inside his thick colt wear. Yet, something else smote him more than the chill in the air. The chill in thought.
Lost in his daily chores of a full time job, he had been wandering around, in search of something that had been lost in all these years of life that had gone by. The weariness of self grated him and the gloom of the day reflected in his heart. The monotone of parading moments, made him gloomier.
“There is no thing as Happiness in this world!”, he muttered to himself, as he passed the mosque, enroute his home. “And it need not be. It’s as much a delusion as God itself is. And if there is any manifestation of it, it’s in the tiny little moments that reciprocate the call of our heart. There could but be no chasing of it, for its not reachable by chase, but only by letting it go”.

Amused by the chain of thoughts his mind had contrived, he chuckled through the gloomy drape of winter evening. But the next moment, he was jolted by the bumper , which he had overlooked and thus had jerked his bike over it. Recovering from the shakeup, he turned his head straight , only to find being discerned by a pair of watery eyes, looking through the drape of her shawl. Her face, partly hidden, partly visible was perhaps amused at the sight, but her eyes bore more than mere amusement. It had the mischief of a lass, together with the compassion of a lady. At the same time, the eyes bore the anxiety and caution of a timid girl, and that rattled his heart. Something floated from him, to her and thence to HIM.
Soon his bike crossed her, leaving behind an image to muse. It was difficult to name her, unnamed and unsought, yet stored in those attics of mind, where the flints of joy are preserved. He turned around, to get an another glance of her, just when her probing eyes locked on his, but as it happened she bent her head, dropped her eyes and gave him another smile to cherish. Then she covered her face with her shawl, with only her obtrusive nose and eyes peeping through it . That was the moment, post which , even the semblance of a rendezvous of such import had been effaced from the scene.

“But if happiness is not important, why scamper around for it?”, He didn’t wish to answer that to himself presently and moved ahead.

The tide turned, the sea rose up in anger and the rain lashed in fury , the deluge of arrows of drops, on the sea bed, making the sound of wheat grains being chaffed out. The blinding flash of thunder storm, added shine to the bed of water intermittently. The sea bore all of it, all the fury, all the noise, as was its wont to do.

The day took a new turn in its next stride. The Sun rose to a new hope , to a new desire. Happiness? No! Just a piece of joy. “Happiness is seductive, it maddens me, but I need a dose of it, just as the food needs a minor dose of salt to add taste to it, to keep my illusion alive. A Joy a day ,lets the illusion stay”, and he drove to work.