Bharani's

She lit the gas. The blue flame gave out a soothing warm heat. The kettle was placed on it. It had been seven years since her husband died. She used to prepare his tea at six o' clock. He would sneak in, kiss her and smile and she would listen happily to his daily news. The kettle was boiling. She used to love to pour out his tea, while he was talking to her. The world had always been outside. They had been one; united body and soul. It had smashed. The cup broke. The noise frightened her. Each piece spread in different directions. She had forgiven her son. He promised that it would never happen again. He had promised that he would never leave her, "All sons say the same thing," she thought. She picked up the pieces and put them in the old box. She poured out the tea for herself and himself. Three lumps of sugar were put into his cup; he always had a sweet tooth. "How was your day at work ?" There was no answer. She stared at the empty chair and the steaming

"I don't know what I may seem to the world, but as to myself, I seem to have been only like a boy playing on the sea shore and diverting myself in now and then finding a smoother pebble or prettier shell than ordinary, whilst the great ocean of truth lay all undiscovered before me".

Finally we got to travel on the new Chennai-Bangalore highway in the past couple of days. I have been hearing so much about it ever since it was completed and this time when a Bangalore visit was required we decided that a drive it had to be. Now if a person inclined to finding faults were to go on such a road trip you bet the smallest of complaints will be blown out of proportion and transformed into a post. Dear reader, I am sorely tempted to do the same because I did have minor comments, petty bits of sarcasm that I bored my fellow travelers with. Nevertheless, it was a comfortable journey on a very well-maintained highway, something that can be done without worrying about bad roads near Vellore or wondering if the Chitoor route is better and so on. We took the route via Vellore and easily covered the 290 odd kilometers in 4 hours. It can be done faster; it can even be done slower because there are no badly behaved drivers honking their way past you. The traffic flows smoothly and t