( Overheard in the apartment lift, just as the lift is making its way to the higher floors.

Young boy, around seven / eight years. Wearing a big red T-shirt with ‘Tommy’ inscribed on it, clutching a ‘Granola’ bar. Accompanied by a middle aged man who hauls numerous plastic bags, apparently from weekend grocery shopping. Along with his paunch. Wife is missing from action today).

Boy : Dad if the lift doesnt stop at the 14th floor, will it take you above…? To heaven..?

Dad : ( Slightly embarassed )..hmm mmm

Boy : Thats great. Then you can be reborn as Aamir Khan !

Horror filled dad suddenly tries hard spotting cobwebs in the corner of a spotless lift !

So, that is that. Proof that everybody knows the story of a birth, death and rebirth.

My hypotheses is that children learn it from the way in which our roads are born, dug up, turned over and left to rot for some time. Until some time later, a brand new layer on top the existing layer is …i mean, given birth to !

Isnt that a perfect example of the cycle of birth, death and rebirth !

The alacrity with which roads are laid, and almost immediately, dug up for some maintenance work, sometimes is such a laugh riot, that it is not funny ! At other times, you wonder, why the tax payer should end up paying for such Sisyphean tasks that perhaps would put Sisyphus himself to shame !

So, for the tar on the road, i am sure, there is yearning to get Moksha. To be free from the cycle of the birth, death and rebirth ! So much like you and me ! But moksha isnt coming in a hurry. To you, or me.

Or for that matter, to the tar on the road !