ALLEGORY

and I started riding my bike early in the morning while it was drizzling, towards Chennai. I was thrilled by the darkness and silence. It was disgusting to get skin irritation by the mild acid rain while I crossed Thirumalai chemical factory. The famous MBT (Madras Bangalore trunk road) is the most critical highways with high traffic of trucks screeching with industrious goods. I was doused with rain lancing into the wind enjoying the chillness, with a sigh of relief from muggy weather of previous days. Suddenly my engine started knocking. DAMN!!! I forgot to refill my tank. Petrol bunk is not too far but still there won’t be anyone to fuel it. Especially at 5:00 AM it’s really hard to find a bunk functioning. As I prejudiced the bunk was abandoned and I tried my level best to wake them up. It was hard to reach their souls from limbo of hangover.

I decided to stroll for another 2 kms though it started to rain heavily and i was left with no other option. The early morning riders gave me a weird look. “Petrol illa” I exclaimed in reflex with no idea why I said so. I didn’t get any reply either.

When I reached the highway i saw four trailors parked along their left side blocking almost half of the road. A sardhaji came out of the trailor approaching me. Thought I could offer him some help as a quid pro quo so that he may offer me some sorta ‘petrol help’. He showed me some invoices of raw materials. I was hardly reading, BHEL was the purchaser written on it. “it is my company” I got no idea how to explain him in Hindi. Somehow I managed him to explain that his destination is 2 kms away. As I was explaining him the beeline I saw a heavy duty Indane tanker raging along the side of parked trailors. He was cornered to travel along his right side (the wrong side) of the road for the next 10 seconds as the lengths of four trailors were so significant. As the vehicle was nearing I wondered how the visibility of the upcoming vehicle is so ostentatiously limpid in the dark. Generally upcoming highway vehicles will dare to bleak our vision with blaring high beam lights. Apparently I heard another screeching tires and engine melancholies in Doppler Effect that shrilled my ears. It was another truck loaded with my company’s finished goods travelling on the other side. The moment I began to realize it’s this truck responsible for the clear vision of tanker and Doppler effects few questions started streaming in my mind of how will he go? Cross the other truck?

My reflex was so slow that before it could converge to a solution that it’s gonna happen, it happened!!!

to be continued...,..