The Blithe of Blind Date! #TheBlindList #SayYesToTheWorld

Mr. Gunasekaran is around fifty-six years of age and works as a Sr. Marketing Manager in a potato chips company. He has reached up to this post with his sheer determination to excel in life and his unqualified submission to hard work. Now he is well-off financially.

He is a god fearing man and is happy with whatever he has received in his life. He is grateful to god for giving him a wife like Chinnamani, he loves her more than anything else in the world. Today is her birthday so he has bought a gold necklace for his wife. He tries to do everything that can keep his wife happy and engaged in order to keep her mind away from the brooding about the childless state of the couple.

During the youthful days, Gunasekaran used to comfort Chinnamani that God will certainly fulfil their wish of becoming parents but as time passed by and they remained childless, the anxiety tendency in Chinnamani grew multifold. Once she has had a nervous breakdown also.

She keeps thinking as to what will happen when their bodies stop supporting them, as there is no one to take care of them! The sight of old age home scares a hell out of her. She doesn’t want to go there. Gunasekaran comforts her saying that: “Look even people with children have pains in life, as the children grow wings and move out of the parental nest they seldom comeback to take care of their parents.”

“In such situations the parents have to be able to learn to take care of themselves on their own. And if we keep doing ‘Yoga’, we will never feel too weak to handle the life after sixties.”

But deep down Gunasekaran knows that life is full of uncertainties and the body is as fragile as glass. Anything can happen at any time in old age. And to fight his depression, he drinks. Yes, this is the only flaw that the gentleman Gunasekaran has. He drinks only to go aloof for some time from the dejecting aspect of his life i.e.: being childless.

He descends from bus at a wine shop while returning from the jewelry shop. He buys a small bottle of his favourite brand of whisky and sits on the table by the side of the shop. He has his potato chips with him to go with his drink. Though he drinks, but in limit and has never been that drunk where his legs are wobbly and mind is oblivious to the current situation. He is a responsible drinker. He never makes any ruckus after drinking.

He completes the drink and chews on some mouth freshener to beguile Chinnamani of the alcohol scent.

His house from the alcohol shop is some two hundred meters away, and he usually walks up to his house and refrains from taking an auto. There is a stretch of path up to his house that seems desolate for some five minutes. While He is going towards his house he meets with that desolate stretch. He hears the noise of three-four pairs of feet following him. His heart starts palpitating…he speeds up but the following pairs of feet also speed up.

Now Gunasekaran grows really anxious as he is sure that these are some goons who are after the gold necklace that he has bought for his wife.

As he decides to move faster to get out of the desolate stretch, a car stops screeching before him. The people from behind pounce on him, overpower him, and shove him into the car. They put a chloroform dunked hanky before his nose and he loses his conscious.

When he comes to his senses, he finds his hands tied to the arms of a chair and his eyes blindfolded.

He hears intermittently the voices like: Lufthansa Airlines welcome you to this part of the world, that part of the world. The names seem utterly unfathomable to him as he has hardly put his foot out of his state, in the years that he has spent on the earth, leave the country.

He assumes that he is now in an airplane.

“What do you want? I am ready to part with the necklace…you can take it but please leave me…my wife is alone in house and she must be crying because I am not there. Please let me go…for god’s sake!” Gunasekaran pleads.

“Guna, you are here?”

“Who… Chinna?”

“Yes…they kidnapped me last night on the pretext that you have met with an accident and I needed to go to hospital,” explains Chinnamani.

“Get up you both!” says a female voice untying their hands and removing the blindfold.

“Make them ready for their fall,” instructs the female voice.

Both of them are made to change into the dresses suitable for a fall from the sky and are loaded with some bags on their backs.

“What do you want to do with us?” yells Gunasekara.

“If you want to kill us… then kill us straight away…we will not resist,” cries Chinnamani frantically.

“Push them!” says the female voice and she herself makes a plunge out of the airplane too.

Gunasekara and Chinnamani clasp the hands of each other as they tumble out of the plane into the free falling arena of the sky. For some time they keep falling like a rock falls from sky piercing the thick air. Suddenly the parachutes bundled onto their backs open up with a jerk and they start dangling in the sky.

“Enjoy the moment!” says the female voice as she clasps the hands of Gunasekaran and Chinamani forming a circle in the air.

Both Gunasekaran and Chinnamani are totally flabbergasted at the situation that they are in. They are totally dumbstruck to say anything; they are just observing the arena around them.

After sometime, she instructs both of them to pull a set of strings down, so that they can land on the piece of land smoothly.

They all land safely afterwards.

It is a beautiful island with breathtaking sea shore.

“For next one month you will be here my dear…enjoy your stay here this is your ‘Blind Date’ with the world... soak up the beauty of the place.”

“But who are you and why have you brought us here?” asks a bamboozled Gunasekaran.

“I am incarnation of Prithvi…the world and why I have brought you here? Well, you both are the lucky winner of the ‘pure soul’ contest held at the court of God … and you have won a free stay at this place as a prize from that contest. So stay here for the month and spoil yourselves. You will get here everything. This island will be at you beck and call for a month,” explains Prithvi.

“But you look quite young to be Prithvi…the world?” asks a puzzled Gunasekaran.

“I also do yoga my dear,” says Prithvi whistling towards the sky. The Lufthansa airplane hovers lower and drops a ladder. Prithvi clasps onto it and moves up to the plane.

Gunasekaran and Chinamani are all alone on the island but instead of fear there is a sense of delight in their hearts. They both feel an immense sense of exhilaration that they have never experienced in their lives so far. The nature is so beautiful in its pristine form that all anxiety and depression has got vanished from the minds of the couple. The feeling that God is really caring for them from up there imbues a sense of security in them.

They see a big bungalow nestled on the beach. They decide to go there. The door is locked. Gunasekaran orders: “The door be open,” and the door does open.

It is quite a thrilling experience that in life things are moving as per their wish. They enter the room and find a luxurious heaven waiting for them with a set of retinue inside.

They can eat anything that they want to eat; they can wear anything that they want to wear. The scrumptious food, the fine finery: everything is available at their command.

Twenty days pass by of their stay of one month. Everything is fine but still the hollowness of living without progenies haunts Chinnamani on and off. Sensing the dejection of her face Gunasekaran says: “Let’s travel to explore the far flung places of sea shore and that too barefoot.”

This brings back Chinnamani   from her thoughts. She agrees to be part of exiting barefoot exploration.

They must have strolled up to two kilometers on the beach but they don’t feel the fatigue. The sand beneath the feet seems like velvet.

Suddenly, they hear the voice of an infant crying. Both focus their attention towards the sound. They see some ten meters away something laying and they assume the voice to be coming from it.

They both rush to the place.

When they reach the place, they both look at each other in disbelief.

It is a mermaid infant.

She is crying continuously.

“She must be hungry but what can we give her to satiate her hunger?” questions Chinnamani as she lifts the baby mermaid from the sand.

As she clasps the baby to her bosom, the intensity of the cry decreases drastically. The baby mermaid starts nuzzling her lips against the bosom of Chinnamani and miraculously the milk starts to spurt through her undergarment. Chinnamani removes her blouse and let the baby mermaid latch on to her breasts. Today, Chinnamani is experiencing the complete sense of motherhood at the age of fifty-two. As the baby suckles on her breasts, the tears of ecstasy trickle down her eyes.

Gunasekaran is witnessing this surreal, magical moment with brimming eyes. Today, he is watching his wife experiencing the joy that even several grams of gold had failed to etch on her face so far.

“Since there seems no one to take care of this little one, I will take her with us, I will look after her, what you say?” asks Chinnamani.

“Sure, why not?”

They bring the baby mermaid to their bungalow and spend rest of the days taking care of her. The little one also develops an unbreakable bond with both of them. They all seem to be familiar with each other since eons.

Since the time, the little one entered their lives… time just flew by.

One morning when they are busy playing with the little one, Prithvi appears.

“So, now your time is up in this place…prepare to come with me to your world,” informs Prithvi.

“Could we take the little one too with us?” asks Chinnamani.

“No…she belongs to this place only…this is her world…now get ready to leave this place and this little one,”Prithvi turns down the request bluntly.

“But now she is our world, she is our life…we cannot think of parting with her…Prithvi you are also mother of innumerable children, please understand my situation,” pleads Chinnamani along with Gunasekaran standing with folded hands.

This scene melts Prithvi.

“Look she cannot survive in your world…one thing I can do but only if you agree.”

“What is that?” asks Gunasekaran.

“Since, she cannot go with you to your world in that case you will have to stay here if you want to be with the little mermaid… but for that you will have to forgo claims on your house and your bank balance in your world…would  you agree to do so?” asks Prithvi.

“Yes we would,” say the couple in unison.

“Look… the blinding happiness that we have found in this blind date is far more precious than the materialistic wealth stashed in bank accounts in that world,” says Gunasekaran.

“But then all the luxury that you have had here till now will vanish in next two hours, I will provide you only with bare minimum needed to stay at this place…do you still agree?” asks Prithvi.

“Yes…even if you take away all of luxury we would prefer to stay here as long as our little one is with us,” says Chinnamani.

“Ok then, I bless you both and the little one a wonderful familial life of a hundred years…enjoy your stay here and contribute to keep this part of the world as flawless as your ‘pure soul’. God will be very happy if you could do so. And yes you will get everything that you need to stay here happily and comfortably. Oh! Now it is time to leave for me,” says Prithvi and dashes out of the bungalow to take her Lufthansa flight like last time.

Thus Gunasekaran, Chinnamani and the little mermaid get a brand new lease of blissful life of hundred years together and wave their goodbye to Prithvi, ensconced on the Lufthansa plane, from their window.

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