A blind date with Lady Luck

It was a hot, humid afternoon when I was driving past the Meenambakkam airport on my way towards the outskirts of Chennai with my spouse and Mani, my nephew in the backseat that the sight of several vehicles parked alongside the stretch of the national highway drew my quick attention. As I decelerated and had a closer look at it I could notice brand new currency notes of various denominations, some sliding leeward, a few others rolling across the road with the men at the wheels running behind them and quickly pocketing them.

Opening the door then and there Mani pursued a few of them and shoved them into his trouser pocket that happened to be only of lower denominations like tens and fifties albeit that there were some hundred and five hundred rupee notes as well skimming fast across and along the road, outrunning him. Daring not to flirt with the peril of racing across the highway the boy, all of 18, traced his steps back to the car appearing chagrined and blaming his bad luck. My wife concurred with my supposition that the wads of spic and span currency notes probably carried that way a short while ago by a vehicle might have dropped unbeknown to those travelling in it.

On another occasion while driving along a national highway a tad before the peak hour on a manic Monday morning to the private engineering college (where I was a lecturer post my retirement from Air Force), I sighted what looked like a tipper truck lying careened on the road median. Soon stopping my car I observed a few motorists, riders of two-wheelers, pedestrians and others from nearby shops and lanes rushing towards it carrying big bags, baskets and whatever big containers they could get their hands on, filling them with the ripe mangoes lying scattered all around and moving out.

As I lowered the window glasses a wee bit, I enjoyed relishing the sweet smell of the hybrid variety of the delicious fruit wafting past my nostrils. Under the nose of the driver of the heavy vehicle who was standing afar, hands on hips and watching in despair the broad daylight heist, the entire contents of the lorry were emptied out within flat fifteen minutes.

Driving on a short stretch of a crazy paving at an outskirt area of Chennai I found people burstling around a huge petrol tanker carrying plastic buckets, tubs and what not and filling them up. Their source of collection of fuel was its profuse leak from a side of the tank resting on a jag jutting from a boulder lying beside the road. I stayed gormlessly in the car and kept merely watching the scene, a handful of empty containers lying in the boot of my car notwithstanding.

I began driving my way ahead musing to myself, "How much I would have stood to benefit, had I availed those golden opportunities. Back at home it hit me that when lady luck came knocking at my door, I failed to embrace her.