March Along……

I am not on the good side of 40, let me admit.  You can call it mid-life crisis, age-defying syndrome or just being whimsical when I signed up for a 6 hours hike in a valley with a group of amateur hikers. “Am I fit?!”….you can say so as I can stand on two feet and walk for 3 hours non-stop (atleast that’s what I thought). Well Well!! know your adversary was the first thought that struck me that morning when the walking terrain loomed ahead. On a Friday morning, waking up at 4.30am for a 1.5hours drive to the meeting point was itself a BIG STEP…trust me I am a sleeping beauty; in the middle east not many see sunrise on a Friday.

Many Lessons learnt on that wonderful day…“Punctuality” – at meeting point an assembly of disciplined hikers with two guides applaud all who reached on time. “Passion” – a mixed bag of nationalities, age, shapes and sizes with a common zest to trek. Nature’s beauty – How we neglect to enjoy God’s gift…that majestic mountain, that calm stream, that surprise oasis, that wild vegetable garden, that mountain goat grazing…..

I observed the group, she is fatter than me, he is much older than me, “if they can do so can I” shouted my mind.  I started with zeal, walked briskly, overtook few, walked somewhere in the middle of the pack. Very soon my over-confidence misconstrued as determination yielded and I began to trudge and was losing ground. “Camaraderie”– the group was like an untrained army, they had each other’s backs, even to newbies like me. The experienced walkers motivated the ones that lagged, it is not a race they made me realize, they waited for each other. Strangers extended a helping hand to lift you up a ledge or  a crevice. No one judged me for my clumsiness . As a novice, the sense of achievement is inexplicable when I completed the hike. That being said, I cannot ignore the “Positivity” I felt the whole day.