Two Sides to the Coin

Being at that particular stage in life where one is sensitive to signs of one’s age, being called “Uncle” is particularly cruel. And twice in two days by people who are on the wrong side of 25, kind of hammers it in for good.

The woman who called me that today at the hypermarket was carrying her baby, a bright eyed cute and cuddly package that one normally smiles at. And when she asked me for a swap of my trolley, I almost refused. Being a stickler for these kind of things, I usually pull out the trolley, check the wheel alignment and back and then decide to use it. But then, the reason won me over – the trolley that she was using, had a baby seat that didn’t open properly and therefore, she wanted to get one that did. The husband stood behind her, anxious to step in if I refused. And I didn’t have the heart to.

And so I ended up pushing a trolley that had a slight kink in one wheel and a dummy baby seat around the hypermarket. With my son in tow, the job got over pretty fast and about an hour later, we were out of there with him wheeling the cart laden with the weekly supplies and some more odds and ends. A couple of feet more to the gate and I heard a loud crash. The back of the cart had opened up and a bottle of honey, a box of eggs and some vegetables had fallen onto the floor.

There is nothing like an accident like this to sour the mood and the broken eggs and near cracked bottle of honey did its bit to make the afternoon pale around the edges. We gathered the stuff as best as well as we could muttering about how these people should make sure that the carts are properly fixed. The walk turned a little nightmarish as we had brought the stuff in the cart to load as it is without any bags. A couple of times, the back came off and things slid out making our mental condition even worse. Finally, we got the stuff loaded up with no more mishaps and sat down, heaving a sigh of relief. Both of us were complaining about the loss of eggs, the bottle of honey, and the near misses of the yogurt.

And it suddenly occurred to us, that if things hadn’t changed, the baby would have probably been sitting in that ill-fitting baby seat which would have rested on the back of the trolley. God forbid that something would have happened and that bundle of joy had come to some pain. That thought quenched all of us down as quickly as a bucket of water poured on a matchstick. Some stroke of luck had intervened or maybe providence itself, and the lady had seen me with an empty trolley and exchanged hers with me. There is a providence after all. And maybe today was the day when He chose to intervene and rearrange things a little bit.

How many times in our lives do we call on Him to come to our rescue and we all know of the countless times, He does. But do we even realize that there are so many occasions when we don’t even know that there is a threat and He effortlessly manages it for us. Do we thank Him for all those times? Speaking personally for myself, I am a selfish enough believer who calls for help when I need it. And so, these invisible touches would most certainly go unnoticed if it had not been for the baby. Would I even be aware of this providential angle if it had not been for the baby? If the woman had come without the baby and if I had refused, would I have been guilty?

But this afternoon after that, as we sat around discussing it, never were we more aware of the fact that there are always two sides to the things that we see. The side which we see, are familiar with and judge. And then there is the other side, the invisible side, only visible to the other that has suffered it or who knows it. And that it’s not true only for the incidents in our lives but also our words and actions. And in all those circumstances, are we aware of the baby who was saved by the bottle of honey and the box of eggs? What therefore was Heads and what was Tails and who won?