The Fear of Small Things.

Thats how I like to refer to it.

When I was a kid, there used to be an aunty in our neighbourhood. Whenever she visited our home, I was ordered to carry out ethnic cleansing of our house. Any sight of the dreaded species and she would start making excuses for her next visit to our home. Aunty's kids were master lizard hunters, having many a slain or pulped lizard to their credit.
So at WIMWI, when Cheenz asked me to shoo away the lizard from her room, it was an old game revisited.
Once, I saw aunty walking around with a bandaged and plastered left hand. I asked mom and she told me that aunty was washing clothes.
"So, their water tank collapsed?!"
"Kalmuhe, chup kar. Can't u think of anything good!"
It turned out, she was washing clothes and saw a lizard on the wall facing her. She fled in such a flurry and tripped. Landed on her elbow and fractured her ulna/radius.

Even as a kid, I wondered. Could the lizard have caused her any more damage than the one she inflicted on herself?

My grandfather was a good man, but he was scared of injections. Nothing could convince him to allow a syringe to come near him. He suffered because of that, led a life where his movement was stunted and people would even avoid him. And all for the fear of syringes!?

Sometimes, I look inside myself and wonder!



from the celebrated song "Solah baras ki..." :
...
ulfat ke dushmanon ne
koshish hazar ki,
fir bhi nahi jhuki jo
us nazar ko, salaam!
...