Gratitude

I have been down with a fever since past few days. My body is aching, I have a running nose, and my eyes are burning. Thankfully it is not Covid but a seasonal flu. But whatever be the disease, it always hurts. Although there is something that hurts more than the discomfort you go through. And it is the lack of sensitivity from fellow people around. I am not one to complain for that as it is not the condition and case with me. But just on this Monday I saw that insensitivity and casualness towards few other people in a clinic and at a chemist shop.

It was from my husband that I caught the flu. On Monday, till I was healthy, we went to a doctor for Mukesh’s check-up. While there was a huge queue of patients, came a man who was in extreme pain and had very high fever. I don’t know his personal circumstances, but he had no one to accompany him and also had no prior appointment. When the receptionist told him that the doctor is too busy today, the man started crying. You can imagine the pain he must be going through from the fact that in a society which questions the masculinity of a man from his display of vulnerable emotions here was one who was openly crying for help. On humanitarian ground all the patients in the queue asked the receptionist to send this man first to the doctor than them. It was so sad to see this person so ill and alone too.

Later after our visit to the doctor we went to a chemist to buy the medicines prescribed. In came two labours, their bodies barely covered decently, they looked dirty owing to the day’s job and they too were sick. While the younger one of them who must be in his early twenties told the chemist that he has fever and was given some paracetamol version, the other man who was more aged desperately said to the chemist that his whole body is in pain and he is feeling very weak. The chemist may be regularly accustomed with such people asking for his help, and that’s why he robotically told him that go and see a doctor then as he already gave him a medicine yesterday. The man just started watching here and there with embarassment. This maybe because the doctor we had just visited charged us a sum of ₹400 as consultation fee. How would a daily labour who earns merely ₹500-600 have that sum so casually.

What I realised here was that no one was at fault in these situations, neither the doctor’s secretary, nor the doctor, nor the chemist. They cannot be running their business with sentiments as there are hell lot of us on which they will have to show their sympathy then. Today while I lay with my head burning, I can only express gratitude for having people around to take care of me and being able to care for people when they are not well. I always have hundreds of complaints with life, but I need to realise it more that things can get worst than what they are anytime, in terms of bad health, loss of a loved one, loss of job, lack of money, and many more. So be thankful for what you have and try to keep progressing nevertheless.