Spirituality: The last train

Life has become a humdrum affair. Every day we wake up, discharge our responsibilities, entertain ourselves and eventually subside. Tomorrow follows today with little or no respite. The week is a bogie full of events that reoccur almost every day. Some bogies are different but eventually all of them string along until they become a train. The train starts rolling out of the station making us painfully aware that our journey has just begun. Once it picks up steam, we are elated thinking that it will end soon. Alas, if only pigs could fly!

We have no recollection of getting onto the train. We just know that we are on it.This train stops only once but we don’t know when.

The journey never ends because for there are no station in sight. In fact if you peer closely enough, it is obvious that there are no stations anywhere. Bogies link up as weeks go by and the train becomes so long that we cannot see its end. Every week we walk forward across the vestibule and we end up in the next bogie because we are out of space.

Our memories remain behind as passengers frozen for all of eternity. These passengers come in all sizes and shapes. The ruddy ones are by far the worst because they inflame our senses many years on. Green shimmering ones we regret because they lessen us in our own eyes. Pale grey diaphanous wisps leave us unspent. Shining angels we treasure; they light up the bogie with pearly luminescence even after countless years.

We yearn to get off this train but it is a futile exercise. We can always walk backwards but we can never stay. We cannot go forwards as there is that bogie has not been linked on yet. We are stuck on this train without a ticket for that would imply we have a destination. We enjoy the train ride for it is a novel experience in the beginning. As bogies pile up, we are left with an unalterable realization that there is only a singular track.

The engine is custom made for our train spurring us along at a velocity that we are capable of absorbing. The speed is crucial because it establishes the rhythm of our existence. The faster we move, the slower we can make up passengers to fill the bogie. We feel in control of our lives if our engine is pushing us along at the speed we desire. But the instant the train is pulled at a velocity that is an anathema to us, we begin to perspire. We feel that our existence is out of control and that the bogies are full of unknown passengers.

We begin to wonder about the identical nature of each bogie. We try our best to open the doors even though the train is rushing along. We cannot open the windows irrespective of relentless effort. We look around but we are hard pressed to find an emergency cord. Our life has become one long never ending voyage to ports unknown. Eventually we begin to accept our place on this train. We are neither the passenger nor are we the driver. However we are satisfied that without us there would be no train at all. In fact we are almost certain that passengers exist only because of our presence.

One question still bothers us. Even though the journey twists and turns, the tracks are always in a straight line. We feel motion that sway us from side to side and even throws us up. Perhaps we are on a mobius strip! But the sooner we think like this, we are again reminded of the linear nature of our travails. We feel helpless because no matter what we do, we are thrust with great velocity on a track that cannot be seen and in a direction that we cannot fathom.

There could well be ghost trains that are still running to stations unknown. Journeys that have not ended at all and instead are still gathering pace after hundreds of years. Some trains are going very slowly just because the sheer pressing weight of passengers. We are certain that there are trains that are decked in their finest colors and rush along with pennants flying. There are others that are zipping along at mind numbing speeds in a tearing hurry to reach the end.

Now what do we do? When we got onto this train, we did not have a choice, did we? We started this whole process by living. We sustain it by existing and one day we will end it by dying. What then?

One day we receive a visit from the engine driver while the train is running on auto pilot. She looks at us and says “is this your stop?”

It is the very first time we have ever had such an encounter and we don’t know what to say! In our confusion we rush to the windows and try to see if there is a station where we can alight. There is none. We turn back to the engine driver to find out that she has left us. We go looking for her but we cannot get out of our bogie. We realize that we have passed the station and we must wait for the next one.

It is surely a surreal experience to be ready for a station that we cannot see and one that does not exist until we chose it.

We realize that we are coming to the end of our journey when the train starts going slower. The weight of our passengers is having an effect on the engine. It was after all a custom built job that was outfitted for us at the very beginning of our interminable journey. So as we motor along the pre-laid tracks we are accosted with the enormity of the travel we started eons ago. Even the older passengers become afraid and try to force themselves into our bogie.

As the train slows down the engine driver makes a surprise appearance. She tells us politely that the load is too heavy and we will have to start letting go. We are not agile enough to stop her from disappearing almost immediately. How do we let go? What can we do to lighten the train? To our everlasting surprise, we see a gleaming light at the very spot where the engine driver had been standing. We stoop to pick it up and we realize that it is a silver spanner large enough for us to loosen the lug nuts. We know now what we must do.

We walk back with the spanner in our hands and all of a sudden a door opens up to the previous bogie. In awe we walk back through scores of passengers that are suddenly familiar to us as if they were born yesterday. We relive each of the moments as we cross bogie after bogie until we are at the very end. It is a wondrous thing that we were able to cross the bogies in hours even though it has taken years for them to be hooked up. We stop at the last one, unscrew the lug nuts and uncouple the last bogie. It slowly detaches itself and disappears into oblivion.

Our act of detaching the bogie seems to have started a chain reaction. The next one uncouples itself and starts slipping back. We start running and leap forwards only to find that the bogies are decoupling faster. We run and run until we are completely out of breath and then we run some more. Exhaustion weighs us down but the fear of being left behind spurs us on to incredible speeds. We are now flying through bogies covering years in seconds until we finally see the first one. We can easily identify it because the engine driver is standing in it waiting for us. She has her hand thrust out inviting us to grasp it.

We launch ourselves from the penultimate bogie across the yawning divide and somehow grab her hand. She effortlessly pulls us in and holds out her other hand as if asking us for something. We realize that we are still holding onto the spanner in our other hand. We give to her and she throws it out of the bogie as now all the windows are open. When we stick our heads out of the window all we can see is velvet darkness.

It is pitch black and impenetrable.

She speaks to us “Your sojourn is over, you may exit when ready. Please leave everything behind since there is nothing that will be needed when you get there.”

We ask her “Where are we?”

She says “You are where you always wanted to be.”

We are still confused. We ask her “how do I live here? What can I do? Who is there with me?”

She smiles imperiously and says “You chose this place when you got on this train. Now it belongs to you and only you. You make what you can and you get what you need. See you later!”

We step out and the train disappears. There is nothing to see or hear. We slowly merge into the blackness. Now we can hear the distant sound of thousands of trains screaming past. They appear like mirages only to disappear in the next instant. Stations appear like leaves on a tree.

We are where we always wanted to be.