'Taxi Number 7822'

"I had to support her and at the same time pick up the pieces of my already shattered life and sew it all together. Well, trust me when I say that I did feel suicidal at times..." he said steering right towards Cunningham road at the Balekundri circle. Raghav had recently lost his mother to cancer. An incident that had created a void deep enough to never be filled again.
"I did expect life to hit me hard the moment I decided to take over the responsibility of running my family. But, I did not expect my decision to boomerang  with a new twist every time I tried to move on..." lamented my driver with a forced smile on his face trying to make light of a situation that inspired deeper admiration than superficial empathy.
My acquaintance with this smiling man, in his mid thirties, was no more than 30 minutes old. I struck a conversation with him to cut through the silence in the cab that was only disturbed by the continuous vehicles the managed to pass by the windows of the white Toyota Etios I had hired or the horns of the ones trying.
He claimed to be a graduate from the Bangalore university with an aggregate of 63% which reflected in his abiding appreciation for his favourite subject. "History..." he said with a spark of jubilation every time he mentioned it. "It gives a deeper understanding of the events of the past, explains the recurrences of various patterns in the present and helps us plan better for an unpredictable future. It is for everyone to notice that history manages to repeat itself in different forms. It is my simple understanding that there is nothing new under the sun.Unfortunately, humans are oblivious beings..." he laughs honking his way through a small gap between two auto rickshaws.
"I, of all people, never had this kind of an understanding of life back then. 'Yen mast ithu sir life avaga...' I had someone to take care of all my needs. It's only after my father's demise that the weight of responsibility has hunched my shoulders a little bit..."
Raghav lost his father in an unfortunate accident in 2005 after which he had to discontinue his studies and try to pursue a career. He explains in length about the various interviews he attended and describes all the straight faces he was greeted with demanding recommendations, their inability to see past his language barrier and his constant fear of repayment of loans his father had borrowed at various points of time.
"Well, to be frank, I can't complain. I started as an auto driver. Now, I own this car. It took me quite some time to get a hang of things. But, I always managed to sail through. Everytime I felt defeated, my honesty and street smartness was my saving grace. I might not have a PhD, but I know to deal with life in a way it has to be dealt with..." he says oozing confidence.

His positivity is contagious. The ability to narrate the various tough circumstances he had to fight his way though with an impeccable sense of comic timing, was the cherry on the top. His approach to the complications life throws on an everyday basis was one of courage and gaiety.
Once an avid reader, he believes that books are a gateway to a parallel universe, a world where solutions to every problem is hidden. It is the skill of the reader to decipher the codes to the right clue at the appropriate time that clears the path to the successful solving of life's mysteries.
"It is often joked that 'History is the mystery of past dead heads.' Even those dead heads couldn't escape the tests of time. But, they did leave us clues to those mysteries..." he concludes wishing me a great evening with the determination of a fighter evident on his ever smiling face.