The Fire

I was reminded of the importance of fire yesterday night when the LPG cylinder suddenly got exhausted. The gas stove doesn't give any signal that the gas is going to be finished, it was just when my wife had put the 3rd or 4th Chapati on the pan, the fire on the stove started loosing all energy and like the last few steps of marathon was almost stopping. This also gives me an idea, that there should be actually an indicator of how much gas is left in the cylinder. This would prepare us for the unknown. Anyway the things which are taken for granted have the ability to make us realize their importance once they are gone. Do not take things for granted. Be grateful for what you have. The sudden loss of fire in our kitchen created panic and throw of words between myself and wife to which there was one almost teen spectator my son Shuaurya. The other one is still an infant and doesn't worry much about these war of words unless it affects his daily supply of milk and other entertainment mainly mobile. The words between the couple went on that one should have booked the cylinder earlier and we could have avoided this situation.

The words settled down and the team focused on the solution. The hand went on to mobile to fulfill the demand required in our household, the other 7-8 chapatis. I ordered 10 chapatis, some buffer to be on safer side. The vegetable curry was already there. This was one of the few occasions when we ordered something from the restaurant just to fulfill our basic needs and not to relish any delicacy and tingle the taste buds in our tongues. The almost 30 minutes which took us to reach to mobile and get the chapatis at our doorstep was pretty smooth. It is so easy now to fulfill the basic needs of human being in a very less time if I compare with prehistoric age when Homo Sapiens or Neanderthal has to go long to search for food. But here in our scenario too, the chapati at the doorstep couldn't have been prepared without the Fire. The fire ended in our house but somewhere else the fire was still burning which helped us dampening the fire of our bellies.

How exciting or not exciting or surprising would it have been when first time the prehistoric human rubbed two stick or two stones and saw the sparkle after rubbing. They wouldn't have known what could this fire do. If I keep myself in their position, I would have been surprised or may be frightened or taken aback about what is this light coming out of rubbing two stones. The only lightning would have been visible in the sky which they would be accustomed by then, but some lightning happening so near would certainly would have surprised them. How many days, months or years would have taken them to light something may be the bushes, trees etc. with that lightning. And then we know from history, it was the greatest invention which separated homo sapiens from other living organisms and made him traverse to the top of the food chain. The same fire which we ignore in day to day life.

The other form of fire which we see is the fire which brings disaster. A factory creating plastic school bags and stuffs gutted to fire because of electrical short circuit or the forest fire in Australia which is burning for days killing around 500 million animals. The amazon forest fire and the California forest fire are other examples where fire played havoc. The start of the fire could be human-driven or human negligence or climatic. The same small fire which helps in preparing some food so that the indigestible food can be digested within our stomach, could also create the disaster and in a way  end the whole world too. The fire is so powerful. The context and the control ability of fire is so important in utilizing it for good use or for exploiting it to create harm to the world or climate.

The enabler of helping us satiate in the dinner, the Fire, is easily ignored until we are reminded of its absence. The fire in the belly should still be there after fulfilling the basic needs. The fire in the belly should be there to keep running and working towards challenges and help us change for the betterment of the world. The fire in the belly should be there till the end of our life to keep progressing, helping others, preventing bad things, educating people, setting examples, working towards betterment of self and society, working towards a cause. Let the fire remain burning in control to keep us illuminated.