THE BIG BANG THEORY.

I was a very curious child. My inquisitiveness never bothered anyone as I was a shy child.

I used to observe and make my own inferences.My world was made up of my own concocted theories. I stood by them and they formed an important pillar of my rich imagination filled childhood.

The earliest mystery I solved was of our black and white TV set.The celluloid stars either dancing around trees or fighting with the bald villains were not of our size. They were small midgets who could fit in the TV screen. They were born differently from us. The cinema screen disproved all my theories when the same midgets became larger than life sized giants. The world was truly an amazing place.

The fighting doves with their ruffling feathers and the mysteriously stuck dogs yelling in agony drove me up to the wall. How could the messengers of peace fight with each other? Why would the best friends of human race get stuck to each other? Our efforts in separating such fight mongers succeeded with sticks and stones.

With the birth of my younger brother, I was drawn into intense debates with my friends about his origin. We later summarized that God made babies and put them in the protuberant bellies of our mothers. It was a simple logical explanation which solved our problem temporarily.

A class teacher in my fourth grade took a particular disliking towards me. I could not understand her at all. She liked my fellow class mate who was my arch rival. She spared no efforts in belittling me. When I topped that year, she dejectedly handed me my mark sheet. My arch rival came second but we were cool with each other. The reason for her biased favors towards him later dawned on me as I grew up. The wars and the riots based on religion perturbed me a lot. I had seen a movie in which three brothers belonged to different religions.They loved each other despite their religion. The world was getting more and more intriguingly complex with every passing day.

A strange phenomenon occurred when I ascended to the fifth grade. I used to get episodes of flushing, palpitations and breathlessness when a particular girl walked in front of me. It was a pleasurable sense of discomfort.It was a thrilling experience but I did not know anything about it at all. As years passed, I got used to such episodes, albeit with different girls in the walk of my life. After marriage, the sub conscience shut out such now pleasurable phenomena.

I used to hop often to the grocer or the vegetable market to fetch stuff for my mom. I used to wonder with wide eyes about the basis of such businesses. They procured stuff from other people and passed it on to us.
What was their purpose? The difference between cost price and sell price eluded my naive child like mind. The money banks used to be thought of as giant piggy banks just storing our money. They too had a purposeless existence.

Time has changed now.

I am an ageing 40 year old doctor with a family to look after. My hair is grey and they have seen many shades of summer and winter. I have mellowed down my inquisitiveness. I hardly get time to think over things. Each and every activity is in a form of a pre-programmed act. There is no more enthusiasm about knowing more in life. I have reached a stagnant plateau phase in life. I no longer ask questions or wonder with wide eyed gaze about the ever changing world.

Yesterday, my daughter came up to me and asked me a simple question.

'Why were we born?'.

This question rattled my senses and I shook my head in a state of disbelief.

Her question was beyond my realms of imagination.

Evolution had caught on and obliterated the child like innocent questions of the past. The kids now asked philosophical and meta physical questions.

I could not answer her question at all.

I have spent 40 years chasing the answer.

May be in death, I will answer the most important question plaguing mankind and realize the purpose of my life....