Another Day In Paradise

"she calls out to the man on the street ,
 sir can you help me?Its cold and I've no where to sleep
 Is there somewhere you can tell me."


One doesn't have to live long to know the perils of the society.An occasional walk across the land is enough to make apparent the slime that has affected it.A little boy with all his innocence perceives the world in a different way than we can imagine.

The protagonist of this story is still a child.He is a child of the streets.The entire perils of the society remain oblivious to him.Unassuming and care free he roams about the society.



As soon as he entered the street he wished he hadn't.He liked to take long walks. But not on this part of the town.He couldn't wonder at the difference. On each sides of the road were the worst smelling garbage he had ever encountered. The narrow and open sewers were overflowing with slime and grime of the worst colors.In fact most of the city was now full of garbage. Garbage! He had grown accustomed to this garbage society.It reminded him of a little procession of violent protestors whom he had seen a few days ago.He would have forgotten them but then he remembered that they had smashed the light lamb that he used to sit under at night.He didn't like them for what they had done.In fact in many parts of the city he noticed that the street lights were smashed.

The narrow street was made home by people like him.He even had a few friends living there besides the garbage.He used to play with them.But now that the rains had arrived they all had gotten ill.
As he walked he slapped a mosquito in his face i.e on his own face.The mosquitoes were always his greatest villains.They were a constant nuisance.He remembered a week during the last rains when he had nightmares with the villain being vampire mosquitoes.Now that they had multiplied in millions the so called society servants sometimes gassed the streets with smoke.After the gassing nobody on the streets could see over an inch in front of them.He shuddered when he remembered the near collision he had with a huge illegal mining truck. Illegal mining truck!!!Now how had he known that!
Things were very hard to get now.Earlier he used to get a meal a day with the money he got by selling things he picked up from garbage.Now all he got was a meal in two days with the same money.When the market became dull the street vendor would sometimes be seen cursing under his breath muttering something about inflation.Inflation!'What does that mean?' he thought.

"She calls out to the man on the street
He can see she's been crying
She's got blisters on the soles of her feet
She can't walk but she's trying"

He turned a curve on the evil smelling street.Then he saw her and stopped in his tracks.The human specimen referred to as 'she' will be described  for reader convenience.
She had grown old.But not so old that you could call her 'Old Woman'. Her appearance of being a cripple with a hunched back and dirty torn clothes would not have brought tears to the society people.The 'Society people' were usually the 'seeing blind.' They saw the half cut trees and heaps of garbage on the roads but they never really saw them.If you ask them about it they would give a reply like 'Its not just my problem you know'. But if they were to see a dirty nickel by the roadside they would invariably pick them up.I guess their only problem is money.This is referred medically as selective blindness.
Let us return to the specimen under observation.But the little boy shed a tear for the poor creature.A moment later he thought 'why i am i upset about some old woman?' He tried to walk on but he couldn't. He still studied the woman intently.
She was widely regarded as being a very hard to read person.She never really spoke unless you consider begging for food or money as speech.

"You can tell from the lines on her face
You can see that she's been there
Probably been moved on from every place
Cause she didn't fit in there"

 Her face was so rugged and scarred as if the life had taken the soul out of her.
 He went near her.She didn't say anything and kept on staring into the distance as if in a trance.
 He sat down beside her.He wanted to help but he knew he couldn't.Still he asked 'Can i help you?' .
There followed an awkward silence.

Then he stood up to leave.
Suddenly she caught him by the hand and held him close.With quite difficulty she spoke these words in a terrifying whisper," What will you give me?How can you help me?I am already dead.My soul had left me a long time ago.Nobody cares.Why should you child?"

He did not reply but looked on trembling with fear.Then he stood up and started to run.He did not know where to.He did not look back.He just wanted to escape from the place.He never returned.He never knew what became of the old woman.But sometimes during nightmares she appears with her coarse whisper petrifying him.
As for the old woman ,she did not see the light of the day.

The End.

"It's just another day
For you and me
In paradise"




The lines in italics are from Phil Collins : Another Day In Paradise