23 Nov Koan 28

Posted at 10:15h in Framework, Observations by

You here, long time?

More than 40 years back, I found myself in a NYC taxi. Though the driver didn’t greet me, he didn’t seem unfriendly. As he was dressed in clothes from the Indian subcontinent, I assumed he had recently arrived in the States. To get going a conversation, I asked him in mock pidgin English: “You here, long time?” To which he responded in the King’s English: “I have been here 10 years, but I don’t know if that is long or short.” We then both laughed, sharing an enlightening moment.

Ten years is ten years, whatever that is. Long or short are empty categories, like bottomless buckets; yet we continue filling them to make order of an otherwise seemingly overwhelming world.