Redefining Horizons

  The Last Run The aircraft had been on the search and rescue mission for quite some time. The sailor ‘over board’ had still not been spotted. The crew had done whatever they could have, but to no avail.  The weather wasn’t great and the sun, too was about to drown.  The captain could feel the knots in his stomach.   A sense of defeat filled the cockpit. It was time to call off  the mission and  set course for the base.  He took a hard look at all those dials in front. The fuel onboard could hold them up a little while more. Something within told him , “May be, one more run, One last run…” He then took a long deep breath and spoke into his radio "Running once more, One last time”. The aircraft banked and turned right back into search and the crew pressed itself to the mission one last time, It was now or never. Suddenly, as if from nowhere appeared, someone, bobbing in the seas below. 'One last time' and a life saved. A decision that snatche...

  Solutions! Really? The earth is infested with discarded PET bottles and plastic carry bags. Bobbing along waves, choking waterways and making up most of landfills, each piece a folly of mankind. Micro plastics have invaded potable water and aqua marine food source and our existence contaminated. Plastics, once touted as the solution to many a problem, have become the most pervasive environmental risk! Solution becoming a problem? Computers determine how we live, whether we use it ourselves or not. It is deployed even to influence our thoughts and emotions, thereby dictating our choices and actions, in ways beyond what we can fathom. Nothing is beyond the reach of these binary logic machines. While we enjoy benefits of information technology applications, we also suffer unstoppable loss of privacy and hopeless dependence. Control of mankind is slowly coming to rest at the mercy of these machines. Once purely meant for mathematical applications, they now evoke both awe and sho...

Down Memory Lane My wife and I, try and find time, both in the morning and evening to sit together and talk to each other. Ever since I left active service, it has become much easier to do so. Quietness of the area we live in and our two wooden chairs provide all the comforts required. Many who know us, ask, “What do you both keep talking so much about?” Besides the mundane, the conversation is mostly about our lives gone by, the good and bad times, the beautiful and trying moments, the calms and roughs we sailed through, of the people we met and their contributions to our journey. Our morning conversations help us plan start and run the day reasonably well. The evening ones are mostly journeys down memory lane. It fills us with a sense of gratitude and helps us re-experience blissful moments. It also helps us view the tough and trying times we survived with a sense of detached wisdom. Often there would be a reference to someone who had been nice to us. Within a day or two of suc...