I’ve found the easiest way to find a misplaced cell phone is to call my number and the find instrument ringing from under a pile of clothes, upturned book or sometimes screaming from my very own pocket, which made me wonder why we couldn’t have some such gadget for lost spectacles: Someone read my thoughts or maybe the thoughts of a billion spectacle users and losers, and newspapers say have invented glasses that whistle back at you when lost!

Each successive government rewrites history, the way an author revises his books. "Look at this," says a minister in my imagination, thumbing through a book of history, "it says the English built the railways in India!"

"Nonsense!" says another minister, "Change that to the Late Vajpayee!"

And as I heard about the building collapse in Mumbai, with sixteen dead and counting, and other concrete structures crumbling during the rains, I hear knowing voices asking, “Why do they stay in such buildings after being told it’s unsafe?” And my pen moves, sadly…

It was during these Covid times I wandered, worry writ on my face as bills piled up at home, and money not what it used to be, when I imagined I heard a voice ringing out to me, “Hi!”

 “Hi!” I offered back in return as a stranger with a beard longer than mine, and much whiter, looked at me with kindly eyes as he sat on a bench in the park and beckoned me to sit beside him, “What do you do with your old toothbrushes?” he asked.

The busy architect picked up his ringing phone, ““Yes Father?” he asked, “What can I do for you?”

“I am in a fix,” said the worried voice of the priest.