Enthralling Trails

  “It is an absolute human certainty that no one can know his own beauty or perceive a sense of his own worth until it has been reflected back to him in the mirror of another loving, caring human being.”― John Joseph Powell, Swami is a trash picker who joined our housing society last year. The name Swami, ‘master’ is paradoxical to Swami’s actual personality. Swami is lean, feeble, boyish statured and sports grey hair on his head, he wets and slaps his hair to cover a part of his forehead. He has a warm smile that is hidden by his apprehensive, shy demeanour. He has a characteristic bend that makes him look much older than his age. Swami had superseded Ranjit the trash picker. Ranjit was brawny but sluggish in his behaviour. He followed erratic timings of work. We could sometimes hear him sweeping the housing complex at 5 in the morning with his long noisy broom, and on many other days, he wouldn’t begin even at noon. He would take a couple of days off a week, and his usual answer on e