The Trapeze Woman

Remember watching fascinated, neck craning, breath caught in throat as your eyes followed the hero of your dreams soaring wingless high above you?

You wanted to follow his footsteps, assuredly letting go of one swing as another moved towards you in a synchronized motion that never failed. The calm with which he sailed into space and reached out with complete confidence made him seem like Superman.

You were told; ‘you are too young to follow, you must wait till you are older’ and you went away holding mommy’s hand promising yourself that you would come back as soon as you were old enough.

The wait was oh! so long and you wondered many a time if the circus and the Trapeze man would still be there waiting for you or will they have gone away. Your heart wrenched at the thought and you couldn’t wait to grow up soon enough.

Then one day you finally did.

You were ready to soar into the sky. And you looked for the circus tent within which was the magical land of your dreams. But alas! now the tent looked tattered and the trapeze man’s act just a routine he followed punctually from 7.30 to 9 every evening.

You were dejected.

Then you planned on launching yourself with exhilaration and a little trepidation in a far bigger circus, whose tents were all colorful and the swings far, far up in the sky.

It was called life.

You would do what none had done before, you would touch new heights of success, passion, knowledge and adventure and others would look up to you like you had once looked up at the Trapeze man.

You started out with juggling studies and play and then as you got adept at it you added on more things, work, a new hobby, friends, charity work, your passion for travel and knowledge and your quest for adventure and last but not the least a special someone.

You managed it all well, everything worked like clockwork and you shifted from one to the other as smoothly as the trapeze man had moved from one swing to another. Those around were suitably impressed by your skills.

A multi-tasker.
A superwoman
A complete woman

They called you.

And though your back bore the pressure ill you continued for how could you let them down?

Then one day the inevitable happened, as you let go of one swing to catch the other it moved away thanks to an unseen gust of air. You soared in space and where the swing should have been you grabbed only thin air.

As you came crashing down you realized that you had far exceeded the skills of the trapeze man.

He after all had his safety net, all you have is a belief in the invisible net of understanding and love and this was when it would be tested for endurance and tenacity.