12/03/2016
[from the Archives ]
MAY YOUR ROAD BE ROUGH
By Tai Solarin, Jan. 1, 1964
I am not cursing you; I am wishing you what I
wish myself every year. I therefore repeat, may you
have a hard time this year, may there be plenty of
troubles for you this year! If you are not so sure
what you should say back, why not just say, ‘Same
to you’? I ask for no more.
Our successes are conditioned by the amount of
risk we are ready to take. Earlier on today I visited
a local farmer about three miles from where I live.
He could not have been more than fifty-five, but he
said he was already too old to farm vigorously. He
still suffered, he said, from the physical energy he
displayed as a farmer in his younger days. Around
his hut were two pepper bushes. There were
kokoyams growing round him. There were snail
shells which had given him meat. There must have
been more around the banana trees I saw. He
hardly ever went to town to buy things. He was
self-sufficient. The car or the bus, the television or
the telephone, the newspaper, Vietnam or Red
China were nothing to him. He had no ambitions
whatsoever, he told me. I am not sure if you are
already envious of him, but were we all to revert to
such a life, we would be practically driven back to
cave dwelling. On the other hand, try to put
yourself into the position of the Russian or the
America astronaut. Any moment now the count, 3,
2, 1, is going to go, and you are going to be shot
into the atmosphere and soon you will be whirling
round our earth at the speed of six miles per
second. If you get so fired into the atmosphere and
you forget what to do to ensure return to earth,
one of the things that might happen to you is that
you could become forever satellite, going round the
earth until you die of starvation and even then your
body would continue the gyration!
When, therefore, you are being dressed up and
padded to be shot into the sky, you know only too
well that you are going on the roughest road man
had ever trodden. The Americans and Russians
who have gone were armed with the great belief
that they would come back. But I cannot believe
that they did not have some slight foreboding on
the contingency of their non-return. It is their
courage for going in spite of these apprehensions
that makes the world hail them so loudly today.
The big fish is never caught in shallow waters. You
have to go into the open sea for it. The biggest
businessmen make decisions with lighting speed
and carry them out with equal celerity. They do
not dare delay or dally. Time would pass them by
if they did. The biggest successes are preceded by
the greatest of heart-burnings. You should read
the stories of the bomber pilots of World War II.
The Russian pilot, the German pilot, the American
or the British pilot suffered exactly the same
physical and mental tension the night before a raid
on enemy territory. There were no alternative
routes for those who most genuinely believed in
victory for their side.
You cannot make omelettes without breaking eggs,
throughout the world, there is no paean without
pain. Jawaharlal Nehru has put it so well. I am
paraphrasing him. He wants to meet his troubles
in a frontal attack. He wants to see himself tossed
into the aperture between the two horns of the bull.
Being there, he determines he is going to win and,
therefore, such a fight requires all his faculties.
When my sisters and I were young and we slept on
our small mats round our mother, she always
woke up at 6a.m. for morning prayers. She always
said prayers on our behalf but always ended with
something like this: ‘May we not enter into any
dangers or get into any difficulties this day.’ It took
me almost thirty years to dislodge the canker-
worm in our mother’s sentiments. I found, by hard
experience, that all that is noble and laudable was
to be achieved only through difficulties and trials
and tears and dangers. There are no other roads.
If I was born into a royal family and should one
day become a constitutional king, I am inclined to
think I should go crazy. How could I, from day to
day, go on smiling and nodding approval at
somebody else’s successes for an entire lifetime?
When Edward the Eighth (now Duke of Windsor)
was a young, sprightly Prince of Wales, he went to
Canada and shook so many hands that his right
arm nearly got pulled out of its socket. It went into
a sling and he shook hands thenceforth with his
left hand. It would appear he was trying his utmost
to make a serious job out of downright sinecurism.
Life, if it is going to be abundant, must have plenty
of hills and vales. It must have plenty of sunshine
and rough weather. It must be rich in obfuscation
and perspicacity. It must be packed with days of
danger and of apprehension.
When I walk into the dry but certainly cool
morning air of every January 1st, I wish myself
plenty of tears and of laughter, plenty of happiness
and unhappiness, plenty of failures and successes.
Plenty of abuse and praise. It is impossible to win
ultimately without a rich measure of intermixture in
such a menu. Life would be worthless without the
lot. We do not achieve much in this country
because we are all so scared of taking risks. We
all want the smooth and well-paved roads. While
the reason the Americans and others succeeded so
well is that they took such great risks.
If, therefore, you are out in this New Year 1964, to
win any target you have set for yourself, please
accept my prayers and your elixir. May your road
be rough!
![[from the Archives ]MAY YOUR ROAD BE ROUGHBy Tai Solarin, Jan. 1, 1964I am not cursing you; I am wishing you what Iwish ...](https://img3.taxyc.com/195/076/250524961950766.jpg)
