EDIT: The Truth Don Die family welcomes Mr Aradi as a new contributor to the blog. Mr Aradi's religious faith is 'Islam' so he is the first Muslim we've had on the blog. Mr Aradi is an incredibly smart human being even though I do not agree with his religious faith. But that is what we aim to do here at this blog, present all sides of every religion so people can become enlightened.
Slower breaths… clammy feet… pounding headache… cool sweats… anxiety… night terrors… hysterical laughter… trembling… fear… elevation… falling… landing….
In a very conventional chemist shop. I was still not used to these transformations, even after all these years.
“Aspirin”, I said, walking up to the counter. “Bad headache.”
And then I noticed The Chemist, and I couldn’t help but chuckle. He’s a short Indian-looking guy with dark shades, wearing an overcoat and crunching dedicatedly on a tin of nuts. Not one of my finest figments.
“Not my fault”, he said as he handed me the aspirin and a glass of water. “At one point you tried to call me Nutty.”
I choked and then apologised sincerely.
“Drop them pearls”, I said. “I’m all ears.” I swear I didn’t notice his flabby ears. He wasn’t too pleased either, but he let it go.
“See these medicines?” he said, motioning across the room, “they are strange things. Let me tell you how they’re made. The chemicals are stored in a dark room at the back. No one’s sure how they’re made exactly, but we believe they spill to the floor and mix themselves up in exactly the same proportion and the same heating and pressure necessary. They then trickle into the empty boxes that await them at the other end of the room and seal themselves into these delightful packages.”
“No”, I said. We stared at each other for two full minutes before I realized I was supposed to present my own point of view. “A chemist or a pharmacist made and packaged them.”
“No they didn’t”, he said. “Just because they’re there you think they must have been made by this clever graduate of a medical school who owns a company and has employees in these laboratories with equipments for pressurising and mixing these ingredients in exactly the same proportion. You think they must have packaging departments and delivery trucks with a standard set of operations to provide you medicines? Wrong! Let me ask you, have you seen him?”
“Well… no, but..”
“Aha!” He smiled victoriously.
“Okay, let me ask you” I said, “How do you suppose the chemicals made it to your room at the back?”
“Easy”, he said, airily. “Do you agree with me that they were delivered there?”
“Yes…” I said, waiting for him to continue. The Chemist merely crunched on his nuts and stared at me. I was tempted to take a dig at his nuts, but I refrained. Not worth it, he’s clearly nuts.
“Who delivered them?”
“Don’t you see?” He said incredulously, mouth full of nuts, “It all starts with the Delivery!”
“Right” I said, nodding slowly. “And I’m sure the medicines were just delirious to hop off their containers.” My tone was sarcastic.
“Ah, now you get it! In fact, we call it The Delirium Delivery Theory. It’s just a random series of events that so happened to seem intelligently designed! Well, they’re not. Look at this chemist shop… plain fiasco! How can you have all these awful tasting liquids in one room?”
“Well, because if we ever fall ill…”
“Ah, illness!” The Chemist said accusingly, and pointed at me with a short finger I barely resisted breaking. “If your medicine making Chemist –slash- Pharmacist was so clever and rich, why didn’t he make a cure for falling ill? Why couldn’t I, for instance… just talking theoretically here… nothing personal… uhm, have a medicine that could make me bigger!”
I couldn’t help it, I laughed. “There are pills for those, dude! They give you this energy and enlarging…”
“You know what I mean!”
I tried to be serious and decided to take a sip of the water, but mid-sip he said “I mean, I have all these nuts, but…”
I toppled to the ground in tears of mirth. But then I remembered that my tears could drown buildings around here, and so I stopped. The Chemist wasn’t too pleased.
“Well…” I proposed, “Did you ask him? I heard that you could write to him and he would do his utmost to consider your request.”
“But there is no he!” he shouted irritably.
I looked around me for a tin labelled ‘Chill Pill’, but then I sensed wariness.
“Sorry man”, I said. “The way I thought this would go we would travel to Europe on a plane and argue about Hotel Managers and you would fly like Neo with that overcoat and all…”
He smiled at me. “Thank you, Aradi.”
I woke up with that headache, in a pool of sweat, but I was still chuckling about The Chemist’s wish.
“Well, just because I call him The Lord Pharmacist and others call him The Mighty Chemist doesn’t mean he didn’t give us those pills!” I said out loud.