Follow your instinct

Conclusion - Part 11

Sometimes life is like a printed book, and the chapters move on as if someone turns the pages. Sometimes the pages are turned slowly and the sometimes the pages jump from chapter to chapter.

In the midst of this ever moving force, sometimes I wish I could stop turning the pages so fast and take time to contemplate some of them.

But what I wish to find is not found in any of the chapters of success. It is in between the hidden pages. The pages that I wanted to flip past without reading. I knew I would find there what had deeply hurt my heart.

It is the part of life when I missed the best moments of my life when I was running after success.

When my son was born, I was spending more time in the office attending business meetings than staying with him and watch him grow.

When he was about 3 years old, the circumstances forced us to go back to France. When I was busy looking for a job, I let pass by the most beautiful moments of his growth, which I did not know to take advantage of and share the father's love and company he needed so much. I shall never find those moments again. They are lost forever.

How I regret today that I did not spend more time to play with him when he was looking for the company of his father and friend.

I was busy worrying about the family income; thinking how I will bring material happiness at home. I did not realize that what the children needed the most was their father's presence and love.

I remember one day, Marc asked me if we can go for a ride together with our bicycles. There were farms and stables close to the house. I realize today that he was asking to take the ride in my company, and not just for the sake of seeing the farm and the stable again. He had already seen it before.

I had ignored his request suggesting that I was busy and had important things to take care of. I wish I could use my time-travel machine and go back to that moment and take that bicycle ride with him.

Time travels in one direction only and never returns backward.

I am not ready to forget till the end of my days some of the best moments in my life; we had decided to spend a few days of vacation together, just he and me. I wanted it to be the way it used to be when I was a kid and when I used to spend my vacation with my father.

I wanted it to be a vacation where he will keep fantastic souvenirs when he grows up.

We chose, after his own suggestion that we go to the Futuroscope, just a few kilometers to the south of France, in a town called Poitiers.

Futuroscope is a theme park, like a city in the future, with extra-ordinary building structures, projections of videos in 3D, In Dynamic 3D, 360 degrees screens, and so many things which you can see only in a dream.

One afternoon, we packed our bags, took our snacks for the road, and took our car in the direction of highway A10. It was a long way of about 350 kms from Paris. But Marc was an excellent companion at the age of 10. He knew to read the maps, and would keep conversation to make the journey more pleasant.

We missed Viviane very much. She would have been such a nice company for us. But she was busy with her studies and could not travel with us.

I remembered when we used to travel almost every year to go to Portugal by car. Viviane was only a year old when she travelled with us the first time. Every trip that we made was so rich in souvenirs with her.

I remember one incident during our trip to Portugal. Viviane was probably 3 or 4 years old. We had made a refilling stop at a gas station on French highway. I heard Viviane burst into a loud laughter on the seat behind. With confusion and surprise I asked Viviane what made her laugh like that. She pointed her finger outside towards the gas pump. There was a large statue of Michelin next to our car. Nothing unusual to us, but she had found it so amusing.