Assessing The Damage

I've come to realise the extent to which the performance of the solat, the five-times-a-day ritual Islamic prayer, quite apart from anything else acts as a sort of barometer of physical well-being. It is in part a physical act, and a mildly demanding one, and being able to pray without undue creaking is a reassuring indication that's one's body is maintaining some degree of flexibility and strength. And since I've found myself, in recent years, having to compromise by sometimes using a chair to do the necessary, it's particularly heartening to go for a stretch of time without undue discomfort being involved.

Yesterday, when we were stuck in a jam heading towards Tuas, I did wonder whether I'd be capable of doing the dawn prayer in normal fashion, or even the Friday congregational prayer at the mosque. The problem was that for a good hour or so the jam became chaotic with cars cutting across each other and a high degree of concentration and, I'm sorry to say, aggression was involved in order to make progress. I remain capable of both even in my dotage (quite a lot, actually) but I could feel the physical toll being taken. My right leg and especially the knee were aching spectacularly by the time we got through and I still had a good three hours of motoring to do. Do it I did, but had to tenderly ease myself into the coffee shop where we had a quick bite at upon completing our journey. I seriously wondered what state I would wake in, I can tell you.

To my relief I woke up aware of a degree of strain remaining, but nothing serious enough to stand in the way of business as usual. And now, after getting back from the little mosque at Sungai Petai just down the road from Mak's house, whence I enjoyed a good walk, I'd say I'm fully recovered from the travails of yesterday evening, with just a little tenderness in my nether regions as a reminder of the inevitable depredations of age.

In contrast I'm sad to report that Fuad arrived here for the family weekend in the early hours of the morning with serious damage to his car. He was about to go through the Malaysian customs around 3.30 am, having elected to travel once the serious jams had cleared, when another car rammed into him at some speed. It seems the driver of the offending vehicle had dropped his handphone and decided it would be a good idea to bend down and pick it up without actually stopping. Good grief!

A painful reminder that as long as you get there in the end without undue incident or damage, it doesn't much matter how difficult the journey is.