The Dream and the Dice

The dice tumbles, perplexed, ignorant of the fate that awaits him. Bearing on his ivory shoulders the destiny of mortals he rolls, attempts in vain to make up his mind and rolls again. A gasp, a dull lub and a dub strikingly similar to the rumbling of a far-away train echo in his brain. The distant thudding becomes loud, defeaning and he realizes it is the moment of reckoning. He had experienced this ever since his glossy atire had been removed, faces marred with chagrin, faces jubilant with joy, the thunder of victory and the silence of defeat- the emotions were constant ,the audience variable. He was a good dice, a noble one, and it pained him to be the cause of a mortal's anguish. And then the audience would disperse, darkness would overthrow light but he would lay awake and think of the faces, the disappointed ones, the happy ones eluded his thoughts.He hated his job.

Board games amuse me, they are life wrapped in a colourful box with funskool branded on them,stretch the four corners of the board to infinity and you have the most intricate game,the one wrapped in the colourful box. There are two categories of nightmares, one, in which you wake up screaming ,drenched in sweat,and the other in which the hollowness of the dream still clutches you days later.Now you must be wondering how are board games and nightmares related.Let me relate a story to you, a dream infact.

We rewind a thousand years, a dimly lit room cluttered with wooden animals,humans,landscapes, a sombre-looking man delicately carving a bird out of wood and a young boy seated on his lap. The old man says, “Why don’t you go out and play with the other kids? ”
“ They don’t allow me to touch their expensive toys.”
“ Hmm..Is that so, come back here tomorrow.”
The boy left, the old man pondered, he wanted to craft a special gift for the boy. He sat on the rooftop and observed his creations….animals,humans,nature. Shadows stretched, shrunk and stretched again, and all he had were the images of the bustling market, humans attending to their daily chores; people hungry, lonely, desolate, hopeless. He became sad, heart-broken after seeing his youngest son squander away his life, indulge in callous acts, killing his brothers. He was confused, he had used the most beautiful piece of wood to create the masterpiece. The night was aging, he was running out of time. He resigned to his desk with a piece of the golden wood, he had saved this one as a memento, and concentrated. He recollected the hazy memories of his life, events blurred by the creative artistery of time.The day his son marked lines over his property and created walls; he divided the wooden piece into a number of equal squares. The day his son manipulated his brothers and used them for his interests;he carved ladders on the wooden piece. The day his son killed his brothers, the ones who had carried him on their shoulders when he was young, because they demanded what was rightfully theirs, he carved the snakes on the wooden piece.His son bore a family, he had grandsons,granddaughters and then they had grandsons and granddaughters, he created the pawns; the cousins, the white pawns; the uncles, the knights,the bishops,the rooks; the aunts, the queens; the old man worked feverishly, his shaking hands bringing to life the inanimate objects. When dawn broke, he was contended but overcome with melancholy, a stinging pain, a sense of loss. He still loved his son and could not fathom what had gone wrong, yet he could no longer be a witness to this chaos and disorder. He had made up his mind,it was time to let go; still he yearned for a way to make things right, tears rolled down and wet his wrinkled cheeks.He sat on his armchair and waited for the young boy to arrive, tired.

When the young boy arrived there was no trace of the old man, all he could find were his new toys; two boards,one with black and white squares and the other having snakes and ladders. A white square with numbers written on it was kept on the board.

The dice smiles, thinks about the times when he lived in a dimly lit house amidst wooden animals,humans,landscapes. He sighs, realizes times have changed but the people around him remind him of his youngest son, the same selfishness, the same hatred, the same greed.