Contest Alert ⚠️ 1 Picture 1 Story Week #64

Assalam-o-Alaikum

First of all I want to Thanks @suboohi ma'm for giving us a chance to participate in a new contest every week that she organizes. Really great contests going on and growing a lot. And that's the reason why the community is very grouping because of these constant competitions and hopefully it will continue to grow and become the number one community in the world.Contest Alert ⚠️ 1 Picture 1 Story Week #64

freepik

At the crack of the horizon before where velvet darkness dipped to sky blue, a shepherd was seen standing on a hillock. That time of the day of course, when the color of dawn and the promise of a new day were arrested by him standing tall in the cold, in the simplicity of the rough check shawl that hung from his near bony shoulders like a toga. Although the villagers who knew him well could address this lone figure only as Zaman, he was in fact the shepherd, currently carrying a small sack of grain in his right hand and a rather shoddy wooden staff in his left.

Around him many goats were assembled and frolicking with eyes down, uttering shrills which disrupted the quietude of the hills. Each goat was unique: Some had thick and hairy pelts with colors ranging from earth tones browns and off white and some had horns that twisted in Styrofoam and fiberglass like sculptures. For Zaman every goat was family, they were as much his own kin as the lines on his hands.

Laying down which produced the desires’ and curiosity of the goats, he knelt down and opened the sack. None of them was strikingly beautiful but a small white kid, not more than a month old, was the first to struggle to the front. Zaman chuckled softly.

“You are right, Nuri, as always, patience, “ he said as he poured the first handful of grain over the dewy green grass.

The others joined it, active movements feeding and walking all over him at once. Sat for Zaman now cross-legged, his staff lay by his side, and he observed them eat with a serene look on his face, which only comes from years in the same pattern.

The relationship Zaman had with his goats was no transient contractual relationship—it was personal because it was out of care, frequent interaction and need. They together with the tough hardships of living on these rocky terrains were his friends, his earnings and his consolation.

Sometime ago he had been a man of some small means and education, but that was many years prior to his present destiny. Many years ago he was a boy with aspiration of moving to the urban area in search of a job. But fate, like it is wants to prove usually has other plans for you. To suppose from this that Zaman comes from a large farming family’ is misconceived; the’s small flock was in the hands of its ‘head,’ Zaman’s father, when the latter was taken ill. As it will be seen what begin as financial duties became career paths. And Zaman one day found that there was a certain small felicity in this kind of life and was most nicely ordered by a plain soul.

As the sun crept up the hills the view became golden and the fresh, gentle breath of wind could bring out the smell of wild flowers. In the course of time, the goats started grazing and some of the males started going up the slope in quest of new tufts of fresh shrubs to feed on while some of the goats simply dropped down and chewed the cud. Time allowed them to go because he knew they would come back to him when he wanted them too.

Sitting there, he observed the world that was going on around him. To his left, the village was down in the valley below and people were starting their day, having wakes up and were making their breakfasts, seen from the rising volumes of smoke through the chimneys. On the right, one could see only hills rising on and on, and their spurs valleed in white, as if the stubble fields had been sown with snow. This was his world – ordinary, however as broad as the earth, as boundless as the skies up high above, as big as the earth and the heavens themselves!

Him being lost in deep thoughts, he was suddenly distracted by movement. In the comer of the flock, a goat was tethered by the horns to a thorny shrub that covered the ground. Zaman was quick to rise from his seat and grab his staff.

“Wait, Moti,” said the man and walked towards the animal.

Panicked the goat began bleating and one of its legs got caught in the branches of the evil thorny bushes. Boy squatting near it, his calloused hands slowly attempting to comb through more confusion there: Zaman. Although he was a crude man, he was gentle when handling the infant.

“Being lost where you should not”, he murmured but his words were filled with humor.

Finally released from Dunnett’s embrace, Moti rubbed her head against the young man as though thanking him. There was a time when Zaman laughed and then put his hand on the goat’s head.

By noon the flock had shifted slightly to a nearby stream and they drank and sup at the water then slept under the single tree. At that time, occupying a large stone, more than is needed, Zaman spread a piece of bread and cheese, and leaned a stick across his knees. It always surprised them how simple his life was and he said to them ‘Look, it may not be much but it makes me this kind of happy’.

The life of a shepherd was not colorful at all – there were nights when it was cold, wild animals were a problem, and every time one had lost a goat to disease or other reason. But, in these moments, being alone with the friends he had grown to like, Zaman was happy – not a happiness of excited expectations but the happiness to be always wished for, the happiness of innocence.

Each time the day started to meld away into the setting sun with the shadows of the hills stretching far and wide Zaman got up and called his flock. The goats also surrounded him waiting for him to lead them back home. Thus, they walked down the hill, the shepherd never putting on haste as the lead.

Finally as the day came to an end Zaman’s figure was once more appear again behind the line of horizon. To the onlookers such those in the village below, he was but a herdsman who tended his goats. But to Zaman, he was the custodian of a holy trust, the protector of a life which although devoid of sophistication was worth living.

Thanks for Reading

Regard @shabbir86