Lets RIP it

Thats the most common thing I heard in my not so distant college days....
"Let RIP it man !!!"

And I obliged ... frequently and gladly !!! The exuberance of youth ... a khatara under my ass and the god given ability to execute a perfect lean with turn at insane speeds....
recepie for disaster .... I didnt think so then ....

thing is do I still think so .... with a full 10 yrs and approximately 50,000 Km under me ...
aparantly so ...
a friend of mine blew her top at a few recent antics ... nothing just the fact that i was hitting 120 at night on the le-meridian road ... racing with another buddy of mine on his thunderbird ... I was safely behind my seatbelt in the safest car manufactured in india today ... the indica...
no amount of reasoning pacified her ...
then she said something that stuck ...
she: "suppose a dog would have run out ... "
my biker frnd: "I would have hit it ... bikes / cars dont stop for dogs !!!"
she: "suppose my 2 yr old nephew would have run out ..."
both of us: QUIET as the grave...

years ago ... another frnd of mine had come up with
she: "do you realize you could have died" ...
and I had replied in the arrogance of youth: "yea so !..."
she: "do you realize you could have not died ... and ended up a vegetable"
... the same kind of deadly silence ....

Thank GOD for frnds who serve to remind us ... of the frailty of life ...

and thank GOD equally for frnds like the biker ....

Live to Ride Dude .......
but remember .... Control is an illusion a fool has ....
Senna didnt make it cos of a 1 mm bump on the road .... too many variables on the road we drive on...

ps: RIP Ayrton Senna