My Father's Colors

Life is a path. It has a beginning and an ending. Actually they are a moment of beginning and a moment of ending. A starting point and an ending point. A womb, then a tomb. Two black wells. Between any two points there can be a straight line or a tortuous one. A narrow passage or a wide one, a wide one that is open to the sky, to the different skies.




















Some, sees this path as a racetrack; others, sees it as an exam. Some sees it as a pleasure; others see it as a suffering and question why they were put in this path, why they were born? And for what reason life had been given to them, and then, someday, will be taken?

{O thou man! Verily thou art ever toiling on towards thy Lord – painfully toiling – but thou shalt meet Him}
The Holy Quran, The Chapter of: "The Rending Asunder" (Al-Inshiqaq), the 6th verse.

A path with a starting point and an ending one. A white dot, then a black one. Sufis think that the right path goes in circles. They wear white inner dress symbolizing a shroud, a black jacket symbolizing the tomb, they put their hand on their heart where God they believe is residing, and they goes dancing in circles on the tone of their spiritual music.

{I saw my Lord with the eye of the heart and said: "Who are you?" He answered: "Yourself."}
Mansur Al-Hallaj

Between my white dot, and my black one, my path was going in gray most of the time lately. Late on that day I chose to go upstairs when suddenly I saw some colors up there. It was one of my father's paintings. It was a trial to copy the original painting by Serwan Baran Aarif. When I asked my father someday why he paints he said: "just for the pleasure of doing so, and to discover new kinds of beauty".

My father's painting

The original painting by Serwan Baran Aarif

The shoemaker in the painting gave me an advice: "I made shoes for your naked feet but, do not ever forget to walk barefoot from time to time." He didn't add an explanation, for his words will find their explanation with every new path feet may step on.

{Straight ahead of him, nobody can go very far…}
The Little Prince, Antoine de Saint-Exupery

Two wells. Two holes in time. A womb then a tomb. A laugh then a tear. A reunion then a farewell. A white and a black and we got to add the colors. Thank you my dad for adding those colors to our life, in our long and uneasy journey.