Around eight to nine years back, I came across a story about
a man who had won tour de France after finding one morning that he was spitting
out blood in the wash basin. That story was the small part of autobiography of
Lance Armstrong translated into a vernacular language in a daily newspaper.
A chain of events forced me to read his autobiography some six
months back and in the way the autobiography was written in the book, “It’s not
about the bike: My journey back to life” convinced my heart that he did not dope.
Cancer is a disease which requires a brave heart to defeat
it to the core. If you always stay with the fear of remission, the cancer will
deal another blow to you. I had read two good books in which cancer afflicted
people had taught us how to lead life and what they see when death bed is
closing on them. This made me realize that life is not cheap and we should always
try to justify the every molecule of air we breathe. The pain which a cancer
patient goes through for seeing a small ray of hope among all tubes clinging
through his body can’t be described. The nurses who infuse the poisonous chemo
in your body know that it will burn your skin but they have no choice as the
cancer stuck patient sees a glimpse of hope even in that poison fed into your
body. You wish good luck for the poison to work on you. Such becomes life on
the bed of cancer patient.
Coming back to Lance Armstrong who recently admitted to doping
said that it was a perfect story made me aghast. The can of worms spilled out
only in 2009 but took three whole years for the realization to take place. A well-orchestrated
musical show suddenly sounded noise to the ear.
It is always said that the thief is always one step ahead of
the police. That applies to sport also. Scientists try to build drugs that can’t
be detected in the blood test while another group tries to decipher it. It’s a cat
and mouse game which will never end.
The desire to win always makes us do things that we never
dreamt of in our life. If we want the result by hook or crook, we go at great
lengths to achieve it. The same thing happened with the Lance. A vicious circle
developed around him and he had to be part of circle to continue the fairy tale
having a happy ending.
Who was the biggest loser in this entire scenario?
Cancer. Millions of patients who looked upon him as that ray
of hope might be feeling uneasy with the thought of seeing an icon fall from
top to the bottom of disgrace.
It’s the conscience that
makes us believe that people are clean but the world proves it otherwise. Such deceptive
and funny the world has become that even the conscience takes a bow in front of
them.
