By Dilshan Boange

As tomorrow beckons
Our existence is scheduled to run on a week, which is basically time slotted into seven equal units called days. And each has a name and to a certain extent has attributes assigned to them on the basis of our moods and attitude(s) towards them. Fridays have a casualness and Saturdays are relaxed with Sundays becoming lazy while Mondays usher in those all too familiar blues. There is still another day of the week which lies in a hidden subtext of sorts. We all acknowledge its existence conceptually, and also how unfixed it is. I mean that day called tomorrow. Tomorrow can be so elusive that it may be the very reason it carries the possibilities of hope for betterment. But that way if you think about it tomorrow is also a convenient excuse, an escape, and at times a means for self deception. (Yes we do like to avert our eyes from the naked grimness of an unpalatable truth staring us right in the face dont we?). But what if tomorrow is meant to be a symbol? A symbol for what is possible of what we would want to make real if we worked towards it today? Today Sri Lanka is at the threshold of great change. In the aftermath of defeating separatist terrorism we as a nation have realized what (a) tomorrow could blossom into when we grasp how tomorrow exists because we have a today to begin with. And yes we can look forward to (a) tomorrow that would be better than our today. But I for one believe the magic of tomorrow rests greatly on what we make of our today. Invest not all your hopes entirely on a tomorrow that is in eternal arrival without making the most of today. Because change for the better may be realized tomorrow more fully only if we make the effort today, the starting point for (a) tomorrow. Tomorrow rests on the reality of today.

We Sri Lankans know very vividly of yesterday and what it represents the past. The many lessons that the past (yesterday), can provide us must be made into an investment of today for a better tomorrow. That would be how a fruitful tomorrow can be envisioned with some sense of pragmatism and not mere fanciful dreaming for a better tomorrow. Do you wonder how you could make your tomorrow better with your decisions made today? Have we as Sri Lankans (like any other humanly real people on this good earth) thought how the investment for a better tomorrow rest upon the people of this country? It does not have to always be grandiose plans and complex undertakings to do with matters of the nations economy and so on. It could be something as simple as being civic minded enough to acknowledge that both drivers and pedestrians must equally share the responsibility of road safety and that the yellow zebra crossings are there for a reason. Yes the motorists too need to take note of it and acknowledge the pedestrians right just as much as the pedestrian must abide by anti-jaywalking laws now in force. It is after all a two way deal isnt it? Think of how much littering that happens on the roads. While some segments of society may dream of a Singaporean tomorrow for Sri Lanka (as it at times sounds trendy and sophisticated) how many can make the Singaporean effort(s)? Can we cope if the authorities enforce strict anti-litterbug laws like in Singapore? Though conceptually is seems very rosy, how many are attitudinally ready for it?

Can we cast out the at times mischievously appealing notion of rules are meant to be broken in favour of a more salutary -rules are there to be observed? Sounds easy? I hardly think so, when you look at everyday street reality it stands to the contrary. And the difficulty in achieving this salutary change is because it is to do with each of us. Change begins with the individual, the most obstinate of living entities. Yet that change is the most impactful. This column is not intended to be a weekly discourse on road rules and township beautification. (Well at least not exclusively). But at least if I have convinced you dear reader to think about it today, it is an investment made for (a) tomorrow I believe.