10/09/2025
THE BOY WHO CHASED THE WIND
-JEEWAN WANGSU
The fire crackled softly, sending sparks swirling into the night sky. Beyond its glow, the hills lay silent beneath a silver moon, and the bamboo leaves whispered secrets to the gentle breeze. The faint scent of earth and river drifted through the smoke, mingling with the cool night air.
A boy sat cross-legged by the fire, eyes wide and bright, leaning in as the old man began to speak.
“Do you want to hear the story of a boy?” the elder asked, his voice low and steady, carried by the rhythmic murmur of the flames.
“Yes,” the boy answered, barely more than a whisper.
“This boy,” the old man said, moving a little closer to the warmth, “laughed like the river itself: wild and free. He ran barefoot across the hills, chased dragonflies that flickered like stars, climbed the tallest trees… and the wind seemed to follow him, eager just to hear his laughter.”
The boy tilted his head. “Did he fall?”
“Many times,” the old man replied, a gentle smile softening his weathered face. “But every time, he rose again. Taller. Braver. Stronger. That is how boys… and men… grow.”
The boy giggled, his small face glowing in the firelight.
“But one day,” the old man continued, his voice dropping, carrying a shadow of sorrow, “everything changed.
Most of the villagers had gone to the fields or into the jungle, tending crops, hunting, gathering. The village lay quiet, almost deserted. And the enemies… they had been watching. Waiting. Patient, calculating, hungry for the perfect moment to strike.”
He leaned closer still, the flickering light casting deep lines across his face.
“When the attack came, only the elders and children remained. The chief gathered his closest friends and ran to defend the village… but they were too few, too weak. They were overpowered. And the boy’s father, the chief of the village fell right in front of him.”
The boy held his breath, eyes wide, caught between wonder and dread.
“He cried,” the old man whispered, “as loud as the river swells in monsoon. He longed to run, to help… but he was powerless. Then his father reached out, barely able to lift his hand, and murmured, ‘Son… you are a man now. Care for your family. Guard the village. From this day, you are the chief.’
The boy leaned in, utterly captivated.
“The boy,” the elder continued, “wiped away his tears. The weight of duty pressed upon him, heavier than the mountains. There was no time to collapse. He learned to track, to defend, to lead… and slowly, he became the man who would hold his people safe, the man his father wanted him to be”
“Did he ever stop being afraid?” the boy asked, his voice small, fragile.
The old man paused, the flames reflecting in his eyes like distant memories. “No. Never entirely. But he learned to carry the fear… to walk with it, to let it become part of him. That, he discovered, was true strength.”
The boy yawned, curling closer to the fire, his eyelids heavy with sleep.
“And though he worked, led, and endured,” the old man said, voice growing softer still, “he never forgot how to dream, how to laugh, how to feel. The rivers, the hills, the forests… they became woven into his spirit. And sometimes, when the world was quiet, he could still hear the wind chasing his laughter across the hills.”
The boy’s breathing slowed, carried away by gentle sleep.
The old man watched him, listening to the night, the river’s soft sigh, the bamboo’s rustling song, the distant call of an owl. Silence settled around them like a sacred embrace.
Then, almost to himself, he murmured:
“You know… sometimes, when the hills stand still and the river hums, I can still hear that small boy laughing. Running barefoot across the fields. Afraid, angry, dreaming… chasing the wind.”
A faint smile appeared, fragile and tender.
“He never really left me. The boy who trembled, who cried, who dared to hope… he lives on in every step I take, every sunrise I greet, every path I follow.”
The fire popped, sending a single spark soaring upward, vanishing into the vast night.
In that quiet, infinite moment, the old man realized a profound truth he had carried for decades:
True strength is not found in fighting, leading, or surviving.
It is in holding onto the child you once were…
in keeping your dreams, your laughter, your fears alive…
because the boy who chased the wind never truly left.
He closed his eyes, feeling the boy’s presence, always there, always close.
The boy and the man were never separate.
They were one.
