To Love - Pt1

So, this happened. Sometime in the second half of December 2018, I found myself on the dance floor of a close friend's wedding party. With a girl I loved. She was dressed in beautiful blue. I was all elbows and angles. She could dance like the devil in the pale moonlight.

That is when it happened. When I twirled her awkwardly, trying to hide my own embarrassment, while trying to not take my eyes off her, she laughed. She wasn't laughing at me, or with me. I had heard that before. At the end of bad dates and unsuccessful interviews. It was now flowing out of someone I loved.

Ek aadat si ban gayi hai tu/Aur aadat kabhi nahi jaati 

I loved her when she first told me she liked me. I loved her when she was kind enough to ask me out. I loved her when she held my hands, and told me 'its alright', as my introverted anxiety-ridden self decided to bail on a party. I loved her when she loved me. I loved her when she no longer did. I loved her when she had a boyfriend 3 years ago. I loved her when she broke up. I loved her when I told her I loved her. I loved her when she said "I don't want to lead you on." And I love her still.

Ours was not a love of passion, or fire, or any other adjective that you find in a Mills&Boons romance. There was no intimacy. Perhaps that was the sign. But, for anxiety ridden, socially awkward dork like me, it was enough. I loved her in Neruda's words, 'like certain dark secrets/between the shadow and the soul'.

Later, when we were going home after the wedding, she remarked, "Next time, I want to come to your wedding." I turned to look at her. In that 2-minute distance which the rickshaw travelled between Marol Maroshi and the Metro, she knew. She knew that I knew.

I knew it 8 years ago. When she first asked me out. She danced, glided through the hearts of boys around her. I did not take lunch breaks or talk to anyone in the office. She could charm her way into a party and hold conversations. I couldn't talk my way out of depression. She was all action. I was all words.

Maana ke main tere deed ke kaabil nahi/Tu mera shauq dekh, intezaar to dekh

Yet, I tried. I hung out with her friends. Who became my friends. I became the nerd who cracked dork jokes. I went on a trip with her, and her then-boyfriend, to Goa. Simply because some of the other guys bailed, and she did not want the only other couple on the group to feel weird. So, there I was. In Goa. The single guy travelling with two couples. I would find every excuse to text her and talk to her. I invited her to movies I had already watched. I would deny her a chance to pay for the tickets because I considered them as 'dates'. I would sit there in the dark,  by her and steal glances. I would tell her every 'big' thing that happened to me at work. In the stupid belief that she might just be impressed, and finally notice what I wanted her to see.

Before I could come to terms with it, 7 years had passed and I was on a dance floor with a beautiful woman. Confident, defiant, and sure of herself in front of everyone else. With me. Still awkward, embarrassed, and seeking her approval. That last part. That was what I had become.

A day later, I got invited by another close friend to a new year's party. I bailed at 10 pm. The music, people dancing and revelling, and drinks brought back something I did not want to remember. It took me 7 days to get these many words going.

She is still a close friend. We share secrets I cannot tell anyone else. I can still laugh at her, with her, and not feel awkward. Everything I am, in some small way, is because of her. And for her. But I know, it was not enough. It is the one thing I am sure of.

Thus, goes the story of my love. It never is enough.

Camus once said, "The struggle itself towards the heights is enough to fill a man's heart. One must imagine Sisyphus happy."

These were the best days of my life. These were the worst days of my life.

PS: I called the friend who invited me to the New Year's party and apologised. I didn't know I had it in me to be courteous. 

The Attack of the Cells

Strangely, it takes time to settle in. You hear your  speak the words, but they flow over you. The dab of the needle is dulled by the anaesthetic, till the moment it wears off. Then you feel the prick, the cold steel prodding its way through your veins.

The first thing that hits you is fear. What now? How do you handle this? Where do you go? Something in your life changes forever. You did not expect this. You cannot handle this. You look at your mom, who is suffering from it. She smiles weakly, and you smile back. What do you tell her? What can you tell her? The numbness seeps in. The brave facade you put up in front of already mourning relatives and friends is not because you are brave, but because you are numb. You are still registering the shock of the news. 

Then come the doctor visits. Each trip to the hospital is a visit to purgatory. There are others. There are worse. If you thought you were in a spot, you see others. They fill the footpaths, crowd the waiting room, sleep on benches and wait for hours to get the doctor to see them. The hospital might be the purgatory that Dante visited. More specifically, the first circle of hell; limbo. 

Mom was fine till the first chemo. She would have been fine even after it. It was us. We were not prepared. We never quite grasped the intensity of the shock. We were still paddling in high water, when the chemo hit us. Mom could not handle it. And we watched her fall, like collateral damage between two rioting factions. It was painful, on so many levels. 

Yet, she fought. With a braveness I did not know existed within her. Somehow, the disease has taught me more about my parents than 27 years of life. I learned that my mother more than anything else. I learnt that there are love stories beyond the ones that movies or novels can create. I learnt that I can break down any moment, anywhere. I learnt that you can never have too much help. 

And this is just the first battle with the dreaded disease - cancer. The war is still on. 

Fighting Emptiness

Emptiness can be a difficult construct to get used to. It requires patience. An ability to sort out necessary thoughts from unnecessary ones is mandatory. Also, the ability to ignore the few unnecessary thoughts that peter into the consciousness can be helpful. I realise this is not everyone's cup of tea. The mind can be a dangerous, but unavoidable companion in those quiet moments. It is the birthplace of all illusions that will drive you crazy. Little niggles will expand into unbearable pain. The searing cut knifing through your thoughts, imploring you to find some placebo to dull your senses. Find something to delay time, or perhaps, fast forward it to the future. It will force you to find a way to pass time in the most boring manner. There will be anger. There will be a sense of frustration. A helplessness that will threaten to destroy everything you seek to protect. You have to keep it under a leash. It is difficult. Ever try to keep a tornado under a leash? It is impossible.

You have to fight. You have to rein your mind back. Again and again. From thoughts running wild, and create a cohesive idea. The idea is often dull, flickering behind curtains of foggy words and images. It threatens to vanish before you can capture it in your mind's eye. You stay on it. You draw back the cobwebs of delusions. You crowd out the noise. You need to fill the emptiness with silence. Easier said than done. Vagueness will cloud your senses. Fight against it. Focus. And soon, it will emerge. An idea, pure, clear and beautiful. You shape it, create it and put it on a pedestal for all to see.

Suddenly, in a moment, as unexpectedly as it arrived, it shall vanish. You are suddenly used to the emptiness. 

The Truth about the Lies In My World

Time slips through your fingers like melted snow. A cold flush and soon, all you have is wet memories of a day past and knocked off the calendar. It has been a month now, since my last job. I am now beginning to grasp the meaning of jobless in its true terms. Everyday I sit in front of the cruel, unemotional computer and send out resumes begging for an opportunity to work in their company. I have always wanted to work in such a publication, It would be an honor, I add. Lies, indeed, but lies need to be told. In a world, where only the mad men and the drunk speak truth, for an opportunistic job seeker to tell lies is the natural way.

Lies are what we are built out of. Our memories, lost to the ravages of time, are often resurrected upon glorified lies. People, characters whose likeness has been eroded slowly with the passage of years, are now remembered with qualities they never did possess. They are recalled, knowingly or unknowingly, to create examples for a newer generation that never did know them, and hence cannot question the veracity of the recollection. Such a funny world do we live in.

Coming back to the fact of my unemployment, it is quite a quandary. My parents, kind as they are, are willing to suffer a few more years of bonded labour in order to support my odyssey of finding the shores of a career. They live on the dredges of the hope that my mediocre writing qualities have evoked among friends and relatives. Lies again. Of course, these are constructed under the façade of decency. You cannot tell an upcoming writer the truth, that his writing sucks and he should make a living out of something else.

All the while, my parents continue to hope like a candle in the storm, of a future that their successful son shall create for them. I, meanwhile, sit in the centre of this whole depraved drama, watching, weeping and wondering when people will understand the truth. Sometimes I think I should speak the truth. Tell them, this is it, I can’t do no more. There is no brilliance hidden under this mediocrity. No flashes of a bright future. Just darkness. Empty, soulless and chronic. A darkness that needs to be traversed in hardship and soundless company. Then I wonder If I can give them nothing, why take away their hope? That would be crueller than I am capable of. So I lie. I tell them I will do something. I put on faces of ambition and pretend to have a drive for success. I send out resumes and wait for modest replies that mask the rejection hidden between the words. I lie that I did not read the truth between the lines.

Our worlds are constructed out of complex systematic lies. Lies, that uphold our dreams, our hopes, that might otherwise be terminated before they were put down on a blueprint. These lies are the foundation to a future that can never be seen, only felt, made up like broken dreams on the next morning. We need the lies, as much as we need the truth. Perhaps, more so. Now, I am realizing the difference between them. Or I am lying to myself that I am. 

SIN!!!!

I saw something today,that i might not forget for the rest of my life.Even the mere recollection of it brings my dinner up from the stomach.It was a bleak picture,except that it was life unfolding itself before me.I have sen this before,but it never struck me as being so poignant .

It was a 7-9 year old boy.In the middle of a hot afternoon,scourging through the garbage bin.he only company he had was that of a dog,who was there for his own selfish motive.He dipped in his hand and found a stale packet of bread.That was the find of the day for him.He sat under the shadow of the bin,and began sharing that stinking morsel with his friend.At that point,I just could not take it.Then I did what first came to my mind.I left my company,went up to him and gave him a 5 rupee coin.He was first apprehensive at this intrusion of his lunch,then surprised at my foolishness.But then,he smiled.No other smile that i remember had wrenched my heart so much as this one.He held the coin in his hand,picked up the packet and walked away.

My friend came up to me and said," Well,now he won't go hungry for 2 more days."His observation chilled my heart.If it was sarcasm,it was cold.If he said the truth,even more so.Now,I sit here on a public platform and tell my story to young,rebellious and intellectual minds.I could quote Sartre,speak like Che,but does it matter? If i do,I might get a few more hits on my blog.But then,would i not be the ame as the many ppl of this city,who see such sights everyday,tut-tut for a moment and catch the next train home?

we have all seen movies.SALAAM BOMBAY,CHANDNI BAR,TRAFFIC SIGNAL.What happens after these movies?We all applaud the grit,courage of the filmmaker.The director wins a national award,the actor a filmfare.But what of those characters?What about the beggars,the prostitutes,the 'system'?They keep on.With every turn of the reel they return to their pain,hunger and humiliation.Eternally trapped within 24 reels.

I am doing my BA today.I might do an Ma.Years later,I might go to Oxford.But what of the boy on the street?What future does he have?Is it going to be better? If so,how?What kind of company does he live in,what sort of a life would he lead?Does he have a family?Or a mother ? Where is his mother...does anyone know where his motheris? Is she happy that her son can feed himself? Or is she scavenging somewhere else?Or worse...?

Mumbai is a city of dreams.what sort of dreams are we talking about here?Does this boy even dream?He probably walks around those desolate streets at night,hungry and under the influence f drugs.Used more to obliviate hunger,than as a tool of pleasure.What country gives its citizens food not fit for dogs?So what if it is 'imported'.Well,we have so long been used to seeing slavery,oppression that some of us have got used to it.The poor are happy,as long as they get to eat,so what if it is dog food,It is imported.

I feel nauseating.I find my life and the existence of it in such a society disgusting.Who am I to judge others.I am a hypocrite myself.When you have such thoughts,questions,and see such sights.what do you do?What could you do,other than ignore them and continue to live in a blissfully fictional world,where 'pain is but an occasional episode'.

Wake up,for somebody else lives a life in pain.