Remembrance

Don't know why I missed out on 'Tamasha'. Finally, saw it last night, an amazing, yet difficult movie to make. Ranbir Kapoor, as Ved, was predictably fabulous, and Deepika as Tara, was the apt catalyst who turned Ved's life upside down. More than a movie, it was a treatise on modern life. It was like watching your daily mundane existence being portrayed on the wide canvas, as you struggle through to keep your inner conflict in check. You want to be someone else, but you end up being someone else. You want to do something else, but you end up doing something else. But, in that helpless mechanical existance as well, we have a choice - to say 'No' to it. After all, we have chosen that life, and no one but ourselves are to be blamed for it. And, no one but ourselves can change it as well. So, at the witching hour, with the lingering sound of 'Matargashti' in the background, I penned the following poem: He wasn't a man of 9 to 5, He wasn't...

That's a question for anyone who is above 30. Ask yourself, when was the last time you made a friend. And, I am not talking about someone you met and added on Facebook. It is the kind of friendship you struck when you were a kid, when you became friends with anyone and everyone without judging them. But, do you do that now? As you grow old, you pile up conventions after conventions. You create certain 'ideals', you need your new friend to fit in your definition of that 'ideal'. Those ideals could range from the banal to the sublime. You only want to be friends with people who are of your class, status, match your intellectual wavelength, adventurous, humorous... the list goes on as you add more numbers and white hair (not necessarily in the same order) to your life.  You lose your spontaneity to be friends with a stranger, someone who is totally unlike you or someone who breaks every possible definition of your 'ideal' friend.  Question is why...

How does it feel to be disowned, to be thrown out on the streets, to be unsupported? It's like your flesh being cut open and someone liberally sprinkling salt and spice on it. Although, you want to scream in agony, your voice is drowned somewhere in the din of your own inner hurt. You are so hurt that you even stop feeling it altogether. You want the moment to pass, but you know things will not settle so soon, it will take time, you would need to go through the motion, you would need to soak in the bitter moments that you are put into. You just fervently wish for one thing, strength, the strength to see it through, to ride out that wave, because you know you are made of better metal than the ones they think you are made up of. And, sometimes, you need to show them the finger...

The world has changed, so I have. The world is still changing, and so I am. Change is the only permanence, and it is stupid enough to seek anything that is permanent, because nothing is. Have I learnt something new? Have I become a better person? Have I stopped making the same mistakes over and over? Don’t know, the answer is still illusive. All I know, I have become calm.

What do you do when you find yourself in the same situation again? Would you make the same mistakes or would you be wiser this time? Would you not be impulsive and jump to conclusions? Would you take your time, be patient and wait for the right time to say the right thing or ruin everything by being anxious and stupid? Would you keep your cool and not become obsessive? Most importantly, would you remember that all the drama that you would create would finally go down the drain? You have already learnt, already burnt your fingers. You know what to do, there is no need to re-learn them in a painful way. Don't run to it, walk swiftly, walk surely and enjoy the view while you inch towards your destination. 

Are you wise now? That's not a rhetorical question, but the answer is not a simple yes. Yes, I take my decisions measured at every teaspoon. Yes, I do not trust people easily. Yes, I have learnt to let broken relations be. Yes, now I remain calm when I am hurt. Yes, I can see nothing is permanent. And, yes, nothing really matters after all. Is that being wise? If that is wise, what happens to vulnerability, spontaneity and of course, life itself?

They are the sophisticated, they are the nice I am the misfit, I am the vice They make rules, they keep order I break rules, I thrive in disorder They are the genesis, the cream at the top I am the anti-thesis, the residual crop They have it all, yet they fear their fall I have only the ground, yet I dare make the call