The rearview mirror

Every once in a while, we do the inevitable gesture of looking back at our past. And we are confounded with a myriad tirade of emotions. We are either glad that things were not as bad as they seemed, or sad that they were not so good after all. We are either happy that the tumultuous ugly-duckling phase of our life is over, or we lament over its continuance. We are either happy that our past played a pivotal role in shaping our future, or we are sad for pretty much the same thing.

I did something similar in the past 2 hours. I went through the old neglected sectors of my hard disk (ah! I miss those primitive days of a simple, humble shoe-box!) And I came up with some really puerile stuff. Here is a poem I wrote in the beginning of my first year of graduation. (I used to flatter myself by calling them poems... I hope you allow me to live in my sweet ignorance.) The poem is about the truth of college life.

It’s a transition encompassed, in a step through a gate:
A transition from a time when ignorance was a virtue.
When a modest past merges with an extravagant uncertain future,
To give meaning and form to words like aim, dreams and expectations.

The media’s mirage slowly crumbles, as reality floats before the eye,
To prove that all that was heard from “experience” was, after all, just a lie.
No maidens or angelic incarnations. No comedic sidekicks to while away loose time.
No song and dance at the drop of a hat. All considered to be an integral part of being sublime.

The “extravagant uncertain future” slowly dissolves so that only “uncertain” is true.
And the notion that life would start with a step through a gate, was just a case where mind misconstrued.
The transition after all was just a change of costume. The gate by its side had a moat.
And the freedom that the soul wanted to rejoice, was the freedom of a hapless scapegoat.

______________________________________________________

Such is the irony of life..... I still find this poem to be true..... lets give it some more years to cure... maybe it'll taste better.... maybe....

In conversation with...

Its 4 in the morning and I've not slept a wink.. some guys are crashing in at my place for the night... so I got ample practice of being lonely in a group... It is so difficult to have a conversation nowadays.. People crammed into a single room can't come up with a memorable conversation... Let alone warring nations or burning factions... It is as if we all live a private life in a public sphere.. A wi-fi hotspot where many people are starting their messengers to chat with people whom they wouldn't have even seen.... but they just cant talk to people around them...

Sometimes i feel that it is a misconception that advances in communications, has brought people together... It has just become more convenient for people to ignore others... you meet some long lost friend and if you are in no mood to socialize.... you just blurt out... "you are on Orkut, right?... I'll catch you there."..... A yahoo messenger comes with a convenient invisible mode.... some people carried two phones till now.... so that they may segregate.... now that process has been simplified by new range of phones which accept both GSM as well as CDMA sim cards..... there was a time when even a phone call was considered an impersonal form of communication.... nowadays, even that is a rarity.... people send their apologies, appreciations and brickbats through the SMS.... Rather, take me as an example, instead of asking the people around me to strike up a new conversation; I am lamenting about it in a blog..

Thus wrote T.S. Eliot in "choruses from the rock".....

Where is the life we have lost in living?

where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge?

where is the knowledge we have lost in information?

The cycles of heaven in twenty centuries

bring us farther from God and nearer to the dust.

Schadenfreude

Dictionary.com defines Schadenfreude as

scha·den·freu·de /ˈʃɑdnˌfrɔɪdə/ Pronunciation[shahd-n-froi-duh]
–noun
satisfaction or pleasure felt at someone else's misfortune.
[Origin: 1890–95; < G, equiv. to Schaden harm + Freude joy]

I don't know about the rest of the world, but I definite say that India is reeling under a severe bout of Schadenfreude. A ten year old girl is allegedly eve-teased by a group of under aged boys driving an SUV, to top it off, they actually hit her and then drag her body for many meters. But what does the media report? Not those juvenile delinquents. They go on and on about the trauma of the little girl, actually showing the footage of her suffering in the hospital room. Who do we blame for this?...... in my earlier post, I squarely blamed the media.... but this time, I think its Schadenfreude.

Because, as the definition of Say's law goes in John Maynard Keynes's "The General theory of employment, interest and money"..... "Supply finds its own demand"..... if we discount for a minute, the possibility that these 'media' are reporting these sickening reports in an even more sickening manner just because they are mentally ill, then we can only conclude that these people are actually minting money on this. There are people out there who actually watch and digest this bull shit (pardon my french, i couldn't think of an appropriate term). People actually enjoy it when Sanjay Dutt's daughter is being called and asked "so did you tell your father that you are going to stick by him till the end?". People actually enjoy it so much that these media people actually spend money on a ISD call, for a question which even Rakhi Sawant might answer! In fact, I am surprised as to why Rakhi Sawant was not asked about her views regarding the decision in the the Sanjay Dutt case. But i'm sure that now that this idea is being floated on the internet by yours truly, some nincompoop assistant of an equally imbecile news producer will find and get Ms. Sawant's precious sound bites.

I hope you enjoy the telecast, as and when it happens. I am sure I will. Schadenfreude is a disease which is going to stay for a long time to come. I might as well enjoy it.

confusing, life

I did something odd today. I went up one of the fly-overs of my town (one of the 3 fly-overs, almost a relic. People often forget that its a fly-over!) I stood by the side, took out my I-pod and started a nice slow song. After sometime, I realized something. My mind was in a state of confusion because what it was hearing was slow and smooth but what it saw and felt was anything but that. And queerly enough, I enjoyed this state of cognitive dissonance.

But we do this more often then we think we do it. Many times we restrict ourselves from becoming too happy, reminding ourselves that this moment of happiness will be short lived. And that it will be followed by misery which seems to be more or less, inevitable. Misery is necessary evil. Many times when we say something that we really wish for, we add "touch wood". In both these instances, we confuse happiness by giving the miseries, the dues it never asks for.

We try our best to confuse life. Because, we believe that in the time that life loses in confusion, we really live.