Numb

Have you ever felt the way I feel...

Numb… there are people around me, just next to me, their voices like a noise in the background, they a blur vision.

My emotions are in a whirlpool, but I cannot feel any. I know its there, like a needle piercing the skin. You know it’s getting into you, you can see it happening, but no matter how hard you try, you just can’t feel it. I am craving to feel the pain... more importantly feel.

Till few days back, I thought it was pain that made me feel real... flesh and blood, but that too has gone. I feel. No I don’t feel, more like a zombie, living but not alive. There was a time when I wanted to be like this, above all and beyond all. But now that I am here, I have my doubts.

Isn’t this human nature, never to be satisfied with what you have? We all talk of contentment but its not there. And I think it’s good. If all were content and satisfied, the world would come to a halt. So who draws a line- to be satisfied or to crave, to feel or not to feel?

I craved for 'not to feel', and now the desire 'to feel' has become stronger than the craving. I am not wandering, I know where I am and where I have come, but where to now? I want to go on - where and towards what I don’t know. Perhaps this is life. Embarking upon an endless journey, experiencing what you get and not knowing what more is to come.

This fact, however, doesn't dull that curiosity to know- What next?

Ping-pong-Ping

THINK!!!
Everyday at school I was told to do so.
Whack! comes a slap from my mom...
can't you think and do something.
Whack! comes another one.... do something,
come out of the dream world & stop thinking.

#!*@???

To think or not to think, is what I am thinking.
That was childhood, now I am an adult.

Profession demands it, relationship doesn't.

If I don’t think, I can’t do a thing (ah! it rhymes)
Yes, I aspire to be an ad person, a journalist, a movie maker…
So if today I don’t think,
all these things will go dong-ding.

If I think, my relationship goes out of sync (ah! ah! it rhymes again)
"you think too much", is all I get to hear.
I have no plans to live life alone
so I have to shut my mind up
for my relationship to be always full of zing!

Now what are you thinking???
Do I really think or just waste ink
writing on whether....
to think or not to think!!!

Life Encompassing Cocoons

I have been born and brought up in this city. It became so much a part of me and my system that I failed to realize and discover it as a separate entity. and then one day, just out of my routine life, something inside me kicked real hard and I woke up to a new world altogether. The surprising part is that everything was the same- the buildings, the lanes, the furniture, the people but suddenly all of it had taken a new meaning. It all became real. The background I had been living with all my life came to the foreground, and this perspective gave a new meaning to my life. It was such an amazing feeling... like a small budding leaf realising that there is this big, huge tree it is a part of. Not only did I start to live my life with a new gust but also of everybody around me.

I stayed like this for a while and throughout there was an effort on my part to awaken others too, to this truth... that we all are on the same continuum... and we are just a part of the process. However, not so soon I realised that people are just not bothered. It doesn't matter to them. They are very comfortable and at ease with leading a life of passive existence, in cocoons they have unknowingly built around themselves. The cocoons that act as barriers to the truth. Living in an illusion that the world begins and ends within that small little chamber. We, me n them, share the same environment, and ironically it was I who was labeled unrealistic, a romantic.

I fought all this for till I realised all my efforts were in vain. And gradually I too built a cocoon around myself, limiting and defining my world with a boundary. The very boundary I had defied had refused to accept. Deep inside I did feel guilty at times, I felt I was cheating myself, like the rest. But then I realised that it’s not myself but them I am cheating, depriving them of the reality I hide within, because they don’t deserve to know.

At the end of the day I too am in a cocoon, you may say, but honey here is life breathing within... unlike the rest.

Another Brick In The Wall

I often get nostalgic. Remembering the old times is the only source of happiness for me. And it is not out of choice, but for the lack of it. I was constructed thirty years ago. Oh! I am sorry I forgot to introduce myself. I am an average ten storey high building. Back then, life was simple and beautiful. I was young and full of life. People knew me, I was known. It was not only me, but everything surrounding me. Mornings you were woken up by the cock’s full-throated wake up call, and evenings were full of children’s laughter and bird’s chirping. There was serenity and peace. However only change is constant, and nearly twenty years back changes started to take place. They were sign of progress. I wasn’t single anymore. By and by others had started moving in. I was a little jealous initially - I was not used to sharing my space with anybody. But it was great to have companions to share my joys and sorrows with.

Time flies by, and before I could realize, everything around me had undergone a metamorphosis. Earlier I had sulked about letting anybody moving in, but now I couldn’t even feel that. Suddenly, all my space had been taken away; virtually there was no room for me to breathe. There were buildings all around me. The lawns were nowhere to be seen. Blaring horns greeted the morning and the sounds from daily living, now elevated to the level of noise, welcomed the night. Cars had come up in place of children. In all this chaos I missed out on my companions too. And just then, I felt like a stranger in my own territory, my own life. I had lost my individuality and myself. Nobody remembered me. I had become one of the lots, another brick in the wall. There was such a pouring in of people I failed to recognize my own from the crowd. I ceased to live and started to exist. Buildings after buildings had crammed into my space and I had been unable to recognize this. What I had thought of as progress, had actually taken my life into the regressive mode.

This is my sad but true tale. And if you haven’t yet woken up to the fact, unfortunately yours too.

A Love-Hate Relationship

Simla - The Queen of Hills. The beauty of theses hills was such that it pulled out an entire government towards itself every summer. The British have long gone, but the attraction towards this lady has carried on. To the extent that to cash on this very beauty, somewhere the beauty itself got marred. Instead of trees, an endless expanse of walls, doors and windows greets you. And except for the winding roads and parking woes, little else reminds you that you’re in the hills. The flood of tourists that throng its streets take away the quiet charm that once lured the Brits. All this and much more on these lines make me detest this city.

Ironically, a love stronger than this hatred exists in me, which draws me in. I curse one and all, the moment I enter the city limits, but once tucked in my room cosily, there is no better feeling. The endless abuse meted out to the hills here has failed to take away the peace that they bring.

Leave out The Mall; there still exist a few quiet roads that are best experienced on foot. These are beautiful walks and a wonderful way to explore this erstwhile summer capital of the British India. The light plays hide and seek as you walk through the deodars and the oaks. Perfect remedy to heal the soul.

Buildings from the time of the British still exude an old-world charm that is difficult to ignore. Even amidst the concrete jungle, they stand apart, on their own, with an elegance that can only be termed Royal. They stand in all their regality, reminding of an era gone by that shall not return. I call them ‘Time Machines’, for they bring the present to a stand still, and are the only one’s that can turn the clock’s hand to the left, giving you a taste of a world lost in time. Urging you to feel it in your bones and forcing you to imagine and experience what it must have felt like then. And lo! You are transported back in time to see the city in a different light, a light a hundred years old – minus the claustrophobic, lifeless concrete, add verdant hills; minus the pollution, and add the freshness and chill in the wind; minus the crowds, and add the calmness; minus the hate, and add the love.

And that is when I love this city like no other.

The latest Bollywood track plays. Something is not right. The puzzlement is over as the reverie is broken. It’s a mobile ringing. And lo! You are back in Shimla 2009.

And that is when I hate this city like no other!