Surrender

“Yes, I did. I murdered him. I took the knife and ran it right through his chest. I also gagged him so I wouldn’t hear him scream.

“He was two days away from turning a year old. Yes, I had nurtured him for a year and I loved him to bits, but I knew that when he grows up, he won’t be able to see or walk or talk like other children… How did I know? I was his mother. Mothers know. I knew.

“Yes, I know there are mothers who spend their lives looking after their handicapped babies and don’t even wince. I happen to be not one of those mothers. Call me selfish, but I don’t want to bear the load of seeing my child feeling lesser than the others every single day of his life. His soul didn’t need to stay trapped for a lifetime like that. She could move on to more colourful happier lives. And I hope she has.

“So, one night, when he was deep in sleep, I just picked up the knife, covered his mouth with my hand, and stabbed him. He woke up… from my touch or from the pain, I don’t know. But he woke up, and he looked at me. I don’t know what that look meant. Until then, he had never experienced any feeling except love. This was a new experience. I don’t think he knew what it meant. I still wonder whether he thought this was love too. I hope he knows that it was. I don’t think there was accusation in his eyes, but as I looked into them, it seemed like there was a knife in my throat.

“Finally, when he stopped making those screams that I didn’t hear and he stopped twisting his hands and feet in the air, his eyes looked stunned. He had stopped breathing. I took my hand away from his mouth, threw the knife on the floor and sat by his side looking at him.

“Yes, it had been a month when they found me sitting there. How was I alive? I had been eating him. He was a part of me. He had started inside me. It was only fair that he should end there. When they found me, only his eyes were left. Yes, I had eaten his heart too. I had been thinking of eating his eyes for many days now, but I couldn’t. They were his eyes.

“I’m a cannibal, you say? But what I ate was a non-living thing. If I could bring fatal pain to my own child, this was not worse. Haven’t you ever given pain to someone who loved you to bits? Haven’t you EVER done something wrong to make amends for another wrong? Haven’t you ever been selfish? You haven’t, you say? You must be God then.

“So yes, when they found me, I quickly hid his eyes in my dress. Yes, I still have them, but I won’t give them to you. I want to meet his father and cremate them with him. I want his father to slap me, beat me, kill me, and let me cry on his shoulder one last time before you execute your sentence on me. You say he doesn’t want to look at my face? You don’t have to tell me that. I know it. Yet, can you please let him know that this is for our baby? We owe it to him. His soul might still be trapped in these eyes. One night, when I sat behind the bars crying, I thought I saw tears in his eyes too. Yes, I know. Maybe, it was my tears which had fallen there, but maybe, they were his soul’s. I want to release her. And I can only do it together with his father. He was OUR baby.

“All those people outside, shouting ‘Bitch’, ‘Cruel’, ‘Cannibal’, ‘Heartless’ still affect me, although they shouldn’t. I have seen a lot in life to be affected by them. But I am, still. For I know that they have a reasonable reason.

“You know, when I gave birth to my baby, I had been on top of the world. I had never known the feeling of such joy. But then, I hadn’t known that he was going to have to live a lesser life. When I realized it, I didn’t want him to suffer any more. I didn’t want myself to suffer because of him, either. I really thought the agony would end with him gone. I didn’t know better.

“Yes, I ran the knife right through his chest, and I gagged him, so that I wouldn’t have to hear him scream. Did I tell you that as I did that, I also ran a knife through my own throat?”

The Girl and the Diamond

Once upon a time, there was a little girl who was very sad. All her friends wore pretty dresses and looked like princesses, but whatever she might wear, she always looked ugly. Everybody would stare at her and talk in whispers when she walked by them. She wouldn’t turn to look but she knew it in her heart that they were laughing at her after she had passed by. She would ask her mother, “Mother, why am I not beautiful like you?” Her mother would reply in surprise, “But you are so beautiful, my dear.” “Why can’t I see it then?” she would ask. And the mother would smile knowingly and say, “… because you’re choosing not to.”

The little girl would only get confused, turn to the mirror and try to see where the beauty that her mother could see, lay. She smiled to see if she looked pretty when she smiled. She frowned to see if she looked pretty when she frowned. She cried to see if she looked pretty when she cried. And then, she cried and cried and cried for she didn’t look pretty whatever she might do. In the middle of all the crying, she didn’t realize when she had fallen asleep. She never came to know that all the tears which had fallen off her eyes were going to do something magical for her…

When she awoke and opened her sad eyes, her vision was blinded by something that lay next to her pillow – something that dazzled like a full moon. Slowly she sat up and took a close look at this magical object. When she touched it, it felt as though she had touched cool water. She felt a balm-like sensation run through the very bones of her body. It was a Diamond. A breathtakingly beautiful heart-shaped Diamond of the size of a heart. It felt so precious, more precious than anything she had ever owned in her lifetime.

As she stood in front of the mirror with the Diamond around her neck, she felt what she had never felt before. The Diamond shone like a star and when its light fell on her cheeks, it made them look like porcelain. They reflected the light to her eyes turning them into little Diamonds themselves, making her whole face come alive like a painting. She smiled and saw that she looked prettier than she had ever felt. She frowned and suddenly, the light went off her face, and she was again ugly as ever. Shocked, she broke into tears and the light was back. Her Diamond shone the brightest when she cried and she paused in the middle just to see how beautiful she looked as streams of tears rolled down her cheeks.

That day onwards, her life changed. The huge Diamond hanging from her neck made her feel like she was the most beautiful girl in the world. It touched her heart every now and then, tickling it, making her laugh and feel so desirable. When people looked at her, they were awestruck, for they had never seen such radiance, such absolute perfection on a countenance. When they whispered, she knew they were discussing her charm. When they pointed her out to others, it was only because words had deserted them. She was having the best time of her life. The Diamond made her complete and she was so grateful to it for that, “Thank you Diamond! I love you too!”

One morning, when she woke up, the back of her neck and her shoulders throbbed with pain – such that she had never known before. For long, she had been ignoring the subtle signs of imminent problems. When a sudden pain would shoot through her neck, she would make herself believe that she had slept in the wrong posture. When her shoulders would become stiff, she would think, “Oh, it’s been so long since I got them massaged.” But today, the pain, the stiffness wouldn’t go. She was in extreme agony.

And yet, she wouldn’t take the Diamond off herself, for it was all she had. “It has given me so much. It has turned the world around for me. I can’t let it go. I can’t leave my Diamond.” So, on she went with the Diamond still around her neck, but slowly, the sensation of exhilaration that it had brought had been overtaken by the overbearing pain in her neck.

“It has given me a lot. I can’t let it go” she would kiss it every night before she went to sleep, hoping that the agony would be a little lesser the next day. But it only increased with each passing day.

“At least it makes me look pretty” she would smile and think, but somewhere deep within her, the pain was churning out rivers of tears – tears which she wouldn’t acknowledge, tears which she never showed the way out to.

One day, she realized that it had been months since she had looked at herself in the mirror. As the thought gripped her, she ran to the mirror, her neck feeling like it would fall off any minute. When she paused to look into the mirror, the light from the Diamond blinded her. But gradually, as her face emerged from behind the dazzle, she saw a pale frail face with eyes that looked like stones. The Diamond still shone just as brilliantly, but her skin had stopped reflecting its light. Her shoulders were drooping and her neck was a disturbing red in colour. In that moment, the tears inside her found their way out and flowed like they would never stop flowing… “I’m sorry, I’m sorry” she kept saying, not knowing whether she was saying it to the Diamond or herself.

Exhausted, she sat on her bed and slowly, almost like a ritual, took the Diamond off her neck. Even as the pain lifted from her neck, a huge weight set in on her heart. She took the Diamond in her hands looking at it forever, she kissed it and as she did that, a tear drop fell on the Diamond. The spot where it fell turned into a tear and gradually, the whole Diamond became a blob of tears and flowed out of her hands. She howled to see what she had done to the Diamond, even though deep within her, she knew that it was her very own tears which had turned into the Diamond that night long ago.

“I’m sorry” she cried out aloud. Only, this time, she knew that she meant it for the Diamond.

For you... Dear Thread

(Something I wrote almost 10 months ago... A lot has changed... A lot hasn't)

I was trapped inside myself.
You became my one thread to the world.

I was cold and shivering.
You became my yarn.

I was parched and the well deep.
You became my rope.

I ached to hear the music of joy.
You became my strings.

I lay in the darkest of nights.
You became my wick.

I knew no directions, nor the path.
You became my halter.

I am foolish maybe… that I have picked the scissors.
But do know, my dear Thread, that as I cut you off
I cut away my World.

Perhaps I need to, perhaps I don’t.
But oh dear Thread, do know, that I must become
All that you became for me.
I must become my own yarn and rope
My own strings, wick, my own halter
And it is only then, dear Thread, that it would make
For a good Knot.

Today, however, will remain a sad day
Because I’ve cut away my World.
Because when I was trapped inside myself
You were my one thread to the world.
In many ways, you WERE the world.

Safar

(Something I wrote for my father on his retirement. The English (literal) translation follows after the original piece in Punjabi)

Nadiyaan, pahaad te registaan

langh taa gaye ne par aane vi ne,

Saal maheene din te pal

bhull vi gaye ne par yaad vi ne

Kayi rahvaan sang tu vageya eyn

Kayi chhavaan heth vi rukeya eyn,

Ohnaa raahvaan laage lagge rukkh

tur vi gaye ne par khade vi ne

Paaley vich tu dhupp baneya

Jad challi loo, tu aa varheya,

Tere har mausam de mitthde phal

digg vi gaye ne par lagge vi ne

Tu kuli vi eyn tu neta vi

Tu rabb vi eyn te banda vi,

Tera har kirdaar te saare roop

mamooli ne par ehem vi ne

Ikk cheez layi bas duniya to

te modi kayi guna kar ke,

Tere pyaar de bhare kayi dil

chhutt vi gaye ne par naal vi ne

Turdi si teri sadak hi hun takk

Hun tere turan di vaari ey,

Kayi rang, mausam te lain-den

mukk vi gaye ne, shuru hoye vi ne

The English Translation

Rivers, mountains and deserts

have passed by but are yet to come too,

Years months days and moments

have been forgotten but are remembered too

You have flown along several roads

Have taken shelter under many shades,

All the trees along those roads

Have walked by but are standing too

In the winter’s cold, you became sunshine

When the hot ‘loo’ blew, you came and rained,

Sweet fruits of your every weather

have fallen down but are growing too

You’re coolie too, you’re leader too

You’re God also and man too,

Your every character and all the roles

are ordinary but special too

You took just one thing from the world

And gave back several times of it,

Many hearts filled with your love

have left you but are with you too

It was only your road that walked till now

It’s now your turn to walk,

Many colours, weathers and gives-and-takes

Have got over, but are beginning too

Two Friends and a Foe

Throughout my conscious memory, I have been best friends with Pa. Sometimes, or in fact many times, I like to spend a few fascinating moments with Fut as well, but Pres has predominantly been like that random student in class who you know by their Name and probably their Roll Number, and just sometimes might want to peep into their tiffin box to know what they’ve got for lunch, but besides that, you pretty much like to be unaware of their existence. Pres was never my friend. I just couldn’t get myself to like Pres.

When I used to be with Pa (and most of the times I was), even the painful moments spent around Pres once upon a time would make me nostalgic with their sepia-toned charm. The days when Pres saw me being ragged up to my skin in the first year, or the time when I had walked down the empty lonely lanes of the sleeping town with the shadow of Pres, even those countless days when Pres had been cruel enough to cause my unrequited love to overflow from my heart through my eyes – all those days would become my haven when I was with Pa – a haven that I felt no desire to leave. Pa was truly my best friend. Crying came easy with Pa around… and Pa was generally around.

Not always though… for sometimes, Fut would hold my hand and take me away from Pa to a land where the night-sky was full of brilliantly bright stars – stars that Fut promised were meant for me, stars that were waiting to fall into my lap and make me radiant and blessed. Fut would show me birds of mesmerizing colours across the horizon, flying… free… In Fut’s land, there were mirrors everywhere, which reflected nothing except the most beautiful image of the world, and in some strange way, even though I knew it was impossible, I felt that image was mine. Fut was my Promise-friend, and Fut was perfect, just like that image in the mirror that was ME even though it couldn’t have been ME.

Which brings us to Pres. I hated Pres – not so much in the beginning, but over the years, I was filled with absolute hatred for Pres right up till my bones. Wherever I went, Pres would come after me. Whatever I did, Pres would be lurking around. Even when I was doing my own thing with Pa or Fut, Pres’ shadow was never too far away. I don’t know whether Pres was obsessed with me or the other way round but it was because of Pres that I sought for a perfect image in a mirror elsewhere, for it was Pres who made me feel absolute worthlessness in my own existence. I hated Pres! Oh! What wouldn’t I give to have Pres killed! I could have chosen to be the murderer myself, I even did once, only I developed cold feet when I realized that as a part of my punishment to kill Pres, I might have to lose Pa and Fut too, and they were all I had. And so, the stalker lived on…

And then…

One day, not too long ago, Pres came up to me… and said, “Please don’t hate me. I haven’t meant to haunt you all these years. I have only been looking out for you, to make sure that you do not get too lost in the streams of tears that Pa brings you or too trapped in the strings of dreams that Fut shows you, for once you’re lost with Pa, you’re lost forever… And once you’ve been trapped away from me by Fut, your dreams will remain only that – dreams. I would always let you see a hint of my shadow around you for I wanted you to remember me and hence, yourself. I always wanted you to see the real YOU, and not the imaginary one that you see in Fut’s fake mirrors, and I knew that only I could help you see that. Now, the time has come when you must do that and face your truth. I want you to see that image that is really YOU. So, will you please…”

And Pres paused for a seemingly endless moment as I stood breathless, waiting for the words that were going to change my world…

“… look into my eyes?”

As I looked hard, I saw an image slowly forming up out of the still waters of Pres’ clear dark eyes. Gradually, it became as vivid as my own flesh, and I couldn’t believe what I saw! I had been wrong all along. Fut’s mirrors had not been showing me the most beautiful image of the world, for if that had been perfection, then what was this? Or had perfection been perfected?

“This is YOU, my dearest. And YOU are perfect! All you need to do is accept it… Pa and Fut can bring you reveries and trances, even though they have to rely on ME to create those for you, but only I will show you the real YOU and it is only if you like ME that you will be able to like yourself, for among the three of us, I am the only one who wants you to be happy TODAY, for among the three of us, I am the only one who LOVES you – I always have, I always will, until death – for the day you die, I shall too.”

Before I acknowledged the tears flowing out of my eyes, before I acknowledged that the image in Pres’ eyes was really me, I heard myself say to him, “I love you. I’m so sorry for the way I have treated you. I was horribly wrong. You deserve so much better than what I gave you. Please forgive me Pres. I love you…”

Pa and Fut are still my friends, of course. They have their own indisputable places in my life and always will, for Pa helps me rediscover my love with Pres all the more and Fut helps me hone the perfection of my love with Pres. Love, after all, cannot be a static entity. Just like life, love has to be dynamic too!

And that’s why, each day, I discover newer things to love about Pres. Each day, the reflection I see in his eyes seems more perfect than the previous day. Each day, I love myself… a little more!

Thank you, Pres! I love you… I love myself…

Revising a Story Lesson

I’ve discovered a magic therapy. Of late, many times (if not most of the times), I have seen and experienced it working wonderfully on myself. And I believe it has got to be effective if it can help someone with symptoms of hereditary Clinical Depression.

That reminds me. Over two years ago, when I was visiting a psychologist regularly for my certifications, she had told me quite clearly that I had a tendency to develop a mild Clinical Depression, especially since it has been being passed on, on my mother’s side, particularly amongst the women. She had advised me to keep psychiatric help accessible, especially through the most important forthcoming period of 3-4 years in my life. A lot was going to happen and even though it was all for the good, there was no guarantee of the period itself being good.

And surely, there were times when I would wish to skip life on particular days. I’d be desperate to find a way to just jump to the next day, or to somehow discover an Invisibility Cloak and simply carry on with life without having to undergo the pressure of being SEEN. How I wished that nobody would see me, nobody would look at me, that people could just see past me, like I was nothing but a molecule of air.

Today, however, I don’t see the point in thinking or talking about those days. Yes, they made me stronger, braver and all that, but today, I also wish I had tried the magic therapy in those days. But then, I didn’t know about it then. Well, actually, perhaps I did. Perhaps all of us do, because it is one of the earliest story lessons of our lives, but we forget about it. We grow up seeing most of the people around us complaining, cribbing and self-pitying; and somewhere along the way, we unknowingly learn it and make it our way of life too.

It’s simple. It’s the lesson we all learnt from the story of the poor man who didn’t have shoes, who went to the church to complain to God, and there, saw a man who was thanking God, even though he did not have legs.

About a month back, on NDTV, I happened to watch a special report on a 2 feet tall man, who was born without legs, without arms, without speech and hearing abilities. All you could see was a tiny torso and a little face. But what was most striking about that face was an absolute absence of complaint on it. The report showed the man going through all his daily activities by himself without any help whatsoever. And I found myself wondering whether it was right of me to make myself hopeless and helpless when there is such a vast landscape of hope and possibility in the world.

These days, when I am morose and basically carrying out an eternal crib-fest, I try to remember this man’s courage in the face of the cruel fate meted out to him by nature. And invariably, I find myself feeling guilty for not thinking above just my own self.

It is not always possible to think of another, when you’re busy thinking of the ‘unfairness’ of life you’re dealing with. It is only possible when there is that little spark existent somewhere deep inside you – the spark of a genuine desire to rid yourself off pain, the desire to be happy. I have a feeling that I just might be igniting that tiny spark inside me these days, that I might be succeeding in letting it prevail…

This spark which is gradually making me believe that despite all the flaws that I might be made up of, I’m likeable… because I like myself, I love myself, I want myself to be happy, and not on the parameters of the world, but on the scales of happiness that I have to define for my own self.

Just...

I wake up early and confirm to myself the plans for the day, plans – that I have been making since yesterday – will go shopping today, will meet Massi today, will watch a new movie today! Finally, a day when I’m not going to work and not even stay at home!

A nice long soothing wonderful shower starts the day. I wash my hair at length and pamper them with the lovely mint-flavoured conditioner I have recently discovered at my aunt’s!

With luxurious applications of a world of body lotions – varying from Peach to Plum to even Tea-flavoured – I let myself smell like an orchard, and revel in the concoction of fragrances that I have become.

Mmm… It’s just 10 am… A little too early to step out. Besides, my hair is wet. I’ll let it dry and catch a little nap right under the fan, wake up in an hour and by then, it would be the perfect time to start with the PLANS!

I spread the wet minted-hair on the bed, cover myself with the blanket and shut my eyes, loving the bundle of fragrances the blanket has become, thanks to me!

I half wake up, take my hand out of the blanket, touch my hair and realize that it is still moist. It can’t have been long since I slept. The hand comes back into the blanket and I go back into my fragrant sleep.

I half wake up, and begin to take my hand out of the blanket to touch my hair again, but vaguely realize that it seems to be going towards my tummy instead. “Grumble”, says the stomach, and I wake up with a start. The aromas seem distant and dying.

I push the blanket away to look at the clock. 3.30, it says! I’ve been sleeping for 5 hours! My hair is all dry and crumpled. Thankfully, it does still smell of mint. I don’t smell of fruits and orchards though. I just smell of sleep. My face is inflated and distorted. My plans are deflated and distorted.

I’m hungry – extremely hungry!! I haven’t eaten a thing since dinner last night, and there’s nothing cooked at home right now. I pick up one of the only two options available, and finish the half-eaten packet of Haldiram’s Kaju mixture. Clean!

“Grumble”, my stomach still says. Hence, I pick up the second option – the pack of Hide-and-Seek biscuits – and finish it clean too, while watching crap after crap on TV.

5 pm – Should I go out now? Should I not? I can’t meet Massi or go for a film alone now – it would get too late to come back alone. I can still go shopping though. And I can get myself some nice inexpensive dinner packed while coming back. Should I? Should I not?...... Doorbell!

Of all the options of days available in the week, the maid has chosen this particular day to perform her weekly duties towards this house. And so, for the next hour or so, as she cleans every nook and corner with utmost dedication, I carry on watching crap after crap on TV, including a film which has a younger-looking Akshaye Khanna with some hair still intact on his head repeating every 10 minutes of the film, “Agar mere dil mein eeshvar hai, agar mere dil mein sachchai hai, to woh mere paas zaroor aayegi”. I watch and hear him say that every time until the end when… surprise surprise! Ms. Aishwarya Rai does goes back running to him after all!

As I say Bye to the maid at the door, I can see that the world outside the door is getting dark already. I can’t go shopping.

Now? I can go take a walk in the Botanical Garden in the vicinity. While coming back, I can go to the market and pick up a packet of Maggi noodles.

I step out and head towards the garden. I can’t believe how totally dark it has become in the 5 minutes I took to struggle with my messy hair before coming out. I’m not accustomed to this area, and the absolute absence of human beings on the long stretch of the dimly lit road makes me unnerved. It doesn’t help that within 2 minutes, three different automobiles with three different sets of men in them pass by me and slow down right next to me to take a good look.

I turn back and head towards the house. On my way, I call up Domino’s and ask them for their cheapest pizza option available. I keep sitting on a slab outside the house waiting for the promised Pizza and counting the minutes, since it is Domino’s.

30 minutes have elapsed, and I don’t know whether to feel happy or sad that the Delivery boy is still not here. It means I am getting the pizza free. I do wish I had placed a big order and included Garlic Breadsticks and the Cheesy Dip and all the other yummy side-dishes. But I am not sure whether I should ask for the pizza free. I have been told that the delivery boys, when they’re late, start begging you to pay them, else the money would be deducted from their salary. If he does that, there’s no way I can’t not pay him. So, I call up the Domino’s number again to tell them directly that their delivery is late. I am told that there is no guarantee of 30 minutes in my area! It makes no difference to me… I say, “Oh, okay… May be you should have told me that at the time of taking the order.”

The delivery comes 40 minutes after this. I make the payment, take the Cheese & Tomato Regular Pizza, go inside the house, turn on the TV, realize that both the Oregano Seasoning packets are torn and empty and eat the bland cold Pizza while watching some more crap on TV.

The pizza over, I take my pills, change the channel, watch the entire length of one of the really cheap and funny multi-starrer Hindi films released of late and find myself laughing…

The cellphone hasn’t buzzed much all day. Not many people in the world needed me today, except yes, two friends - one of them calling to let me talk, and the other calling to talk. I talked in one call and listened in the other, although I don't think I remember much of either.

Now, the cellphone buzzes. An SMS. I reply, turn off the lights and turn myself into the blanket. A distant ghost of the ‘orchard’ engulfs me and I shut my mind before I shut my eyes. Thinking is not allowed… Sleep, Sleep, Sleep, Don’t think, Just Sleep… Don’t think… Just sleep, sleep… Just…

The Circle of... Sorrow

[I had started writing the previous post with the intention of writing what I’m going to write here now. The two streams of thoughts, albeit interconnected, would feel more justified in being discussed separately]

“There are burdens in this world… And they have to fall somewhere. If they fall on you, Know that You were chosen because You have been given the ability to carry them”

I may not have been able to reproduce verbatim these words from a very moving film ‘Parzania’, but the beautiful thought in them never leaves me. It’s not like I don’t have the moments of – “Why me?”, not like my mind doesn’t get restless in trying to find Someone to Blame, but sooner or later, some voice (from within or without) in some way always reminds me that I have the Choice to Be Happy, Choice to Feel Content, Choice to Forgive, Choice to Be at Peace, Choice to Choose… With so many choices at hand, need I fret over being helpless and hopeless?

Let’s face it. There’s no Fun without the Boring. No Smile without the Tears. And there’s no Joy without the Sorrows. The flip side will always exist, because that’s what gives the sunny side its existence. But which side should stay up depends on the hand that tosses the coin… Our hand!

There are many ways in which one deals with Sorrow, a few of which are these:

~ Sulk! {Which only leads to more… sulking, but may I add, that Sulking can be quite a lot of fun! Especially when you have audience!}

~ Try to forget by means of self-indulgence! {Momentary relief, to be generally followed by a torrent of emotions again}

~ Try to forget by helping out others. {A much evolved and seemingly successful method}

~ Seek professional help. {Works for some people}

~ Seek revenge!! {The bruise always remains fresh and tender, because it is never allowed to heal}

~ Subconsciously nurture the Pain and Sorrow...

The last one is perhaps the most dangerous. It happens when the scar is much deeper than it seems. So much so, that it might have even been removed from the most frequently-visited pages of memory. The surface heals, yet deep down, it never stops bleeding and affects one in the most unfathomable ways. It creates a Sense of Sorrow which is difficult to justify and to come to terms with. Because the wound is so deep that you have no touch with it anymore. And without air and care, it only cuts deeper and deeper within.

~0~0~0~0~

PR is a man from the upper middle class, comfortable living, good wife, lovely children, a pretty satisfactory life… PR beats up his wife or children at least once in a week. He begs of them for forgiveness for days after that, and yet, he can’t stop himself from doing it again in moments of confrontation. His wife has learnt to live with it. “When he was a kid, his father used to beat him black and blue everyday. He is trying to improve. I want to give him time…”

The Circle of Sorrow. PR is caught up in it, and I fear his children would too. The bruises his father gave him decades ago still breathe in his subconscious. In his conscious mind, then, he would have vowed to be a man just the opposite of his own father. And yet, he finds himself incapable of doing that today, inflicting the same bruises on his children’s bodies and hearts.

Why? Because the place he should have been able to call Home, became a Haunt. The man he expected to be protected by, became his tormentor. Quite obviously, the ground which is the basis for bringing up a stable human being… That ground, itself, was unstable, shaky… and so, that is the kind of man it produced as well.

PR has nurtured his Sorrow. And now, he is carrying forward the tradition, the Circle of Sorrow. Unknowingly. Not that he wants to. Given a chance, his conscious mind would try to discard all the wounded parts of him and feel free. But his subconscious wouldn’t let him. Because somewhere along the way, that Sorrow has become a part of his very existence. His identity even. He would feel hollow without it. Incomplete. Maybe handicapped.

~0~0~0~0~

And that’s why the Circle of Sorrow is an unusual circle. It builds on every negative emotion a person harbors within himself – fear, pain, insecurity, hatred, and it keeps growing bigger and bigger in circumference and area, as each hurt person emanates his Sorrow to the ones linked to him.

The only way to cut this Circle away is for one person to free themselves… That one person who can realize that whatever happened to them made them a stronger and better human being, whoever made that happen to them was human too and they made a mistake and that mistakes are forgivable [Yes! Toughest! Highly Debatable! And yet, the only way to Redemption], and that they, today, take the Choice to Let Go – of their Pain, their Grudge, their Loss, their Wound, their Circle of Sorrow.

I came across one such exceptional person recently. And if you’ve read Me until here, I urge you to go ahead and read Her.

The Circle of... Pain

[‘Man’, ‘He’, ‘Him’ words in this piece should not be looked at, as gender-specific]

"Nobody has had it easy in life."

I’ve come to believe that, over the years. Yes, some people have to ride against the tide much more often than the others. And some of the rival tides carry the might of a cyclone behind them… It feels from the look of it that life has perhaps been the most unfair on these few. Perhaps, it has too. But then, were it not for the adversity, the Heroes would never have been called so.

Heroes have special powers. And the most important of those powers are their own oppositions, their own hardships. Not everybody is a Hero, because well, not everybody gets to be conditioned by mammoth problems.

This, however, does not mean that the so-called (and believed to be) ordinary man doesn’t have a taste of real problems. For most people, their ‘ordinary’ problems are extraordinary, because whatever said and done, at any given point in time, one man’s problem is unique to him, and he’s the only one fighting it, even if millions before him have seen, faced and dealt with exactly the same crisis.

Heartbreak may seem an extremely mundane and passé reason for swollen eyes to some people, while these very people would probably shut themselves into darkness over the loss of a pet. Actually, other things being constant, pain is as small or as big as the lack of familiarity with it. It works like antibodies – like one of those immunization injections – which build a protective wall inside you, a wall against any afflictions by similar sources of pain attacking yet again. But well, if the source of pain is a new one… Boom! There goes the Wall! And then, starts the process of the buildup of a new defense mechanism. A new thing or two are learnt, and the Wall is repaired to face the storms yet again.

Every storm is unique, which is why every wall is unique. Resilience is built up as and when new storms loom large on the skies. But to say that a certain Wall, as it exists today, has not been through the worst possible or hasn’t endured as much as its ability is, would be a little unfair.

Nobody can get into another person’s shoes. Yet, in every way, one must have a heart big enough to accommodate those dealing with seemingly trivial problems. Looking down upon them as trite is tad insensitive.

After all, Pain and the Ability to Bear It – come in a circle. You may never know which came before the other, but they must always coexist. If the Ability exists but Pain doesn’t, then there’s no way to prove the existence of the former at all. If the Pain exists and the Ability doesn’t, well, it becomes a question of existence then. And the choice one makes in that one moment is actually the only choice available to them. To create the Ability, to complete… the Circle of Pain.

The Blow

“Kehta tha aap sab majoori karte ho… Main service karoonga. Kehta tha main kuchh banoonga”… {“He used to say – You all may do labour work… But I’ll do a job. He used to say - I’ll become something”}

Not a trace of dampness in them, and yet so hollow were his eyes as he spoke of his son, that they sent a chill down my very bones. Hollow, just like his skeletal structure – eaten from within by the moths of poverty all his life; and now in the past few hours, every morsel of hope left in there chewed away to nothingness… This time, by the moths outside – the ones he doesn’t know, would never know. And there’s one more thing that he would perhaps never know – the answer to one simple question… Why?

As I sat eating a sumptuous lunch watching news on NDTV this afternoon, one after another, came on screen faces of people who I might have seen sometime, maybe passed by them, perhaps bought something from their shops. They had all lost some part of their existence today – a dear one had left them forever, and they had had no chance to hug them or wish them goodbye. One of the most peaceful cities in my country, the city dearest to my heart – Jaipur – has, instead, said goodbye to peace. “Friends, no more!”

7 bomb blasts… 70 dead bodies… 70 multiplied by a diverse range of number of years of LIFE multiplied by 365… days of LIFE, of memories, laughs, promises, cheers, dreams… turned to dust. Nothing left. Not a thing. The universe has a strange way of absorbing the most beautiful things about life. The things which are not things at all. Because… they don’t REMAIN when life doesn’t remain. And yet, they’re all that life is about!

The headline of today’s Punjabi newspaper Ajit reads “Pink city turned blood red”. It shakes my core everytime I read it. The pink city is the city where I spent the pink years of my life. Not once had it crossed my mind then that someone could even think of bombing this place, these people. And today when I know for sure that it has happened, I’m still trying to convince myself that someone DID after all think of bombing that place, those people.

I’m a firm believer in the Ways of God. That He knows best, and that He’ll make sure that whatever happens is for the best. On such days, though, I find my faith standing on rickety grounds. Why? Just why should an old man who doesn’t get enough water to drink have to shed it from his eyes, in the name of a son who was supposed to quench the thirst of his entire lifetime? Why can these people whom we call terrorists not see their own fathers in this man? And just why can they not see that their God, whoever He is, did not give them the right to create dead bodies? – Neither the ones they’ve left motionless, nor the ones they’ve left moving.