First day of new semester

Coming back, turns out not much has changed. No. Not really.
The whiners still whine, the hep stay hep, the vain, vain and the plain, plain.
The same nods, the same groupism, the seniority hierarchy, the rooms, the tears, the comfort levels. Yes. All the same. But of course, as always, change is inevitable innit?

We first years found ourselves becoming a part of the system- walking the walk, talking the talk, having intellectual conversations once in a while, knowing when to do what and all that jazz.

Fear, once in a while, is an amazing feeling. Maybe not fear exactly. That rush of adrenalin, the heightened sense of excitement; the feeling you get before you bungee jump off a cliff or before you commit yourself to a serious relationship, or in my case before the start of a new semester, is just thrilling. It’s the curiosity; the wait that does things to you. Unfortunately, it also, all the while, builds up expectations within your mind. Expectations and attachments; desire, as we all have been hearing, is the root cause of evil. And so, when these so called expectations we’ve attached ourselves to do not get fulfilled, we become but disheartened. It drains the enthusiasm out of you. You are left with just the hope that things will get better. This is what I’m left with right now. Fortunately, for me, that’s all it takes to put the enthu right back into me. So I start off this academic semester with optimism.
(Just realized that I’ve been jumping between the three persons of narration too often. No matter.)

Secondly, I seem to be waking up every day with a burst of positive energy. Good for me. But this optimism might get into trouble one day.

Stuff that has interested me so far this semester:
One, solipsism – The belief that only you exist in this world and that everything else is but your dream and your creation. Fascinating isn’t it? And believable. For all you know, you could be living in your dream as you read this and wake up to find only existing or in a world completely different. An infinite number of possibilities rush to my mind as I think about this.
If not this being my dream and creation, then someone else’s. Ever since I was fifteen I’ve pondered whether we all live in a giant’s dream. Now, I think maybe we’re dolls belonging to a kid, belonging to a superhuman race which has the ability to infuse life into inanimate objects, and he’s watching us play to pass his time. Could be, right? Or that you're a different being altogether in some completely other dimension and you fell asleep one day and are dreaming all of this. Maybe that's a place where there are no concepts of universe. Maybe all reality is just a four walled room and you're the only being. Maybe reality is you're an invisible dog with extraordinary thinking capacities. Complex, yet believable.

Two, the fact that mathematics is abstract. Yes. I realized it just now. One of the basic facts of life; the science of numbers, is abstract. Where did they come from? From one of the most abstract and complicated things – the mind. WE created numbers and symbols. WE said that two is greater than one. Nowhere do these numbers EXIST. Nor do these symbols. They weren’t begotten from Nature unlike Physics or Biology. Math was just pulled out from thin air.

Third, the chapters on “Sex” and “Rearing” in “The Naked Ape” by Desmond Morris. Really good. Amazingly eye-opening. For me, at least.


And lastly, I’ve understood that I actually do have the strength to overcome any difficulty in life. Nothing is worth dying. A number of setbacks may happen again and again, but I have the strength. I do.

Bleeding words

Ten in the night. Her table.

She stared at the blank page in front of her. She knew what she had to do. It was simple.

 At least, that’s what others told her.

“Ha!” She thought to herself. “‘Easier said than done’ to them all! What do they know anyway? They’ve never had to think. Gah!”

She sat there, looking around her room for ideas; for inspiration. She gazed at the picture frames on her table – heart shaped ones, self decorated ones, ones with her; with her parents; with her friends; and her favourite- the one with Ronald McDonald. That one was taken when she was six. She loved that day. But that didn’t matter now; didn’t matter at all. She looked at her Mac, in sleep mode; her phone, switched off. She didn’t need messages flooding into her inbox dozen to the minute demanding her attention. No, that wouldn’t do. She knew what they’d be about anyway. “Are you done yet?”, “Today’s the last date”, “What’s wrong with you?” yada yada yada yada.

Bored, her gaze shifted to her CD collection- Buble, Presley, Kylie, King of Pop, Rolling stones, SOAD… “It would be easier to write a song”, she thought and put her head down on her table.

After some time, she swiveled around, only to find the T.V running pointlessly, clothes strewn around, Plato, Spinoza, Crichton, Rowling and Blyton lying around cozily on her bed, some on the floor, and the table fan whirring away. It was all just a huge, confounding mess to her right now. Just like her life.

Out of desperation, she turned to the ceiling and found nothing that could help her there either. Just dingy, old, blue paint. Exhaling loudly, she closed her eyes and mouthed a small prayer.

“What am I doing?! Ugh. I’ve to finish this today.”, she thought, disgusted with herself, and faced the table again.

 She fingered her application form for the scholarship and read (for what she thought was the thousandth time) the last line: Please attach herewith a handwritten composition on how you view “Speech”. You will be tested on your ability to put across your ideas within the limit of five to ten sentences.

She stared at it and cursed herself.

All said and done, she knew she had to do it, and now at that. So she got down to it.

Shakily, her hand reached out for her pen, “accidentally” dropping it back in twice. She set it down on the paper and slowly wrote:

SPEECH

Then she put the pen down again and took a deep breath. She knew she was needlessly over-dramatizing, but she didn’t know what to write. And so, for the first time, she sat back and thought. After two minutes, she slowly picked up her pen again and put nib to paper.

Speech is a comfort, nothing more. It improves communication but is not necessary. It is just a vocalization of thoughts. Undoubtedly, without speech, the civilization we know would not exist, but civilization still would. Life may not be as simple, but life would go on. After all, my life has been going on, and I haven’t been able to speak in eighteen years.

She took her pen, closed it and read what she had written once again. Calmly, she kept the forms aside and got up. She could feel the anger rising in her slowly. By the time she’d reached her bed, all she could do was fling whatever was on her bed onto the floor and throw herself on her bed. She made an awkward moaning noise and, for the first time in a year, she cried; cried about the unfair ways of the monster she thought Life to be.

A second of solace

Down the hideous path I tread; fighting

To ward off that Darkness that chases

Me

It overpowers me even as I try

Hard to keep myself above

The shadow it casts

Upon my dreams

Lower than dust, my dreams

Do become as (in)significant as

A grain of sand

Within my eye, filling me with anguish

Making me cry

Trudge I did, seeking to find

Solace in that whose existence I still

Am ignorant of

As I walked the path, I took

Refuge within myself

Within that they call

The mind, then a Gust hit

My haggard face and ruffled body,

Cajoling me to believe that

It is true that I’m but a feather floating

On this gust that

Takes me upon itself

I feel myself elated; lifted by

The breeze carrying me as

I go, as water

In a river, gliding, I

The feather, dip and tumble as

The wind makes me, only

To let me land in shelter safe

 Thus, I take comfort

For those few seconds while

The breeze washes over me

Relief

And leaves me be while

I open my eyes to find that

The Darkness has me,

Encompassed.

The curve of a smile

"I am enlightened" said the Fool's smile
"I am ignorant" said that of the Wise
"You know nothing" implied the Skeptic's
"I know all" was that of the Vain
"I'm right" was seen of the Pessimist's
"Not always" replied the Optimist's
Looking at this, appeared- a smile
Another; a smirk almost
"I am happy" smiled Innocence.

Life in a festival... (again tentative)

Atop sits the elephant, wise and watchful

Father on his one side, his other

Occupied by his compassionate mother

Their neighbours, each of four hands

Look down on the world, asserting

Their greatness at the top, the beginning

A level below stood the lusty blue youth,

Rounded by the girls dancing, in merry

And joy, their eyes glowing

To his side, lay a mirror invisible

Ten in fact, each portraying in difference,

Him, in all His glory and power within

By his other side sat his wife

With her friends, each a beauty;

A power; a woman; a deity

Then came the saints; one, two, three,

On their divine way

Devotion in their hearts, wisdom in their say

And then, the mortals, a variety of them at that

A wedding, a worship, a game,

A parade to the temple came

Down below sat the merchant

His wife beside; goods all about

Gleaming smile and a belly wide

And below all were the villagers.

Dhobis; a farmer; a snake charmer on the side.

Working their lives off until they died.

And as the girl looks at her art created

Her mind wonders.

How the world is so alike her art

She watches and ponders

Another generation?

This is a very weird post. For in this post, I shall tell you people why I feel older than any of my class mates. I feel like I'm in another generation altogether.

After coming here, 4 of my class girls started going out with some guy or the other. I use the term "going out" for that is exactly what it is. They sit, talk to the guy for a week, two at the maximum, and become their girlfriends of sorts.

I am amazed how they do that. For when I got into a relationship, I got "committed". I wasn't "going out". My friends and I, then, did not "go out". We fell in love. We first talk, we fall in love and get committed to him only if we trust him and know we'll end up with  him. That ain't the case today. You find a guy. You go out, "be his girlfriend", make out and then maybe, you'll love him and he'll love you

I find that very different actually. My opinion of course. And I every time I see them I go like.." the kids these days...!!" :p

A thousand years of love

A thousand years I want to hold your hand
A thousand years of you beside me
Loving me all the way

A thousand years I want to say
I shall love you a thousand years
Come what may.

A thousand years your eyes I want to see
Thousand years within them, love
Is what I want to be

A thousand years I want to be seen
As nothing that meant to you more,
A thousand years I want to mean

A thousand years within your arms
A thousand years I want to be held
Where nothing harms

I pray, I cry, I want that with all my life
To be yours; all yours; only yours
The one to whom I belong, I ask of thee
Let my love be yours. Deny me not of this.