Friday, February 24, 2012

'You can seek the advice of others, surround yourself with trusted advisers, but in the end the decision is always yours- and yours alone. And when it's time to act and you're all alone, with your back against the wall, the only voice that matters is the one in your head- the one telling you what you probably already knew. The one that's almost always right.'

Wednesday, February 15, 2012

The last three days have been painful.
As always, I have realized the fragility of life yet again. It is not easy. It is not easy to accept that someone you loved so dearly and looked upto as an inspiration, is no longer. Death? It's not easy. Sometimes, when I feel my chest tighten, sadness envelop like a woolly black coat and hot streams run down my face, I wonder if there is any consolation at all? I understand karma and life after death. And I understand that no one can escape the inevitability of our mortal lives- I understand the bigger picture. I ask myself, in spite of  knowing all this, how one can cope? How can one learn to overlook a memory, ignore an absence in a family picture or try and forget  everything they ever associated that person with? Time, you may say. Time doesn't erase loss. No amount of strength can efface memories. Today, I can't see the light at the end of the tunnel. I can only hope that tomorrow, when grief learns to accept, that tiny speck will show itself.

Monday, February 6, 2012

When you were little, you always got your way. You cried and promptly came your milk, you threw a fit and everybody surrounded you asking 'what's wrong baby? What do you want?', you were allowed to leave your broccoli if you didn't want it, you were taken to the restaurant of your choice, you got to keep the remote (you even got to pick the movie), your little friend circle always disliked the people you disliked-in short, you did the things you wanted to. You made the decisions. And sometimes you made them for other people as well.
Soon, you grew up. You were admonished for being self centred, you were made to eat your broccoli, you were asked to give other people a chance to pick a movie and everyone formed their own opinions in that same little friend circle. It, of course, took you a while to come to terms with this deviation from what you thought was a way of life. Eventually as you got older, you came to realize that the phrase 'it's my way or the highway' would get you nowhere. However, in spite of being twenty-seemingly reasonable and mature and yada yada- that little adolescent (what with it's timely appearance and all) still has expectations, sometimes. You still like to pick the restaurant even if it's more often than not, you still feel like leaving the broccoli out-for old time's sake, you still expect your friends to side with you even if it isn't their battle to fight and most importantly, you still expect to be understood without having to say it. I say most importantly, because adults have this ostensible notion that saying what you feel is not an option. I don't know if it has to do with the fact that you're afraid of being judged or if in some pathetic way it makes you a lesser person for thinking it. As a subsequent result, you make a little world of your own in that head of yours and you are left to deal with it by yourself. And as if that were not bad enough, you expect to be understood and have the gall to be upset when you're not. I think what I'm trying to say is that- even as adults who are required to be level-headed, free of insecurities and selfless- that little child in us will always be just that- a child.