Last couple of months have been incredibly tough. Not in terms of work, effort or anything similar. They have been tough for there has been no diversion. Not a move to move away. All my life has been characterized by bypassing the tough things when they got tougher. I had always been able to justify it with an excuse, a new vagrancy, a “valid” desire for solitude, for seeing things... innumerable things that can somehow instil in you a curiosity. And I had move in such a way for avoiding things when they got tougher.
I have been very critical of myself, all this while... while the desires and efforts burned away the edges off me, thus rounding the square peg that I was. The inevitability of life, I would have called it. But now I think I have gotten round to a point where I know. That is an achievement. I know that I belong, that I have tried, that I have succeeded. The dilettante is gone. Here comes the scrapper who won’t give an inch, who won’t budge, who won’t blink. Something like the Indian Cricket Team these days. There is this swagger, this innate sense of belonging. The fielding is so sorry, but there is the “walk the talk” attitude. It may all be false bravado. Who knows but yes they have arrived. They have a plan other relying on Tendulkar. I mean, I spent all that good time on cricket, imagining India would one day win convincingly. From the Reliance World Cup in 1987 to 1996 Semi-final, I was always there but then I had it. The heartbreak of Kolkata will never be forgotten though. Never. But yes lichens grow where there was nothing. I miss the purity of cricket now, but that’s left and at least it lasts.
I have a couple of kid brothers who were lambasting Tendulkar sometime back. Asking me the sanity of keeping that grandpa in the team. I hate to these days tell people that I had break their heads, but those two nearly got it. It was like the old times. The one time a friend got beaten up when India lost and he sided with Pakistan. But its like those lines “Khuda ke vaaste purdah na kaabe ka utha Ghalib, Kahin aisa na ho vahaan bhi vahi pathar ka sanam nikle”. The false religions, the false prophets are the ones loved most. There is a tremendous change in the way India operates. Things happen, slowly but things are happening. Values are changing but things are happening.
Unfortunately I don’t get the music these days. I mean, do you even remember the music that was playing a couple of months back. This is the age of use and throw. Take it if you like it, use it, trash it and please buy again. Its an age of cheap wisdom, an age of doing the “right” things. There is too much confidence in people, something I had never seen before in People I knew. Mebbe its because they all use Facebook and thats where you meet them. Maybe.
But yes Calcutta has changed to Kolkata and nothing else changed here. It still takes eons to get things done here and I miss the industriousness of Bombay. And I miss home. If I miss home, I have a tremendously bad mood. But I will be back soon.
There was this time, I don’t know if anyone remembers. But there was this kid Matthew Eapen. He was barely an year old and his Au Pair killed him. And I had great faith in American System then. My Father had foretold that she had be set free and thats what happened. Even after it was proven beyond doubt, they let her go on a technicality. That was American Justice. We see the duplicity everywhere. The Osamas and the Obamas are all excuses. The fact is all simple. They just don’t give a shit. It was 25 years of Bhopal Gas Tragedy and The Sell Out by Indian Government and Indian Judiciary was so stark, that the same people should be hung for subverting justice. Someday someone will bring justice to the ones who massacred thousands. Accidents happen, but looting poor people, just because you can, shows the kind of people they are. Like when Lincoln said “But if you want to test a man's character - give him power”. Obama is a poop, whiter than the white.
And I was reading Calvin Hobbes today and it was beautiful again. The simple and acute three liners are a killer. And then I reviewed a SoP for my sister. Whoa, its a torture. Simplifying things is tough. But somehow we still have the temerity to dream, hope and hope again. Maybe thats all there is to life.
And time for the truth.
जो तटस्त हैं समय करेगा उनके गुनाह तय
Comments