P for 'Pause-Rewind-Play'

I was whiling away my time at a nearby park, looking at a bunch of kids at play. It was a treat to watch their innocence. The way they charged at each other, bumped, collided, toppled over, giggling happily, straightening up a little once they got tired only to eventually brush off the weariness like the mud on their sleeves and jump at each other again.

The scene unfolding in front of me transported me back in time to an age when I too was unaffected by worldly norms and societal rules, where one only got hurt if they grazed their knee or skinned their elbow, where forgiveness was granted with a simple 'sorry' and all bitterness was forgotten thereafter. The ways of the world had not caught up with us. Life was uncomplicated...simple...happy.

And that made me wish for these kids never to grow up, at least not before they had to.

Just sitting there on that park bench surrounded by a group of these mischievous minions had set my world in motion once again. The spark of curiosity glittered in their eyes. The effervescence of enthusiasm gurgled in their voices.
Their exuberance was infectious. It had been ages since I experienced that kind of warmth around me---the non-judgemental attitude of those who believed that the world was still a good place.

As I got up to leave, I wondered if I could take a bit of that much needed belief along. But something stopped me right then-as I gazed at the setting sun in the distance, I realised it was getting late. Perhaps, a little too late.


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 P for 'Pause-Rewind-Play'  is the sixteenth post in the 'A-Z Series' of posts, a chain of scribbles by me on topics starting with each alphabet of the English language. Read back and forth for the other posts, and please feel free to contribute your thoughts on the subject.

There are cracks in everything

NEWSFLASH: A bit of relationship-gyaan (that you all know yet need to be reminded of) from my side.
Going by a lot of recent case studies involving my friends, enemies, and people I see around, I have derived a very important law of relationships.

PERFECTION = 1/PROXIMITY

Proximity and perfection share an inverse relationship. You must have noticed this around you---two people madly in love think the world of one another. Time flies and the relationship gets stale older. Slowly but surely, you see the enthusiasm they share die a silent death. The couple that could once not get their hands off each other have started squabbling on petty things. The best friend gets to hear complaints and sulks of how the spouse just doesn't care anymore. The once perfect spouse/partner has turned into a bundle of flaws. The closer you get, the less perfect you realize he/she is. You get the drift, don't you? Happens with the best of us.
It's just a matter of time before we discover the deficits in something or someone we once thought the world of. That is the problem with proximity. It brings us closer, close enough to notice the things we did not intend to see. That is when we start missing what we now think should have been present all along. We start craving for perfection in others, instead of trying to attain it in ourselves. We wish for words that have not been uttered. We long for things beyond our reach. We set our imagination to work, and eventually end up feeling miserable.

It is a known fact that expectations in life, inadvertently, lead to disappointment. It is also equally true that love (in any form or degree of severity) eventually results in expectations. It is then that we start nit-picking. We magnify the arguments, blow the misunderstandings out of proportion, and ignore the memories. We end up blaming each other, not realizing that it is a game that nobody wins. Mud slinging can only worsen your emotional conflict.
If you cannot talk it out without pulling at each other's hair, then take some time off and think. Rash decisions never helped anyone. Introspection, however, has!

Introspection is an innate quality that all humans possess but seldom use. Maybe we are afraid. After all, not everybody can handle the truth that soul-searching introspection often tends to reveal. Questioning ourselves and assessing our feelings urges us to examine the faults within ourselves in a more objective way, in a way that we are made to realize that the flaws we see in others are an extension of our own deficits.

We sit back and smile. Who can we blame but ourselves?
We now begin to view 'perfection' in a different light; nothing is absolute. There are cracks in everything.

O for 'Off-beat musings'

She is the hope that needs no promise, the kind that makes you content with her subtle presence in your heart, treading carefully with muffled footsteps, making sure you never lose or gain complete control of her nimble self.
At times, you feel your heart shriveling up, searching in all its corners for that seductive glimmer, that first ray of dawn, that refreshing wave of optimism; positive signs that permit you to carry on dreaming. But alas, you see none.
The night seems endless, and the shroud of light you once saw has faded into a small dot in the distance. Hope, like the palace of illusions, has fooled you once again. The minstrel with her musical anklets was just a mirage you ought not have trusted.

The relentless heart, however, is no quitter. Despite the emptiness you feel inside, you know for sure that when the time comes and you hear the tinkling bells again, your heart will expand to accommodate her merry dance. And you will sway to her merry tune, once more.

For she might be the hope that needs no promise, but you are the love that knows no bounds.

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 O for 'Off-beat musings'  is the fifteenth post in the 'A-Z Series' of posts, a chain of scribbles by me on topics starting with each alphabet of the English language. Read back and forth for the other posts, and please feel free to contribute your thoughts on the subject.

N for 'Nosy neighbors'

Mine is a creative neighborhood
Of well-acquainted strangers,
With faces lit with Cheshire-cat grins
That instantly transform
Into wrinkles and frowns,
And pleasantries to groans and grimaces,
Snapping congeniality at the blink of an eye
Into sharp indifference and oblivion
When someone approaches them
For a helping hand.

Glass-window panes tightly shut down,
Doors lock and peepholes open,
As my neighborhood lurks into troubled homes,
Hoping nobody will catch the bluff
They'd manufacture at the gossip mill
Where they work tirelessly day in and out,
Not knowing that inside every adjacent house,
Behind every curtain shade,
Is another eye watching them spy;
Another mind cooking another story.


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N for 'Nosy neighbors'  is the fourteenth post in the 'A-Z Series' of posts, a chain of scribbles by me on topics starting with each alphabet of the English language. Read back and forth for the other posts, and please feel free to contribute your thoughts on the subject.

It's complicated

Goodbyes are painful. It doesn't really matter how you say it, or when you are going to say it. You might choose the perfect way to part ways, a sentimental card, a kind word, a heart warming hug, a farewell kiss, but nothing in the world can make the ache from a loved one's 'Goodbye' go away.

It is somewhat of an oxymoron, isn't it? How can there ever be any 'Good' in 'Goodbye'? I often wonder how we can be so sure that this is the end. Yet there are those tearful separations that coerce us into cutting our losses. We cross the bridge, reach the other side, and then burn it down so that we are never tempted into looking back.

Honestly speaking, the goodbyes that are left explained are the worst of all. You are left hanging on to an abyss. You wonder how someone could just leave from your life, all of a sudden. You keep searching for answers. You try to connect, and keep getting disappointed. It's like banging your head against a wall. Eventually you get numb to the pain.

I know the feeling. I have lost a few close friends that way, sans parting words. No emotional drama. No commitment. No promises. Relationships of pure convenience. When I think about them today, I wonder if their silent farewell was a gift of eternal hope--a pregnant pause filled with hope that we might just meet again and get things back in order, or was it an abrupt halt--an awkward exclamation mark to bring forth a harsh finality to an incomplete story.
Every unsaid goodbye makes our heart a little tougher.  It strengthens it with security armors--of hope, of courage, of resilience. Hope that is needed to sustain an endless wait, courage needed to bear the pain of the back stab, and resilience to bounce back despite the broken heart.

If we were never to see each other again, what would you prefer---a teary farewell, or a hopeful silence?