The Year of Reclamation
Four more days and this year as well will come to an end, was this year any different from all 23 of its counterparts that I have lived through is the question that I find myself facing. One thing that I realized in all these intervening years is years always seem to pass more quickly than the days, my graduation party seems to be just a moment ago but what I did last night seems to be a part of some ancient memory perhaps because my days are so filled with inconsequential chores bound together by a rhythm of repetitiveness that even a slightest break from routine ends up forming a major crux of memory. But sometimes I think that life is nothing but a routine, we all move in tandem as the music of life plays on and perhaps that is why we all have an inherent desire to break free, to be different.
Another thing which I realized was despite being a rogue, I was still a wolf and wolves always belong to a pack, no matter how much I want to run away at the end of the day it is this society that I have to return to and no matter how much I try to alienate myself and be different from people, I have realized that I am still awfully like everyone else. Perhaps, because differences are all relative and despite of being like everyone else it’s the way I maintain my individuality that makes me different. It did took me a long time but I finally realized the similarity between loneliness and the self imposed exodus that I had condemned myself to for what we all may call as solitude is nothing more than an euphemism that we use to describe our ineptitude or incapacity to relate with people.
Friendship is probably the most important and easiest to forge relationship and this probably is one of the most useful of all lessons that I learnt this year. I found new friends and that too in people with whom I had no inkling with, people who have been around me for as long as I can remember but whom owing to my attitude or rather arrogance got to know in the previous few months. I think we always anyways end up knowing people whom we are meant to be with, no matter how weird and implausible the acquaintance may seem to be and as far as my experience with this life goes, I have realized that the number of people whom you can be with at a time always remains the same. Perhaps because everything comes at a price and what you may chose goes a long way in deciding what people you stay with or move away from and if only we can control whom to let in and whom to let go and more importantly when to let go then perhaps we can go to live a much more contented and a happier life.
This year I finally realized the importance one’s past plays in his life, I realized moving on is perhaps the easiest thing to do but to look your past in the eye and to imbibe all the lessons learnt from it, is probably the toughest thing to do. Finally this year, I was once again able to coax my heart into falling in love and that too again with a person whom I could never be with but perhaps an unrequited heart is better than a broken one and who knows somewhere down the line she may as well end up feeling the same things for me. This year has been all about a rebirth, a reincarnation where I did things in the most uncharacteristic of all manners from sharing a house with 3 other of my friend to actually loving them all despite of all their proclivities and delinquencies, from trying to be metrosexual and looking like a girl to once again embracing black and blues and still looking like a girl, from trying to be what I want to being what I am, from loving to losing and loving despite of losing.
This year, I could finally say I have grown for now adolescence seems to me like childhood and now that I have finally learnt how make a perfect coffee and that too in a microwave instead of a coffee maker, I could say for sure that I have lost all the naivety that once I very much loved. Unfinished businesses are as well something which I have grown to love more so because I know someday I will be walking these roads again, these unfinished businesses and the things which I could have said but never said will make me come back and look for people whom I have left but till then I would rather wander along these paths of life, meeting and falling in love with people whom I get to walk these roads with for love is the most important of all emotions that I have reclaimed in the past one year and now that I know what being in love is, I have realized that love is what makes this life bearable and worth living.
5 Things which We All have heard Women Say
It’s a list though not as exhaustive and endless as I initially thought of it to be and it’s just a list derived from my own observation of our estrogen powered counterparts and though it’s not backed by any scientific or sociological hypothesis but it still is pretty much observationally true. I think that each of us is different in every perceptible way but still at some level I feel given the company that we keep and given the similar circumstances that we all face, we end up feeling or behaving in an almost similar manner (gender, race or bias notwithstanding) though I think when it comes to men it always easy to find a common denominator i.e. either booze or cars or women (or men’s for some) or any other subset of these three. Women are an altogether different creation I would say and it more or less is impossible to categorize them but still given circumstances like philandering boyfriends or unresolved daddy issues or their inherent tendency to play mom, the words that they speak end up sounding almost the same though I wish I could know for myself about the intent with which these words may have been spoken but sadly I am not a psychic though I think X-Ray vision and a red cape would have got me more chicks then any psychic abilities.
First thing that you will hear any girl say has to be “I am not like any other girl” followed closely by an almost similar sounding verse “I am different”. I for one never actually understood as to why this need for individualization is so acute in a female mind and as to why even after following the each word scribbled in Cosmopolitan like verses of bible and wanting almost the same things as any other female in the street, can’t they accept this horrible but yet true fact that they are as well like every else. It’s not saying but rather believing in your identity that makes you different and I believe if you truly are different then words become redundant because in this world of fakeness and make believes, reality always stands out.
Second thing on my list is “I don’t follow fashion” or “What I wear becomes a trend” or “I wear what I like”. Well, don’t we all wear what we like and really if what you wear becomes a trend then how come we never saw you wearing empire cut or skinny jeans in the summer of 2005 and if you don’t follow fashion then why are you not down scavenging the old and used store instead of standing amidst all the sequined tops.
Third most used verse has to be “I have food allergies” or “I have dyslexia or whatever new and exotic disease that movie star has”. One thing which I never understood is how come someone almost miraculously develops an allergy or intolerance and that too in middle age and how you happen to earn a college degree when you are a dyslexic. I am actually waiting to hear someone say that they are suffering from attention deficient syndrome and I sometimes wonder if all this dumb and bimbo behavior which most of the females seem to suffer from is nothing but a ruse made popular by movies such as The Rainman or The Dumb and Dumber.
Fourth most heard remark is “I am manipulative” or “I am least unforgiving of all people” or “I will find your weakness and hurt you where it hurts the most” or “I don’t forget”. Well, none of us can actually forget the wrong done to us but what matters is who goes onto hold the grudge in his heart and who moves on with life and seriously , blessed are those who can forget for it is to them the present belongs. As for the other proclamations, I think when you are with someone you don’t have to work really hard to find their weakness and almost anyone can hit below the belt and get away with it and being manipulative is something which each human being is endowed with.
Finally, the fifth most used one liners has to be “I hate pink” or “I don’t do make up” or “I am not a feminist”. Really, I never can understand as to why girls are aversive to anything which would make them look more like a girl and if women are not going to stand by their feminist ideals then who will. It’s okay to believe in the equality of sexes but still we are not equal and rather than equality I think it’s the coexistence which we should strive for.
Like I said this list isn’t exhaustive and it’s not like we men are without fallacies or fraudulence and I think the above said things apply equally to men’s as well for deep down the circumstances that go into defining the human architecture are the same and lastly despite of my belief in outward beauty, I am not a chauvinist but like they say truth can sometimes as well lead to delusions, so even if you feel as if I am then please deal with it.
Final GoodBye
Close your eyes for I don’t want to be seen
As I slip away into an oblivion
And once again become a part of your dreams.
It’s not love but rather a pain which my heart feels
For all these memories are like wounds
And I am afraid they may never heal.
I have to walk alone with you gone by my side
I will fumble, I will fall and perhaps I will lose myself
But I won’t look back or think of you
For this pain is what that will keep me alive.
Our paths may once again cross one day
And our hearts may have healed enough for us to embrace
But till then I chose to walk a different way
For a goodbye perhaps is what suffices now
And perhaps my absence is what you need.
