Thursday, February 16, 2006

Coming Back to Life

It's been a while. A week to be exact. Which is not much time, considering this is not my profession and so I needn't be doing it as religiously as I would, say, be studying. Yes, that was a joke, you can all smile knowingly. But it is such a compulsion to pour out the smallest, dullest, most insignificant happenings in your even more insignificant life into this webpage that you wonder if people don't have any concept of privacy anymore. The sad part is that it is so widely done as well, and getting ever so popular. The world is shrinking. But not so much that it shrinks into MY own, separate world. No Thanks. You can all shrink till just outside my world.

I don't know why I put that Floyd Song as the title. I don't know much these days. It's all abstract, a vague collection of thoughts and ideas and desires. The sinking realization that my life is headed nowhere suddenly rammed home with startling clarity in class today. Well, not nowhere, I THINK I can vaguely see paths laid out in front of me, leading to places. So I guess I must say I don't know where I WANT my life to go, instead of saying it's going nowhere. Yes, take the blame. It's easier that way.

I went through my Yahoo Mail Inbox today. The oldest mail I had was dated 25 July, 2004. It was one of those jokes which come through forwards. It was a good one, I wouldn't have kept it otherwise. I smiled when I read mails from my friends all excited about the first few weeks in college, whichever one they were in. And I was being pretty excited too, my Sent Items said so. "Oh wow, this campus is really cool.", "The Chemistry professor is unbelievable.", "The Computer Facility has Net connection at the speed of light!" Innocent, awe-struck wonderings of a boy lost in an unfamiliar place. And around November of first year in college, I saw the first signs of the crack showing. "I'm a man broken by the system he tried so hard to get into.". Now of course, I'm beyond all of that. Take life as it comes. Go with the flow. Things will happen when they have to. Call me a believer in destiny.... or someone resigned to fate.

Room-cleaning. With a vengeance. Trying to get back some of the lost me. I'm usually very ordered, I like to see things neatly stacked up and symmetric. Symmetry is pleasing to the eye. My room was a mess. The table was littered, the cupboard had clothes in a heap and there's a lizard in one corner of the room which lives in this room more than I do. Therefore the room-cleaning. Swept it. Once, twice, thrice. The dust simply wouldn't stop coming. So I gave up. Rearranged the table. Ordered the clothes in the cupboard. Why am I saying all this? See what I meant, in my opening paragraph?

What do I do when the quizzes are over. Where do the 24 hours go on normal days? Frightening thought. That absolute murder of time could come so naturally and without our realising it. What DID I do yesterday??? Um, I don't know! So there's a resolution made, to do something... anything! As ever. To be broken at the first possible chance. Oh well, at least I realised that I don't realise I'm wasting time. It's a start.

It's been a while. For many things. It's been a while since... I drove my car. Since I watched Live Cricket. Since I read a novel, lying on the bed, munching on horribly unhealthy snacks. Since I went to the beach alone and sat at the water's edge and listened to the waves. Since I watched the Saturday Night movie on Star Movies. Since I've been to a friend's house. Since I've had a pure, cold shower (Chennai's becoming COLD!). Since I sent someone a greeting card. Since I've listened to a very old song on the radio. Since I played Minesweeper. Since I wrote a short story, just for the heck of it. Since I sat in front of my book collection, took them all out and arranged them again in exactly the same order...

Since I've been myself...

17 comments:

Manasi Subramaniam said...

I demand to be mentioned. I am your guardian angel.

Ducky said...

Since my Guardian Angel gave me a treat... ;)

Shazz said...

She what???

Ae what do i care!

Good timing with the post. I was just thinking of putting down the something of the sort. In fact, i was just thinking that theres no place here for me sit alone and think. I mean the campus is big enough but its either college campus or rolling grasslands. either there are people there or there just wilderness. So the only place left is my own head. Yup, with earphones on and a book in my hand, i forget everything else. And i mean everything! Kutty had to point out that our club prez had come and spent a couple of hours in the room or i would never have known.
He got into Stanford btw. Depressing... for me that is...

Prashanth said...

ore the feeling...I like sleeping the only thing that doesn't involve thinking nowadays...and posting stuff on my blog ;)

Ducky said...

Oh, sorry Anirudh...
She DIDN'T. I meant that line as a continuation of my post. "It's been a while...

Manasi Subramaniam said...

Your guardian angel guards over your life. And she does a damn good job of it too. So pipe down.

Vijay Shankar said...

Totally agree with ur post.
IIT squeezes the life out of u.
But it does teach u to appreciate the finer things in life- like girls, good food and small things like reading a novel etc

it's baille said...

ur right ....it's been a while.....it's tough to take mind off stress during quiz time

Dharik said...

ya its been a while since I touched a cricket bat:) and its been an age since I called you Anand!!!
ducky is cool...

AG said...

Hmm.. That's the whole point.. People change with time.. However much you try, you can never be your old self again. You can possibly never listen to the same old metallica crap again, never play FIFA again etc etc.. The fact that you are not doing certain things in your life, which you used to do years back, indicate that you have outgrown them. It's clearly time to do something new...!..
All this can be tagged under one word - 'Peer pressure'. You want to differ from your peers by being different, by being meticulous etc. But it works only till a point. So, better change yourself to live with the world around you. You will realize soon that that's the only solution.

Shazz said...

Gobaz. I think you're feeling a bit of that 'pressure' yourself! You've started talkin all weird. Where's that good ol' fun-lovin gobaz we used to know? ;)

AG said...

Shastry,
No da.. Everyone has an 'other' side.. I had 2..:-).. One of which ceased to exist sometime during late November. So, its just me and myself now..:-)..
And yeah, I've been through all this crap before... When you dunno where ur life's heading, you have nothing to look forward to in life. I had some personal interests which came to my aide then. And then, the next stage is when you get bored of these things. Then, you start looking out for other things to do and you're pretty much confused. In effect, you're back to square one. And as ducky said, you choose one of the many paths laid out to you, a different path from the one you just chose. But again, at the end of it all, all paths lead back to the initial starting place. So, life's all about choosing the best paths. The lesser the time you spend at this junction, the better it is for you.

Howitis?? :)

Ducky said...

Gobaz,
you wanna blog, do it on YOUR page :)

AG said...

KNEW you'd say that...:-)
Still, they are words of advice for you my boy..:-)

Vijay Shankar said...

now u know why ajit doesnt put any entries :)

Raytracer said...

Shit I dint know u guys felt that pathetic.

Prashanth said...

4 lines 20 comments....er more than 4 lines 18 comments +1....interesting?!
Ducky for lit-sec?? kallakku form!!