I Want to Live

The perpetual numbness, the dissociation
I thought life was supposed to be a sinusoid
But it's more of a flatline 

With a few steep, sharp, short-lived blips 

When I am one with nature
I come alive, I blip

I have felt it in Lamar Valley in Yellowstone
In the poppy fields of Antelope Valley
With the Starry Night, 

And most recently 

Under a cove of sun kissed birch trees
In the sweetness of the cool gentle breeze
In the birdsong and the music of the trees
Witnessing a feast of colors in fall and spring
And with the lightest light bouncing off of the snow

I have felt it, profoundly, in these places 
A sharp steep blip in my otherwise flat signal
But it doesn't last
I want to keep a piece of it with me at all times
Be present, feel alive

I want to make it last
The short-lived blip in my otherwise flat signal
You say 'If it lasted it wouldn't be special', 

yet I feel
It can never not be special
In its fleetingness, it can be everlasting

Meeting you made me feel it too
The connection 
And that bit has lasted
Its not a compliment silly
Its not your friendship, so much as it is you

You being you, and you existing
And you letting me in, sort of ...
As much as you let me in 
Which wasn't a lot 
But it was a lot for you, and enough for me

I value life, I want to feel alive
I want the numbness to end 
Not me

No, I did not waste time

 Part I

For a long time after graduating I felt like I didn't know shit. This decreased my self esteem, which worsened my depression which in turn made it that much harder to read or learn anything. Concentration went to the dogs, and attention span decreased to -∞. It was a vicious cycle.

Then I would end up bingeing shows. 30 hours no sleep, no food, I would finish multiple seasons in less than 2 days. This only made me feel worse that I wasted so much time rather than doing anything productive. A ton of self-loathing. But I was addicted. This too right before exams and presentations out of procrastination.

I had completely stopped following news (something I did religiously as a kid, out of interest) and I knew precious little about what was going on. Hell, I even stopped following cricket, which I was crazy about. 

It is true, depression can reduce your IQ by a good 10-20 points. It can be hard to learn new things when you are too busy trying to not kill yourself, even when learning new things is one of the treatments.

However, I had developed an interesting habit during all of this - After finishing the series, I used to read up about the show's cast, characters, biographies, all sorts of random stuff - on wikipedia. At the time I didn't think much of it, only considered it more time waste - but I let my curiosity roam free, look up whatever piqued my interest, and pretty soon one wikipedia page became 10.

Part II

It took me many years to realize, that I wasn't wasting time! Sure I wasn't studying for my test and getting decent grades, but my brain was passively learning, absorbing tons of stuff, even though I didn't realize at the time - stuff that has been quite useful in life and that led to personal growth.

For example, I was one of those who thought you should only have sex after marriage, only do it with one person in life, not date multiple people. I thought ill of porn of western culture - so much so that I couldn't even watch friends, I was so disgusted by it. But starting second year, as I watched more and more stuff, and approached content with curiosity minus the stigma and judgement, my perspective began to change. 

I learnt that love was complicated, that you could love more than 1 person in your lifetime, that you are yet to meet the love of your life, that heartbreak sucks but a breakup is not the end of the world. This was important because 19 year old me was punishing and loathing myself way too much following breakups. I was also treating my depression with stories of hope, stories full of laughter, which kept me going even when depression was at its worse. 

I learnt English fluently - mostly listening. I went from needing subtitles to differentiating between American, British and Australian accents. Then southern and the horrid NJ accents and even Irish and Scottish. When I moved abroad, I had no problem understanding what was being said - one less barrier to overcome. I have had friends who struggled quite a bit following lectures or even what was being said in a one on one meeting, and needed to record everything and re-listen at 0.5x speed. I also learnt tons of new words, pronunciations, phrases and cultural references. I don't need to translate things in my head, I can think in both Hindi and English.

I was particularly interested in period pieces. Over 8 years I saw so many biopics, shows and docudramas and read about them on wiki that I am quite a history buff now, even to the point of being an obnoxious know-it-all :D  I can list the names of British Kings & Queens from Edward the IV in the 1400s to Queen Elizabeth the II :P I am working on the first millennia right now :P I have learnt quite a bit about European History especially that of France, Spain, Italy, Germany, Russia and I am still growing in knowledge. 

A king could be the hero in one show but a villain in another. Was Caesar a hero, a necessary evil, or an egotistical tyrant? Watching history from multiple perspectives taught me to consider looking at things from different sides, to ask questions and helped me get past my own cognitive dissonance. Now when I judge and dislike someone for their point of view, I take a step back and try to see where they are coming from, what their background is.

I learnt a lot about the geopolitics of the 20th century and  I am still learning . All this from watching tv shows and movies :P that began with 'The Tudors' ;) in my third year at BITS. History is not just dates and war and the rise and fall of empires, but also how ordinary people of all classes lived - something Austen, the Bronte sisters, Dickens and Twain have documented beautifully. During a fellowship interview, I was asked why people my age were interested in Jane Austen, what did I see in it? To which I replied that I find it fascinating how similar ordinary people are - that people in two different cultures (English and ours) centuries apart spoke, thought, behaved and socialized in shockingly similar ways.

I learnt what sex really was. While I knew how babies were born since I was 10, but even at 20, I didn't fully understand the mechanics of it (facepalm!). I didn't know what went where, and I was positively freaked out when I found out. I understood what rape was, why it was so awful, why victims ended up in the hospital :'(
But ... I also learnt about the many many facets of sex, that it is a pretty normal and natural thing to do, that there is no shame in it, that our societies perspective on it is misguided and fucked up, and my taboo and stigma slowly started to dissolve. SATC isn't the full story but still, useful education for a noob.

I found out that 'The Perks of Being a Wallflower' was the story of my life. 

That in part, my depression was rooted in the events of my childhood and that I needed interventions. This was the beginning of slowly learning how to be the life of the party after a lifetime of being a Wallflower - a silent observer.

I became more comfortable about homosexuality, how gay stereotypes were inaccurate and harmful.

Part III

coming soon ...

The Freedom of Aves

(What all do I miss?)

The birdies and their fluttering wings
The sunbirds, beetle-eaters, spider-hunters
The parrots, the pelicans and the pigeons
The nightingales and the sparrows

Their twittering alarms at dawn
Their childlike play under the sun all day
Their serene silences after twilight
And their arrant absence by midnight
Oh! How I would enjoy their games
Every afternoon spending hours after hours

Mesmerizing as they always were
The couple of them – spider-hunters
All around the drumstick tree,
That was their motherly refuge,
And occasionally visiting the hibiscus (bush)
Gently nudging its fragile petals
With an even more tender beak...
Groping for spiders, if at all, any.
The hibiscus style would annoy her
Troubled, she would curse it tersely
With the sweetest possible chirp
As if scolding the burgeon, for irritating her 😀
Oh! How I used to laugh at all this.
Then back again to mommy dearest (drumstick)
Pollinating her cheerful creamy flowers
(Though unaware of this, yet so innocently)
During hide and seek with the spiders

Oh! How I miss the families of parakeets
Thousands and thousands of them
Whose arrival was certain everyday
With the first ray of the golden sun
Their magnificent green, casting a spell
Their chirping, loudest and loveliest of all,
Would announce of their daily advent
On the evergreen tree of Neem- Their favourite evening hangout
Oh! How the parakeet struggled to hold
The tiny yellow bitter neem fruit
In its rosy red spouting beak
Distinctly visible in the sea of green
From my bedroom's balcony
Where I would remain glued for hours
Holding the bars of the barred balcony
A captive beholding the beauty of freedom
With the corners of my lips
Stretched wide into a grin
That would turn into a hearty laugh
Every time the green angel dropped
The canary yellow oval neem fruit

Oh! How I miss to scowl
At the light blue grey pigeons
Who were never found in a count
Of more or less than two 😏
For they would try time and again
(Never giving up)
To build their dream home
Of twigs and hay and potpourri
In my bedroom's balcony
(In doing so they succeeded
Never but once)
But would lay their eggs
Without a nest..... ;(
Oh! How I wish i could stop them
Help them, stop them from doing this
For the broken remains (of the egg)
Lying shattered on the railing
Epitome of a love gone waste...
Would upset me beyond measure
Genesis of a void that never can be filled
But for the mother...
Her entire world had come to an end...
Oh! How I wish I could speak
The dialect, the cooing of the pigeons
And articulate my feelings to her
For only a mother can apprehend
The pain of another mother
Both having suffered, a sorrow so huge
Lives blown apart
With the supernova of explosions
Would take quite a time
For both of us to recover
For life goes on, never stopping
And so, with wounds that never heal
But with a hope for the growth
Of new olive branches
The two of us move on.

And how I miss the winter guests
Painting the azure colossal heavens
With every shade possible
That the mighty seven can yield
Making my winters so unlike the west
Full of new hope and gaiety
Mother indeed is the best artist
She created us all with a different stroke
So very unique, none like any other
Hail!! Mother Nature.

What I wish I could say to you

If only you could see what I see in you
Then you would know...
I see a brave, courageous man
And an extraordinarily plucky and resilient child
Deeply hurt, with open bleeding wounds

I wish more people told you
That they love you
And that you deserve to be loved
Then maybe just maybe
The walls of distrust, distress and dread
Would begin to crumble

Then maybe just maybe
You will believe that you are loved
You have loved your inner child
Your entire life
A most nurturing, paternal love

You have been there for yourself
You got yourself out
Of every deep dark hole you fell into
Cheering yourself on
To keep going
For every success, small or large

You raised yourself
And you will always be there
You will always love yourself
Even when you die

The adult you, the wise you, the today you
Has always been with this child
You are the father you seek
You have been the father you never had

And one day
You will be a wonderful father to your children
For you have had a lifetime of practice

- Shruti Singh Kakan