Perspective

It was a usual lazy sunday afternoon. Half of which I had spent cribbing about trivialities like it being too sunny, too hot, too bright outside; tomorrow being a Monday requiring me to go back to mundane work again; and the other half was spent in picking between two really hard life choices - doing the laundry, cleaning the house, cooking versus napping and wasting time. As one would expect, laziness is mightier than all swords and hence, the latter choice always wins. Fast foward to 5 PM sunday evening. I wake up sullen & sourpuss because well for one, its only a few hours to the ever dreadful Monday now but also because no work got done and the house is a mess. In your head you go all dramatic about what a big piece of shit life is and how you don't like anything or anyone. You make mental notes of how endlessly your mom talks everytime you call her and yet complains about you not calling her enough. You think about what a pain 16 hour flights are to India and sometimes wish you didn't have to ever take them again. The sun outside is still blinding you. Did you really wait for summer so eagerly? Give me the winter anyday over this. Oh! But the snow! Don't you hate that too? Your mind wanders to that annoying colleague at work. Isn't she competitive to the edge of being a jerk? Who cares? You hate work anyways. But you love the gym at work, don't you? I wonder why I don't lose any weight. How much harder can I slog at the gym, really? Isn't it frustrating when you work out every single day of the week with passion and your weighing machine hasn't budged a number (not even the one after the decimal point) in five months? I am hungry. What do I cook for dinnner? I possibly can't eat out again. I miss India. Those guys have it so lucky. Most of my friends still never have to cook. And really if I had the luxury of a maid doing the dishes and cleaning up the kitchen afterwards, I would cook as much as Nigella Lawson. Why are the fuel prices going up again? Tickets are so expensive to everywhere. Can't believe I will be sulking at home yet another long weekend. Do I really love my boyfriend? I wonder what he adds to my experience of life. Do I even like men? How could I possibly tell if I liked women without ever dating one? After all, wasn't I conditioned to believe I am straight? I hate finance. Don't I? Didn't I always hate math, numbers, finance. How did I end up on wall street? I think it's the commute to Manhattan every day that makes it worse? Is it about time I moved to the city? That would mean no savings. Savings! What a joke. I don't have any savings even today. But can I really live in an 8X11 prison cell? with rats, possibly! All I need is a pet but is is such a responsibility. Plus, all day alone for the pet at home - inhumane, don't you think? As usual again, your mind is a jungle. A chaotic mess of contradictory and regressive thoughts whiplashing against each other, possibly bringing in a neurosis. You mindlessly reach out for your phone. One unread email - the screen says. It's from my accountant. It read - 

Hello Jiya,

Regret the silence from my end these past few weeks. We lost our daughter to an aggressive, hitherto unknown, strain of cancer last month. I am now getting back into work mode and will get back to you after updating pending work at my end. Regret any inconvenience it may have caused.

Regards,

Ankit Mehta 

Wham!! What were you just hit with. You have never met Ankit. He works remotely from his California office. You don't know who his daughter is. But you know she was young, probably your age. And you had once seen a smiling picture of Ankit with his daughter somewhere on social media. You do remember her eyes. Young, ambitious, full of life. Wanting to see so much, to do so much. Hoping to travel across the seven seas, hoping to to fall in love a few times. So many dreams. Suddenly, all the noise in my head is all gone. There's pin drop silence. My trembling fingers find the reply button on my phone. I stare at the screen blankly. I don't know how to say I am sorry for your loss to this father. I cannot say I feel his pain because in all honesty, I can't. So, through the tears & the silence, I sit there phone in hand not knowing what to type.

For what is love that hath no eyes

For what is love that hath no eyes
that hath not met, that deals in lies
Ye love that for convenience sake
thrives in lonely hours, on a secret lake

It hath no limbs, it hath no sight
Wist we all that love is blind! but this?
This has no eyes, this doth not see
And thus lives on, in monopoly

Thy voice so sweet upon me fell
For thee, I sin; For thee, I'd take hell
Thy voice that sounds like heaven bells
Avaunt! Wise men rue, what a dreadful knell

Love that claims of longest kisses
No lips have met, nor tongues intertwined
Many a heaving bosoms, forlorn and turned
Ah! But a hundred nights the sighs have chimed

And yet one more time the night crawls in
And yet one more time on our beds we lain
Our hollow shadows on the wall
Ah! Such disdain. Ah! Such disdain

For what is love that can not touch
Nor fill my mouth with a burning kiss
Sets my heart ablaze with passion doth
And in one swift strike, unwraps my soul aloft my heels

When I am gone...

Some evenings, I just sit on my couch, book in hand, looking out of the window. Not reading, just staring blankly into the vastness. I wonder if I was gone, would you miss me? Every morning I wake up and I call you. I talk to you throughout the day in between tasks that demand my attention. We talk about our day, about past incidents, about future aspirations. Sometimes we talk about sundry things - the weather, football, other people. We talk & talk. We talk a lot. Sometimes, amidst the madness of our really busy days, one of us messages the other - "I miss you". I wonder what it really means. I think the simplest explanation is - I miss talking to you? What does that make me? Am I my words, am I my voice? What if tomorrow morning I woke up like Nakata? No recollection of anything, no words. Not knowing what to say or how to talk? But I woke up next to you and you never left my side again. Would you still miss me?

Sometimes I think we try too hard. Too hard to be liked, to be loved, to be wanted, to be missed, to not be forgotten. Why do we want to be remembered? Wouldn't it be nice if I was gone today and tomorrow you wouldn't remember me? Why do I want to be remembered? When I am gone, would I know I am still remembered?

I know I am replacable. I know I am not special. That you see everything in me, but it's in parts. And part by part, I am replacable. That if I am gone suddenly, without notice, without warning - you will be surprised but tomorrow will be just another day. The same day without the talk. May be you will miss the sound of my laughter on the phone, may be no one will ask you if you had lunch. May be a week will pass. But you will have lunch everyday without anyone asking if you did. You will still cross the road. Then slowly, or not so slowly, may be fastly, you will forget. The sound of my laughter, the sound of my voice, my talk, me. I will be a distant name on the far far horizon. But I was more. I was more than my words. I was more than my voice. I was more. But you and I never got to know.