Details coming soooooon..............
Sunday, October 31, 2010
Wednesday, October 13, 2010
In The Silence Of My Solitude - A Novel (Part 20)
23. Steps on the sands of time
It was already midnight when I reached the nearest city's railway station. Except for a few homeless people it looked deserted.As I left the house that evening, I had felt as sense of joy passing over me. I tried to understand the significance of it. I realised that the joy was about 'Action' , that I was doing something, getting out of the house and walking, working towards the solution. It was the joy of a hunter with hunger in his stomach sensing a prey in his sight. The joy of 'just do it'.
I had a plan, not an exact plan perse, just an outline of what I had to do. I made sure that I didnt plan too much as I was notorious for skipping the queuqe far too many time. The order and structure of a well planned plan used to always bore me to death. But, even if I had planned exactly what I was supposed to do, How would that plan look like?
The goal was pretty clear : Find mother.
Fortunately or unfortunatley, Coincidentally or fatefully, we both experienced the same things. I walked in her foot steps. It was like a equation which produces the same solutions given the same input data.
Step 1 : Mental Breakdown.
Step 2 : Shock from husband's change of behavior.
Step 3 : Left the house.
Step 0 : We saw the samething.
After those initial steps on the sands of time, it all looked fuzzy, as if a herd a buffaloes passed in that direction erasing her steps. I could able to think up two scenerios pointing at the directions she might had taken, based on her mental condition.
Scenerio one : She had gone crazy.
Scenerio two: She didnt.
If she had gone crazy, Some one must had helped her? Who was it?
If she hadnt gone crazy, Did she leave the house just like me, just like me....
That thought brought a chill to my spine.
She got up that morning. She ate. She thought. She made up her mind. She argued with my dad. She finalised her decision. It was midnight. She woke me up. Took me in her lap.She cried. I cried. Then she left. I slept. She went to a railway station. She sat at the same bench where I was sitting now.Then she started crying.
I got up from the bench, and carefully observed it. I looked around. It looked surreal, but it all looked familiar, as if I was just walking through my mother's memories. People were looking at me. Who are they? Theives? Rapists? A woman in the middle of the night, quater century back, in india. Was she robbed? raped? and then hit with rocks, and thrown on the tracks?? What happened?
I didnt feel any kind of fear in me though, especially the fear of coming face to face with a thief or a serial murderer. 'Hey you, come here, who are you? a murderer? you wanna kill me? hahhaha, come here. Try your murdering skills on me. You wont kill me? Why? Oh, because I dont have fear?'
I didnt fear none of those things : Going to strange places, getting robbed, attacked, or even raped. What I feared was the doubt in me -- What if I am fucking up my life? A doubt, a small doubt. I knew the source of all that fear : Inspite of me saying fuckall, and going after my mother, I still wanted to be part of the society. I wanted to fuck sexy women. Love a woman and be loved. Who will love a man like me? is there a woman who is in search of her mother..just like me??
Announcement about an incoming train. Dejavu. Sad.
What was that emotion? How to explain a complex emotion?
A boring train gallopped into the station. A poor family got down from the general compartment. Another poor family boarded the train. People starting their journeys. People ending their journeys.
Hey you, where u going?
I dont know
why are u going?
to find my mother.
Where is she?
no idea
How is she?
no idea.
R u gonna take the train?
I dont know.
Announcement again. The train started moving.
Take the train.
Why?
You have no choice.
I ran towards the general compartment.
I stood at the door watching the huts of the poorest of the poor, whose lives revolved around timings of the trains and trains themselves.The train pulled away from the station, picking up speed, chasing the darkness.
Destination : Hyderabad.
Continued here..
It was already midnight when I reached the nearest city's railway station. Except for a few homeless people it looked deserted.As I left the house that evening, I had felt as sense of joy passing over me. I tried to understand the significance of it. I realised that the joy was about 'Action' , that I was doing something, getting out of the house and walking, working towards the solution. It was the joy of a hunter with hunger in his stomach sensing a prey in his sight. The joy of 'just do it'.
I had a plan, not an exact plan perse, just an outline of what I had to do. I made sure that I didnt plan too much as I was notorious for skipping the queuqe far too many time. The order and structure of a well planned plan used to always bore me to death. But, even if I had planned exactly what I was supposed to do, How would that plan look like?
The goal was pretty clear : Find mother.
Fortunately or unfortunatley, Coincidentally or fatefully, we both experienced the same things. I walked in her foot steps. It was like a equation which produces the same solutions given the same input data.
Step 1 : Mental Breakdown.
Step 2 : Shock from husband's change of behavior.
Step 3 : Left the house.
Step 0 : We saw the samething.
After those initial steps on the sands of time, it all looked fuzzy, as if a herd a buffaloes passed in that direction erasing her steps. I could able to think up two scenerios pointing at the directions she might had taken, based on her mental condition.
Scenerio one : She had gone crazy.
Scenerio two: She didnt.
If she had gone crazy, Some one must had helped her? Who was it?
If she hadnt gone crazy, Did she leave the house just like me, just like me....
That thought brought a chill to my spine.
She got up that morning. She ate. She thought. She made up her mind. She argued with my dad. She finalised her decision. It was midnight. She woke me up. Took me in her lap.She cried. I cried. Then she left. I slept. She went to a railway station. She sat at the same bench where I was sitting now.Then she started crying.
I got up from the bench, and carefully observed it. I looked around. It looked surreal, but it all looked familiar, as if I was just walking through my mother's memories. People were looking at me. Who are they? Theives? Rapists? A woman in the middle of the night, quater century back, in india. Was she robbed? raped? and then hit with rocks, and thrown on the tracks?? What happened?
I didnt feel any kind of fear in me though, especially the fear of coming face to face with a thief or a serial murderer. 'Hey you, come here, who are you? a murderer? you wanna kill me? hahhaha, come here. Try your murdering skills on me. You wont kill me? Why? Oh, because I dont have fear?'
I didnt fear none of those things : Going to strange places, getting robbed, attacked, or even raped. What I feared was the doubt in me -- What if I am fucking up my life? A doubt, a small doubt. I knew the source of all that fear : Inspite of me saying fuckall, and going after my mother, I still wanted to be part of the society. I wanted to fuck sexy women. Love a woman and be loved. Who will love a man like me? is there a woman who is in search of her mother..just like me??
Announcement about an incoming train. Dejavu. Sad.
What was that emotion? How to explain a complex emotion?
A boring train gallopped into the station. A poor family got down from the general compartment. Another poor family boarded the train. People starting their journeys. People ending their journeys.
Hey you, where u going?
I dont know
why are u going?
to find my mother.
Where is she?
no idea
How is she?
no idea.
R u gonna take the train?
I dont know.
Announcement again. The train started moving.
Take the train.
Why?
You have no choice.
I ran towards the general compartment.
I stood at the door watching the huts of the poorest of the poor, whose lives revolved around timings of the trains and trains themselves.The train pulled away from the station, picking up speed, chasing the darkness.
Destination : Hyderabad.
Continued here..
In The Silence Of My Solitude - A Novel (Part 19)
22. Intermission
Dear Friends, Are you getting bored reading my life story? Are you murmuring to yourself ..who the fuck is this guy, and whats the deal with his mother, and why should we care? And the literary cinematic critic in you wanting to give thumbs down to my amateur effort, questioning my grasp of English language, my lack of creativity, and finally exclaiming , ' Look, the main character is uninteresting because it is not well defined!! '.
Well defined characters???. What nonsense! What a lie!
If there are hundreds of thought possibilities in my mind, and if I chose one thought among all those, based on the state of my mind, then how can I define my character with boundaries and borders? How can any one define the character of a man if that man is a change in progress? People define the character as 'oh..look at this man...this man is full of integrity', 'this man is full of shit', 'this man is epitome of [ ] '..etc. etc. But, would the man -- the man full of integrity possess it, had he faced the same situations and circumstances a man without integrity faced? Then, they talk about some great man in the history, saying..'Hey look at this man..he was intelligent..his objectives were well defined..look at the way he solved problems..and finally found success' . They look at that great man's life from his birth to death, and then they look at his success, and define the character accordingly. They define the person's character posthumously. Nothing can be so inaccurate in the realm of united states of mind.
First of all, how can they use a word like 'great man'? If I have the same genes as his, and if I faced the same situations he faced, Won't I be him? How can anyone call a man 'great man' without answering 'What is a man?' .
There are no great men in history. Just men. That's all. You delude yourself thinking of those people as great because you want to achieve, atleast partially, what they achieved. The so-called greatness of those men is nothing but your desires playing games with you, a desire to have a character, an achor, a god-ideal for your lost self.No wonder we have so many religions!
Even if the so-called great men exist, and if you meet them in heaven or hell, ask them this question, 'What happened during that darkest night of your life? Did those dark nights reoccur even when you found solutions before?'. His reaction would be, first : he would hug you and cry for asking that question, and goes on telling how he suffered during that dark hour, second: he would say that something drove him, some kind of invisible shit drove him towards that solution. Well, how about this --- Luck??
If there are no great men..then there wont be loser men. There wont be any-kind of hatred.
That was why, I forgave my dad. He didn't ask his mind, he didn't ask his circumstances, he didn't come across with stroke of great luck. He didn't ask his parents, the environment he grew up in. He didn't ask none of it.
I forgive you too, my friends, for judging me from your social conditioned sense of beauty, and your conditioned definition of the art itself.
Continued here..
Dear Friends, Are you getting bored reading my life story? Are you murmuring to yourself ..who the fuck is this guy, and whats the deal with his mother, and why should we care? And the literary cinematic critic in you wanting to give thumbs down to my amateur effort, questioning my grasp of English language, my lack of creativity, and finally exclaiming , ' Look, the main character is uninteresting because it is not well defined!! '.
Well defined characters???. What nonsense! What a lie!
If there are hundreds of thought possibilities in my mind, and if I chose one thought among all those, based on the state of my mind, then how can I define my character with boundaries and borders? How can any one define the character of a man if that man is a change in progress? People define the character as 'oh..look at this man...this man is full of integrity', 'this man is full of shit', 'this man is epitome of [ ] '..etc. etc. But, would the man -- the man full of integrity possess it, had he faced the same situations and circumstances a man without integrity faced? Then, they talk about some great man in the history, saying..'Hey look at this man..he was intelligent..his objectives were well defined..look at the way he solved problems..and finally found success' . They look at that great man's life from his birth to death, and then they look at his success, and define the character accordingly. They define the person's character posthumously. Nothing can be so inaccurate in the realm of united states of mind.
First of all, how can they use a word like 'great man'? If I have the same genes as his, and if I faced the same situations he faced, Won't I be him? How can anyone call a man 'great man' without answering 'What is a man?' .
There are no great men in history. Just men. That's all. You delude yourself thinking of those people as great because you want to achieve, atleast partially, what they achieved. The so-called greatness of those men is nothing but your desires playing games with you, a desire to have a character, an achor, a god-ideal for your lost self.No wonder we have so many religions!
Even if the so-called great men exist, and if you meet them in heaven or hell, ask them this question, 'What happened during that darkest night of your life? Did those dark nights reoccur even when you found solutions before?'. His reaction would be, first : he would hug you and cry for asking that question, and goes on telling how he suffered during that dark hour, second: he would say that something drove him, some kind of invisible shit drove him towards that solution. Well, how about this --- Luck??
If there are no great men..then there wont be loser men. There wont be any-kind of hatred.
That was why, I forgave my dad. He didn't ask his mind, he didn't ask his circumstances, he didn't come across with stroke of great luck. He didn't ask his parents, the environment he grew up in. He didn't ask none of it.
I forgive you too, my friends, for judging me from your social conditioned sense of beauty, and your conditioned definition of the art itself.
Continued here..
Friday, October 1, 2010
In The Silence Of My Solitude - A Novel (Part 18)
21. Good bye
What must be the number one priority in life?
As as a kid, they tell -- “your priority is to get good marks in school, behave well, and be obedient”.
As a teenager, they tell you -- ‘Your priority is to get good marks, and think about future”
As an adult -- “ Your priority is to find a job, make money, marry, have kids, and have a secure life”.
THEY dictate OUR priorities. Nice!
But, really, What must be our priorities? Let me tell you what my priorities were.
As a kid, I just wanted to play.
As a teenager, all I thought about was sex and knowledge.
As an adult, all I want was to find myself.
But, all those wants, Did I want them because I was forced to do something else?
The mind wanted me to play because I was forced to go to school.
The mind always thought about sex, a bit too much,because of the sexual frustration brought on by the conservative society.
The mind wanted knowledge because lot of things this society taught didn't make sense.
I wanted to find myself because I was lost.
What would a child,teenager,adult want if he is not forced to do anything??
Here's the thing -- even if people stops forcing their will on you, the nature would still force its will on you, and that is -- survival -- survival of the human body.
As a child we need nurturing from parents, and we need their love. Different needs at various stages of our lives, and dependency on people for those needs, makes us want our wants.
Our needs dictates our wants, even if they are polar opposites. Then wants becomes needs. A cycle.
That begs the question -- What do a human being really want in life? Are our wants dictated by the circumstances? Does an absolute want exist?
I needed money,fame, and comforts; and I spent time and energy to attain them, and I attained them, but I lost myself in that process -- I lost my happiness. Now, I want to find myself and find that happiness. Needs and Wants.
Yes. I wanted to find myself. isn’t it your first priority?
Please! Be honest to yourself. Have you ever got up one morning, and asked yourself, “ What the fuck am I doing? Why am I not happy? Why I feel like a prisoner of my own mind, even after following all the rules of the society, the same society which promised me heaven if I followed all its rules and conventions?”
After the hunters and gatherers discovered farming, after forming their societies and villages, after finding the so called ‘civilizations’; one guy got up on the stage, and said, ‘Look, this is how we are supposed to live. This is how we are supposed to procreate. This is how we need to stone 'crazy' women to death. Because, if we don’t, this whole fucking society will collapse. That’s why, this is blasphemy; that is taboo. We need to believe in god, because god gives us rains. And then we need to follow a religion. We are not supposed to kill ourselves, but we can kill others. We must wage wars. Because you know my friend, if you don’t defeat them, they will defeat us. Lets do the farming..but hey ..we need fertile land..okay..lets invade that place..that civilization. Lets kill them all…or better..let them be our slaves. Morality? Power is the only morality. Yes, sir, You got to be powerful. Hey woman, you are weak, you are a slave. Woman, if you don’t behave, this society will collapse. The whole burden is on you. The future of the society is on you, and you can only save it by being a slave. Hey boy, take care of her. Keep her in the golden cage. Let her crave for sex and love. That’s your duty, my dear son. You gotta work. You are not supposed to rebel. The society will fuck up if you rebel. Work, Work, Work…Money,Money,Money…that must be your only priority. Kill people, back stab friends, bribe…and in the end if you are rich..all is fine. We, the society, sanction it. But, who am I? I am only you. I am not something different. I am the program which keeps you in line. You know, we created this great concept called -- ‘Fame’, and we conditioned everyone from their childhood to crave for it. Yes, it is the drug we gave you. Crave for it idiot. What?? You don’t want fame? You are a rebel, You will be responsible for the destruction of this utopia. You need to ostracized, you need to be outcasted, you need to be spit upon.Say yes for conventions. Say yes for money.Say yes for fame. No to hunters. No to dreamers. Please don’t think. Well, if you think something good, may be we will honor you posthumously.”
Clap..clap..from the audience.
Okay, lets stop talking about humanity.Lets stop talking in generalities. Lets talk about certain kind of people, those kind of people who are in minority in majority. The kind of people who are hunters in this world.
Let me ask you this, What happens to hunters in farmers world? Fucked?
But, part of the soul of minority is in the soul of the majority. So, we have to come again and talk in generality. Every farmer yearns to be hunter. I became that yearning, I am that yearning.
Every man is a hunter in heart. Every man is always hunting for truth.
A man will find himself only when he finds his truth…what ever it is.
How can a man find himself, and there by find happiness, if he didn’t make peace with his memories?
A man’s only priority in life is to be happy. Simple!
I wanted to be happy. The money didn’t give me happiness. The cars, big screen Tvs, diamonds, gold..didn’t give me happiness.
Mother was a memory of a mystery. I didn’t love her. I just wanted to find what happened to her. I just wanted to make peace with that memory, by solving that mystery. That was all.
Fuck the god..if he says to me that it is not my priority.
Mother is not mother. Mother is Me.
It is just pointless to tell a hunter to farm.
It is just pointless to stop a person who is in the pursuit of truth.
“Dad, You are mad. The whole world is mad. It is a mad,mad,mad world.”, I said as I picked up my bag, and stepped out of the house.
Goodbye, Dad.
And then, I went in search of truth, in search of my mother -- a mother to the humanity, in search of my happiness.
Continued here..
What must be the number one priority in life?
As as a kid, they tell -- “your priority is to get good marks in school, behave well, and be obedient”.
As a teenager, they tell you -- ‘Your priority is to get good marks, and think about future”
As an adult -- “ Your priority is to find a job, make money, marry, have kids, and have a secure life”.
THEY dictate OUR priorities. Nice!
But, really, What must be our priorities? Let me tell you what my priorities were.
As a kid, I just wanted to play.
As a teenager, all I thought about was sex and knowledge.
As an adult, all I want was to find myself.
But, all those wants, Did I want them because I was forced to do something else?
The mind wanted me to play because I was forced to go to school.
The mind always thought about sex, a bit too much,because of the sexual frustration brought on by the conservative society.
The mind wanted knowledge because lot of things this society taught didn't make sense.
I wanted to find myself because I was lost.
What would a child,teenager,adult want if he is not forced to do anything??
Here's the thing -- even if people stops forcing their will on you, the nature would still force its will on you, and that is -- survival -- survival of the human body.
As a child we need nurturing from parents, and we need their love. Different needs at various stages of our lives, and dependency on people for those needs, makes us want our wants.
Our needs dictates our wants, even if they are polar opposites. Then wants becomes needs. A cycle.
That begs the question -- What do a human being really want in life? Are our wants dictated by the circumstances? Does an absolute want exist?
I needed money,fame, and comforts; and I spent time and energy to attain them, and I attained them, but I lost myself in that process -- I lost my happiness. Now, I want to find myself and find that happiness. Needs and Wants.
Yes. I wanted to find myself. isn’t it your first priority?
Please! Be honest to yourself. Have you ever got up one morning, and asked yourself, “ What the fuck am I doing? Why am I not happy? Why I feel like a prisoner of my own mind, even after following all the rules of the society, the same society which promised me heaven if I followed all its rules and conventions?”
After the hunters and gatherers discovered farming, after forming their societies and villages, after finding the so called ‘civilizations’; one guy got up on the stage, and said, ‘Look, this is how we are supposed to live. This is how we are supposed to procreate. This is how we need to stone 'crazy' women to death. Because, if we don’t, this whole fucking society will collapse. That’s why, this is blasphemy; that is taboo. We need to believe in god, because god gives us rains. And then we need to follow a religion. We are not supposed to kill ourselves, but we can kill others. We must wage wars. Because you know my friend, if you don’t defeat them, they will defeat us. Lets do the farming..but hey ..we need fertile land..okay..lets invade that place..that civilization. Lets kill them all…or better..let them be our slaves. Morality? Power is the only morality. Yes, sir, You got to be powerful. Hey woman, you are weak, you are a slave. Woman, if you don’t behave, this society will collapse. The whole burden is on you. The future of the society is on you, and you can only save it by being a slave. Hey boy, take care of her. Keep her in the golden cage. Let her crave for sex and love. That’s your duty, my dear son. You gotta work. You are not supposed to rebel. The society will fuck up if you rebel. Work, Work, Work…Money,Money,Money…that must be your only priority. Kill people, back stab friends, bribe…and in the end if you are rich..all is fine. We, the society, sanction it. But, who am I? I am only you. I am not something different. I am the program which keeps you in line. You know, we created this great concept called -- ‘Fame’, and we conditioned everyone from their childhood to crave for it. Yes, it is the drug we gave you. Crave for it idiot. What?? You don’t want fame? You are a rebel, You will be responsible for the destruction of this utopia. You need to ostracized, you need to be outcasted, you need to be spit upon.Say yes for conventions. Say yes for money.Say yes for fame. No to hunters. No to dreamers. Please don’t think. Well, if you think something good, may be we will honor you posthumously.”
Clap..clap..from the audience.
Okay, lets stop talking about humanity.Lets stop talking in generalities. Lets talk about certain kind of people, those kind of people who are in minority in majority. The kind of people who are hunters in this world.
Let me ask you this, What happens to hunters in farmers world? Fucked?
But, part of the soul of minority is in the soul of the majority. So, we have to come again and talk in generality. Every farmer yearns to be hunter. I became that yearning, I am that yearning.
Every man is a hunter in heart. Every man is always hunting for truth.
A man will find himself only when he finds his truth…what ever it is.
How can a man find himself, and there by find happiness, if he didn’t make peace with his memories?
A man’s only priority in life is to be happy. Simple!
I wanted to be happy. The money didn’t give me happiness. The cars, big screen Tvs, diamonds, gold..didn’t give me happiness.
Mother was a memory of a mystery. I didn’t love her. I just wanted to find what happened to her. I just wanted to make peace with that memory, by solving that mystery. That was all.
Fuck the god..if he says to me that it is not my priority.
Mother is not mother. Mother is Me.
It is just pointless to tell a hunter to farm.
It is just pointless to stop a person who is in the pursuit of truth.
“Dad, You are mad. The whole world is mad. It is a mad,mad,mad world.”, I said as I picked up my bag, and stepped out of the house.
Goodbye, Dad.
And then, I went in search of truth, in search of my mother -- a mother to the humanity, in search of my happiness.
Continued here..
In The Silence Of My Solitude - A Novel (Part 17)
20.The Mind-Bang
“What you going to do now?”, asked my father as I was packing my bag. The bulk of the bag was filled with my DVDs and books covering whole range of philosophy to psychology to fiction.
“I am going to find her”, I said calmly.
“Listen, son, Please listen to me. Don’t do it. Listen to me carefully”, he pleaded.
“Okay, I am listening”. I replied, obviously a bit touched by the 'please'.
“Let me ask you this. If you were born in a poor family, unable to afford even two decent meals a day, in a family where your sister is supposed to sleep with dirty laborers for those meals, if you were born in a family in which getting a heart disease is death, in a family which dreads that time in the night when the father comes drunk and beat everyone in sight; would you be thinking in the same way you are thinking now? Answer me.”
He talks logic. He talks logic. Mother wrote in her dairy.
“ I don’t know”, I replied. I was interested to know where he was going with all this.
“ You don’t know. But, I have seen families like that. They wouldn’t care a rat’s ass if their mother left them or not. If she left, its fine. You know why? Because, the hunger in the stomach or rather the fear of getting hungry can eat away the sorrow of deaths of hundred mothers. They wouldn’t chase mysteries. Tomorrow itself is a mystery for them. They are so involved in solving their own mystery of life that all other mysteries are mere facts for them. ‘Our crazy mother mysteriously left us’, that’s not a mystery. There is no why? What? How?. It happened and its over, and the next day the sun rises as if nothing happened.”
“Where you going with all this?”, I interrupted.
“Look at you. You get up at 12 in the afternoon. Eat food thrice a day. Drink diet coke. Smoke cigarettes. Drink alcohol. Watch TV and sleep effortlessly at 2am in the night. Where did you get all this comfort? Who provided you for your education? If I let that woman stay in this house, or if I went in search of her and brought her back, she would have destroyed our life. I wouldn’t be able to provide the comforts and education, you wouldn’t have this spare time, and acidity in the stomach because of overeating, and diet concerns. You wouldn’t want to go after her. You want to go after her because I saved this family. I saved this family."
"What family? You and me?", I laughed, satirically of-course.
"Yes. You and me. Two lives versus already one brain dead person. Think logically with the perspective of reality. What else can any man do in my position? Crazy people are crazy making.We both would have gone crazy. We both would have hated her. Look all those old people who refuse to die, who piss in their beds, who cannot move, look at them, do u think their kids really want them? Life does not stop for anyone.Everyone have their own lives to live.We have to move on. We have to survive."
I saw his point. I understood his logic. I had seen many middle class families who just hated their grandparents, very old grand parents who remained coma like for many years. Yes, their grandson and daughters cried for them initially for the first few years. And then, it got on their nerves. The old people just refused to die, eating away their time, money and most importantly their hygiene. Imagine the smell of piss and faeces, and that constant smell of death which refuses to leave.
Yes. I understood what he was talking. People move on.There were no memories to make peace with, just their conscience. Making peace with your conscience is nothing but the concept of moving on, as Everyone moves on, as if it is a fact of life. Morality has no meaning if everyone does the same thing.
But, then again, nothing made sense to me. All logic is based upon certain assumptions and ground rules. If you agree to those assumptions and ground rules, then only you can venture into that logical world. He made sense because a part of me understood those ground rules, but a part of me refused to accept the same rules. I went beyond those rules. I wanted to know the reason behind those rules.
Lot of questions popped up.
For what purpose are we all moving on? For what purpose we are living? For what purpose we are surviving?
I asked him the same. " Dad, What is this life all about?"
He gave me a surprised look and remained quiet for close to half-minute, and said something which kind of triggered me to some realizations, which made me finally find the reason behind my obsession to chase the mystery of mother.
" Life is a game. As simple as that. We got to understand its rules first, and than play it.Its pointless to ask why we are playing that game, because we are born on that playground. Horrifying darkness surrounds that playground. A darkness at which we are not supposed to look, a darkness into which you are not supposed to venture. People make rules of the game, people play the game hard, people compete with other, people do anything to involve themselves in the game -- with only one purpose -- with - only - one - purpose --- Not to stare at that darkness. That darkness is unknown, and its the most fearful-thing in the life of every organism, it is death, it is insanity.For all practical purposes, your mother ventured into that. I refused to follow her. I did the right thing"
He remained quiet for a few seconds, and then said as if he found something about his own life."Fear of that darkness drives our lives".
Emotion driving those rules: Fear. Fear of unknown. Fear of darkness. Fear of death.
The metaphor my dad gave stimulated my mind. May be that's why metaphors are for. May be every word is a metaphor for something in our lives.Now, he was talking about the king of metaphors -- a metaphor for life itself. A metaphor in which his philosophy of life got wrapped in.
Thoughts.Thoughts.Thoughts. What drove these thoughts? I didn't know. But, many thoughts came, only with the goal of proving myself right. I guess!
"Dad, What if there is no darkness surrounding us? What if there is a beautiful world surrounding us? Beautiful gardens, peaceful gardens with flowers and trees. But we refuse to look at them, because we were told..taught that there is only darkness outside, that it would be horrible for us if we stop the game and look outside. People refuse to look because they fear..an illusory fear. What if all that fear is an illusion?"
"Death is not an illusion"
"But, fear of death is."
"Are you saying that you have no fear of death?"
"No. I realized, just now, that I can be truly happy only when I lose that fear"
"You can never face death without fear"
"May be I will fear death at the exact moment I meet it, but I refuse to let my life guided by that fear".
He got my logic. He got my logic because I went beyond his assumptions, and established my own assumptions. But, those assumptions themselves became logic. Contradiction?
All physics becomes meaningless beyond big bang. All logic becomes useless beyond the big-bang of mind. is big bang in the realm of physics same as big bang in the realm of mind?
How can we define big-bang of the mind? Whats this mind-bang?
Yeah, he got it. Everyone gets it. But, they discard it. If they don't discard it, and accept it, that means they lived a false lives all these years. They played a game, and they played it with a purpose, but the logic behind that purpose was based upon wrong assumptions.But, they already mastered the rules of that game, and played that game all that life, just like a machine. They were programmed...and I was just a bug or a virus...for them.
Their life is programmed."Vadhinchina vistari valla jeevitam". A great poet said in telugu.
The machine --my father, started again, " But, that's not reality".
"Whats reality?"
" The reality is that your body is material, and it needs to survive"
" Dad, Do I need all your cars, palaces, fashions to survive?"
" But you gotta be competitive and successful in life. You need to find success and be powerful"
" Why do I need to be powerful?"
" You need to be powerful to play the game better"
" Wait. You need to play the game better so as to play the game better?"
"So, you chose to be a loser, then"
"How can I be a loser if I refuse to play that game of life...at-least the game you are playing which is based on false assumptions. You see dad, there is no stopping in that game of life you are playing. You get food and bed, but thats not enuf. You gotta own stuff, buy stuff, you are not supposed to be satisfied with what you have..because if you are satisfied, then you stop the game, but the fear wouldnt let you stop, and you gotta play the game forever..you played that game for too long that, Fear became you."
"Son, you are not buddha, you are not jesus, you are not muhammad, you are not mahavira.
If you think you are, please come out of your illusions. You dont know what pain is. You never suffered."
Can a buddha become buddha without pain?
Words came automatically out of my mouth, as if the thought 'Fear is an illusion' , and the thought that I rejected the assumptions on which the humanity based their lives, drove me.
"What if pain is pain only in your game?"
Pain is pain because of the game.
"But, you are still in the game", he replied.
"Yes, I was playing that game. I am taking a break from it now"
He lost interest in this whole discussion, I guess, as he might have found his contradictory self, and he was not comfortable with contradictions. His logic might have shutup my mother..but not her son.
He finally asked, "Where is this going?"
"I dont know, Dad. You tell me. You started it, so let me continue this.Now, tell me, what is the purpose of our lives?"
"Purpose of life is to play the game.Simple! Because, if you dont play the game, you would'nt be here to ask that question in the first place"
"I thought we are all in the pursuit of happiness"
"The happiness can be found in the game itself"
" Are you happy?"
"No, I am not", he replied.
"Why?"
"Because of you".
"Sorry dad. Your game is yours, my game is mine.If everyone plays their own game and find happiness in that, then how can I be responsible for your unhappiness?"
"You are my son, goddamn it!", he finally lost his patience.
"She is my MOTHER", I strategically stressed the word.
"Whats your point?", he asked betraying some helplessness.
"Dad, You are right and wrong about your game metafor for life. You are right because thats how people live. You are wrong because thats not how human life is supposed to be. Yes, I too played that game. But, it didnt give me any happiness. Now, because of mother I am forced to look into that darkness. I am forced to face my own fears. Mother is hiding in that darkness,and she wants me to find her even if she was buried or burnt to ashes somewhere. The only way I can find her is by chasing away that darkness -- becoming free of fear -- and filling it all with light. Then only I can find mother, and my happiness. Pursuit of mother is pursuit of happiness"
What I ever I said at that time was not planned at all -- I realised it right there -- at that moment -- triggered by the argument.
Continued here..
“What you going to do now?”, asked my father as I was packing my bag. The bulk of the bag was filled with my DVDs and books covering whole range of philosophy to psychology to fiction.
“I am going to find her”, I said calmly.
“Listen, son, Please listen to me. Don’t do it. Listen to me carefully”, he pleaded.
“Okay, I am listening”. I replied, obviously a bit touched by the 'please'.
“Let me ask you this. If you were born in a poor family, unable to afford even two decent meals a day, in a family where your sister is supposed to sleep with dirty laborers for those meals, if you were born in a family in which getting a heart disease is death, in a family which dreads that time in the night when the father comes drunk and beat everyone in sight; would you be thinking in the same way you are thinking now? Answer me.”
He talks logic. He talks logic. Mother wrote in her dairy.
“ I don’t know”, I replied. I was interested to know where he was going with all this.
“ You don’t know. But, I have seen families like that. They wouldn’t care a rat’s ass if their mother left them or not. If she left, its fine. You know why? Because, the hunger in the stomach or rather the fear of getting hungry can eat away the sorrow of deaths of hundred mothers. They wouldn’t chase mysteries. Tomorrow itself is a mystery for them. They are so involved in solving their own mystery of life that all other mysteries are mere facts for them. ‘Our crazy mother mysteriously left us’, that’s not a mystery. There is no why? What? How?. It happened and its over, and the next day the sun rises as if nothing happened.”
“Where you going with all this?”, I interrupted.
“Look at you. You get up at 12 in the afternoon. Eat food thrice a day. Drink diet coke. Smoke cigarettes. Drink alcohol. Watch TV and sleep effortlessly at 2am in the night. Where did you get all this comfort? Who provided you for your education? If I let that woman stay in this house, or if I went in search of her and brought her back, she would have destroyed our life. I wouldn’t be able to provide the comforts and education, you wouldn’t have this spare time, and acidity in the stomach because of overeating, and diet concerns. You wouldn’t want to go after her. You want to go after her because I saved this family. I saved this family."
"What family? You and me?", I laughed, satirically of-course.
"Yes. You and me. Two lives versus already one brain dead person. Think logically with the perspective of reality. What else can any man do in my position? Crazy people are crazy making.We both would have gone crazy. We both would have hated her. Look all those old people who refuse to die, who piss in their beds, who cannot move, look at them, do u think their kids really want them? Life does not stop for anyone.Everyone have their own lives to live.We have to move on. We have to survive."
I saw his point. I understood his logic. I had seen many middle class families who just hated their grandparents, very old grand parents who remained coma like for many years. Yes, their grandson and daughters cried for them initially for the first few years. And then, it got on their nerves. The old people just refused to die, eating away their time, money and most importantly their hygiene. Imagine the smell of piss and faeces, and that constant smell of death which refuses to leave.
Yes. I understood what he was talking. People move on.There were no memories to make peace with, just their conscience. Making peace with your conscience is nothing but the concept of moving on, as Everyone moves on, as if it is a fact of life. Morality has no meaning if everyone does the same thing.
But, then again, nothing made sense to me. All logic is based upon certain assumptions and ground rules. If you agree to those assumptions and ground rules, then only you can venture into that logical world. He made sense because a part of me understood those ground rules, but a part of me refused to accept the same rules. I went beyond those rules. I wanted to know the reason behind those rules.
Lot of questions popped up.
For what purpose are we all moving on? For what purpose we are living? For what purpose we are surviving?
I asked him the same. " Dad, What is this life all about?"
He gave me a surprised look and remained quiet for close to half-minute, and said something which kind of triggered me to some realizations, which made me finally find the reason behind my obsession to chase the mystery of mother.
" Life is a game. As simple as that. We got to understand its rules first, and than play it.Its pointless to ask why we are playing that game, because we are born on that playground. Horrifying darkness surrounds that playground. A darkness at which we are not supposed to look, a darkness into which you are not supposed to venture. People make rules of the game, people play the game hard, people compete with other, people do anything to involve themselves in the game -- with only one purpose -- with - only - one - purpose --- Not to stare at that darkness. That darkness is unknown, and its the most fearful-thing in the life of every organism, it is death, it is insanity.For all practical purposes, your mother ventured into that. I refused to follow her. I did the right thing"
He remained quiet for a few seconds, and then said as if he found something about his own life."Fear of that darkness drives our lives".
Emotion driving those rules: Fear. Fear of unknown. Fear of darkness. Fear of death.
The metaphor my dad gave stimulated my mind. May be that's why metaphors are for. May be every word is a metaphor for something in our lives.Now, he was talking about the king of metaphors -- a metaphor for life itself. A metaphor in which his philosophy of life got wrapped in.
Thoughts.Thoughts.Thoughts. What drove these thoughts? I didn't know. But, many thoughts came, only with the goal of proving myself right. I guess!
"Dad, What if there is no darkness surrounding us? What if there is a beautiful world surrounding us? Beautiful gardens, peaceful gardens with flowers and trees. But we refuse to look at them, because we were told..taught that there is only darkness outside, that it would be horrible for us if we stop the game and look outside. People refuse to look because they fear..an illusory fear. What if all that fear is an illusion?"
"Death is not an illusion"
"But, fear of death is."
"Are you saying that you have no fear of death?"
"No. I realized, just now, that I can be truly happy only when I lose that fear"
"You can never face death without fear"
"May be I will fear death at the exact moment I meet it, but I refuse to let my life guided by that fear".
He got my logic. He got my logic because I went beyond his assumptions, and established my own assumptions. But, those assumptions themselves became logic. Contradiction?
All physics becomes meaningless beyond big bang. All logic becomes useless beyond the big-bang of mind. is big bang in the realm of physics same as big bang in the realm of mind?
How can we define big-bang of the mind? Whats this mind-bang?
Yeah, he got it. Everyone gets it. But, they discard it. If they don't discard it, and accept it, that means they lived a false lives all these years. They played a game, and they played it with a purpose, but the logic behind that purpose was based upon wrong assumptions.But, they already mastered the rules of that game, and played that game all that life, just like a machine. They were programmed...and I was just a bug or a virus...for them.
Their life is programmed."Vadhinchina vistari valla jeevitam". A great poet said in telugu.
The machine --my father, started again, " But, that's not reality".
"Whats reality?"
" The reality is that your body is material, and it needs to survive"
" Dad, Do I need all your cars, palaces, fashions to survive?"
" But you gotta be competitive and successful in life. You need to find success and be powerful"
" Why do I need to be powerful?"
" You need to be powerful to play the game better"
" Wait. You need to play the game better so as to play the game better?"
"So, you chose to be a loser, then"
"How can I be a loser if I refuse to play that game of life...at-least the game you are playing which is based on false assumptions. You see dad, there is no stopping in that game of life you are playing. You get food and bed, but thats not enuf. You gotta own stuff, buy stuff, you are not supposed to be satisfied with what you have..because if you are satisfied, then you stop the game, but the fear wouldnt let you stop, and you gotta play the game forever..you played that game for too long that, Fear became you."
"Son, you are not buddha, you are not jesus, you are not muhammad, you are not mahavira.
If you think you are, please come out of your illusions. You dont know what pain is. You never suffered."
Can a buddha become buddha without pain?
Words came automatically out of my mouth, as if the thought 'Fear is an illusion' , and the thought that I rejected the assumptions on which the humanity based their lives, drove me.
"What if pain is pain only in your game?"
Pain is pain because of the game.
"But, you are still in the game", he replied.
"Yes, I was playing that game. I am taking a break from it now"
He lost interest in this whole discussion, I guess, as he might have found his contradictory self, and he was not comfortable with contradictions. His logic might have shutup my mother..but not her son.
He finally asked, "Where is this going?"
"I dont know, Dad. You tell me. You started it, so let me continue this.Now, tell me, what is the purpose of our lives?"
"Purpose of life is to play the game.Simple! Because, if you dont play the game, you would'nt be here to ask that question in the first place"
"I thought we are all in the pursuit of happiness"
"The happiness can be found in the game itself"
" Are you happy?"
"No, I am not", he replied.
"Why?"
"Because of you".
"Sorry dad. Your game is yours, my game is mine.If everyone plays their own game and find happiness in that, then how can I be responsible for your unhappiness?"
"You are my son, goddamn it!", he finally lost his patience.
"She is my MOTHER", I strategically stressed the word.
"Whats your point?", he asked betraying some helplessness.
"Dad, You are right and wrong about your game metafor for life. You are right because thats how people live. You are wrong because thats not how human life is supposed to be. Yes, I too played that game. But, it didnt give me any happiness. Now, because of mother I am forced to look into that darkness. I am forced to face my own fears. Mother is hiding in that darkness,and she wants me to find her even if she was buried or burnt to ashes somewhere. The only way I can find her is by chasing away that darkness -- becoming free of fear -- and filling it all with light. Then only I can find mother, and my happiness. Pursuit of mother is pursuit of happiness"
What I ever I said at that time was not planned at all -- I realised it right there -- at that moment -- triggered by the argument.
Continued here..
In The Silence Of My Solitude - A Novel (Part 16)
20. The book of revelations
One of the biggest myths perpetuated by the humanity from time immemorial, one of the biggest lies the humanity believed and deluded itself is this --- Parental love --- that Parents unconditionally love their kids. If such kind of unconditional love existed; then why are there honor killings, incestuous rapes, forced arranged marriages, jealousies, harassments, cruel corporeal punishments. divorces, second third fourth marriages, selling own kids, and borderline parents engulfing their kids? I am not saying that parental love does not exist, I am just saying that when people say that parental love is universal,that it is granted, that it is given....Its all a lie.
If at all there is anything that is called as Love, it only comes from understanding, not from needs. In that sense, a buffalo ferociously protecting its calf from the lion is not love, the mother nurturing her kid is not love ...they are just necessary evolutionary survival instincts.If parents refuse to understand their kids...then parental love has no meaning. There is nothing immoral,moral,right or wrong in that. Just that there is a disconnect between what the society teaches us and what really happens.
That was why I couldn't control my laugh when my dad finally said, " In spite of all this, In spite of you behaving so oddly, I still love you.Because, you are my son".
That was how that episode ended. Me laughing, and he leaving the scene.
That afternoon, as I was getting ready myself for an afternoon nap, I got a call. A trembling, agitated voice said, " Meet me exactly 10pm tonight at the ground"
"who is this?", I asked.
He revealed his name. It was the servant, the one who collapsed on the ataka.
"Just be there. I need to talk to you", he curtly said and disconnected the phone.
I spent the whole afternoon about what he was going to say. I had an inkling as to what he was going to say. He might had seen something there.But, why didn't he say something then? Why now?
At 9:45 pm I walked to the ground, reaching 5 minutes before the appointment. It was empty. The only light was the street light outside the ground. I stood at the lighted section of the ground and waited for him. Few minutes passed.Then I noticed a figure approaching me from the non-gated side of the ground, as If he was already there before I came.
I recognized the servant's voice as he asked, " Did anyone come with you?"
"No", I replied.
"Now, tell me what did you expect me to find there when you sent me up there", he asked with a trembling voice. He was obviously scared shitless.
"What did you see?", I asked him.
"Do you believe in god?"
"No"
"Do you believe in Jesus Christ?"
"Wait..what is all this?? Just tell me what you saw there""
"Read the bible..in the book of revelations..its all written"
I was aware of book of revelations. Every biblical horror movie I ever saw had a reference to that particular part of the book. If those horror movies were to be believed, the book of revelations had some information about how the world is gonna end..all those predictions.
"Cut the crap, and tell me what you saw there", I asked this time forcefully.
"Devil". he said, " I saw the devil"
"A devil?", I asked.
"A satanic devil", he replied.
" If you saw something there, why didn't you tell us about it on that day? Why did you act as if nothing happened"
"Don't you get it?"
"What?"
"The devil is protected. If your eyes meet the devils, and after that if you continue to be believer in the lord Jesus Christ, You are dead. They will kill you"
"Who are they?"
"The soldiers of Satan, your father, and his two friends"
"Stop it. Stop this nonsense", I raised my voice.
"I am warning you. Leave that house immediately, right now.You will die if you don't", he warned me.
"Thanks. I will think about it", I replied a bit sarcastically.
He remained silent for few moments.
Then he blurted out, "Its coming in my sleep. I couldn't forget its eyes. I couldn't sleep. The devil wants me.It wants me. Only Christ is protecting me..."
He murmured something, and then trembled in fear, and then he turned around and ran, disappearing into darkness.
While walking back home, I remembered that I too shouted 'I saw devil..I saw devil' while I was in the hospital. My 'devil' was different than this servant guy's 'devil'. I was sure that I had referenced devil in a casual way. But, his devil was the biblical devil -- the Satan himself. Then, it all made sense to me. He saw IT. IT saw him. But his conclusions were different.
I once had an unfortunate encounter with these kind of religious fanatics. With that experience, I can tell you, Whenever they see something extraordinary, either on earth or in the sky, they immediately attribute it to the bible. Most of the time it was all about second coming of the Christ, kingdom of the god, or the end of the world..and there was always evil lurking around..competing with the lord; it could be a comet, or a tragedy, or even gay marriage. If something abhors them, and if they couldn't wrap their mind around it, they immediately attribute it to the devil, concluding that it was a sign of things to come...horrible things.
Its not that they believe the bible, They want to believe the bible.They want to believe in something -- something permanent. They yearn for that.They were taught all their life that Bible is the word, that it is the word of god, and that it is permanent and eternal. The existence of other religions, faiths, agnostics and atheists makes them uncomfortable, and it plants a seed of doubt in their mind.That doubt bothers them every day. These extraordinary events provide them an excellent opportunity to clear that doubt. They find some hidden meanings in the bible pointing to those events, making them clear their doubt and restore their faith in the word of god. In that process they go to extraordinary level, almost obsessional level, to publicize the event, and finally saying that the Bible predicted it.
I attributed the same reason to the servant guy. But, in this case, the event actually happened to him. I felt bad for him. Jesus Christ, most probably the first person in the whole world who started the love movement at a mass level, taught us to love the enemy. But, there is no way any living human could love that creature.
I was sure about his recovery though. I thought that he was just going through a phase of coming in terms with a creature he had never seen before. I came out of it, didn't I? ...did I?
That night, as usual, I couldn't sleep. The encounter with the servant, and his words proved to me the existence of the creature, and he became my living witness, a living proof of my sanity. Slowly a plan formed in my mind, as to what I was supposed to do, and how to proceed. While I was thinking about the plan, I realized that I didn't love my mother. I just wanted to solve the mystery of mother. The mystery became my obsession. Dead or alive, I wanted to know what had happened to her after she left the house. I was surprised at myself, watching the passion and obsession with which I wanted to go after her. I wondered what could be that force inside my mind which was driving me towards her.
Next day afternoon, when I got up, My Dad broke me the shocking news. The servant guy committed suicide. His wife found his body hanging from the ceiling as she woke up in the morning. He hung himself right before his wife and kids as they slept. He took measures not to disturb their sleep as he died. That poor guy! That poor selfish guy!
In his suicide letter, written in poor Telugu, he explained that he was unable to clear the mounting debts and since he couldn't find a solution, he was forced to take that extreme measure. Few sentences near the end of the letter caught my attention. He wrote : Poverty is THE devil. I saw that devil. No matter how much I tried, I couldn't get away from it. I refuse that devil as my master. Jesus commanded us to love the poor because he knew the hatred in this devil.
That was how he ended his letter, and that must have been the first and last time he was creative. Had he realized, as he ended the letter, that he too could be creative, would he still be alive? Can a creative person creatively live his life? Can he creatively find solutions for the problems in his life? As I read those words, I felt that he cleverly mixed two truths in his life -- The 'devil' he saw, and the poverty he experienced everyday. But, he was afraid of the so called 'soldiers' coming after his family if they came to know that he saw the 'devil'. A dying man always want to tell the truth, to the people and to himself. And, that guy did his best to tell the truth. In the end, both were true. For me, he died a long back when he saw the devil of poverty, and now the sight of real 'devil' sealed his fate.
Some people face their fears, fight with them, and comes out triumphantly.
Some people face their fears, and unable to bear the horror, kills themselves.
Some people fear the fear itself, and by refusing to face it, die every day.
That servant who became my friend posthumously, my lone witness, my only proof of my sanity....died only twice.
Continued here..
One of the biggest myths perpetuated by the humanity from time immemorial, one of the biggest lies the humanity believed and deluded itself is this --- Parental love --- that Parents unconditionally love their kids. If such kind of unconditional love existed; then why are there honor killings, incestuous rapes, forced arranged marriages, jealousies, harassments, cruel corporeal punishments. divorces, second third fourth marriages, selling own kids, and borderline parents engulfing their kids? I am not saying that parental love does not exist, I am just saying that when people say that parental love is universal,that it is granted, that it is given....Its all a lie.
If at all there is anything that is called as Love, it only comes from understanding, not from needs. In that sense, a buffalo ferociously protecting its calf from the lion is not love, the mother nurturing her kid is not love ...they are just necessary evolutionary survival instincts.If parents refuse to understand their kids...then parental love has no meaning. There is nothing immoral,moral,right or wrong in that. Just that there is a disconnect between what the society teaches us and what really happens.
That was why I couldn't control my laugh when my dad finally said, " In spite of all this, In spite of you behaving so oddly, I still love you.Because, you are my son".
That was how that episode ended. Me laughing, and he leaving the scene.
That afternoon, as I was getting ready myself for an afternoon nap, I got a call. A trembling, agitated voice said, " Meet me exactly 10pm tonight at the ground"
"who is this?", I asked.
He revealed his name. It was the servant, the one who collapsed on the ataka.
"Just be there. I need to talk to you", he curtly said and disconnected the phone.
I spent the whole afternoon about what he was going to say. I had an inkling as to what he was going to say. He might had seen something there.But, why didn't he say something then? Why now?
At 9:45 pm I walked to the ground, reaching 5 minutes before the appointment. It was empty. The only light was the street light outside the ground. I stood at the lighted section of the ground and waited for him. Few minutes passed.Then I noticed a figure approaching me from the non-gated side of the ground, as If he was already there before I came.
I recognized the servant's voice as he asked, " Did anyone come with you?"
"No", I replied.
"Now, tell me what did you expect me to find there when you sent me up there", he asked with a trembling voice. He was obviously scared shitless.
"What did you see?", I asked him.
"Do you believe in god?"
"No"
"Do you believe in Jesus Christ?"
"Wait..what is all this?? Just tell me what you saw there""
"Read the bible..in the book of revelations..its all written"
I was aware of book of revelations. Every biblical horror movie I ever saw had a reference to that particular part of the book. If those horror movies were to be believed, the book of revelations had some information about how the world is gonna end..all those predictions.
"Cut the crap, and tell me what you saw there", I asked this time forcefully.
"Devil". he said, " I saw the devil"
"A devil?", I asked.
"A satanic devil", he replied.
" If you saw something there, why didn't you tell us about it on that day? Why did you act as if nothing happened"
"Don't you get it?"
"What?"
"The devil is protected. If your eyes meet the devils, and after that if you continue to be believer in the lord Jesus Christ, You are dead. They will kill you"
"Who are they?"
"The soldiers of Satan, your father, and his two friends"
"Stop it. Stop this nonsense", I raised my voice.
"I am warning you. Leave that house immediately, right now.You will die if you don't", he warned me.
"Thanks. I will think about it", I replied a bit sarcastically.
He remained silent for few moments.
Then he blurted out, "Its coming in my sleep. I couldn't forget its eyes. I couldn't sleep. The devil wants me.It wants me. Only Christ is protecting me..."
He murmured something, and then trembled in fear, and then he turned around and ran, disappearing into darkness.
While walking back home, I remembered that I too shouted 'I saw devil..I saw devil' while I was in the hospital. My 'devil' was different than this servant guy's 'devil'. I was sure that I had referenced devil in a casual way. But, his devil was the biblical devil -- the Satan himself. Then, it all made sense to me. He saw IT. IT saw him. But his conclusions were different.
I once had an unfortunate encounter with these kind of religious fanatics. With that experience, I can tell you, Whenever they see something extraordinary, either on earth or in the sky, they immediately attribute it to the bible. Most of the time it was all about second coming of the Christ, kingdom of the god, or the end of the world..and there was always evil lurking around..competing with the lord; it could be a comet, or a tragedy, or even gay marriage. If something abhors them, and if they couldn't wrap their mind around it, they immediately attribute it to the devil, concluding that it was a sign of things to come...horrible things.
Its not that they believe the bible, They want to believe the bible.They want to believe in something -- something permanent. They yearn for that.They were taught all their life that Bible is the word, that it is the word of god, and that it is permanent and eternal. The existence of other religions, faiths, agnostics and atheists makes them uncomfortable, and it plants a seed of doubt in their mind.That doubt bothers them every day. These extraordinary events provide them an excellent opportunity to clear that doubt. They find some hidden meanings in the bible pointing to those events, making them clear their doubt and restore their faith in the word of god. In that process they go to extraordinary level, almost obsessional level, to publicize the event, and finally saying that the Bible predicted it.
I attributed the same reason to the servant guy. But, in this case, the event actually happened to him. I felt bad for him. Jesus Christ, most probably the first person in the whole world who started the love movement at a mass level, taught us to love the enemy. But, there is no way any living human could love that creature.
I was sure about his recovery though. I thought that he was just going through a phase of coming in terms with a creature he had never seen before. I came out of it, didn't I? ...did I?
That night, as usual, I couldn't sleep. The encounter with the servant, and his words proved to me the existence of the creature, and he became my living witness, a living proof of my sanity. Slowly a plan formed in my mind, as to what I was supposed to do, and how to proceed. While I was thinking about the plan, I realized that I didn't love my mother. I just wanted to solve the mystery of mother. The mystery became my obsession. Dead or alive, I wanted to know what had happened to her after she left the house. I was surprised at myself, watching the passion and obsession with which I wanted to go after her. I wondered what could be that force inside my mind which was driving me towards her.
Next day afternoon, when I got up, My Dad broke me the shocking news. The servant guy committed suicide. His wife found his body hanging from the ceiling as she woke up in the morning. He hung himself right before his wife and kids as they slept. He took measures not to disturb their sleep as he died. That poor guy! That poor selfish guy!
In his suicide letter, written in poor Telugu, he explained that he was unable to clear the mounting debts and since he couldn't find a solution, he was forced to take that extreme measure. Few sentences near the end of the letter caught my attention. He wrote : Poverty is THE devil. I saw that devil. No matter how much I tried, I couldn't get away from it. I refuse that devil as my master. Jesus commanded us to love the poor because he knew the hatred in this devil.
That was how he ended his letter, and that must have been the first and last time he was creative. Had he realized, as he ended the letter, that he too could be creative, would he still be alive? Can a creative person creatively live his life? Can he creatively find solutions for the problems in his life? As I read those words, I felt that he cleverly mixed two truths in his life -- The 'devil' he saw, and the poverty he experienced everyday. But, he was afraid of the so called 'soldiers' coming after his family if they came to know that he saw the 'devil'. A dying man always want to tell the truth, to the people and to himself. And, that guy did his best to tell the truth. In the end, both were true. For me, he died a long back when he saw the devil of poverty, and now the sight of real 'devil' sealed his fate.
Some people face their fears, fight with them, and comes out triumphantly.
Some people face their fears, and unable to bear the horror, kills themselves.
Some people fear the fear itself, and by refusing to face it, die every day.
That servant who became my friend posthumously, my lone witness, my only proof of my sanity....died only twice.
Continued here..
In The Silence Of My Solitude - A Novel (Part 15)
19. People Don’t Change
Can we really understand people? Can a husband really understand his wife, with whom he was living for the last 50 years?
Yeah, sure, he knows what she likes, what she wears, what she eats, etc..etc..but, does he really understand her? Can a father understand his grownup son/daughter; whom he fathered, looked after, fought, compromised and for whom he sacrificed part of his life?
The answer to all these questions points to a single source --- Pain.
Pain may as well be a prerequisite for self-knowledge, and which in turn is a prerequisite for balming the same pain; but pain could also lead to self-destruction if the circumstances do not allow that person to introspect, especially if that pain grows up the ego to hide it.
Hide it, It grows. Observe it, It diminishes.
When a person hides his pain, he builds a wall around it, as he builds that wall..he automatically builds a wall around his soul..there by turning into a different person.
He lives with that character he built for the rest of his life, more or less. As hidden pain grows, the growing pain reaches the boundaries of the wall, and the mind adjusts itself to build its ego, and there by changing him further -- to a worse version of himself.
That person is always blind to the facts before him, especially the facts which would rupture his ego. That person, knowingly or unknowingly becomes the most dangerous person creating pain to everyone around him.
And, that person exists in every one of us in various intensities.
My dad was no different, in that moment. But, was it obvious??
He was a person who commanded respect in society, a person who craved and worked for that respect. Such a person would do anything for that society, even if it involves hurting his own family. The society sees only that part of him, the part which strives to be a conformist. If a man is not obvious to himself, how can his real nature be obvious to others except during the times of explosive emotions.
What my dear dad implied was that I too was going in the footsteps of my mother – that I was also going crazy. Preposterous..ain't it? Even if I had the same psychiatric disorder as my mother, Even if I was going crazy…Why would we see the same ‘something’ at the same place?
I was shocked by his revelations. I was angry. But I observed myself.
I knew that I was going through all the emotions any person would go through If he faced the same situation. But the difference --- I observed myself. That observation calmed me down. If I was able to observe my mind, didn't it mean that I disassociated myself from my mind? If I apply the same logic, Whom shall I blame? My dad or his mind? If I blame his mind, then doesn't it mean that I really don't hate him?
Did I observe myself or I only thought that I observed myself? It didn't matter. When a thought calms you down, you apply the same thought process to others. I applied the same thought -- the thought that he was not to be blamed but his mind, and that application made me forgive him. The tragedy of the whole concept of 'observing yourself' is that -- the thought -- the thought which made you unhappy already happened.
Is a man responsible for his actions?? I didn't know the answer for that, and it didn't matter either. I didn't want revenge. I wanted the truth. I knew that people don't change. They do the same thing again and again expecting a different result every time. That implied only one thing -- My dad was going to demonstrate, at-least partially, how he behaved with her when he rightly or wrongly suspected her of going crazy.I hoped his behavior would provide with information about what my mother had gone through, or at least what she might had felt.
So, I let him continue that drama. I acted in that drama. I observed him as I acted. I didn't ask him too many questions. A man's actions betrays a lot more than his words.
"Dad, Why don't we search the Ataka?", I suggested him.
"No, I already did it when your mother came running to me on that night. There is nothing on it..damn it! Dont you think I would have seen it for all these years? Ask yourself..why you saw it only after reading her diary".
She wrote something in her diary, and after reading it your imagination played a game with you.
"Please, for my sake, search again?", I pleaded this time.
He accepted. Thank god.
He, along with neighbors servant, started searching the Ataka. My dad lied to the servant that I saw a snake in there. The servant turned out to be, incredulously during all these incredulous incidents, a snake lover. He wanted to catch the snake alive. He warned me again and again not to kill the snake as he noticed me arming myself with an iron rod.
I armed myself with an iron rod. I found it in the construction site a block away from my house. I didn't intend to do anything with it, but it acted as an anti-dote to the fear in me. Are all violent people kids inside?
They searched the whole ataka for almost an hour.
"Nothing in here", the servant shouted.
My dad's eyes met mine. Accept your defeat, they were saying. I didn't.
"Do you see any hole in the wall?", I asked the servant.
"A hole?"
"Yes, a hole in the wall at the corner".
The servant disappeared for a couple of minutes, and then he shouted, " Yes, there is hole here. A big one, the snake might have escaped from here. I think it came from the same hole"
I looked at my dad. WTF expression in his face. He immediately walked over there and confirmed it.
"Any explanation for the hole?", I asked.
"I don't know. I am sure it was not there when we built this house", he replied.
"Do you see any football lying around there?", I asked the servant with some trembling excitement in my voice.
"A football?",
"Yes, a football"
"What football got to do with a snake?", he asked.
"Just look for a football", I ordered.
He again disappeared for a couple of minutes. I could hear the sounds of boxes kept aside, objects dropped, objects picked up..the usual sounds of a search..and then..silence..increasing my heartbeat..and then again the search. He found nothing in the end.
As they were about to climb down the ataka, I asked him, "Did you look inside the hole?".
"No, I didn't", he replied.
"What if the snake is inside it?"
My dad wore an apathetic face. He already concluded the outcome of these proceedings.
The servant, who was already drenched in sweat, disappeared again.
"No.Nothing in the hole", he shouted.
"Search properly", I shouted back.
A tense minute went by. I didn't know why I was tensed as If I sensed something, as If that creature was right there looking at us, observing us. I might had sensed the smell. I might had sixth-sensed it. I didn't know. But, I felt very tense.
I was able to see the the light dispersed by the torch light. An eerie feeling. An anticipation of hell.
My Dad got down the ataka and went in to the hall for a breather.
The servant finally came back, and stood at the edge of the ataka. The torch light still on.
"Nothing here", he said. He gave up the search.
"Do you smell anything peculiar?",I asked him.
"Peculiar? No. But, then again, all these kinds of places smell the same"
Then, I noticed a a shadow of a snake..may be a tail..I didnt know..it was right behind him..
and I shouted on the top of my voice, " LOOK UP!"
He looked up. The torch fell down. Then I heard a scream, and then I heard a thumping sound of someone falling down, and then...silence. Terrible silence.
"What did you see?", I asked him, after he came out of his blackout.
That poor guy had lost his consciousness on the Ataka. My Dad called for help, and two of his friends appeared. They got him down the ataka, and searched it once again...including the ceiling.They found nothing. We waited for him to wake up. Finally after half-hour he woke up. I knew what he saw. I was sure he was going to tell them what he saw. That was my ticket to prove everyone that that creature was not my and my mother's imagination.
I asked him again , "What did you see?"
He replied, "Nothing".
"Nothing? Then, why did you scream, Why did you fell down? tell me".I was shocked by his response.
"No. I didn't see anything. I slipped and fell. Thats all. I didn't see a thing", he replied.
"I told you to look up, right? You looked up, right?"
"Yes, I looked up.But there was nothing. I just slipped and fell"
"What nonsense!". I was totally frustrated by his response.
"Look, I didn't see anything, not a snake, or rat, or a cat. I need to go now", he said.
I tried to stop him, calling him a liar and whatnot. My dad's friends stopped me.
That guy almost ran away from the house, as if he didn't want to be there even for one second.
"It was on the ceiling. I saw it.It was right there", I shouted.
"What did you see?", one of my dad's friend asked.
"A creature, I think", I said.
They looked at me with sympathy. Looked like they already knew the whole story -- my dad's version of the story. But, I tried to convince them. I told them everything, all the events that had happened for the last 2 weeks. They didn't interrupt me.
After I finished my version of the story, one of the friend said, " Listen to your dad. You need a doctor". The other guy said,"No, he just needs a job", and laughed.
Nope. They didnt believe my story. I didnt see any reason as to why they had to believe it. There was no proof. Moreover, the story made me look deranged. I didnt blame them.
Two days went by. My dad decided that he had enough with that Ataka, and he hired some construction laborers to dismantle it. I didn't object to it as I too wanted it to go. It was the scene of a mystery ,but I was not Sherlock Holmes, I was the victim cum detective. Moreover, I believed that Ataka served no purpose to the amateur detective in me..as I gleamed as much information an amateur could from it.
While they were dismantling it, with their tools and whatnot, they discovered that the hole had in fact an opening outside, a six feet above the inside opening, near the upstairs, not as big as the hole inside, but a smaller one, covered by some trees. It took them large amount of concrete to fill the hole, and they joked that we had been screwed by the engineer who built this house as he used inferior material to build it.
But, for me,it all made sense. If I forget for a minute as to who made that hole, the fact that there was an opening outside made it plausible for me to believe that a creature entered through it. That became my proof.At least I thought it was my proof. But would the existence of the hole prove the existence of a creature?
As they dismantled the ataka, and filled up the hole, I broached the subject with my Dad.
"Dad, Dont you think it is kinda odd that there is hole with an opening outside? In all these years, you didnt notice that?",
"No, I didn't, and frankly, I am quite surprised. But, this has nothing to do with any creature whatsoever. I never saw anything."
"What makes you so sure?", I asked him.
"What makes me so sure? Even if there is something here, I don't see any reason why would anyone behave oddly, or crazily after seeing it. Its just impossible", he explained.
"But, you yourself said that you didn't see anything. How can you be so cock-sure about how people are supposed to behave after seeing it?"
"Why don't you just leave me alone?". He was irritated.
I observed his face closely. No, it was not cock-sure, it was full of doubt. There was guilt in his face, and that meant only one thing -- a doubt had been planted in his mind. It appeared to me as if he wanted to dismantle the ataka to erase his memories, his guilt, and his doubt. A seed of doubt had been planted in his mind, and he wanted to kill it before it grows big. He tried to kill that seed by dismantling the scene of the mystery.
The ataka was dismantled within a couple of hours, and it took two more hours to fill the hole. By that evening, everything was clean and done. If any new person saw that room, and was told that there existed an ataka few hours back, he wouldn't believe it..imagine me telling my story that something else existed in there. My Dad took extra care to make sure that no traces of past existed in that room. Thats how he tried to kill his memories, thats how he tried to repress them. I call it repression by destruction.
That night it rained heavily. The TV was on. Dad was eating his dinner all alone. Watching him like that, all alone, made me feel sorry for him. What did he achieve in the end? The things he had done decades back were haunting him. He thought past as something gone, something over..and he thought he moved on. But, did he really moved on?
Thoughts as usual came and gone, even as I was watching the TV. But, this time, there was no fear..I was sure that creature did not live there anymore. That calmed my mind a bit...and the thoughts freely flowed. I was thinking as to why that creature appeared only to me and my mom, but not to my Dad. I was a late sleeper, and as I wrote before, I got that habit from my mother's side -- she is also a late sleeper -- a vampire kinda -- a nocturnal.I remembered that every-time we saw that creature, we saw it in the middle of the night. That meant that the creature is nocturnal. It becomes active in the night. Some animals are nocturnal, aren't they? Since, my dad was an early sleeper, he most probably didn't come in contact with it.
There was something else -- Why didnt my Dad and his friends hadnt been able to find it the last time they checked the late-ataka? Most probably, it must have escaped through the hole.But, why did it come to ataka in the first place? What does it eat? Male? Female? Sex? Kids? What is it anyway? An alien that fell down in a freak accident? A creature born on earth?
I remembered that it rained quite heavily on the night I found it. I also sensed the smell when it was raining. I quickly turned to my dad interrupting his dinner, " Dad, Can I ask something?"
"What?"
"Was it raining...well, did it rained on that night when mother saw, i mean, she thought she saw something?"
"I don't remember", he replied without giving much thought to my question.
"Please remember, its important"
He thought for a couple of seconds, and then said, " Ya, it rained that night.So what?"
"Nothing. Just asking", I replied.
If it was not a mere coincidence that we both found the creature during rainy nights, that meant --most probably it likes to stay in dry places, and hates wetness. Since, it is a nocturnal creature, and since it rained that night, the creature instead of going out that night, climbed down the ataka most probably in search of food.
The puzzle was getting solved too easily, and I didn't like it. Yes, it relieved me for a minute, but there was a sense of unease. I felt as If I was writing a Sherlock Holmes mystery, and trying to give hints to the readers, sometimes throwing them off the track by misleading them, and in the end showing them how all those edges fit perfectly, and how clever I was as a writer. But, that story was all my imagination. In the same way, What if that creature was just my imagination, and what if I was using mere coincidences as solutions to the puzzle? What if I was imagining as a writer and reader at the same time, trying to out-guess myself? A small doubt. Wait, What if I just doubt my own success, What if I was sabotaging my own progress.....
A thunderstrom somewhere stopped those thoughts.
Rain again, I thought.
Wait, Rain. Night. It is raining tonight. A rainy night.
A creature. Noctural. Hates rain. It is raining now.
I didn't sleep a wink that night.Nothing returned. Nothing happened either.
Two more days gone by. I waited for my dad to make a move, the same move he made with my mother. He didn't make a move, he didn't talk to me either. Then I realized that he already made a move, it is called the silent treatment. Either that or he was really thinking something, or worrying about something. I put my hopes on the later.
Worry is nothing but mind looking for solutions for pain or a prospective pain, and result of that worry may go both ways. The mind may find solution or it could find a short cut by repressing the pain.Either one of them must happen ASAP, because the mind cannot sustain that pain for longer time. It is almost like death. That shortcut -- repression of the pain is a survival technique which we learnt as kids....and mastered it as we grew up. That's why I say that people don't change, because in order to change you have to be truthful to yourself. Repression goes against truth.
I was sure my Dad was not going change at all.The small doubt -- a doubt that he might be wrong about my mother -- a doubt that got planted in his mind because of the existence of the hole, and most probably the peculiar behaviour of the servant, caused him pain. But, it was a small doubt and a small pain. These small pains, in comparison to ego-smashing-life-altering mega pains, are very dangerous. I predicted that he was going to worry, feel guilty, and regret for a couple of days, and unable to face the resulting pain, he would hide it, by falling back on his old self. He would absolve himself of all wrong doings, he inflates his ego by telling himself that was the best father, best husband, and he did the best he could do. He would put the blame on others. He pities himself for being the sacrificial lamb. He imagines telling people how he sacrificed his life for the welfare of his family, and the people calling him 'a great guy'. That thought calms him down. Taking that calmness as cue, the mind encourages the same thought. The mind imagines, creating stories to gain sympathy from others, and the only way to do that is to make the villain of the story evil. The villains in this case - Me and my mother. Then slowly he starts believing his own stories. The cycle of pain-repression-ego inflation is now complete. I predicted all of it, and was just waiting for him to make a move.
On the third day, he approached me. I didn't find any kind of worry in his face, but he appeared sad, as if he was carrying the burden of humanity.
"You know what?", he said.
"What?"
"The truth is that You and your mother..both are both mental", he said.
I realized right then and there..that my predictions came true. His words were carefully designed to officially put the blame on others, and more importantly designed to hurt them.
He continued, " It breaks my heart to say that...to talk the truth. The truth that I married a crazy woman and begot a crazy son. I wonder how many hits this heart of mine is gonna take. A crazy wife who destroyed my life, and now, a crazy son who is destroying my happiness..whatever remained of it. Oh god, let not even the worst enemy of mine face the same predicaments I went through and going through"
His face grew sadder, but I knew that somewhere inside he was feeling happy, feeling better about himself. He was infected with Jesus Christ syndrome -- a false sense of sacrificial lamb -- fake righteousness -- A self-pitying narcissist.
He killed us to save his soul.
People don't change, do they?
Continued here..
Can we really understand people? Can a husband really understand his wife, with whom he was living for the last 50 years?
Yeah, sure, he knows what she likes, what she wears, what she eats, etc..etc..but, does he really understand her? Can a father understand his grownup son/daughter; whom he fathered, looked after, fought, compromised and for whom he sacrificed part of his life?
The answer to all these questions points to a single source --- Pain.
Pain may as well be a prerequisite for self-knowledge, and which in turn is a prerequisite for balming the same pain; but pain could also lead to self-destruction if the circumstances do not allow that person to introspect, especially if that pain grows up the ego to hide it.
Hide it, It grows. Observe it, It diminishes.
When a person hides his pain, he builds a wall around it, as he builds that wall..he automatically builds a wall around his soul..there by turning into a different person.
He lives with that character he built for the rest of his life, more or less. As hidden pain grows, the growing pain reaches the boundaries of the wall, and the mind adjusts itself to build its ego, and there by changing him further -- to a worse version of himself.
That person is always blind to the facts before him, especially the facts which would rupture his ego. That person, knowingly or unknowingly becomes the most dangerous person creating pain to everyone around him.
And, that person exists in every one of us in various intensities.
My dad was no different, in that moment. But, was it obvious??
He was a person who commanded respect in society, a person who craved and worked for that respect. Such a person would do anything for that society, even if it involves hurting his own family. The society sees only that part of him, the part which strives to be a conformist. If a man is not obvious to himself, how can his real nature be obvious to others except during the times of explosive emotions.
What my dear dad implied was that I too was going in the footsteps of my mother – that I was also going crazy. Preposterous..ain't it? Even if I had the same psychiatric disorder as my mother, Even if I was going crazy…Why would we see the same ‘something’ at the same place?
I was shocked by his revelations. I was angry. But I observed myself.
I knew that I was going through all the emotions any person would go through If he faced the same situation. But the difference --- I observed myself. That observation calmed me down. If I was able to observe my mind, didn't it mean that I disassociated myself from my mind? If I apply the same logic, Whom shall I blame? My dad or his mind? If I blame his mind, then doesn't it mean that I really don't hate him?
Did I observe myself or I only thought that I observed myself? It didn't matter. When a thought calms you down, you apply the same thought process to others. I applied the same thought -- the thought that he was not to be blamed but his mind, and that application made me forgive him. The tragedy of the whole concept of 'observing yourself' is that -- the thought -- the thought which made you unhappy already happened.
Is a man responsible for his actions?? I didn't know the answer for that, and it didn't matter either. I didn't want revenge. I wanted the truth. I knew that people don't change. They do the same thing again and again expecting a different result every time. That implied only one thing -- My dad was going to demonstrate, at-least partially, how he behaved with her when he rightly or wrongly suspected her of going crazy.I hoped his behavior would provide with information about what my mother had gone through, or at least what she might had felt.
So, I let him continue that drama. I acted in that drama. I observed him as I acted. I didn't ask him too many questions. A man's actions betrays a lot more than his words.
"Dad, Why don't we search the Ataka?", I suggested him.
"No, I already did it when your mother came running to me on that night. There is nothing on it..damn it! Dont you think I would have seen it for all these years? Ask yourself..why you saw it only after reading her diary".
She wrote something in her diary, and after reading it your imagination played a game with you.
"Please, for my sake, search again?", I pleaded this time.
He accepted. Thank god.
He, along with neighbors servant, started searching the Ataka. My dad lied to the servant that I saw a snake in there. The servant turned out to be, incredulously during all these incredulous incidents, a snake lover. He wanted to catch the snake alive. He warned me again and again not to kill the snake as he noticed me arming myself with an iron rod.
I armed myself with an iron rod. I found it in the construction site a block away from my house. I didn't intend to do anything with it, but it acted as an anti-dote to the fear in me. Are all violent people kids inside?
They searched the whole ataka for almost an hour.
"Nothing in here", the servant shouted.
My dad's eyes met mine. Accept your defeat, they were saying. I didn't.
"Do you see any hole in the wall?", I asked the servant.
"A hole?"
"Yes, a hole in the wall at the corner".
The servant disappeared for a couple of minutes, and then he shouted, " Yes, there is hole here. A big one, the snake might have escaped from here. I think it came from the same hole"
I looked at my dad. WTF expression in his face. He immediately walked over there and confirmed it.
"Any explanation for the hole?", I asked.
"I don't know. I am sure it was not there when we built this house", he replied.
"Do you see any football lying around there?", I asked the servant with some trembling excitement in my voice.
"A football?",
"Yes, a football"
"What football got to do with a snake?", he asked.
"Just look for a football", I ordered.
He again disappeared for a couple of minutes. I could hear the sounds of boxes kept aside, objects dropped, objects picked up..the usual sounds of a search..and then..silence..increasing my heartbeat..and then again the search. He found nothing in the end.
As they were about to climb down the ataka, I asked him, "Did you look inside the hole?".
"No, I didn't", he replied.
"What if the snake is inside it?"
My dad wore an apathetic face. He already concluded the outcome of these proceedings.
The servant, who was already drenched in sweat, disappeared again.
"No.Nothing in the hole", he shouted.
"Search properly", I shouted back.
A tense minute went by. I didn't know why I was tensed as If I sensed something, as If that creature was right there looking at us, observing us. I might had sensed the smell. I might had sixth-sensed it. I didn't know. But, I felt very tense.
I was able to see the the light dispersed by the torch light. An eerie feeling. An anticipation of hell.
My Dad got down the ataka and went in to the hall for a breather.
The servant finally came back, and stood at the edge of the ataka. The torch light still on.
"Nothing here", he said. He gave up the search.
"Do you smell anything peculiar?",I asked him.
"Peculiar? No. But, then again, all these kinds of places smell the same"
Then, I noticed a a shadow of a snake..may be a tail..I didnt know..it was right behind him..
and I shouted on the top of my voice, " LOOK UP!"
He looked up. The torch fell down. Then I heard a scream, and then I heard a thumping sound of someone falling down, and then...silence. Terrible silence.
"What did you see?", I asked him, after he came out of his blackout.
That poor guy had lost his consciousness on the Ataka. My Dad called for help, and two of his friends appeared. They got him down the ataka, and searched it once again...including the ceiling.They found nothing. We waited for him to wake up. Finally after half-hour he woke up. I knew what he saw. I was sure he was going to tell them what he saw. That was my ticket to prove everyone that that creature was not my and my mother's imagination.
I asked him again , "What did you see?"
He replied, "Nothing".
"Nothing? Then, why did you scream, Why did you fell down? tell me".I was shocked by his response.
"No. I didn't see anything. I slipped and fell. Thats all. I didn't see a thing", he replied.
"I told you to look up, right? You looked up, right?"
"Yes, I looked up.But there was nothing. I just slipped and fell"
"What nonsense!". I was totally frustrated by his response.
"Look, I didn't see anything, not a snake, or rat, or a cat. I need to go now", he said.
I tried to stop him, calling him a liar and whatnot. My dad's friends stopped me.
That guy almost ran away from the house, as if he didn't want to be there even for one second.
"It was on the ceiling. I saw it.It was right there", I shouted.
"What did you see?", one of my dad's friend asked.
"A creature, I think", I said.
They looked at me with sympathy. Looked like they already knew the whole story -- my dad's version of the story. But, I tried to convince them. I told them everything, all the events that had happened for the last 2 weeks. They didn't interrupt me.
After I finished my version of the story, one of the friend said, " Listen to your dad. You need a doctor". The other guy said,"No, he just needs a job", and laughed.
Nope. They didnt believe my story. I didnt see any reason as to why they had to believe it. There was no proof. Moreover, the story made me look deranged. I didnt blame them.
Two days went by. My dad decided that he had enough with that Ataka, and he hired some construction laborers to dismantle it. I didn't object to it as I too wanted it to go. It was the scene of a mystery ,but I was not Sherlock Holmes, I was the victim cum detective. Moreover, I believed that Ataka served no purpose to the amateur detective in me..as I gleamed as much information an amateur could from it.
While they were dismantling it, with their tools and whatnot, they discovered that the hole had in fact an opening outside, a six feet above the inside opening, near the upstairs, not as big as the hole inside, but a smaller one, covered by some trees. It took them large amount of concrete to fill the hole, and they joked that we had been screwed by the engineer who built this house as he used inferior material to build it.
But, for me,it all made sense. If I forget for a minute as to who made that hole, the fact that there was an opening outside made it plausible for me to believe that a creature entered through it. That became my proof.At least I thought it was my proof. But would the existence of the hole prove the existence of a creature?
As they dismantled the ataka, and filled up the hole, I broached the subject with my Dad.
"Dad, Dont you think it is kinda odd that there is hole with an opening outside? In all these years, you didnt notice that?",
"No, I didn't, and frankly, I am quite surprised. But, this has nothing to do with any creature whatsoever. I never saw anything."
"What makes you so sure?", I asked him.
"What makes me so sure? Even if there is something here, I don't see any reason why would anyone behave oddly, or crazily after seeing it. Its just impossible", he explained.
"But, you yourself said that you didn't see anything. How can you be so cock-sure about how people are supposed to behave after seeing it?"
"Why don't you just leave me alone?". He was irritated.
I observed his face closely. No, it was not cock-sure, it was full of doubt. There was guilt in his face, and that meant only one thing -- a doubt had been planted in his mind. It appeared to me as if he wanted to dismantle the ataka to erase his memories, his guilt, and his doubt. A seed of doubt had been planted in his mind, and he wanted to kill it before it grows big. He tried to kill that seed by dismantling the scene of the mystery.
The ataka was dismantled within a couple of hours, and it took two more hours to fill the hole. By that evening, everything was clean and done. If any new person saw that room, and was told that there existed an ataka few hours back, he wouldn't believe it..imagine me telling my story that something else existed in there. My Dad took extra care to make sure that no traces of past existed in that room. Thats how he tried to kill his memories, thats how he tried to repress them. I call it repression by destruction.
That night it rained heavily. The TV was on. Dad was eating his dinner all alone. Watching him like that, all alone, made me feel sorry for him. What did he achieve in the end? The things he had done decades back were haunting him. He thought past as something gone, something over..and he thought he moved on. But, did he really moved on?
Thoughts as usual came and gone, even as I was watching the TV. But, this time, there was no fear..I was sure that creature did not live there anymore. That calmed my mind a bit...and the thoughts freely flowed. I was thinking as to why that creature appeared only to me and my mom, but not to my Dad. I was a late sleeper, and as I wrote before, I got that habit from my mother's side -- she is also a late sleeper -- a vampire kinda -- a nocturnal.I remembered that every-time we saw that creature, we saw it in the middle of the night. That meant that the creature is nocturnal. It becomes active in the night. Some animals are nocturnal, aren't they? Since, my dad was an early sleeper, he most probably didn't come in contact with it.
There was something else -- Why didnt my Dad and his friends hadnt been able to find it the last time they checked the late-ataka? Most probably, it must have escaped through the hole.But, why did it come to ataka in the first place? What does it eat? Male? Female? Sex? Kids? What is it anyway? An alien that fell down in a freak accident? A creature born on earth?
I remembered that it rained quite heavily on the night I found it. I also sensed the smell when it was raining. I quickly turned to my dad interrupting his dinner, " Dad, Can I ask something?"
"What?"
"Was it raining...well, did it rained on that night when mother saw, i mean, she thought she saw something?"
"I don't remember", he replied without giving much thought to my question.
"Please remember, its important"
He thought for a couple of seconds, and then said, " Ya, it rained that night.So what?"
"Nothing. Just asking", I replied.
If it was not a mere coincidence that we both found the creature during rainy nights, that meant --most probably it likes to stay in dry places, and hates wetness. Since, it is a nocturnal creature, and since it rained that night, the creature instead of going out that night, climbed down the ataka most probably in search of food.
The puzzle was getting solved too easily, and I didn't like it. Yes, it relieved me for a minute, but there was a sense of unease. I felt as If I was writing a Sherlock Holmes mystery, and trying to give hints to the readers, sometimes throwing them off the track by misleading them, and in the end showing them how all those edges fit perfectly, and how clever I was as a writer. But, that story was all my imagination. In the same way, What if that creature was just my imagination, and what if I was using mere coincidences as solutions to the puzzle? What if I was imagining as a writer and reader at the same time, trying to out-guess myself? A small doubt. Wait, What if I just doubt my own success, What if I was sabotaging my own progress.....
A thunderstrom somewhere stopped those thoughts.
Rain again, I thought.
Wait, Rain. Night. It is raining tonight. A rainy night.
A creature. Noctural. Hates rain. It is raining now.
I didn't sleep a wink that night.Nothing returned. Nothing happened either.
Two more days gone by. I waited for my dad to make a move, the same move he made with my mother. He didn't make a move, he didn't talk to me either. Then I realized that he already made a move, it is called the silent treatment. Either that or he was really thinking something, or worrying about something. I put my hopes on the later.
Worry is nothing but mind looking for solutions for pain or a prospective pain, and result of that worry may go both ways. The mind may find solution or it could find a short cut by repressing the pain.Either one of them must happen ASAP, because the mind cannot sustain that pain for longer time. It is almost like death. That shortcut -- repression of the pain is a survival technique which we learnt as kids....and mastered it as we grew up. That's why I say that people don't change, because in order to change you have to be truthful to yourself. Repression goes against truth.
I was sure my Dad was not going change at all.The small doubt -- a doubt that he might be wrong about my mother -- a doubt that got planted in his mind because of the existence of the hole, and most probably the peculiar behaviour of the servant, caused him pain. But, it was a small doubt and a small pain. These small pains, in comparison to ego-smashing-life-altering mega pains, are very dangerous. I predicted that he was going to worry, feel guilty, and regret for a couple of days, and unable to face the resulting pain, he would hide it, by falling back on his old self. He would absolve himself of all wrong doings, he inflates his ego by telling himself that was the best father, best husband, and he did the best he could do. He would put the blame on others. He pities himself for being the sacrificial lamb. He imagines telling people how he sacrificed his life for the welfare of his family, and the people calling him 'a great guy'. That thought calms him down. Taking that calmness as cue, the mind encourages the same thought. The mind imagines, creating stories to gain sympathy from others, and the only way to do that is to make the villain of the story evil. The villains in this case - Me and my mother. Then slowly he starts believing his own stories. The cycle of pain-repression-ego inflation is now complete. I predicted all of it, and was just waiting for him to make a move.
On the third day, he approached me. I didn't find any kind of worry in his face, but he appeared sad, as if he was carrying the burden of humanity.
"You know what?", he said.
"What?"
"The truth is that You and your mother..both are both mental", he said.
I realized right then and there..that my predictions came true. His words were carefully designed to officially put the blame on others, and more importantly designed to hurt them.
He continued, " It breaks my heart to say that...to talk the truth. The truth that I married a crazy woman and begot a crazy son. I wonder how many hits this heart of mine is gonna take. A crazy wife who destroyed my life, and now, a crazy son who is destroying my happiness..whatever remained of it. Oh god, let not even the worst enemy of mine face the same predicaments I went through and going through"
His face grew sadder, but I knew that somewhere inside he was feeling happy, feeling better about himself. He was infected with Jesus Christ syndrome -- a false sense of sacrificial lamb -- fake righteousness -- A self-pitying narcissist.
He killed us to save his soul.
People don't change, do they?
Continued here..
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