Ripples of my Reflections

I think, therefore I write

Category: FICTION (Page 5 of 5)

My encouter with the inevitable

January 4, 2012 / / 10 Comments

I stood there, lost in the awesomeness of the sunset. I had retreated to my favorite spot on the terrace to sulk over the endless problems that seem to find their way to me effortlessly. Why has 2011 been a year that I cannot understand? Why did it seem that the year has taught me a lot yet I am glad that it ended? Why do the familiar rays of hope arise when I think of 2012, when nothing has changed? I am still waiting for things to fall into place, holding my breath and pretending that life will pass on and one fine morning, everything will be like I wanted it to be. But, why does the hope arise in my heart from time to time? I thought of curbing the hope that arises and creates disappointment when the hope does not turn into reality. I decided not to believe in a tomorrow. If it comes, that’s good! Else, I will at least be spared of the disappointment. After all, hope didn’t seem to be a good decision to my problems. And with that decision, I continued to stare at the sunset.

Image Courtesy: http://scienceblogs.com

The setting sun glowed under the dark covers of clouds and I couldn’t help but stare at it. It hurt my eyes to keep staring like that and my eyes watered, but I didn’t move my eyes from the scene. It was too beautiful. Slowly as the sun set fully, I was engulfed in the darkness around me and once again my mind started searching for answers, with undivided concentration. From where I stood, people on the roads below seemed like scurrying ants and the sight made me wonder how busy the city is even after dusk. Moms hurrying to their homes to make the dinner in time for their families, Dads hurrying to their awaiting families so that they can spend more time with their kids, Children hurrying back home after school in the hope of getting some play time, Auto-drivers dashing to and fro to earn enough wages for their next day’s life, Street-vendors looking for some last-minute business before they close their shops and head home and so on. What enables them to go through the tiring routine throughout the day and look forward to another day? What makes them believe in a better tomorrow?

Suddenly a blazing light flashed across and I looked up at the sky. I couldn’t believe my eyes. I watched in awe as the scene unfolded. A bob of light that started at a point started growing bigger and bigger until its radiance was so strong that I could no longer decide where it started and where it ended. From the very centre of the radiance, a figure slowly walked towards me and as it came nearer I found that it was none but me. But I am here on the terrace! How can I be in two places at the same time? The glowing me smiled and said “You can be anywhere you want to be”. “Hey! Wait a minute. You can read my thoughts?” was my shocked reply and “Can’t I? After all I am you.” was the smug reply.

Me: So you are saying that this is happening inside my head?

Glowing-me: Only if you want it to be.

Me: What the hell? Too much Harry Potter and this is the aftermath of it.

(Glowing-me smirks)

Me: What are you smirking at?

Glowing-me: I am astonished by how naïve you are. You can believe a book which spins stories about people flying on brooms, and carrying sticks around cursing others, splitting your soul into 7 and keeping it in 7 places, you secretly hope that there is a Hogwarts and you will get your letter soon, but you cannot believe in yourself.

Me: (Taking offense) Hey! Who told you that I do not believe in myself?

Glowing-me: Stop trying to be defensive. Who do you think I am? I am you. If you do not believe in me, then you don’t believe in yourself.

Me: Arggh! This is all so confusing. What do you want? Why did you come?

Glowing-me: I came because you called me.

Me: What??? When did I ever call you?This is getting weirder by the passing second. Can you please stop being so annoying and tell me who you are and why you came?

Glowing-me: Since you are too dumb to realize that we both are the same and that you indeed called me, let me explain. I am you and I came to make you realize that you just took the stupidest decision of your life.

Me: That’s outrageous. What decision? How dare you appear out of nowhere and call my decisions stupid?

Glowing-me: Didn’t you just take the stupidest decision of your life that you will curb the hope that arises everyday, to prevent disappointments? Didn’t you just decide to stop believing in a tomorrow? Didn’t you just decide to live in a no-man’s space until things fall into place by themselves?

Me: Huh! Yeah I did, but how can you say that they are stupid? I have my own justifications and reasons.

Glowing-me: You answered this question too, a few minutes back. Didn’t you wonder how all those people believe in a tomorrow and doing their routine? Didn’t you just think how they manage to look forward to another day in spite of a crappy day?

Me: (This is getting scary.. I better be careful in my replies) Yee..aa..h! I did. So what?

Glowing-me: Put things together, you dumb-head! They fit. Hope is the only thing that keeps us alive. Without hope, you are as good as dead. If you so not believe in a tomorrow, why should you live? You can as well jump off this roof and die. Why do you think that old man in that corner of the road still returns to the same spot every day? It is in the hope that someone would be kind enough to give alms to him the next day and he might be able to make a meal out of it. Why do you think that woman over there opens her snack shop every day, leaving her sick child at home? It is in the hope that the next day, business would be better and she would be able to make enough money to buy medicines for her child. Do you think you have the biggest problem of all? Do you think your life sucks the most? If you do, you are the dumbest person ever born. Why do you think you still manage to go through a very draining day and yet manage to cheer up the next day? Because deep down, you have that hope the next day will be better and might bring some good news that you want to hear. And if you decide to curb that hope and stop believing in a tomorrow, then I would say, kill yourself now. There is no place for people without hope in the living world.

Thus Having blasted me, the glowing figure of mine turned around and started walking back towards the center of the radiating circle. I stood as a rock, too shocked even to move. Was she right? Am I being stupid to stop believing just because a few things happened which I didn’t want to and a few things I wanted to happen didn’t happen. I looked up and saw the glowing figure slowly starting to disappear. I called out frantically, “Hey! Are you really me? Is this happening inside my head?” I heard a voice coming out from the receding glow “Only if you want it to be”. I stood there for a very long time. Not moving. The truth dawned on me like a glorious sunrise and I knew. The truth was bitter but I knew that I had been wrong in my decisions. After what seemed like thousands of years, I found my peace with the truth. I decided to believe. I decided to keep the hope burning in me. It felt right.  I yelled out into the space “Hey! I am sorry to have been a fool before. I believe now!” I got no answer, but I was pretty sure that I heard a smile within myself.

This post is a result of me trying to find my inner peace. Around the end of 2011, I had become upset even for the smallest of things going wrong. I was continuously restless, thinking if it was even worth living. 2011 had taught a lot to me, but still somehow the things I want to happen more than my life, never seemed to be happening. That had made me feel all lost, depressed, confused and mourning at the year-end. Then again, I found my peace in 2012’s birth. With 2012, the hope I almost killed was re-born. Things have not yet fallen into place, but maybe this year, everything will become fine. Maybe. Maybe not. But that will not stop me from hoping or believing. Without hope, we are nothing. Believe in a tomorrow. Have a blast out of 2012!

Image Courtesy: wikimedia.org

“Happiness can be found, even in the darkest of times, if one only remembers to turn on the light.”

Now, definitely too much Harry Potter! 😛 Right?

Until later 🙂

Love is just love!

December 3, 2011 / / 0 Comments

Originally written for DOV. Once I finished writing it, I felt very satisfied and full. So, wanted to record it here too 🙂

They were sitting on the stone bench on the park. “Love you” he said. “Me too” She said. They were lost in bliss. Time did not matter to them. Neither did the world around them. Lost in each other’s hugs, their smiles reached their eyes. Unlike those smiles that come when under the illusion that they are in love. Can you ever fall so much in love that you feel that your soul is no longer yours. Not your heart. Your soul. A single soul will no longer exist, rather an entwined strand that will glow in the darkest of time and also in the brightest of time too. Very few lucky people manage to find such a love.

Source: anasahmed.wordpress.com

Many have said, “Love is divine” and even more people have said, “Love is dark” and some have said, “Love is mystic”. But very few realize that love is just love. No adjective can do justice to it. The ones who realize this will never attach any undue description to it. No classification. No conditions. No expectations. If any of these are there, then it is not love. It is only a mirage that the mind chooses to see. Half of the people die believing this mirage to be true and the other half dies when they are hit by the realization that what they believed to be true and lasting was indeed a mirage. An illusion. Only a few exceptions escape the mist and see clearly.

Source: freewebs.com

Grey strands of hair and wrinkles decked their love. The couple seemed lost to the others in the park. A young man saw them and thought of approaching them to ask if they needed help. He had come to the park to calm himself down after a fight with his girl. Damn! He had resolved not to think of her again, at least for a while. He was so pissed off at the thought of her. So demanding and expecting she is, he thought to himself. Pushing the thoughts about her to a corner, her started towards the elderly couple to ask them if they wanted any help. As he neared them he saw that after all, they weren’t the ones who were lost and they weren’t the ones who needed help. The glow in their eyes seemed to be of a different kind, a different world.

He left without disturbing them.Without a word or even a look, the couple had managed to impart wisdom in him. From that day on, he kept returning to that park just to see them. To see that love emanating from them. The woman ran her hands through her mate’s hair softly smiling at him, as he lay on her lap looking deep into her eyes.

One day, they didn’t turn up. Nor did they, the day after. He went around, inquiring about them. Nobody knew who they were or where they lived.  Finally, a beggar who used to live in the corner of that park, guided him to a building on the opposite side of the road. It was an old age home. The place was so quiet. People moved about in slow motion, as if in a different world. He saw a lady helping an old man to his bed. He hesitantly approached her and inquired about the couple. She could not understand to whom he was referring to, because he had no names. And then after he described their looks and visits to the park, a knowing look came into her eyes. She asked him who he was and  how he knew them. By instinct, he answered honestly telling her all about how he ran into them and how he doubted if they knew him. He also pleaded her to allow him to visit them expressing his concern for them because in the past 6 months he had known them, they had never missed a day in the park.She asked him to follow her. He did, dutifully. She went across the road and inside the park. She silently pointed out to a piece of ground below the lone Gulmohar tree near the stone bench. “The place was their choice” she quietly told him. He went near the headstone that marked their place, apart from the red blossoms that the tree had bestowed upon them. As he slowly read the engraving that read “Born apart by destiny and lived together by choice. Love brought us together and we chose to let it do so. For Love is just love. Always.” tears made way to his eyes and down his cheeks. They were one of a kind and they had chosen this engraving for their headstone long back, she said. He nodded and left without a word. A part of him seemed lost and he knew where it went. Also he knew that the spot was a record for posterity. After all, love is just love!

A new attempt

August 13, 2011 / / 2 Comments

I recently discovered that there a concept called Vignette in literature. My curiosity was aroused because the tool I am working with at office is also called Vignette. So I thought, “Well, it doesn’t hurt to give this a try” and here it is. I am not sure if it is good or even if I have written a Vignette. But, well, this is my blog and where else can I post my feeble attempts at writing 🙂 😛

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Real Beauty

She hurriedly stepped inside her Mercedes and nudged her husband to get the car going. The rain had started splattering on the window harshly. The rain had already made her saree wet and she felt that her carefully done make-up had been smudged. Irritated at the rain, she took her compact from her handbag. She was suddenly flooded with the thoughts of her past, for no reason. It was a hard time then, without even being able to afford 3 meals a day.But back then, she was that innocent girl who thought that humanity existed in every human.She had thought that in this world, help would be given to those who asked for it. She learned that she was wrong and that she learned it the hard way. She no longer believed that helping others is a concept in this inhumane world. She had been taught by her experiences that much.

She was shaken out of her reverie by the knocking on her car window. A little girl was begging for money. The car had stopped at the signal. The water drops had stopped. The constant knocking on her window irritated her. She had stopped helping, the day she realised that the world is full of nothing but just cold-hearted robots. After a few more knocks, the little girl gave up and went to a man on the two-wheeler nearby, who dropped off a ten rupee note on the tiny palm of the girl. The girls little brown eyes turned wide at the sight of ten rupees. She watched the little girl run to the tiny shed beside the bus stand and call out to all her friends. All of them started shouting with joy and headed towards the tea shop. They got some brown buns that were hardly enough for all of them. Yet there they were, munching on the buns happily, taking turns in having a bite, feeding each other. Something stirred inside her. She looked down at the unopened compact in her hand. She put it inside, stepped out of her car and headed towards the little ones at the tea shop. The water drops started falling,again.

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Until later 🙂

If I were a guy!!!

April 23, 2010 / / 8 Comments

Hi all 🙂

Finally, I am done with the report stuff after facing so many problems.  Free till the next fiasco, viva-voce.

The topic of this post might seem funny or idiotic. However, I have often come across comments or remarks like “You should have been a guy!!” or “You behave like a guy!!”. Hence, this post.

I don’t regret this life of a girl because I take all the liberty that I can afford or sometimes, even more than I can afford (Thanks to my dad!!!). From childhood, my dad gave me all the freedom that was needed for me to stand up to anything I want. So, if I were actually a guy, these are the things I might have done:

1.I would have definitely been taller. 😛

2. I would have never been home before late night.

3. I would have watched all the movies with my friends, especially night shows. You can guess what mischief I will be up to at the theatre  😉

4. I would have been sent out of class for some reason on alternate days, because that’s when I will be coming to college.

5. I might have formed a gang of my own in the class or maybe I could have had the whole class as a gang 😛

6. I would have been more into cricket, fighting for teams that I support.

7. Midnight walks on the lonely road with a gang of friends would have interested me.

8. I would have never considered my dad’s scoldings though they are reasonable.

9. I would have been crazy about bikes and cars.

These are some might-be’s that come to my mind if I think – “If I were a guy….”  because I wish to do all these now, but am not able to, for reasons that you know:) However, life is the best as it is. So no regrets, no complaints…

Until later 🙂

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