Sunday, September 2, 2012

Dear Life, With Love

Dear Life,

It has been 24 years trying to find you, understand you, revel in you- celebrate you at least once every year. Last year in particular has been all about FINDING you. One moment, you were with me and the next moment you vanished. I saw a faint structure of you far away in between the fog. I didn’t know where you were going. So I just followed. I ran behind you, panting, losing breath, sweating- if it were a treadmill, I would have lost so much weight (well, let’s just leave that for another day). It seemed like a long winding road, uphill and downhill. I took detours sometimes, hoping to catch up with you faster. While I was at it, I met your twin lovers- Dreams and Reality.

Dreams was a lot of fun. He revealed a different side of me which I never knew existed. I would sit with him for hours, talking about you, sometimes us. Every time I spoke to him, the picture of you in my mind became more colourful. I discovered new music, met new people, explored places I’d never been to before, learnt new things, met his friends- surreal, divine and enigma, boomed with them and felt closer to you.

While I was flirting away with Dreams, one day I came across his alter ego Reality. I didn’t know who he was then. He looked straight into my eyes. I felt a strange connection, like he could read what was inside me. I turned away, not knowing what else to do. But that look stayed with me in my mind, my heart was busy taking care of Dreams. I remembered him often when I was with Dreams and his friends.

One warm evening, when I was tired running behind you carrying a hangover from Dreams’ revelry, I felt someone running behind me. From the corner of my eyes, I saw it was Reality. I slowed down. Everything around me became slow too. I felt the wind getting into my hair, the fallen leaves on the ground were flying in slow motion, my eyes felt heavy and head was in a whirlwind. I felt a flash of darkness in front of my eyes, I lost my balance… Reality was right there to catch me in his arms. I didn’t fall. Even in that moment of unconsciousness when my mind and heart stopped ticking, I could feel his broad arms and the intimate scent. I woke up to find his eyes looking at me. There was something about his eyes, which now made a place in my heart as well.

He explained to me how I had entered a limbo and while I thought I was running, I was actually sleeping. I was in such deep slumber that I imagined I had woken up.

Well, I am pleased to break this news to you that I am ‘in a relationship’ with Reality. And we are extremely happy together. We understand each other so well and he is a great lover! As I turned 24 today, he gave me the most beautiful gift- Wisdom. I have got nothing to complain!

Still running behind you, but with him by my side.

Love,
S

Edited to add: From the Birthday series - How S turns 23

12 comments:

  1. Happy birthday S :) That's a profound post - beautiful, deep and coming-of-age. There's a lot to learn and realize from this post so I will read it again.

    Welcome back to blogging. And please keep writing. Don't abandon this space. :)

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  2. Hi Ajay :) Thanks for your wishes.

    "profound" :D I never thought I will have a comment like this on my blog! Have been trying to come-of-age for quite some time now :D Hence the long hiatus! Thanks for being a reader despite my absence in the blogosphere.

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  3. Happy Birthday S!
    Remember me? Your blog alter-ego? :)
    how you been doing? I can see a lot of growing up has been happening! :D

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  4. Thank you :)

    Yes, yes I do !! *hug*
    I have been doing great! Haha.. growing up ;) trying to sound like one! :P

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  5. OMG.. u got "Wisdom" as a Birthday Gift.. Beware, it could really accelerate your Growing Up Process.. Jokes Apart, it was a nice post..

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  6. Haha.. I wish there was a way to cease the growing up process! :D

    Thanks for dropping by :)

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  7. > While I was flirting away with Dreams, one day I came across his alter ego Reality

    << I will not remember these thoughts when I want to comment later - so here goes ad lib>>

    There are a handful of lines in Inception that will stay with me forever. One of them was when Cob and colleague visit the chemist in Morocco, they go into his slumber laboratory and see 5 - 10 people "sleeping". He corrects them, "Oh no, they don't come here to sleep - they come here to wake up!"

    Inception claimed to be about a dream within a dream within a dream. Remember that concept when you reach the second half of Sophie's World. Then, when you watch Inception again, ask yourself if there weren't four levels of dream in the movie (and when you visualise the movie in your own mind, they effectively become levels of "dream" in your own mind, so 5 deep).

    << I will return to Inception in the near future, comments on it feature in how I ended up on your site on 19 Aug. >>

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    1. OK - I looked up exactly what the screenplay had, I see I made a few mistakes (I will check the movie again though, I am sure that you actually see 5-10 sleepers, not 18-20 though)

      EXT. DECREPIT BUILDING, MOMBASA - LATER
      Eames leads Cobb and Saito down uneven steps to a doorway.

      INT. PHARMACY - CONTINUOUS
      Row upon row of wooden shelves holding hundreds of dusty
      glass bottles of all shapes and colors. At the far end, a
      portly 40-year-old man rises from behind his desk, beckoning.
      This is YUSUF.

              EAMES
            (counting)
          Eighteen, twenty-all connected, bloody hell.

              EAMES
          They come here every day to sleep?

              ELDERLY BALD MAN (O.S.)
          No.

      Cobb turns to the Elderly Bald Man, who looks fondly at his dreamers.

              ELDERLY BALD MAN
          They come to be woken up... the dream has become their reality...
          The Elderly Bald Man pokes a crooked finger at Cobb's chest.

              ELDERLY BALD MAN
          And who are you to say otherwise?

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    2. Last thoughts (for today) on this

      i) Contemporary writer (name TBA): "Most people go through life asleep - they never wake up." {His sense was not that they dream their way through life though.}

      ii) Plato, "Most people don't see reality, all they see of life, and think of as life, are images like the shadows cast at the back of a dim cave. They never see where the light comes from, nor what is casting the shadows."

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    3. Inception is one of my favourite movies :) It makes you think. I don't know anybody who has watched that movie just once! Dream within a dream is an intriguing concept. The open-ended climax leaves the viewer filled with more curiosity :)


      Loved the last two quotes that you shared. Thank you.

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  8. Ref (i) : Anthony de Mello, Awareness, (date TBA).

    Spirituality means waking up. Most people, even though they don’t know it, are asleep. They’re born asleep, they live asleep, they marry in their sleep, they breed children in their sleep, they die in their sleep without ever waking up.

    P.S. Happy birthday today :-))
    Maybe my last email did not get through, it had 5+ MB of attachments, possibly gmail bounced it? Am testing to myself, will resend in smaller pieces if needed.

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    1. Thank you for your wishes. I received your email too. Thanks a ton! :)

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I love hand-written notes :)