I feel so old.
So cold.
I feel
Alone.
Helpless.
Dejected.
Vain.
Insignificant.
Charming.
Horny.
Impotent.
A wreck.
Flatulent.
Restless.
Like dancing.
And cowering in a corner.

But the one thing I don't feel...
Is lonely.
And for that I am grateful.

A mind storm, space truckin', helter-skelter
Cellophane flowers and lemon trees
A crazy train, a magic carpet ride

Open your eyes, you're out of control
Under pressure, act naturally

Hush, let it be, I'm so tired
Dream on alone on the hill

It's all right now
Numb.

- An anonymous worker in Richard Cory's factory.

(I'm shamelessly copying this from an earlier post of mine, but as pointed out by a friend this post really belongs here.)

Laurels were only meant to decorate your head, but you expect to ride on them all your life. Lovemaking to you is an achievement. The blocky angular plastic world around you has left its mark in your head - its jagged edges continue to hurt you from within. You smile just so people will not bother you with their concern, your life simply ticks by the sound of bugs crackling on the bug killer. While your hand curls up yet again to give you empty pleasure, and while the world momentarily fades out, giving you one moment of clarity, one moment to move up to the ceiling of the room and see yourself as you are and be free of all the hazy lights and the screens and the unbearable noise, you consider giving it all up. That's the only way. Clear and delightfully simple.

A moment later you are washing your hands, and all the years of filth come back inside you, and you fear the clarity once again.

We were on a train journey back from Goa. The three of us. We had shared some good times, shared a few details of our lives with each other.

We got down from the train with not a worry in the world, on to one of the smaller stations the train had stopped at. There was a small crowd gathered on one side of the platform. But of course we went and poked our heads in amongst the onlookers. It was a gambling game, a game simple enough to understand upon but one glance: three cards, one being an ace, were first displayed and then shuffled around face down. All you had to do was guess which one of the three was the ace, post-shuffle.

I know what you're thinking... Well, of course it was rigged, but the false and utterly conceited notion that we could outwit those uneducated con-men ensured that we fell right into their trap. I remember how strongly I urged my friend to place a 500 rupee bet and that too twice! Of course I couldn't in the end see through what they were doing, and of course we lost our money. I did pay my friend my fair share of the losses, but I'll always remember how stupid I felt. How helpless. How humiliating, the experience of being fooled, in bright daylight, even when we knew what we were getting into.

I had to swallow and bury this little incident. I told no one unless I absolutely had to. We all have such memories, don't we? Ones that still bring back such strong emotions in us that we get min-choked into silence. Ones that sting just as strong. Ones we want to forget and we can't.

Still, we do what we can to make sure we don't make the same mistake. Don't give ourselves the chance to feel like that again. And in the process create barriers. Iron fortresses of defense. Which our minds can run into, with everything we need. All except some light. Incidents like the one I just described and others have not made me less gullible. All they have succeeded in doing is make me feel so.

And I noticed that there are people who are so skeptical and paranoid about everything and everyone that they often miss something that they needed to hear. Grimacing, they tend to analyze what they hear to no end, because they think they know best. They wish to take everything with a pinch of salt, but more often end up with just a whole lot of salt!

I still don't consider myself old enough to have stopped learning. I'll absorb all I can get, understand where the words are coming from and what they might mean projected onto my little world. I know I'll be fooled enough times in my life whether I am careful or not. At least this way I'll learn a little more.

She opened my eyes.
I came, I saw, I did not conquer. I watched.
I saw the landscape from the hill.
But I still sit on the hill alone, glass in hand, watching.

I see no difference in what I see.
Through the glass or without.
Surely I think I'm smarter than that.
Only I'm not.
And all that's real to me is the grass.
And the glass in my hand, alone.