13 going on 30...

Aaj kal ke bachche bhi naa……


Why is it that life is no longer as much as fun as it used to be? Even at a relatively young age why does it seem that this abyss of gloom is ever expanding? What was it about childhood that made the simplest of pleasures most endearing, the wildest of indulgences, an innocent pretext of experience?

I guess it is this and not the “string quantum theory” whose validity needs to be authenticated. With a life marked by few accomplishments and fewer but piquant moments of happiness, let me venture into this mysterious dimension, a dimension known to the truly blessed as “ultimate happiness”.

One major reason for the things becoming too sallow and sorrowful is the murder of the freedom to make mistakes. In our younger days we never “thought twice” a fact which colored even the most mundane of situations. Today we don’t think twice but at least 42 times before venturing into simple endeavors because of the fear of failure and the obsession of perfection. As a kid did we ever think of the absolute necessity for perfection? We had no precedent, no experience and most importantly nothing to fear. We became indomitable with the sheer audacity of manner and the simplicity of precision. As time flew past us and the dreaded age caught up with us, it brought along his senile brother- the much loathed experience, who by the way has crippled us in ways more than one.

One of my so called experienced friends, aged 19 considers “age gracefully” the best known oxymoron of the “white man’s” language. In his opinion, which I endorse, how the “6th letter” can one age gracefully? After adolescence/youth, when you get toyed around by the “hormones”, you graduate to mid life crisis and guess what is the icing on the cake?? “Graceful old-age”, fat chance!!! And I was left feeling that the very conversation between a 19 and a 21 year old about “old age” is by itself kinda oxy“moronic”!!!

I loathed just about every other poet back in school when their work meant 2 S.A.Q’s (Short Answer Question) and 1 E.A.Q( Essay Answer Question), because they got away with scribbling gibberish with their quills and died “peacefully” quite contrary to the sleepless nights they gave us before those examination D-days. I’m sure that not one of those men of letters is lying straight in their grave after listening to the interpretations that we have given to their simple verses.

For a specimen let’s look at this innocent stanza from Robert Frost's "The Road not taken":

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I--
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

How many of us still bear bumps on our head (from all the head-banging on the wall) trying to decipher the exact mood of his “bloody sigh” when he composed those god-forbidden lines? Some of us felt his sorrow for having lost out on the race in life as a result of the wrong path. While some others dwelled upon his sense of vindication for having taken the path (though less traveled) to success. All that “yours truly” could make out of it was that the poor chap just lost his way in the forest; they had not come up with route maps,cell phones and GSM tracking devices by then u see..

We no longer appreciate the happiness of little yet satisfying things in life because we are what I call “over-educated”. We are forever trying to double guess, play mind games and this is truly the age of “multi dimensional thinking”. Take any person in this whole wide world for instance, we are all getting hyper so to say about who is going to think what, say what, et all…

Our neighbors are busy guessing our military strategy; Zidane is playing mind games to defeat Ballack before which he needs to tackle Luis Figo, Palestine is awaiting Israel’s attack, Shashi Tharoor is trying to gauge the mood of UN member nations, Rakhi Sawant is searching for the next set of celebrity lips, Mahesh Bhatt is waiting for the next Hollywood movie to release in order to make an inspired desi version, Sourav is plotting Chappel’s downfall, Y.S.R is worried about C.B.N, my father is trying his level best to guess “what in the world is my son up to?” and I’m trying hard to control my laughter thinking about how my colleagues and friends will react after reading this?? The worst victim of the multi dimensional thinking is George W(icked) Bush because he has to keep track of so many people in the world; from Osama to Kofi Annan, from Chirac to Hugo Chavez, from Musharraf to Putin and every body else who is minding his own business!!!

And after all this, we have the ultimate tear-jerkers to contend with (read as Karan Johar flicks) and when we are back home we are ushered into the utopic families by "KKKyun ki mama bhi kkabhi kkaka tha"," KKusum", "KKasam se(god-promise)" etc...in addition to the Indian Idle, Sa Re Ga Ma Pa Da Ni, The great indian (pls laugh at us) show and not to mention the hazaar news channels: one fixed on Rakhi Sawant( whatever it takes to be), one on Salman Khan, one on late night parties but none on actual news!!!!!

Women have a way of complicating things...I ll tackle that in my subsequent posts!!! As of now lemme stop and be content with the male "brick bats"


Some more food for thought: Is metrosexuality an excuse for men to cry out loud???


Keep picking your brains...!!!