Why I write today

It is very close to my favorite season of the year and I am feeling tired. In fact, more than tired, I'm feeling jaded. What's going to be new and different now? Routine swells of time will pass, days will come and go, nights will spread and recede, and time will pass. What's going to happen?

Sometimes, I wonder if it is such a good idea to keep a diary. I write to keep track of the winks and nudges of the Universe. To get a sense of perspective. But there's no perspective to be had because I can't see the boundaries. I don't know where anything begins and where anything ends. If you do believe the law of karma, how can you say a particular incident is a cause or an effect? And if you can't determine even something as fundamental as that, then does it mean you have to be on your toes all the time?

And why is it important to make sense of all this, in any case? Because...I think minds are condemned to reason. There is nothing more annoying than faced with the prospect of seeing a whole lot of explanations around and yet have a disgruntled feeling that something's not quite all right.

I have been severely depressed the last two days because I have not been able to make sense of what I am thinking. It is irritating to question yourself - because it's illogical. I first of all question myself because I am stupid enough to not have a fool-proof explanation of anything. And second of all, if I am indeed stupid enough to not have a robust enough explanation, what is the use of asking me any questions further? This is what I have been trying to talk myself into all this while.

Is this what existential angst feels like? Like Salinger said, "..everything feels peripheral?" Like Sylvia Plath said,"..we all live in our bell jars?"

It's not about questioning too many things. I don't question much at all. I don't question things like how companies can be so cruel to expect employees to travel nearly 4 hours every day and yet not have a gym or a room to sleep when you're tired. I don't question things like how is it that the stickiest, rotten people in the world are getting babies when the nice deserving ones aren't. I don't question. All I question is this...why does all this happen? Why? I remember Gayatri so much. I miss her with all my heart. I will write about her soon. I have to. She is a gift to the world. And she has just passed on because of the stupid teachers we had - the ones who couldn't appreciate or understand her.

Now I understand the significance of death. Or at least I am getting a sense of why it is important. It is important to stop at some point and say, I will not go on like this. I cease to live. And then you step off the treadmill, and just watch the belt go whirring on. All the while, you just watch. You just see what's happening; not question, not make sense of it, not sequence information or categorize or put stuff in order, etc.

I wish I were dead, while still being able to observe life as it went on. I wish I didn't have this urge to collate stuff and make it meaningful. Why should it be meaningful? Why can't it be just one day of mess peeling away to reveal another layer of decrepit. It's all layers anyway. How do you know that, Mukta? I don't know that. What's knowing, really? Just saying something over and over and over again is knowledge.

Gayatri would be able to explain it all so well. Until my teachers...that teacher...killed her. It's good you died, Gayatri. You deserve much better.

What is this life anyway? A continued struggle to get your head and your heart to learn that they work for the same person.

If I could die for a little bit, I would take my head out for coffee and sandwiches and ask it," What did you think of me?" Maybe my head will say, "You were a really cool person to be around...but maybe I could have done more with my time, you know. I had so much time to spare."

Maybe I'll take my heart to Zenzi and order chilled Chilean wine (for the heart...I am a teetotaller now) and ask it, "Were you happy with me?" And my heart would snap, "Are you crazy! You broke me almost every other week, and you had no clue how to handle me...and what was with all those twisted emotions you kept hoarding inside? That stupid brain of yours was so empty...you could have passed some of it there, right? Oh...and one more thing...i am delicate...I need a vault of my own..what's the big idea of wearing me on your sleeve?"

See...I have mistreated my heart, so that's why I need to spend more on it by taking it to Zensi. My brain will be sated with Jai sandwich ...the cheap bugger.


Then maybe I'll call both of them to Bandstand and tell them that I need to be away somewhere and it's best they learn to get along without me. I introduce them and walk away and when I turn around, I see them sitting on one of the benches in the promenade and talk animatedly. I stop and look at them a minute - my babies.

They happen to look at me as well. My brain smiles and looks away. My heart jumps up and down and gives me a flying kiss and giggles. I do the same.

Strange...you always hurt the one you're closest to.