Changing frequency

[ When talking to yourself, tangibly, becomes a necessity to maintain your sanity ]

As a kid my nightmares had me standing on a diving board, very high, made up of glass and as I would try to balance myself up there, the glass would break underneath my feet - completely crushed into pieces, noiselessly though - and I would fall in this abyss of darkness.

And wake up. And it would end.

Many years later, I wake up to reality and the free fall into the bottomless pit doesn't end. It makes me realise the metaphor of that particular dream and its convergence into reality.

Life has its peaks and troughs and I find myself shifting from one trough to another, maybe lower than before, I can't figure out, maybe because the numbness of being there negatively impacts your sense of direction and decision making. The peaks seem a thing of past - to me, to people around me. They seem far, a distant possibility, an upward slope you can't seem to gather the courage to even start climbing, reaching the peak seems out of bounds. But your clock is still ticking, the road to the peak won't be ever accessible.

Being in this trough dehumanises you gradually. You're no longer a person. You are your failures, piled together, stitched mercilessly with expectations and given a veil of a human face, that could nod positively when asked if okay.

Do you recognise yourself? The shine in your eyes, the ring in your laughter, the cheer in your voice long gone. Do you still dare to hope? To dream? To wish for more when all of them seem shredded into a million bits? You resemble those very pieces of broken glass - with rough edges and without depth.

The trough never feels like home. So you find yourself as if in another body and another place, although nothing outside has changed. You are an alien in your own surroundings.

Hearing the phrases "May your wishes/dreams come true" and "Stay the same" scare me to no end. And at this point of time, I don't know any other way of response to them.

Treading through days seems heavy, everyday begins with the effort to break through, using your last ounce of courage. The dents made in the trough are almost negligible and the night brings with it the familiar remorse and hopelessness.

The dreams of the peak are sporadic and never without the familiar fear of failing and falling.

Even the confession of the condition comes by hesitantly, words flee you, leaving you with the hostility of the incapability of expression and the necessity to do so nevertheless -

and hence, ramblings like these are born.

And with them, the reminder, to find a way to the peak. Tomorrow. Again.

Race against time : Prelude

2004
Nagpur

Dad dropped me and my sister at the school gate. My sister joined her friends and headed to her classroom. As I was about to pass through the school gate, one of my friends met me and said :

"You forgot your SUPW bag!"

I realised that to be true. I did place that godforsaken thing near my school bag but forgot to bring it along in a hurry.

Now let me digress a little and explain what this SUPW bag was. It was a bag you made using plastic sheet and decorated it as you liked. This bag was later used to keep your assignments of the SUPW class.

But what was the big deal? Who took that period of the time table seriously? The "Socially Useful Productive Work" class was a pain for most of the students and for all the parents, because, hello? Do you expect that students did all that art and craft by themselves? No! They were completed using inputs from parents and sometimes they ended up making the whole of it.

But being the kid that I was, I didn't want to be pointed out in the class or to be punished for being insincere. The time of morning assembly was drawing near. Students in queues had already started trickling out of the school building to the playground, where the morning assembly was held. There wasn't any time to lose.

So I ran! I ran back to my home!

With my heavy school bag still on my back, I started running back towards my home. To my little feet, the distance from the school to back home was a lot. I kept running. I passed by the usual landmarks I saw everyday, now in a blur, because of the tears welling up in my eyes. The thought of being late for school was also something I dreaded, among many other things. After a point of time, I was aware of my breathlessness but my feet didn't stop.

I encountered an old lady, going in the opposite direction, who asked me something in Marathi. I didn't understand a word she said and in all my awkwardness, I nodded and kept running! Perhaps she thought of me to be crazy to be running in the opposite direction of the school at that time of the day.

After a lot of running, I finally reached home - out of breath and in tears and that alarmed my parents. After I managed to tell them the reason behind this endeavour of mine, my dad was furious - for putting myself through this unnecessary ordeal, for something as frivolous as that SUPW bag. Mom intervened and asked him to drop me back, lest I get late for school.

It was just a few hours into the day and this high drama episode had taken place. I was dropped at the school gate again, this time with that wretched SUPW bag. There was a bit more of running to do. I ran to my classroom at the first floor and back to the ground, in the queue of my class at my place, just in time.

All sorted.
Or maybe not?

The last period. SUPW.
Though the teacher was very much present in the school that day, he didn't turn up for the class!

To this day, my dad teases me for that incident and all the family (myself included) has a good laugh over it! :D

Race against time

11 October 2015
New Delhi

The goodbyes and good wishes and parting hugs.
It's 3:45 pm, the train I'm supposed to board leaves at 4:35 pm. I still have time and the railway station isn't very far. I turn around and quickly head to the GTB metro station, which is only a few steps away.

"This won't take long." I think to myself, constantly checking my wrist watch.

As the train is about to reach Vidhan Sabha, this thought crosses my mind - I should take the trip to loo now, so that I don't have to do it on my way back home and wouldn't have to leave my bag unattended. Yes, that would be a wise thing to do.

( NO, IT WASN'T)

I get down at Vidhan Sabha metro station and walk towards the loo. I see this khaki clad woman preening, looking at her reflection in the mirror. Next, I try and open these two loos and when they didn't, I assumed they were occupied. There was a third one too, the door being without a door knob. I decided to wait for a while.

While I was waiting, another girl enters, repeats the process of trying to open those doors and reaches the third one, when this khaki clad lady says - "These two are out of order, only that one (without the door knob ) is functional."

I wondered why she didn't make this revelation a minute before!

I had to wait some more before I got to do my business and leave.

"I should still be able to make it. The metro won't take long." I assured myself.

15 minutes before the train departs.
I reach the New Delhi metro station. The swarm of people wasn't surprising, but was surely distressing. I join one of those not-so-symmetrical queues which was, thankfully, moving swiftly, until -

Until it was my turn.

I place my card at the panel. The error message written in red flashes across the screen. I don't remember what it said, I just remember the colour of it and I guess that very colour spread across my cheeks too, I could feel them burning. I try and place the card differently, a couple of times, but to no avail. I turn for a split second and see the crowd swelling behind me.

The metro card cheated me. At this point. And how!

That's when this metro security person, who was standing there and probably saw this episode of the betrayal of the metro card, came to my rescue. He gave me a token so that I could pass through. I did, but still couldn't let out a sigh of relief. Time was running out. I cut through these two men engaging in a brawl and made my way to the railway station.

10 minutes before the train departs and what I saw wasn't very encouraging.

An impenetrable human fence at the entry, right opposite to the metro station exit, where it says "for ticket holders only". There was no way I could make it to the station in 10 minutes. I was nearly at my wit's end when suddenly, as if a switch was flicked on inside me, I ran to the main entrance, the last resort.

The entrance wasn't any less crowded. I checked the display board for the platform my train was to arrive on. 9, it said. Now, I had to find the way to the platform. I spotted a flight of stairs, and climbed up only to find out that they weren't leading me anywhere. I still looked around to see if there is any way I could join the throng of people heading towards the platforms. None. I rushed down the stairs and saw the sign board, opposite to where I was, saying "platform 16 to 1". And between these two points, was a sea of people to cross.

I was making my way hurriedly to the other end when I heard this voice asking me which platform I wanted to go to and he could take me there without the checking process. I didn't even have the time to look back at the source of the voice. I kept moving. I could see the check point now. I made my way past the people moving leisurely.

The last lap. Reaching the platform. No time to look at the time.

It was for the first time that I actually had to push people aside (gently though) to make my way to platform no. 9. Reached the last set of stairs of this hurdle race. As much as I am afraid of falling down from the stairs, I got down as quickly as I could, with the other voice in my head telling me that a missed train is better than a broken bone.

Thankfully, the coach I was supposed to get into, wasn't very far from the stairs. I got inside and made way to my seat. I sat down, panting by now, sweat trickling down my neck and my throat felt what it might feel to have gulped down a burning piece of coal. I could feel my head and my face throb.

4 minutes for the train to depart. I made it!

It was several minutes before I was finally in a position to call my parents and tell them that I have boarded the train. Doing so while I was still struggling for breath would have scared them and that was certainly not the thing I wanted. I sounded like how a girl having a really happy birthday should.

Oh yes, this adventurous hurdle race happened on my birthday!

Exhausted that I was, I slept like a log for 40 minutes straight. My sense of time was pretty much distorted after that and the 4 hour journey didn't seem very long, like it used to be. All I wanted to do was to crash on my bed as soon as I could.

On the brighter side, I think I won't complain of the inability to fall asleep at night for a few days to come!