6th April 2020 – 13th DAY OF COMPLETE LOCK-DOWN OF INDIA

24TH DAY OF MY SOCIAL ISOLATION

4693 POSITIVE, 129 DEAD (2.75%), 346 RECOVERED (7.37%)

General Feeling: “Reflecting about life is often a beautiful moment. Living that moment, however is surreal. I feel we’re living such a moment of 21 days, reflecting on many many things, which needed attention & time that we just didn’t have.” 

There is only so much one can open up about oneself. Or are there no boundaries?

As I went about the day, I wondered what is it that I wanted to write about in tonight’s blog. I had many ideas actually. I wanted to write about a recent conversation that I had with a bunch of friends in which we wondered why is it that it’s become difficult to find people interesting and intriguing. Why are we so bored easily? Why is it getting difficult to find such common grounds with people that you enjoy your conversations with them and can do that rather regularly?

Were we living in such narrow bubbles that we’re unable to find connections with people? Are we failing to see them as they are and are constantly templatizing and re-organizing them in our set boxes of experiential conditioning? Like, what’s happening?

We didn’t find many answers. And we were too tired to philosophize further. As I understand it, somehow as we grow older and our cohorts become narrower, the ability to find one-ness with another person in any sense, even basic human camaraderie starts getting affected. More and more, we look for people who’re like us. And when we meet them, we sometimes don’t like them. Yeah, that’s kind of weird.

Sometimes, ‘what we like’ and ‘what we want’ are different things. Most of the times, actually!

I also considered addressing the conversation around Corona’s communal nature, which has picked up steam in the country after the Markaz episode. I thought I’ll do a case study of world history to find references of when and how religion has taken more lives than pandemics or wars. How religious theories have burnt men and women, ostracized them, divided them. How religion, of any kind, is being more divisive at a time in which only community welfare and social cooperation can save us from extreme misfortune.

It was an ambitious project to undertake. It was going to need extremely thorough research with credible citations. It was a sensitive topic (read: hyper-ultra-mega-sonic-sensitive). So needed to be handled carefully. And these days, you never know, social media disagreement leads to crimes & all! 

Thank God for the lock-down, it’s unlikely I’ll be attacked with acid. I am not sure why I paint such a grim picture about social-media badgering in my mind. Is it the Deepika Padukone movie (Chhapaak) that I saw a month back? Or is that this topic is actually that explosive?

Anyway, the third and final option was to write a very personal account of suffering & abuse. Of mansplaining, of humiliation and of undue aggression. That would have been kind of crazy. Not just because, I’ve never spoken to many people about this or ever written about it. But, also because I was scared of stirring up the dust that had quietly settled in some place of my generally-worn out heart.

It would perhaps mean calling people out. And I do not want to do that. (Although one would argue that it’s the right thing to do). I am not sure why. It’s not that I am scared. Personally, I am just non-confrontational, I guess. Call it convenience, maybe?

I mean being in touch with oneself is a very difficult pursuit. And you never quite make it a 100%. You’re sometimes 75, sometimes 90, and sometimes not even 30! It keeps somewhat swinging but eventually improving. So I guess, no- matter how much we try, somethings, we’ll always find difficult to address.

This doesn’t mean lack of ‘maturity’. It probably means lack of ‘readiness’. The strength to address these things comes by itself and doesn’t come until you’re kind of ready for it.

Unlike love. Love comes in, when you’re least expecting it.

At least that’s what they say. (Always wondered who ‘they’ were and why they ‘said’ so much!)

So yes, it’s love. The only thing that transcends this animate & in-animate world. The thing that really matters and the thing which exists, in different forms, across time-space, planets and ecosystems. It’s just love that you feel when you’re in sync with the nature. Its love that is joyful and bountiful. Love makes you feel it’s worth living. Love brings meaning. In meaningless ways.

A set of people I love, - Ritu Kothari, Gaurav Nijhawan and their beautiful tiny Anaya. (Ritu & Gaurav are not just my college seniors and close friends. They have often been guardians and treated me like their baby.)
 I often called them Mom & Dad those days, 2010-2015 ish.