Independence Or Freedom?

Freedom and Independence have been used interchangeably and also occur as each others synonyms, but they do not necessarily mean the same thing. Are we really free when we are independent? Or are we really independent when we are free? The hairline difference between the two is a matter of discussion for everyone. Independence is being self dependent, being able to rise on your own feet. It means that that you have your own responsibility and your own dilemmas to solve.


Freedom means liberation which may lead us to think that it is the same as independence. In reality, the two words have different meanings and applications. Independence is somewhat binding, whereas freedom is full liberation. Independence demands a certain responsible behavior where you alone are responsible and answerable to your own  life. Freedom is complete liberty without any constraint whatsoever. 


When we celebrate India's Independence Day, we rejoice and feel freedom in our hearts. That feeling is the freedom we want to have, the liberated state we want to be in, not the one we are in, currently. Has our independence given us the freedom we all crave for? Or has our liberated thoughts and unconstrained life lead to independence? As a matter of thought, I personally feel that we choose our own ways, whether it is to be independent enjoying all the responsibility or to be liberated with a carefree eye on the future. So, when we celebrate Independence Day next year, we should be able to demarcate what we actually are celebrating, our independence or our freedom.

Numb

I walk down the streets all my by myself. I look no further beyond what is necessary. I enter the supermarket at 9 pm and walk down. I grab a packet of cupcakes and some Lindt and pay. I move out into the street and find myself with no umbrella and a heavy dose of rainfall. I decide to wait outside under the shelter. I try to cover myself from all sides and instantly, my chocolate bar falls to the ground. Disgusted, I bend down to pick it up and with that, I accidentally, pick up some of my previously dropped memories too.

It was raining heavily that day. Thunder and lightening, it had not paused for over a few days now. There was no grocery in the kitchen and we had been surviving on left-overs. As our last cup of coffee and a packet of biscuits were on the verge of finishing, he told me, "On my way to the supermarket, come back before you know it."

And he came back, all soaked up with loads of food stuff. That day was one of the last times we enjoyed. After exactly seven days and eighteen hours, I was sitting next to his body wrapped up in cheap linen on the empty road in the never-ending rain. That was my last day in the city. I moved out as soon as his funeral was over. I answered no calls and nobody called me thereafter. I could not feel myself, it felt as if my heart was numb too. My blood had frozen and I could no longer speak or move. I stayed alone in my new flat with my books. I read a lot and wrote a little. I did not know when I fell asleep or when I woke up. I hardly looked at my watch as I was afraid it would show me the time of his death. Things started to get better when a guitarist moved up to the floor above mine. His guitar kept me engaged and it gave me a good night's sleep. But apart from having less baggy eyes, nothing had changed. I lived the same old life with same old grudges from life.

I pick up that chocolate bar and pretend that nothing earth shattering has happened a few years ago. I walk down the street, getting soaked, bringing home some food. That is what he did for me years back. I climb the stairs, the water dripping from my clothes and hair. I reach my flat and look for the key. The door opens up and I see a man with a guitar looking at me in total surprise. I was about to say something as I saw the room number which meant I had reached his floor. I was taken aback at my own stupidity when he took things from me and asked me where I lived. I point out towards the ground and follow him downstairs. 

This was the first time I had seen a person since 5 years. The minute I spoke to him, I didn't stop for hours. After I was done with my story, he told me he was one of the reporters back then when the accident took place and ever since he always wanted to cover my story. But now, that he has got one, he does not want it any more. He looks at me with life shouting out to me and I have smiling eyes for the first time. I hear his guitar playing again.

Re-Dilli

Red light at Aurobindo Marg.
"Didi, ek rupiya de do na." One of the girls start dancing to the dholak beats amidst the traffic and pollution. Her fragile hands on her waist, her face expressionless. Her rouge covered cheeks trying to cover the leftover tear stains from last night. Tears that had formed tributaries on her dust clad face. Behind all the show business lies a bunch of children trying to make a living.

Aren't we all trying to do the same, some with more rouge and some with less. But ultimately we all put some makeup and go there and make a living. Our real need is to live, amidst all the theatrical ambiance and decoupaged masks. We lose ourselves in the search of making a living.

I think about Delhi and think about what has it given me. Maybe, a mask or a red-colored rouge to cover up my real self and get out there and face reality.

Has it really made me strong? Has it really given me what I craved for? Or has it increased my craving? Has it been responsible for my newly acquired unlimited wants. Has it really taught me something or has it separated me from everything I knew. Many unanswered questions, answers unhidden.

A simple incident on a red light at around 10 am in the morning made me rethink about my entire life and rediscover myself from scratch. Maybe, that is what she has really given me.

A chance, a way to discover that I have a life. Maybe, she has given me the freedom to give it a second thought. To life.

Little Dreams

As the day bids farewell and the night proceeds to take over, I sat alone in an empty basketball court and ponder over my life. All these days I had been so busy with work, home and had not even a minute to myself. I think about all the lovely days and the ugly ones that have made me what I am today. I look at the orange horizon and smell the warm air which immediately rejuvenates me.

I think about my life and where I had started from. I always used to crib and complain about my life being unfair. And now, I laugh at my past self and take the criticism and the compliment equally. Every day I lived my life has made me stronger and I couldn't ask for more. All this while I had been busy working and struggling with my emotions, but now its the time to fulfill those little dreams which mean a lot to me. Those sweet little dreams which I had been saving for this while and now I can convert them into reality. Now all of them can really come true. As I watched the birds returning to their places at dusk, I thought I should also make a move. I stood up and looked at the vacant court and the empty net, and smiled. 

It was finally time for new beginnings, new hopes, new dawns. It was time for realizing dreams ans more importantly, it was time for dreaming about something new altogether.

Limited Unlimited

A very vague thought surfaces itself when I think about my present life. Its as if my life had just swept off my feet and sent me a a notification later on, saying that it had gone forever this time. Sometimes when such life-churning things happen, I often feel offended by life. I feel as though I have been cheated on by life. It comes to me as a day-mare and almost instantly everything I built is gone within seconds. I had built a castle in the sand and one day it just vanished. It flew away from me and told me it was just a random dream which couldn't come true. This is what makes me feel that life is so unlimited yet so limited. It does not always mean that we do not spend time with life. It means that in that limited amount of time, we should live and love our lives. We should experience the good and the bad, the rough and the smooth, all together and emerge out as a person who is holistic in every approach. So, get up and live your lives as much as you can.

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The Smell of Color

I sat down to paint. This was my first time after six long months. I had not seen paints, pencils in a pretty long time. I was afraid to touch them, feel them again. I still remember when I sat with colors for long hours, felt them and enjoyed their company. The very smell of them enticed me to play with them in a whole new way. I spread my cartridge sheet on the floor and took out my colors. I waited for the blank sheet to say something to me. I stared at it for some time until I could see birds flying and hear the sound of water gurgling. I picked up red color and mixed it with blue to create a purple hue. The purple touched the sheet and gave me energy to create new shades. I splashed a watery deep blue and dropped pink on it. I let the sheet dry and started again on another one. 


For the second one I dipped my fingers in Prussian Blue color, put it on the sheet and let the color flow from one edge of the sheet to another. The dark blue color slowly transformed itself into a lighter blue. I quickly made the ground with blue fingers and spread them with nails. When I dipped my finger into the glass bottle of the blue paint, I closed my eyes and let myself dream. I felt I was in ecstasy. The blue color melted on my finger and looked delicious. The next thing I did was to slowly smell the color on my finger. As I smelt it, I felt different. I felt I could never be this peaceful again. I wished this moment would never pass. I understood the smell of my colors, it was peace. I was at peace with them. The pure smell of colors are my release. Release from this world, this moment, this real life into a world of colors, a life full of vibrancy.


Everybody has a release, a way of letting yourself loose. Taking a moment off from the real life into a world of your own. Whenever we have a bit of time, we should always try and find out our release from our life and make peace with that moment. 

Dear Dilli

Our dear Delhi. Everybody remembers their memories in city, whenever they set their foot in Delhi. My first day in Delhi was when I stepped out of the Lucknow Mail at 7:00 am on 9th July,2006. The enormous railway station which had 12 platforms left me wide-eyed. Honestly, I had not seen the city before that but had heard enough to make a rough satisfactory image to which my school mates and I had mutually agreed upon. We had discussed about Delhi in our school days, created an image about our country's capital based on the secondary or tertiary information we had managed to come across. From horrifying rape cases to the 26th January parades on television, some stories were true and others were cooked up by the people who gave us the secondary information. When I had been selected in the Delhi centre of NIFT, I recalled all my information and thoughts I had formed some time back. Everything revolved in my head from India Gate to parades to Connaught Place and rapes! All of it came as a flash when I entered the city. 


My very first impression of Delhi was the wide space which it offered to my eye. Wide roads, large spaces, big buildings. There was so much greenery everywhere as I looked outside my auto and felt a mild smell which I associate with Delhi till date. 


Delhi has taught me everything. From being loving, caring to being blunt, everything. Delhi has given me unexpected things and I have learnt quite a lot here. From being with friends in GK II and enjoying to Ansal Plaza and sitting alone chewing on a Mac Veggie. It was as if I had entered a whole new world of various activities and a life so fast that it was hard to imagine that a person like me could adjust. Leave alone cultural shocks, the city was always so bling, so fast that I had no option but to run with it. The metamorphosis took some time and then I was completely transformed to an entire new person. 


I still remember the first time I saw the chhole-kulche vala and found it very strange but now whenever I am walking down the street, I try to find one. In this city of Delhi, peace is achieved amidst the chaos and confusion. I am still waiting for my peace.

From mother to daughter

I shall miss you dear, even though you were never there with me but your presence gave me a reason to live, which was enough for me. Your smiling eyes lightened mine and your innocent smile spoke of those unsaid feelings which will remain even when you are never going to come back. I'm never going to see you which feels so killing and yet I feel so strong because you have left a wise example for me. I really did not expect you to make this difference in my life. I might have not survived but I'm surprised that I did. You so unknown of life and its sorrows, lived, so patient and so lively but for a short while. Why did you leave me in this world to face the world without you and to see the world without your eyes, to smile and survive, without any reason, your warm hugs always made me feel so special, your voice, an eternal bliss. I do not say I will remember you, because I do not feel you are gone. Your everlasting fragrance will always make me live each day. Your sweet thoughts will make my each passing day fresher. You created a world for me and will always remain within me.

Priceless

Darkened sky, light drizzling, lush greenery all around. I was walking down the wet grey road, glancing at the yellow flowers on the sidewalk. I saw blurred traffic lights at a distance in the dense fog. Birds were flying back to their nests and amidst their humming sounds, I saw a brown car stop four steps away from me. A hefty lady stepped out and made her way to the store. 

I stood there watching people and their activities. It was not just any other day, it was a day when you wanted to sit on your window sill and enjoy the weather outside, when you wanted to watch rain brushing lightly against your face when you stood in the balcony. A little drop fell on my face and it gave me a new reason to live. 'This was a time to live', I told myself. So I stood there in the rain and let it wet my face. I thought about times when I had somebody to be on my side always, but now I had none. It is these little raindrops which give me a reason to live again. I stood there on the sidewalk and watched the rain streaming down and refreshing me. I saw black umbrellas, people running to shelter themselves, some even signalling me to run and hide. But I preferred to stand there and enjoy this heavenly experience. It had been quite a while since I had enjoyed the rain. Now there was no one for me, I was for no one. I faced up towards the sky and stood in the pouring rain. I wanted to gulp every single moment of happiness. There was thunder accompanied by lightning and it drew darker each second. As I saw the sky turning from blue to purple to nearly black, I realized that this rain was actually a release, a stress outlet which assisted in releasing all the mental pressure. And compared to all the priced things of the world, this moment was absolutely priceless. After a while, I felt better and realized how precious that moment was. I stood in the rain for some time and then crossed the road to get some shelter. A smile ran across my face as I thought of myself when I was at the other end of the road.


I walked down the sidewalk and found a coffee shop. I found the same hefty lady with her endless shopping bags, dripping wet. I went inside and ordered a regular cappuccino.

Serendipity

Out of remorse and regret, hiding my face in shame and covering my head with a layered veil of uncertainty, I walk out of the building hurriedly. I wait for the bus on the wet sidewalk, the rain forming droplets on my eyelashes. I try to look up at the grey sky and the buildings appear nothing more than blurry outlines. The feeling of losing something has deeply resided in me. I am afraid of losing even when I have nothing more to lose. I am here to board a bus to a city where I will always be unknown to everybody.

A yellow bus stops in front of me and a bird chirps. An old man coughs and I try not to acknowledge the fact that we are the only two people in the almost vacant sidewalk. A bird perches firmly on a tree behind me. There are mixed emotions flowing inside me at this moment. I hear a very familiar sound and try to give it some meaning. Unfortunately, there are certain things which are meant to be the way they are. At a distance, a dog barks and I see a red bicycle. It is a bit foggy and is about to snow. My lips are frozen and I am unable to speak. I am still thinking about the day when I met the stranger years back. Since then, I feel a lump in my throat and try to ignore it. I stand there but I think of the day when I ran after the car shouting on top of my lungs. Now I stand here and look at the old man and listen to the faraway dog. Memories float in my mind as I wait for the bus. 

I open my bag and pull out my umbrella as it starts to snow. All of a sudden, the umbrella slips from my hand and flies away. I see it going away from me and I do nothing. Everybody has left me and I have done nothing to prevent it. I follow the umbrella. The umbrella flies high, stoops low and then rises again. I sigh and move towards it. It enters an alley and lays on a rubbish heap. I slow down and lazily move towards it. Suddenly, there is a tap on my back. I feel a rush of blood within me. In a flash, I remember all the things which happened six years back. From the first meeting to the instant proposal and to the very hurried separation. I have not seen him in six years, not even once. I do not know where he is, what he did for a living, did he still love me. I do not have the power to re-think. I am very scared to turn around, as if I know that something very familiar has touched me. I can feel the hot breath on my neck. I feel insecure and comforting all at the same time.It feels as if serendipity was personified and was around me, laughing. A hand moves on my left side and I can see the tip of my lost umbrella. I see a blurred black umbrella in front of me while holding my own umbrella. For some unknown reason, I had followed it. I gather courage to turn around, still struggling with the thoughts and emotions only to find a person who had left me on the white porch. I try and look somewhere else. He makes no effort to say anything. He offers me his hand, I look in his eyes for a brief moment and we walk back to the bus stand leaving the black umbrella behind.

The Blank Truth

Some people just walk in our life for the mere reason of walking out one day. But whatever be the duration of their stay, they teach us some wonderful lessons in life which we can only smile at. Smiling and reminiscing at the same time when there is nothing else to remember. A burnt piece of tie, a cigarette stub, a crumpled piece of paper from the coat pocket, a broken mirror with golden frame..all speak of a dilapidated marriage and a a truth which you can never overcome. The truth about your life and mine,which cannot be expressed in words. It is experienced in long drawn silences and moments of eye contact. It was felt in those divine moments when you had once stared at me for a while, among the flower beds and I looked at you briefly and fell in love with you almost instantly. Between that cherished moment and the broken mirror piece lies a truth which is as hollow as life itself. It is the blank truth which is empty and vacant. Retaining the emptiness of life and the hollow truth, it speaks with its eyes and swallows you with its ears. Its an experience when you give yourself a chance amidst all confusions in life. You are somewhere in the middle when this happens and it doesn't give you the opportunity to save yourself. You are caught fighting ultimately with yourself. And when you are over that, you are left with some remnants of the last night's struggle to keep yourself alive. So whenever you look back at that very time, you think of its as blank and hollow because the only feeling you had in you was emptiness. But today, as I look at myself, I can feel the past casting its shadows on me and I move away and face the broad daylight.

Inertia

I get up this morning with a little song playing in my mind and a cup of coffee in my right hand. Some days you just keep on thinking, whether at work or at play. Today was one of those days. When I came back after freshening up, I sat down on the corner of the bed, thinking about all the things which had happened in the past few days. I hung down my head in silence for a while as I had no answer to many questions which kept on striking at me. Had it not been for that one last day which still has the power to string me down to it, life would have been much easier and I would have been able to breathe. The faint memory of the last day in the coffee place on the corner table makes me all nostalgic about the days I spent with him. I was sipping coffee and he was looking at me.
There is no remorse or regret, though sometimes I feel that we would have made better friends than a couple. but you had said, 'I'll always be at your side...' and now that very sentence is threatening. Today, as I sit on the side of my bed with a feeling of nostalgia, sipping my stone cold coffee, I feel as if I had moved on but my soul was still hanging on to the last day at the coffee shop. I was in a state of perfect inertia where I was divided between moving on and not letting go. When it all had came as a sudden shock for me, my world had crashed down. On the surface, I got over everything and moved on. But still somewhere in the corner of my heart, I feel some strings of the dilapidated relation still ringing. I feel a pinch in my heart every time I start to reminisce. But you have to move on with life with all the experiences to help you get through....

As I hold on to my engagement ring, I hear a car horn and I know that this time, for real, I have to move on.

Surrender and Resurrection

 रात के अँधेरे में 

डूबते हुए सूरज में छिप कर

अपनी पलकों के कुछ आंसूं 

मैंने  युहीं हंसी से दबा लिए

कुछ बातें थी अनकही

कुछ अधूरे ख्वाब थे 

कुछ अनकहे शब्द थे

और मैं...

हमेशा से वहीँ खढी थी

उसी अँधेरे में 

अपने आंसुओं को छिपाए 

डरते हुए, सहमे हुए 

नज़रें झुकी हुई

स्वर में हिचकिचाहट

एक डर सा था

अँधेरे का...शायद

जैसे जैसे सूरज ढलता गया 

मेरा डर उभर कर सामने आने लगा

मेरी आवाज़ भर्राने लगी

और मेरे हाथ पाँव ठन्डे पड़ गए

कुछ शब्द और कुछ अश्क 

रोक लिए..

अपने आँचल से जैसे समेट लिए

सन्नाटे में घुँघरू की आवाज़ 

को दबोच लिया

पैरों की सरसराहट को

धीरे से किसी ने चुरा लिया

और रह गयी एक चुभती 

हुई ख़ामोशी 

मैं उस ख़ामोशी से कुछ 

शब्द चुराना चाहती थी

उस शान्ति को भंग करना चाहती थी..

अचानक से एक रौशनी हुई

अब मैं जीना चाहती थी

आँखों में एक उम्मीद थी

पर मेरा पैर फँस गया

मैं बहुत खुश थी

मेरी आँखें उस रौशनी को देख रही थी

वो मेरे करीब बढ़ रही थी

पर मेरा पैर....

मेरी आँखों में वो रौशनी 

बड़ी हो रही थी

मैं ख़ुशी से पागल हो गयी

वो पीली चौंधियाने वाली बत्ती 

अब मेरे करीब थी

मै जीना चाहती थी

मैं ख़ुशी ख़ुशी उस रौशनी को

एकटक देखा...

यकायक एक हाथ ने मेरे सुन्न से

हाथ को अपनी ओर खींचा

और वो तेज़ी में आती हुई ट्रेन 

नेरे करीब से निकल गयी....

Welcome to Italics

Italics is a blog started for the purpose of defining the undefined and to reach out to people with the medium of writing (and so on and so forth). The real purpose of setting up this blog is to pen down my thoughts, to try and adjust my little pieces of writing in this given space and to entertain you all. I hope you will all like and appreciate. And I will wait for your most valuable advice and feedback. Thanks!