Hey You...

ALERT : Heavy dose of frustration follows!

In our poor lives, we dream rich dreams. From our lowly mud slums, we look up to the high heavens and dream and hope and pray that our life’s journey bring us closer every day to those heavens. We live in our dreams; our lives become our dream.

We struggle for our dream and we struggle against each other, for there isn’t enough to satisfy everyone’s dream in our land. Opportunities are few and far between and the dreamers aplenty. We push in the crowd, trying to elbow our way to our goal, while some fall away kicking and screaming, the sight of their fall searing us even more and we end up fighting an even bloodier fight.

I meet people who have fallen while I was kicking for my space in the crowd. They tell me their tales where-in they ‘compromised’ for the sake of things other than their own self, with a resigned look in their eyes. I feel sad for them, even want to console them but do not for I may hurt their ego. Their tales deepen the shadow of fear in me .I pause amidst the milling crowd for a second and swallow hard the rising lump in my throat and frantically eye the grey skies overhead for some sign of relief.

We know what we are capable of, and we know that what we want is just beyond that door. Our dreams are closed in on all sides by thick walls that rise unto the skies and the lone door is tiny. We bang our heads against the walls moaning, and groaning at our slim chances .Around me, I see some people weeping for it’s their last chance to get their dreams. If not this time, they will have to give up and fall back into lowly slum lives. They fear that they will be reduced to telling tales of their lost dreams.

Here, we grow up fast, fast-forward childhood and ignore adolescence. We harden our hearts against teenage love and wave good bye to song and story quite early, for we realize there are grim realities to be tackled before we get a chance to knock at our dream’s door. Bibliophiles read only text books, singers sang only theories and dancers danced to the tunes of their syllabi, for we didn’t want to fall prey to ‘distractions’.

It’s drizzling on us as we crowd outside the walls, kicking the slush. There is no ray of light except when the door opens to let a lucky one in. Then there’s a renewed energy and we push even harder in the direction of the light. Braving the darkness and the rain, each one to his very own selfish self, we push and shove, we claw and we kick…For ,in our land, the dreams are many and the chances few…

PS : Bringing to light an old piece.

Recommended music:Hey You,Pink Floyd.

The Rustic Charm of Ruskin Bond

Writing comes more easily to me when I have music in the background. Or is it that I lose myself in the music, get into the mood and write whatever captures the mood? If there’s any flow at all that’s there in my writing, it is due to the music. It’s also why most of the stuff here are just dreamy. If I were given one topic and then asked to write about it, I would find it boring - the eternal drifter that I am. Drifting brings me to what is holding me in sway these days - Ruskin Bond. My Orkut status already says so.

Ruskin Bond is one author I hadn’t had the chance to read much till now. He is also not whom I would pick, had I much of a choice of selection. Not mush reason for that except ignorance and negligible exposure to his works .I do remember though the short story of the blind girl the author meets in the train to Dehra Dun, that was part of our school syllabus. Though its titled ‘The Eyes Have It’ , in the book I’m hooked to right now – ‘The Best of Ruskin Bond’ - a collection of his stories , poems ,essays and what not ;I am certain the English Reader text had a different name for the story . It’s a love story – the story of a short, sweet romance. Couldn’t suppress a smile when I thought back about those school days when I was ‘taught’ this story .It never did strike me as a love story then. Not at all …. I read it now, and it’s a discovery that the author meant it as a love story. I was probably too young to recognize the faint scent of a tender romance that was the mood of the story. Or was it that the repetitious explanation from the teacher had killed the spirit of the story? A poem or a story cannot be ruined further than by explaining it. When you take a poem , read two lines and explain the meaning , take down the new words and their meanings ,delve deep into the metaphors and the similes ,you are actually dissecting it –literally opening its tummy and looking inside before even seeing the creature in its entire beauty and form . Should not! Not before you give it a full reading at least once, feel the flow and the mood, and lose some time in thinking about it. I guess you wouldn’t get the whole picture otherwise.

Take the story in question – the girl is going to Saharanpur and the author,all the way, to Dehra .So where is the girl going ,children ?? Saharanpur …we bellow .. and the that’s what gets the emphasis ,and that’s what stays in our mind .Tsk tsk .. Totally needless details get the spotlight and poor li’l romance is sidelined. But then, we were children and not to be spoilt with discourses on how the author’s heart went out to the girl .

I digress.

Back to Ruskin Bond.The office library is nothing much to write home about, holding in its general reading section, nothing much other than the how-to guides: the quintessential loser’s guide. Need I say more? I detest self-help literature .Period! So it was a relief to spot ‘The Best of Ruskin Bond’ among such wastage of precious paper like the afore mentioned genre of books. Grabbed it ,started reading and was hooked .The very first story ,’The eyes have it ’, was like the ‘hi there ,remember me ’ from a long lost friend .RB writes candid and simple prose that is heavily nostalgic about his boyhood days in Dehra dun and Mussorie . Most of it reads like first hand accounts of his life, as the ones that are shared among friends over a cup of tea, reminiscing the good old days. He describes his growing up years in the naturally bountiful hill station ,where he had all the time to wonder and be fascinated by nature , the many plants and trees and animals that he talks about with great familiarity, making the reader pine to go back to their own childhoods and relive it once again .As I have said here time and again , I am perpetually infatuated with childhood .For me ,its the best part of one’s life ,and I was always reluctant to grow up .I remember how sad I was to grow up and leave school ,and then later on ,college . It’s a tragedy that we cannot stop the years , live as much as we want is in our favorite age , and then continue with life when we are up for it .

He talks just as easily and eloquently about all the stages of life, from boyhood, to his late teens in London and after .There are also simple, lovely poems that can be enjoyed in one read, like a deep lungful breath of sweet fragrance. Would sign off recommending Ruskin Bond for company for the times when you feel wistfully nostalgic and want to go back in time. On that slow dusk watching the sun wave good bye , sipping sweet black tea , get on that hammock and stretch out with a copy of ‘The Best Of Ruskin Bond’ .

BGM

Track - I am born again.

Album – Oceans of Fantasy

Band - BoneyM