Would You Give Me Another Chance?

"We will talk later, calm down."

That later never came. I take a moment to process all that happened today, and consider the effects of it. Perhaps it was meant to be, you know, the almighty and the fate playing hoopla with my life. But I certainly have never credited him (or her, you never know) for my accomplishments, then why, all of sudden I am assuming he's there. And even if he is there somewhere, he's not going to sort my dangled strings of complications out. I sort my shit out. 

As the reminiscences of the day hasten through me, a persisting thought finds its way to my conscious mind. How it is just about scary to come so close to someone that you actually start seeing parts of yourself in them. That you begin to mutter the same syllables, have similar thoughts, parallel opinions, you share inside jokes and talks just with a slight trivial glance at them because you're so irresistibly close to them and the waves of whatever -ship you’re in radiates through air. You’re so close to them that you can almost sense how they feel but they rapidly and unexpectedly pull themselves away.

Perhaps it was my mistake. I was just too rude and the steaming anger did much more damage than I could have possibly controlled. 
It is just so strange that what once was strong as fire could be blown off by a little frosty arctic winter breeze. 
But we both never really talked to each other, did we? It was all just, 'Hey, how are you?', 'How was the review', 'How is your health?' Or the more personal, 'I hope you're doing fine' and ‘Oh, I am glad you’re here with me, I love you’. 
But that kind of solitude felt okay. This loneliness is saddening. 
It almost pains you physically, your inside wrenches and you somehow don't feel good about it. Like you have heavy hearts or lungs or whatever there is in the upper middle body. But it is just so bizarre to expect that kind of separation from someone who knew about you, how you react to everything big or small, happy or sad, and who knew your sleeping times, working times, and that you go days without bathing, that you don't pretend to like someone and say things on the faces of other people, that you weren’t feeling okay, and that the same mistake made thrice would actually distress you off really hard.

So, I feel a little distant with myself, and I might have a little headache the coming day. Headache is so common for me these days, it must be just because of my odd sleeping habits and insomniac behaviour. Oh how my imagination flies in another direction, within seconds. Anyway, I lost someone last December. This is the same time around. And like the headache, I might actually get used to it. And I also feel a little sad, the kind of sad that makes you search deep inside yourself for all the mistakes you made, but still I am not talking to her. 

Many a promise left hanging in the air, many a thousand thoughts contradicted, and many a lesson learnt.

I am off apologizing for the things I didn't do.

"You know, you're all I ever wanted and I love you. Do you love me, Ryan?"

"Yeah, I do. I have always loved you" said I in a conspicuous little shattering voice.

"Have you forgiven me yet?"

"I have. Long back"

"Now, would you give me another chance?"

Yes  "No."

Afire Love

When I was lost and lonely,

and no one was beside me.

I needed someone so closely,

To hold me, save me from drowning in the sea!

I knew no one would come,

for all were only passers by.

To laugh and laugh, mum,

I asked for help, but time went by and by.

One came and empathised with me,

for me like an angel in disguise.

He held me up, sat down on his knee,

With him, hand in hand, I would rise.

His grip, his embrace, his memory

The love was earnest, too soon.

The sparks, the music, the ecstasy,

I was like a butterfly out of a cocoon.

The connection was sweet and pretty,

He was also with glee.

We both shared our pity,

Everything faded, all the problems and the misery.

Days and months passed

Loneliness was now a thing of past

Holding my hand, my love was all he asked

For, the kindled fire would outlast

I was happy yet dreary

On a one fine day

Couldn’t guess what was so scary

So I went to him, he was my escape.

When on the way I was walking

The same thoughts surpassed me

Again, yet again I felt lost and lonely

I needed him to hold me

Streams of water were on the brink of falling

Just when I saw him coming towards me

Wearing an odd little white gown

But still extending his strengthened arm for me

I am again walking down the aisle

My eyes go searching for him in the crowd

I smile seeing his lean figure lying

Putting matching flowers, I bowed. 

Anymore.

All the insults I have been through,

and all the pain I drank with a smile.

Every time I wish they were few,

but I let them travel another mile.

They were like the strings I held on to too tight.
By me, with me, like that, all my life.
My side of it, today I am letting go,
Maybe, just maybe, it all wasn't worth the while.

Now I don't choose you. I know I chose you without any complaints or doubts right till the last hour I have spent crying and thinking in perfect silence, except for the sound of my beating heart but now, in this moment and the rest, I don't choose you anymore. Perhaps the silence teaches us a lot. And the gloomy sky is going from the shades of orange to purple to blue, the prevailing dusk starts to fall with the singing birds returning to their cradles, and I too am seeking a closure.

I like it, dark and alone.

Deafening Noises

Some people like silence. For them it is about sitting in the quietest, peaceful place and wondering about their life, their experiences, their pasts and the rest of the things.

But I like immense noise. All the disturbances, blaring loudness, vivacity and dynamism and shouting people. I like the activity, the chaos. It makes the whole experience of life more consuming, enriching. You immerse yourself in the ear-splitting music. You appreciate all the disturbances, well at least I do. That’s how you’re able to see all the silence in the first place.

I listen to music at the loudest of tones. The heart thumping, ear numbing deafening noise relieves and replenishes the whole of me. I sometimes get scared of all of it, it is just so overwhelming. It gives me shudders of fear and anxiety. So many beats, so much loudness, such liveliness, those thumps and pumps, it makes me wonder about my being. It compels me to think about what I have done my entire life and how I have spent every minute of it.

It reminds me of my deep profound dark corners, of the sins I have committed and of the losses I have incurred. It makes the whole world go black, gloomy and blurry in front of me. I marvel at the how the shouts are turned into music so intense it makes you crave for more fire.

The loudness of the noise conjures me to contemplate about life a certain way. It may feel a little devilish, but maybe the devil was god’s best friend until he fell down. Hard rock music makes me cry, weep for all the evil that I have faced and how I am still living with it. It creates a void so deep that emotions can’t fill. It makes me think of myself as an incomplete soul and that’s how it emboldens me to become better for myself. It flashes the past in front of me and forces me to face myself. It makes the whole experience of earnest love all the more wanting.

How many of you are capable of getting solace in noises? Of finding peace in disturbances? Of fixing yourself in the darkest deep buried places through numbing loudness? 

It might seem narcissistic and plain masochistic but all of me is full of similar evil. And the noises stimulate me to erase it and wipe out the slate of all I’ve done. It makes me regretful of the millions of lies I have said.  It makes me uncertain of my aims and ambitions I have for my future and it forces me to rethink and make choices to help me start all over again.

Dark loud music is like a drug for me, a strong narcotic adrenaline rushing drug that calms me down. 
It reminds me of my pain and makes me reason hard, cry harder and then it makes me let all of it go just like the songs end, the chaos turns uniform and life becomes more meaningful.

Trust and Belief

You made a mistake, we both burned. We committed a blunder and now we’re prepared to lose.

I lost the trust Clare and I don't even know how to get that back. Now it is all messy, the room, the hair, the face, the way, the words, the heart, the life. You meant so much to me. You were the herald of life for me. I never thought I would have to face this day. I was so unprepared for what I will have to act upon now. That love, that trust, that faith. It happened all too soon, I couldn’t quite accept it as true.

To regain the trust is the utmost daunting task in the whole of cosmos. The hope, the conviction to believe when all I see in front of my eyes is the demolition, the remains of the annihilation. To look away from it and have faith. To recover the strength to trust the soul that left you in the middle of the path you both decided to venture. The path that I don't even know the way out of. It was like I walked with you, for you, like I once did with my father, unknowingly, unpretentiously.

You blindly confided in the person to take you out.  But now you're all alone in this mess. It is as if the world is falling apart in front of you. You keep your hands strong but they just are strong and numb. Without any feeling. Just numb. And you can't stand. You don't even have the will to. Maybe you’re too broken to be fixed by a single person. Maybe too messy to be cleaned up. But you’re still trying. There are no two ways around it my dear. You have to try. You search for all your remains from the mess. You collect it all and get back right up however hard it may be. We spilled the wine. It is time to clean it up. I have to clean it up. You've already given up. How can I be sure you still want to fight and you still want to be with me. I am drained of all the strength I had. 

And it isn't easy I know. Trusting isn't easy, but we've got to play the game of stake, the battle of risk. The odds of winning are less but we have got no chance of vanquishing that battle without having something to battle for.

I will find a way to trust you, Clare. But next time it breaks, I ask for forgiveness my dear, I won't be able to trust you back again. I have lost too much already.

Illustrations

It is just pleasant to sit at one place. Static. To calm yourself down and feel the breeze blowing, striking at your face in quiet long intervals. To observe things like the many posters on the notice board saying, “Maggi is back and so are we!” or that there is a “Entrepreneurship week” or showing “Solidarity with Palestine Convention” or “Dance of the heart” and the most common “CodeBenders”. Or how the people chit chat and keep doing it all day long, talking about ‘stuff’ or those second floor corridors that you roamed about in your first year of college.

Suddenly the breeze stops blowing and the time is immovably still. Silence silences. Even the chirpy birds have quietened. Only then you see, and realise that time moved all too fast but you trailed behind looking for answers when they were right in front of you. You were too busy to notice things pass by.  Like how the sun goes down, or how you shouted from the second floor so that your friends could hear you from the ground.

Here comes a bunch of students discussing movies, group hugs, squad goals and priorities. Priorities. That seems like a big heavy word. Just like the word dedication. When your best friend used to teach you various disciplines, you were too busy to observe the dedication she puts in and the motivation she gives you. When the rain pours, you’re too busy finding shelter to feel the cool water all over you, and revel in that integral moment. . And how one day you’re working here and the next day, there.  When the culturals happened and you anchored, you were too engaged to actually hear the crowds, sense their sudden surge of energy and see their expressions. And now you see, but don’t actually see anything. And now you feel but don’t actually feel anything.  You look, but not quite. Here I spot squirrels all around the campus but discerned their casual, searching quick walk just now. 

You don’t appreciate these moments, flashes of impact until the time you realise you lost them all of a sudden. 

Like how your best friend would never sit in the same class and walk the same corridors. And you wouldn’t be able to anchor again even though it’ll be just for quite some time. The experience is always enthralling.

I think that maybe not having work enough makes the very experience of working so significant, so poignant and holy. I now comprehend that some of the squirrels don’t just walk for food, they  might be looking for their love, waiting for rains to come, or living a life just like we are without observing anything like us. The staircase you tread on is so vacant now that it fills you with a miserable gloomy void. The only logical significance of having a staircase is when people stroll on it. But it is so terribly empty now. Empty. The word itself feels so empty, like nothingness.

The holy tree of the Girls Common Room (GCR), fun filled with fervent crowds singing, dancing, asking crowds to participate in countless activities is so scare fully secluded, silent and empty now that I feel sad because it has lost its charm and colour. It is a very dull shade of lush green now. Or how the time ruins everything in its path. It acts as a sole devourer, destroying everything on its way to eternity. Like it did with our college building. The scalped walls and the melancholy holes. Or the algal growth, and how it is another shade of green.

Sometimes I feel that this college building is another one of our parent taking care of us and the lampshade and the direction markers are a way leading to stability. Right now, everything is so static, deserted and immovable that it is petrifyingly scary. But the leaves are still making trifling movements with the wind, only if one could stop, take a halt and see. And the atoms inside of each of the living soul and the rest.

But I think, slightly think that somehow things are so meant to be. Perhaps the things are so out of place but still fit into each of their places so beautifully and only we just don’t care to notice. And maybe if we watched around, beheld and tried to observe things, like the ant on the tree leaf, or the spider on the tree branch and how the ant is relentlessly moving and the spider is spinning its web, we could actually see things. And we could appreciate the fact that just like us, even they do exist.

And perhaps we could find a way back to our memories and be delighted about how things were, even out of place. And maybe we could pile up the mess and clear it out. And possibly we could find all our missing pieces and join the concealed dots. And however tough, we could improve from our mistakes. And feel good about it.

A couple of students come by and the sounds of pigeons and squirrels is heard from a distance. As usual, life goes on. 

Divergent.

The Divergent Series; Allegiant.

~Written by Roth, Veronica

SPOILERS AHEAD!

Arguably, it is the best book I read after, of course Pride and Prejudice. It kind of motivated me to be someone I wanted to be, and someone I wish I was. 

"I suppose a fire that burns that bright is not meant to last"

There are a few things that are synonymous but are not. One of them being your identity. There are, as I feel, three things-

1. The person people see you and judge you as;

2. The person who you wish to be and think you are;

3. The person who you actually are. 

I have been brought up to believe that it is only the third thing that matters. But if we go deeper, we realise that what people think of us or what we think we are, is not any less important.

I believe what my sir teaches me, not blindly, but I do consider everything he says. Similarly, if my friends or peers or parents or siblings call me something, I will definitely put a thought to it and believe it to some extent. Why wouldn't I? They have been living with me and are quite familiar with the type of the lifestyle that I have. I don't mean to say that all the stuff they say is right, or wrong for that matter, but it should at least be considered. You might not like it, or you might but at least give their words a thought. Chances are there that we might actually find it useful and improve to some extent. Or maybe they are just praising you and it will brighten your day up.

I also know that the person I think I am and I wish to be is really important too, because it actually provides a scope for personal development. I want to be the most successful person the world will see and I think for that I need to figure out certain things and work to achieve what I wish I can.

Similarly, what I think of myself is a boost to my own self. I am so full of energy and confidence, but hey, that's what I think I am, so does it make it any less important? NO! It builds self confidence in me and is really good for my esteem. 

And I don't, don't, don't mean to say that you take yourself down the road of guilt because you think that you are the worst creature in the world, because you're not. Not until you're Osama Bin Laden. But then, maybe it was all about circumstances with him, maybe not. I just don't know. 

That's where the 'who you actually are' part kicks in. And I believe nobody is wrong. Did you just do all that crappy thing to your classmate because you're sadistic and wanted to hurt her/him? Or did you just shout at your parents for no reason? Or you kicked a dog because you know, he was a little piece of shit. No. Nobody is a terrible person. Don't believe me blindly, apply your intelligence. That's what the brain is there for in the first place. 

Everyone has reasons and ways of doing things. People sometimes tell us that we need to improve upon this and that and some suggestions are really useful. Then you think that you can actually improve. And you actually make an effort to. And only then your true self changes for the better things in the world. Of course it is the last part that weighs the most, but the other two aren't negligible. They do matter too. 

Get me?

Here's to the book who made me come out of my identity crises just a year back and to the choices I made.

"

One choice can transform you.

One choice can destroy you.

One choice will define you.

"

Falling Apart

What would you do if the world is falling apart in front of you, and all you can do is stare at it? You have no control over it and it all just comes as a shock to you. It's like you could see the clouds approaching and you were silently wishing the storm would go without causing any damage.  It's like you felt the pain but didn't do anything to make it hurt less. Like you listened to all the noises but plugged your earphones on, so you didn't have to hear anything. Like you could see what was coming your way but shut your eyes, closed them like a kid believing that if you couldn't see it, the devastation wouldn't happen. 

But the damage was done so much before. 

It is my story. The story of a girl living in the southernmost part of the south of New Delhi. I remember the days when my sister used to teach me astronomy in sixth standard with tiny stones and grasses in the early mornings on the roof of my house. I remember not studying the curriculum but searching for Astronomy books in the library and discussing black holes, star dusts, nebulae in the chilly nights. I was always the naughty kid. People around me say I still am. I don't know where things went wrong. I always wanted to be an astronaut, and in all the difficult times, I stayed, I held on to my ambitions like stars thinking that one day I will achieve them and these faltering disappointments would vanish.

Things do come to an end after all. After every dream, we do have to wake up. The real world isn't a fairy tale land where whatever you wish comes true. The same happened with me. I thought that I would take an undergraduate degree in any science major/clear Defense exams, get flight experience and then NASA people would select me, because of course, I am so awesome (So easy!) until one fine day in my twelfth standard, just two months before the boards I saw that National Defense Academy people don't select girls, because they menstruate and are weaklings and would ultimately become a liability (Gah! They don't understand that they were born because of the very same reason). They do take some, but once in a lot of time, as I heard. Great! I least expected it.  My sister wasn't even here with me to empathize and have my back. Nobody. Not my parents, for whom I am kind of a non-existential being. Now comes the interesting part of the fantasy. I thought I would go to Indian Air Force and they do take up women as pilots. But then, my eyes played hopscotch with me. I got myopic and the IAF don't take people having incorrect vision. Hear the glasses breaking and shattering? That was my heart and all the strength. Did the world just tag me as a pitiable 'visually disabled girl'? I don't know.

Next I know is that I was really worried about my result. I didn't study one thing all my twelfth standard and didn't prepare for entrances, no coachings and no self study. Somehow I got admitted to a government college having Electronics and Communication as my major (I left Information Technology for it, see the pattern?) and made fairly good friends. I was afraid of getting a best friend since my ex-best friend didn't really make me better or stood up for me or thought about me. With her, it was always her life, her problems, her grades and things like that. Time waste. Eventually I met with this amazing girl, my best friend, and I am so used to her company now. People who are meant to stay in your life, eventually find a way to stay.
With two semesters over and quite okay percentages, I was fairly happy with my life, learning on the way, learning from my failures, learning from experiences until the storm I didn't see coming finally started gushing from the sky. A shift in the placement pattern and people started shifting to IT. I could have shifted too, I had the required grades, but I didn't because I didn't want to work to make people click advertisements, the greatest minds would work to make people click ads, how does that sadden you? (That might look judgemental, but I have no idea what IT/CSE people actually do in their jobs, please tell me?) But who would do the research? Who will make the devices? But what if I don't get placed? I know I should be studying for that's the only thing in my hands, but you can't help it when you think, can you? That's why I am into most of the societies so I don't get time to think and am always busy. The world is indeed ruled by money because why else would people shift? My best friend is shifting too (beat that pattern of losses !) then she says she is interested in coding and that makes sense, she's good at it too. I am really happy for her, she deserves the best for herself.

But here I am, unsure of what future holds for me, in the midst of all the politics surrounding college life, separated by miles from my sister, discontentment of the major that I'm in, where every classmate hates me, where my best friend is leaving me. This path that I took seems so much lonely and difficult for me to fathom any chances of improving. I can't disappoint the few people who actually care for me. I'm lying in a pit full of dirt, wishing to rise to the top, fitting pieces of my life together in a way I never imagined they would, knowing that I have faced dark blurry times but I'm still here to rise above it all. 

I am still here.

Enveloped.

Ray Sanders,

Who would you talk to when you're feeling terrible?
Who would hold your hand when you're sad?
Who would comfort you while you want to shout out at the world for being unfair?
And who would hug you and let you cry in their arms, making you feel just right?

The past week hadn't been the best for me you know. Work load, the thought of school reopening after the summer break, my fear of being bad at every attempt I make to be better and my own wishful thoughts about myself. I haven't felt that lonely and disappointed and weak. Even though I know things aren't always beautiful and that you face a bad time every few days, I can't help it. And the thought that everything is wrong is just unnerving.
While I sit here writing this, a lot is going on inside my mind. What could I have possibly done to not be the person I am now? Are there any scopes for improvement? Am I a terrible person? And what if no one liked the new me, if I changed myself?
Thinking of all this is the most indolent thing I can do now. Knowing the amount of homework that's pending I should better be going off now and completing at least one thing. But I choose to stay, to let my mind wander about things I can not be, to think about all the good things I have done or should do and letting the thought persist, maybe counting the wrong deeds I did that all the people I live around are disappointed with the way I am. I find none of the them. I speak what I think, maybe that's the problem.
Nobody is a born wreak, are they? I must have been a mischievous child but I wasn't born the adult I am now. Maybe if people could love me the way people should be loved, maybe if they cared enough to point out my mistakes and correct them and not shout out for making them, maybe if they learned with me, maybe if they listened to me. That's how I know listening is so important.

Chances are, you are finding this entry boring Ray and maybe this is, I don't know. Anyway, I do not know whom to go to while I am sad. I am counting people I know, my good friends, my siblings, my past best friends and present best friends but I do not find any person I can share my thoughts with. That's the number of people I have in my life I can cry my heart out with, zero. Number of people I can speak all my pains with, people who would understand, and maybe fight with me, for me or just stand there to make me feel I have someone who cares about me. And no such person exists.

But with all this, I am fairly certain of one thing. I do not need anybody. What can they even do? I have to clean the slate of all the injuries, misdeeds, a thousand offences that I did and a million lies that I told, myself. I am standing at the edge of destruction and it is in my hands to turn back. I am slipping in the abyss of disaster and only I can help myself come out of it. I have to save myself from the sudden flood of cataclysm I am drowning in. And I have to let all of this go. Letting go is a hard, hard thing. But I have to let it all go.

I  realize I am my own problem and I am my only solution.

Yours,
Tennessee Arthur.

Semicolon Mark

I have been quite depressed for the last few days. There are some reasons for it which I ain't going to blabber about. But one thing is for sure, I am not happy about it.
I can feel myself wondering how my best friend, Parker, manages it. Or how some people can be really like me and not feel what I am feeling. 
I can almost sit here and think about how great other people were, how great my classmates are and how I could be like them, better than them, if I tried. Then I ask myself, have I not tried? 
People code beautifully, my best friend does so too. I must have been entirely wrong the last time I tried. I would have committed some terrible mistake. Ah, if only I tried harder. But then, I am scared to try again. Scared to fail again. Scared to disappoint people around me. Scared that if I lost, it'd disappoint my best friend the most if not me. Maybe she just doesn't care about my coding skills. Maybe she is just saying it because that's what best friends are supposed to do. Or maybe I am just paranoid about it and that if I tried again it might work, it might.

Here we are, Parker, Mary, our hard core robo friend, and I, thinking how to enable our Raspberry Pi to accept some particular sounds and perform a specific task with it like the dimming of light. Parker and Mary code and check the hardware requirements respectively. I sit here and stare at the screens like I am a kid, not because I don't know anything about includes, bubbble sorts, scanfs and stuff like that, but because I am really paranoid of making a mistake and spoiling everything they've done so far. I am pretty good with the hardware part though, but I can't help the freaking, can I?

I reach home everyday at 1930 approximately, then I watch 'The Big Bang Theory'  which comes at 2000 till 2100 and the time moves. After 2100 I have other tasks to complete, you know, society work and stuff like that; photoshopping, writing content, collecting data, making surveys and things. I then think about reading astronomy books and novels and everything I love. But then the thought that I could learn a lot of C in the meantime, or the JAVA tutorials or the Arduino project I have to submit in a few days pervades my mind and I just can't read.
At this stage, seems like I am the jack of all and master of none. I mean I can speak and talk with sass ( as Dizzy says) but then what's the use of that? Everybody does that, don't they? Oh wait, I am just doing what I said I won't right? Blabbering about my problems? But like in the novel, 'The Perks of Being a Wallflower', "Other people have had it worse".

I remember myself thinking a few days ago, reminiscing the reason I wanted to have a semicolon printed on my palms. It is not that I have suicidal tendencies or anything, I am not a coward you see. And even if I wasn't suicidal, I could never do it for I won't die unless I have achieved my ambitions and completed the reason I was born to accomplish. And I don't really need a symbol or a tattoo to remind me I am strong and brave and that everything will be okay, but just because I want to support all those people who seek inspiration from it, people who are struggling with illnesses, to do my bit in giving them hope and love and people who are making themselves strong enough to let go and be strong. Maybe they don't need my hope because I am just another human from billions of them living, maybe that's no reason to get a sign imprinted (it is a semicolon marked with a pen, anyway) and maybe I am just following a new internet fad (that's the exact same thing Rosaline said to me this morning after seeing the semicolon) but that's how it is with me, that's how I am and that's my way to see things, perceive things and support if not help others.

I am Blaire and I am strong enough to let go;