Sleep

The day comes to a close,
My eyelids want to follow suit.
There are things I need to do;
Promises that I have given
Or rather made to give.
The dreams that haunt me
When I am awake
Seem to leave me
When I am asleep.
The sleep beckons,
The night says to go,
Things left undone
Not important anymore.
The eyelids win,
The dreams recede,
I lay myself
On the forgiving mattress.
Alone in the day,
Alone in bed,
Alone in the thoughts
That run in my head
I wish to leave now
From the bounds that bind,
I wish to run now
From things I dread.
This life too tiring,
Too hard to bear
Things I want to say,
Never reach an ear.
This sleep is welcome,
It gives me courage
To be what I want to be,
Where I can.
Sleep my friend,
Life seems to say,
Things gone unsaid
Will always be said.
I become real,
In the unreal world,
Dreams that I dream
Are never dead.

Date: 7th February, 2007

Killing himself

He was hungry,
He was cold,
He hadn’t had a meal
That wasn’t two days old.

He crept into the house
Silent like a mime,
To steal a few something
A dollar, a penny, a dime.

Unfortunate, his soul,
A wrong moment he chose.
He walked into the house,
Just as the master arose.

A brief struggle,
A short fight,
Too many people,
Smothering his flight.

The cops were called,
In the middle of the night
They came in their cars,
In all their might.

They dragged his body
They dragged his soul.
They dragged him through
Every unknown hole.

They had kept him in chains,
They had kept him locked
They had tried to break him
They had to keep him shocked.

They beat him with fists,
And sticks, all they tried
For each lash on his body
Not once, he cried.

They had caught him stealing
To feed himself.
They never knew they
Caught him, killing himself.

Dated: 25th December 2005

Sorry

There was a time, when I was young, when I was probably the rudest being the almighty ever created. I did not give elders the respect they were entitled to, I was too young to gauge if they actually deserved it. If one has ever conversed in a language that was Indian - Hindi, Tamil or any other regional language, I guess one will understand what I mean. There is a way of addressing the people that are in the same age group and those donkey years older than you are. I used the kind of language one uses to address and fight with ones siblings on everybody. This is when a cousin of mine, god bless his heart, taught me one does not do that and the nuances of the language. The reason I bring this up is this is when I began using the word “sorry”.

Over the last few days, a series of events occurred that has made me question the very use of the word. Again, the events do not matter, as do the questions that arose in my head. This is another effort to convert those useless things called random musings to valid arguments.

The main question is does on really control what they are doing? The answer to that, according to me is yes, they do. Everything one does is a choice. Taking into consideration all other possible avenues possible, the result of each one and weighing them also known as cost – benefit analysis in management parlance, one takes the decision. Post this one implements the decision. This means following a particular path is a result of a conscious decision.

Since one has control over every event, not the result, one had the choice not to do it, but chose to do so; does one need to be sorry the result was different compared to the one he/she expected when he/she chose to walk down that path?

This is where I am not able to conclude. There are two arguments I have and both seem to be equally sane. I will try to elucidate them both. Maybe someone out there can provide assistance.

Each decision one takes can be of two types - one that affects others and one that affects only the decision maker. This is the main assumption I am running with.

In the former case, where the decision I take affects others, I guess I have a responsibility to make sure the things I do, do not affect the other person in a detrimental manner, and even though this mainly contradicts the fact one man’s gain is another man’s loss. To take this further, I guess, only the people that matter to me should not to have a negative return from my actions. Does this mean I can do things I like when the other person is a complete stranger? Well, I am not sure. This is where the society steps in to say there is a limit to what I can do when it affects someone in a negative manner. What this means is, I can inflict pain to an unknown stranger to a certain extent, I can earn his money off him, which is really saying I can rob him of his money without me realizing I have done that, I can cause him emotional stress hopefully unknowingly, but I cannot do all this knowingly.

Does this mean I can do this if I do not care? If I give two hoots about what happens to others, can I carry on indulging myself and not bothering about what happens to others? Can I be selfish regarding my happiness and not give a damn about what it does to others?

When it comes to things that affects no one else, is there such a thing? Is not the “Butterfly Effect” that says, a butterfly flapping its wings at the equator can set off a chain of events that can lead to a tsunami in Japan? Is it not true no man is an island and he/she cannot exist in a vacuum, in a cocoon, alone and without a connection in the world? Is he/she not a social animal?

I have used two main influences in this thought. One is objectivism of Ayn Rand, the thought “no act in this world is selfless”; one that says, “There is a selfish reason behind everything one does”. The other line of thought is the one proposed by John Nash of the “A Beautiful Mind”, “The best result will happen for a group of people when the people think and do the things that are best for themselves and the group as a whole”.

I really seemed to have rambled on about everything but the topic. The question I am asking is “If everything I do is the result of a conscious decision, a choice, can I ever be sorry? By being sorry, am I not belittling myself? Is not a way of saying I was stupid when I made the choice? Is not saying I am sorry for taking the path I chose and I regret what I did? Is regretting something the worst thing to do?

If I never regret what I have done, if I am at peace with what I have done and what it has led to, no matter what the outcome, do I have to be sorry?

Does not being sorry, make me a worse man than I am? These questions were some I asked to my own self and the answers I got were amazing. I have not felt sorry when the effect was on some one I did not care for. When it was in some one I cared about, I was not sorry for the effect on the person, I was sorry because the person telling me I had let them down made me feel bad. When I felt bad because of something I did, I felt sorry. This sorry was not for the target that felt bad, but to me. In the end, I was sorry I let some one mean so much that hurting them hurt me.

The thin line between solitude and loneliness

I always love referring to the dictionary when I have no clue as to what a word means, the reason being that it gives the meaning that is farthest removed from what I am looking for. In fact when I looked up the words solitude and loneliness, they were synonyms. But there exists a world of difference between the two.

Man is a social animal and needs to be with other people. This has meant that more times than not, he seems to be happier when he is in a group, where there are more people, indulging in the presence of one and another and hanging out. This can mean different things for different people. For some this may mean having a cup of coffee at a local coffee shop, for some this may be talking about the movie that they went to last night, for some this can be the hot girl that they are dating, while others this can be a chance to bounce their ideas of each other.

It has always been said that a person can achieve more when he is in a group, where there is a healthy competition. This is mainly because one tries to out do the other. This does not mean that they adopt any method necessary to outperform the others in the group. This means that they shall give all their efforts to beat the other person. In case that they fail to do so, they are not fazed. They are happy that some one in the team has done what was necessary.

As far as the personal side of life goes, it is obvious. Every one seems to need someone that they can pour their hearts to, some one who can listen to them. I remember I have a friend, a very close one who used to use me as a sounding board. What she used to do was nice. She used to come to my place and start talking about the things that used to worry her. All I had to do was, keep listening. When she was done, she was clearer in her head as to what she had to do to overcome what ever was troubling her. More than anything, when you have someone that listens to you, I guess that it makes what you are churning in your head much lighter.

Many a time, I have noticed that the thing that is bothering me is so insignificant; it need not be worried about at all. This is something that I would not have been able to see on my own. Thanks to the perception that I trust enough to share my thoughts, I would be able to see that.

At the end of a day, I guess that it helps to have someone that cares to lend an ear. In addition, to have someone on whose shoulder you can lay a shoulder is wonderful.

Anyone that craves for the above and does not get it is said to be lonely.

Unfortunately, I would not know all this. I have never been able to sustain myself in a group that had more than three people, preferably with one absent.

I have become a person who does not need this. Rather, I guess that I work better when I am alone, when the only one that I need to talk to is I. Is that being asocial? Does that mean that I am a snob?

I do not have answer to all this. All I can say is that I prefer my company to people with whom I do not share any interests. Even when I am with people that I share interests with, I am more silent. I talk in bursts. My mind wanders as does theirs. I am at my most creative (if I can be called creative that is) when I am alone.

I guess that I yearn for solitude. This is a state of mind more than a physical existence. One can be in a fair and yet be alone. I guess there is only a thin line that pushes person in solitude over to loneliness, his desire to be or not to be in the company of others. If he thinks that all that matters to him is he and does not give a damn what others think, he is in solitude. Else he goes about trying to influence what others think about him and gives more care to what others think of him than he does of himself, I guess that he will fall into loneliness when he is alone.

Solitude is you looking at the stars, lying on your back on the grass, with your best friend, not talking a word for hours, and yet feeling that you have been talking. It is when you are happy to be alone, as happy as you are in others company.

Solitude is - knowing you, finding you and living it, Loneliness is searching for you in others and not finding it. There is just that thin line that separates them; that line is in your head.

O Almighty

O almighty above,
Give me a reason for existence,
For having made pain in this world.
Give me a reason for life
When death is all that comes of it?
Why did you create people,
With desire to take lives of others?
Why is it that you create joy,
When that is not eternal?

I take the joy you offer
Without anticipation,
For the time it will last,
I choose to be happy.
I take the life I have,
To live it as I please,
Till death comes knocking
To prevent me from living.

I fear not the coming of the end,
I look forward with open hands.
I tread not a path, wary
Of things coming up ahead.
I worry not if others pass on by,
For I know deep in my heart,
Life is for living,
I shall meet death, not greet it.

Date: 3rd December, 2006

Tolerance

A post after what seems to be ages. I have been making the excuse that I have been busy to write, and that I have to put up with too much. Well, that is true to a certain extent. I have been busy upstairs. I have been doing things that I am not too happy about, and things that have not been as pleasurable as I would like them to be. This is where it all ends. From this day forth, I shall do only those things that I like. That means that I shall be writing, or rather pursuing my mostly pathetic effort of converting thoughts in this head of mine to text on my laptop.

I was talking to an uncle after five years. Considering the fact that I am the only person I in this entire universe who can talk to him on a one on one basis, I guess that five years has been too long a time. I do not want to delve in to the things that prevented me from having a more regular talk with him. He did not do much in terms of influencing me, but to give him credit, he tried. All he left me with is a profound sense of what I am.

Coming to what I want to talk about, tolerance. I guess most of us think that we are tolerant people. What do we mean when we say that we are tolerant? Do we mean that we put up with things that we do not like? Do we mean that we do not care what others do as long as they do not interfere in what we do and at times, even if they did interfere, we are irked, but would rather shut up? Do we mean that we do not care what others do as long as it is not in our faces? This is what we have thought of being tolerant.

I have thought myself to be a very tolerant person. In fact, so many times I have tolerated things that I did not like. Today, I had a rude awakening. So rude that I have had to check the premises that I have been working upon.

I have always thought that not to care and carry on what we are doing is tolerant. Today I realized to tolerate what one is doing one needs to understand. Understand why the other person is what he is, why something that is being followed is actually being followed, why something being done is being done, we have understand the cause.

When someone has said in the past that he is tolerant of people that follow Islam, he has meant, more often then not, that he has nothing to do with them, and would not like to. He did not care what they did in their lives as long as they did not bother him. The minute that they bothered him, he would gladly throw down his tolerance. This can be said of so many things. My mother is tolerant of people that eat meat, even when she cannot sit at the same table as them while she is eating and she cannot stand the smell or sight of anything that has either not been plucked or fallen from something that was once not rooted to the ground.

This is not tolerance. As I understand it, to tolerate is to know what you do not like, to understand why you do not like it and finally think that because you know about it, it does not matter that others do it, you personally have a reason that is backed by reason as to why you are not doing it. This would mean that a person who is a Hindu because he was born a Hindu or a vegetarian who is one because his parents are one would not classify to be included in the tolerant list. This is applicable for all despicable things that one tolerates.

Only when one says that he is a Hindu because he believes in the Hindu way of life and that he is a vegetarian because he thinks that killing animals is not something that he would indulge in, but accepts what others do as a personal choice of theirs just like his, he can be tolerant.

Tolerance can never be a state of being, a state of existence. It has to be a constant effort in understanding the unknown and to test the limits of ones own self to realize what they are, it has to be firmly rooted in knowing oneself, in being true to oneself.

I must know me before I can tolerate others.

Weaker

I tell you a thousand things,
Feelings, fears, and hopes.
No one else knows what I am,
I care not for those folks.

When I was in pain, I ran to you,
To tell you my life is sore.
But I ran to tell you what happened,
Because than life, you meant more.

Times have changed,
And we have drifted in life.
aLone I have faced it
and conquered many a strife.

When I finally ran to you,
To tell you what I was doing.
I realized I had changed
From where we were to where I am going.

Sadly, I return to my corner,
In life, I am now my own sense maker,
Knowing, without you there
I am all the more weaker.

Date: 3^rd December, 2006

Absence

Time has dulled the pain,
Of your absence.
I have made me live the life,
I thought I would never live.

Nightmares of moments
Spent in your company,
Dreams of moments
That you held me in your arms.

Those moments are just a memory
Of a time long gone by
A time I was younger
A time when I was happier

Now that I realize you are gone,
Never to return to my side,
I walk on into the darkness
Without a hope of finding light

Power

It has been long since I have had the time to sit and talk about things that make me think. Last week, I was browsing for information regarding some college assignment, when I happened upon a website of one Mr. Bryan Caplan. He is an economic professor at GMU and has an amazing website. One of the pages that I read talked about power.

Every man has four things that he works for, money, love, sex, and power. And the most elusive of these is the most sought after one, by simple Law of Supply and Demand, Power. Those who do not have it want it and those who have it cannot seem to get enough of it. Thus, life is simply a struggle to see who can have the most power. Every war fought, in the battlefields, the courtrooms or in every household was over power.

There is an eternal struggle in a man’s life to be more powerful than someone who controls him. The car driver one day wants to be the one on the back seat; the secretary wants to be in the boss’s seat someday. This is given. However, the thought that arises, is humankind made for power, for control?

The quintessential feature of every man is the desire for individualism. This is what drives him, is the fuel for his ego, something to give him a reason to live. Under every man, here is a small voice telling him that no matter what, he is one of the best examples of human beings made. The main target for a power wielder is this voice. As long as one has this voice in him, he refuses to be ruled.

The power wielder and the target of the power are locked in an eternal struggle, with both not winning. The only thing that remains is feelings of ill and desolation. For a normal human being, even when he controls another being, his conscience will not allow him a moments rest. The case for the target is simple; as long he is a subordinate, he will not be satisfied. Every revolution, every fight for independence has stemmed from this.

What happens when a man is broken? When he loses that spark, that fire, that ego? He becomes no more than a robot, no more a part of the human clan. Percy Shelly immortalizes these thoughts.

'Nature rejects the monarch, not the man;
The subject, not the citizen; for kings
And subjects, mutual foes, forever play
A losing game into each other's hands,
Whose stakes are vice and misery. The man
Of virtuous soul commands not, nor obeys.
Power, like a desolating pestilence,
Pollutes whate'er it touches; and obedience,
Bane of all genius, virtue, freedom, truth,
Makes slaves of men, and of the human frame
A mechanized automaton.
--Percy Shelley, Queen Mab

Is there a solution? Not as far as I can see. As long as there are people whose egos are insatiable, and as long as there is envy and jealousy over the influence wielded, there will be power struggles and that will make life miserable for the rest of the world.

Orkut-ian

In the last year, a new craze has caught fervor among the students. There are more people following what is going on in that then there are people following class. Every break, no matter how small, every class no matter how important, every system no matter the owner is plugged into this forum. It is called Orkut. All those who were on the forum will differ saying that they were there long before the craze caught on. The time of joining does not matter. What matters is what people do in that. What matters what is each persons take away from that.

I used to be a member once. Then in a fit of, for lack of better adjective, stupidity, I deleted the account. The second stint has been very rewarding. As far as I am concerned what people have taken away are:

• People that you talked to once upon a time, people that went to the same class as you did, people that lived in the same apartments as you did, people that you knew by name long time back are there, just a click away. You may never know when you have an urge to talk to someone that shared a joke with you when you were in your unddies. It is then that this forum comes on its own.
• When there is no time to call up and talk, when there is no time to send a detailed mail regarding the state of affairs on your side, but you desperately want the other person to either share the agony or the joy, all you need to do is to send a scrap. And they are intimated of the matter. On the other hand, so are the millions of others that are frequent visitors to that person’s scrapbook.
• If you are a lonely soul and want to find that perfect life partner, the man/woman of your dreams, that elusive personality, chances are that you may find them. I have an instance where a girl talked to a person for six months at the end of which she was convinced that he was the one that she would spend the rest of her life, so much so that, she told him. What happened then is an altogether different story.
• The fierce competition to get more friends, more scraps, and more testimonials than the roommate of yours. Every nigh is spent checking how many new friends you have added and how many he has. Every single minute supposed to be working is spent trying to create a one sided conversation that ensures that your buddy get to a milestone of scraps, 100, 200, 500, 1000 and so on.
• The community where you get to discuss thing from what you had for dinner last night (not that I want to know), to the performance of the cricket team (not that I am bothered), to the nuances of science and technology (now we are warming up), to religion (talk on buddy) and to what one can do for the world at large, this is the true soul of Orkut. This is when you realize that you can be the part of something big.
• The down side is when people abuse the faith you have bestowed upon the world, where they take your identity using the photos that you have uploaded, call you names, call your girl friend names, and make your life a living hell. It is at times like this that you question the forum. One of my friends told me the reason that he was not so active on the forum when I was at the peak (2500 scraps, 66 fans, 475 friends all in a period of 3 months) that he felt odd that what he told me was being read by others, that what he says to me is to be between us. I told him that there was messaging. His reply that he can call me and talk, rather than this, was true.

You have to realize that the forum was meant to bring together people sharing a common past, people that want to share a present and are looking to meet new people. It is for people that are looking for people that want to talk, people that are willing to debate on things that they believe in, people that are networking, people that are not able to keep in touch for reasons unknown. In short, Orkut is a way of life these days, a religion. Hail Orkut.