He could see her standing against the last light...as the sun went down...surrendering in its ochre tint. Slowly shifting his gaze to the porch above her where children were plotting nervously; he brought the last cigarette to his parched lips. He would need water, he thought, smoothening out the creases on his wilted cigarette; but then he’d hold on to watch the sun drop away today- a vivid April sunset behind wisps of dry smoke. Standing in his balcony, inhaling the smoke and silence that slowly enveloped his thoughts within her silhouette, he pondered vaguely over the likeliness of everyday. He looked at her, tracing the distance between them and wondered like every other day. Rarely did they move beyond the skewed familiarity of their allegorical presence. And then, all of a sudden she looked straight at him...moving two fingers to her lips and then waving in dismissal. She gesticulated, hinting at him perhaps, at his cigarette? Staring at her, playing a game of silence, he continued to smoke; still nonchalant like wisps from the final embers. And finally, when it was too dark to see and the sun had eclipsed them in his absence.....the game was over. He had missed another beautiful sunset, like every other day, he thought.
Water
"Water is my darkest luxury. To be swimming in thought, desirous or otherwise, feels like being submerged in water. How I long for that state, of being surrounded by something richer, more stimulated to my existence and reflecting its vitality so purposefully."
Sitting here in this room of the NUJS Boys Hostel, a nonchalant building squeezed in the middle of a dangerously forgotten cubbyhole on the outskirts of Calcutta- Salk Lake Sector II, I feel strangely compelled- almost overwhelmed- by the memory of a conversation I don't think ever took place; a coversation long due with myself, over water. Strangely enough, even though the conversations were somehow whisked away, there remained simpler memories of something relevant- water. Memories of times when I was considerably younger than I am now- deeply afraid and religiously nervous of most things in my simple world at home-an eriee government bungalow locked away in my mind- high walls with tapestries that boomed in the sinister laughs of dreary,ringing telephones, the darkness in its many forgotten corners and the darkness above, a Skeletor poster board in the store house, awning Victorian windows with crying faces etched out on its misty glass panes on dewy mornings, the boarded fireplaces with endless debris, silence, my mother, her silhouette, mountain shadows I had imagined, evenings spent in the back alley that ran through to somewhere where the eerie church gong sounded, hollow breeze, my cousins, their silhouettes too, dolls, the retreat hour at five in the evening when everything came to a standstill apart from the melancholic battalion trumpet and the flag as it dropped below the setting sun, rooms with boarded fireplaces and ochre lights, rooms with high ceilings, monkey’s peering from skylights tugging at cables passing through to the terrace boards, a row of Peepul trees along the front view, and many more things I cannot remember......as I hope you can see, it was a long time ago. In this time, I was in what I would suppose could have been an innocuous rendition of mad and dangerous love- that with water. Though my love exceeded many times my ability to soothe the both of us or any onlooker in it, I did love it in meaning- as I understood it- like most other things. In that time, I had admirations too. Things I was utterly pleased to show interest in. In their appreciation I found I could live ephemerally forever with them. Sleep with them, play with them in my dreams, walk down with them in fantastic ecstasy to a place I thought existed, anguish with them, and eat with them, for them, from them. The existence of anything and the compassion I felt towards it, however trivial, went undoubted, sailing over still waters....rarely battered by the burden of foresight. I was not afraid or worried that my love would eventually wane, if at all it ever did (mostly it did). I didn’t care to let time pass by gradually or care to let love for something drift in like the afternoon breeze this moment. Back then, it was love at first sight. And at first, it was always unconditional. In the anticipation and rush of an entourage of experiences, I dove into wells for experiences I knew lay beyond where I couldn’t see; the water only wet me with transient emotion. My admirations bounced around in my small world, craving for experience. But if admirations were my mistresses then water was my muse.
I would have loved to have remembered, clearly, how it must’ve felt like to plunge into a body of water for the first time ever. I was too little unfortunately, around three years old I would think, when my father brought me to the army swimming pool and with a reassurance I can only imagine- dropped me into the water and seen me squabble with a veracity I wouldn’t know existed. I can imagine all these things. And I can imagine how it must’ve been even though I don’t remember most of it now. But it is from here, a few miles away from where I am now, in Fort William where my parents were transferred, that I can begin to trace back the lure of waters.
Though there are very few things I now remember in general, it’s stifling as a writer though it brings outlandish joy for the poet. Somewhere along the road that I have travelled fairly straight on, upwards even; as I turn to look around before settling into a dreamy nostalgia- I see a strange mist that has been hanging thickly. It amuses, bewilders and even sometimes hypnotises me into stupor or beckons me dangerously. The sun fortunately sets before me and not behind that mist- though it does rise there. And I do miss the sunrise but console myself in the lap of lassitude, usually sleeping through till she leaves from under my head only to rest it in the arms of forgetfulness, where I wake up and most days and walk on- unsuspectingly, slightly hung over. As I go on through the day, the unsuspecting sun comes up from behind my neck only to begin falling faster in front of me than I could imagine. And in that again I am caught longing to catch up, each day, day after day, as it drops silently....indifferently. Maybe someday I will race it, when I get close enough, and then sleep in its place to placate myself. Maybe that thought keeps me going too apart from the lassitude and forgetfulness. And as for my sun and when it get around presumptuously only to find me there, I long to see him in person- as equals maybe. Capable of dousing and protecting one another with respect we both I hope will someday acknowledge.
It is here maybe, in my forgettable quest, from the poverty it shrouds on me, water shields me. The thought of surrendering to water as it engulfs me each time I dive into it lends me a familiar sanctuary that the sun could never provide, that very few things could ever provide. In water, my world was encouraging and trust worthy, even as a child. In the fiercest of waters it seemed brilliantly challenging and fair- and even if the water tide won over mine it left me safe at the shore, beaming uncertainly as it quickly ebbed away into the vague depth, without a name. It was in tides and waves, in being pushed away, or pitted against, engulfed into or be pushed out of something so tedious and rewarding to my curiosity, it was in the ready relationship with the aged waters- blue, composed and satiated by provoking experience yet playful like old sailors- that I found comfort and an excellent mentor.
But there was a time, when I hadn’t relinquished all doubt to trust this age old friend. In Lucknow, preceding my stay in Calcutta, I had never seen the sea. I had never felt the surge as it came charging at me with such willingness and apparent wrath. I had never imagined water to rise operatically as it neared us before the sand only to cascade majestically as if bowing away, half in respect for us and half in recognition of its own may. I had never waded too far unsuspectingly, only to be frighteningly battered and sent homewards by the sea. I didn’t know that the seas too, like us- rise and die, confront and beguile, stammer and worship those above, uncertainly. I had never imagined myself to be curious of water, of why it wouldn’t rise on certain days when I expected it too. I had never felt disappointment as it mislaid my wishes, took my castles on days it was angrier, receded when it was saddened by us, or took some stranger with it in apparent egocentricity. I never loathed it or loved it. I never knew that water in fact had character, a character, a personality that wasn’t necessarily perfect, or completely obtuse. That it responded differently to each on each one us and that too just like we did to each other. I never knew I could affect its disposition of my own accord, let alone befriend it and eventually entrust it each time with my life with great faith. I never knew all this and so I never thought of water as something, someone, with life, animated, forbearing and even expectant. Most importantly, I never knew or expected that water too possessed a certain rationality with which it worked itself around our feet and eventually submerged us.
I think of it as a way to disconnect myself from the umbilical cord of the world usually, one that I thought hung over each one us from the skies as a kid, bridging us to something, slowly tugging harder as we grow- to me it sometimes nagged even. And when it did, water was my retreat most often. In water, its tug was reduced to a gentle sway, I could see it loosen its clutch as it slowed down in water, bending and leaning leisurely- as if humbled by the sobriety of time- fossilized below the unrelenting, smooth permafrost of waters unruffled and sinuous- something richer, something powerful, something quantifiable in its sheer volume and not in its dearth- so unlike poverty- assuredly assignable as faith.
As my evenings in Calcutta came about to be- they were marked with great expectations and soft yearning. It was here that I first dove into a swimming pool. I would ride to the swimming pool each evening except on Thursdays and Sundays. Sundays marked morning timings and Thursdays the pool would be cleaned rather thoroughly. In fact, most things there were done with a certain wholeness and arduousness. The cleaners cleaned it with diligence if not affection (I could never imagine a person would do that with affection), the lifeguards practiced their drills, the fat ladies swam breaths always, the uncles swam lengths, old ones clutching to their sides religiously, the same children clung and moved along the sides as if never to learn or unaware of the art of swimming- day after day, coaches with starched short pants, white socks and cheap navy blue trainers from the army canteen shot at everyone, glances, bellows and the frequent use of the steel mouth whistle- it didn’t matter who, they kept recreational swimmers overtime and argued with parents to let slip another hour for the prodigious ones, chlorine levels were monitored and water was kept as natural and fresh as possible, a ten metre diving board- the sepulchre of my frivolous fear and awe alike- stood across the deeper end of the fifty metre pool and at the end of each quarter the pool would host a swimming gala that culminated with a brilliant display of divers and surfers. There, I could wade about for hours, immersed in a cauldron of challenging curiosity. And with this thought in mind, in pursuit of the wealth I saw in it, I would cycle down with a red, thatched plastic grocery bag that stored towels and paraphernalia hung over the back nest, bouncing and clicking away as it brushed against the naked wheel....with great expectations and little thought for regret or the big wide world.
Bullets for Your Thought- Friendly Fire On Cannabis
So, I can’t speak for everyone, but about a year ago, I decided to never (now rarely) be surprised in my chosen world- NUJS. By surprised I intend to mean greatly bothered, ashamed, taken aback, topple over, startled, etc. By surprised, or rather lack of it, I intend to address that part of the GG’s query, intended or not, where it became difficult to comprehend a certain behavior that manifests itself in most of us- but in very different renditions, backed by a tumult of varying reasons. That slight nonchalance almost transcendental to our NUJSverse[3]. I can’t reason with you on paper and put down bullets here for why it is like that because we’re talking about not being surprised by the world at large- the world that surrounds us (me) here, usually at large within and without us- differing with each person, countless elements and observations forming a part of each. I won’t go into how people should not be weak enough to be bothered by things such as externalities or how there are people I know who really don’t care. And I also won’t try and convince you that its because most of you are indifferent, individualistic, wiki everything, mooters, low lifes, too similar, not like me, too callous, lawyers, too arduous, over involved, SidSins[4], over enthusiastic to the point of being stupid and loud, too quiet, hairy metalheads, self involved, problematic, rappers, too simple, homosexuals, accented, wide eyed, neighbours, blah blah blah, not yet and maybe never. Neither will I get at the college administration, prove and label them as cheats who gas in their prospectus and touch up academic block images on a secret version of Photoshop that NASA used for fake Apollo 11 missions to make them wow ‘unreal’, or as apparatchik, as disquieting, stammering, insecure, political, communists who don’t approve college canteens, liberals in the garb of communists, failed lawyers with burning egos, rising lawyers with flaring egos, incapable, unworthy and so many things that I’ve heard and thought of (in that order so don’t blame me…..wholly). I can’t do all that because it’s been done before, not here, but everywhere else; it’s too tedious and usually gets the better of my otherwise unbiased attempts. This is about me and people who agree in general. In fact, Goutam delineated pretty much everything in his last post here and it is from there that I’d like to follow up- with an internalized approach- one that doesn’t justify but sheds light on a perspective. So here I toss yet another salad hoping you’ll taste it and know where the likes come from. And before I continue I would like all to keep in mind that almost nothing has changed after the widely appreciated article by GG and that children like us and like those we don’t know much about and don’t honestly care are still seen doing exactly the same things. So this is not an article attempting change, its merely hoping that you can derive entertainment enough from it so that it lasts you through till the next issue.
So I’ve given you a head note of reasons behind my nonchalance and have told you I don’t want to justify them since some of them are wholly true and some implicitly false, the rest we’ll never agree upon and even if we do it would be of no consequence. I have told you about the ideas ephemerally governing my life and that I often eat them up myself and told you that they are not as important as why I end up eating them. I have told you that I am rarely surprised. And that has something to do with all of this.
Moving on, weighing scales and the blind lady on the touché prospectus can do the trick sometimes by simplifying my temper into two categories and pitting that one against the other. And after a semester here- my optimism was sitting, eye to eye with the lady of justice (who was blind….sniff), while Mr. Smartass/ Narcissist/ Pessimist/ Selfish/ Sadass/ Lowlife/ &^%^* had just about touched down and walked off. It reminds me of that fat, pissing off kid who’d catapult me across the see-saw on account of his weight;[5] just like that my optimism too had been flung about in a similar way, by some fat dirty kid who’d grown up inside me, feeding of these validations and who I didn’t know existed. And that surprised me more than I remember being surprised when I hit the grass as a child; NUJS hurt not only because of the way I was, or that part of me that grew there had become, but also the way so many around me were when they noticed- all those dirty reasons came back to my mind almost instantaneously. And when that happened I took a U turn on the road prescribed, for a while. Of course, I did give reasons for it then and even negotiated them with others. We all did I guess- participatory nature of grief and disbelief. But the truth is that it was as instant as it was gradual in the sense that after a while, it was not that plethora of reasons that guided my ‘unconcern’, it was the absence of alternatives that led me to rediscover this ganglion of issues each time I was systematically or even vaguely reminded of something concernedly obtuse. So that it grew not only gradually but in ephemeral loftiness each time.
The truth is that I got bored of these reasons, gave up on them rather than felt restrained by them. To my own conscience, they seemed rather futile after a point since they went mostly justified, consensual, unopposed, let alone to me, to everyone. There was a point (more like an epoch) when our centre table (late night contraband enabled) discussions revolved around the ethereal plague of the university’s inherent lethargy. Their seemed to be a common consensus that such existed and collectively (conclusively) we had formed a rather vivid sketch of things that plagued us and our environment. It had a pattern of speechifying and mutual cachet, only to be abruptly restarted in the company of other good men a few days later. So that in under a month’s time, I was high on eight casks of Mallya’s premium beer, Rs.2000 short, staring at potential failure in Contract Law I (which I eventually did fail), one of Abcos’ favoured clients despite being a despotic consumer and in mutual admiration of an army of good men. I remember the time we were working on building a canteen and nothing seemed to come of it except these inconsequential forums. And soon enough the canteen proposal was scrapped, the slope group disbanded and every one hauled their broken spirits back home for Pujo.
I realized then that reasons and observations like those can last forever in the rhetoric of law students and perhaps most others, but their worth and strength, from where they derive a consequential character can last only as long as someone or something capable of affecting them actively does so. Opposition, concession, submission, something has to mirror them. But here, all I heard after repeated thuds to the ground was the panting of the grass- no applause, no jeer, no pushing or shoving- the fat kid was like an assuming, farting mannequin whom we all detested but that was it- he was just too stiff for any one of us. Soon I learned that amotivation not only ruled but ruled rather wisely amongst the presumptuous lot that we all were and continue to be. It enabled rhetorical analysis of almost everything. And it spanned so far across so as to cover all rationales; so far deep so as to mirror its every aspect with brilliant depth, but at the emblematic layer only. There were no ATRs (Action Taken Reports). Just ACRs handed out on every issue. There was no consequence and everything, every decision ended like a roadside Adda- like learned old men debating oil policy for hours each evening only to ride over the fear of loneliness inherent in communism and arthritis. Everyone seemed to accept these reasons and advised me in-spite of their existence, showing me the lawyer’s case. In all of this, I first gave into this rhetoric, simply and honestly considering it as a part of a larger process. But soon I found that students and faculty alike understood and regarded these entire processes- similar experiences backed by similar inferences leading to similar grievances- that I experienced at college initiation as a parallel, rhetorical reality that could strangely be left open ended like loose strings. They might not have meant it, but so many things demanded of them to do so. It seemed like a duality they had identified, accepted and reassured themselves of a long time ago. So long ago that even when they delved back into past I doubt they ever penetrated through the canopy or slid down the trunk to the roots. I saw students accepting and practicing popular politics en masse, saw them not only use words carefully but analyse those uttered by fellows with sharp, churlish method; I saw loyalties transpiring layers and saw that it was easy to transcend frameworks within which they operated- people stood for right and wrong, some chose to take no heed of right or wrong- but as friends or follies such beliefs often reversed and accepted as common practice, I saw with scared eyes potentially powerful people lose themselves in the aurora of power- without bothering to understand its vast implications, I saw some understand them and them thwart them as characteristically and firmly acceptable, saw teachers lamenting administrative decrees and cold shoulder each other, saw effortless procrastination at the highest levels- student societies, administration, trusts, UGC grants and what not. In other words, while I felt that the fire in their belly burnt I learnt that it was conceived on a promise of convenience, compromise- that fed it continuously without guilt. Guilt was contractually void. And that explained the viciously vicious cycle of thought, trepidation, mutual rhetoric, compromise, commonality and mutual admiration. And in all of this, I was lost through my own eyes. Law being a distant, uncompromised dream now seemed like a small circus of world governance, or rather how it was inferred. Nothing seemed wrong here and nothing was right objectively. It was rather philosophical until everyone forgot the spheres of operation and arguments worked like Sophist logic- without a set initial framework- justifiable in the same way as arbitrary African policy ‘upgrades’ by developed countries. In that I saw little that would attract a respectful glance, let alone avid interest. Many seemed to function that way and somehow many shared common ground when they asserted that such an outlook had little bearing on how most perceived, learnt or taught law in the university.
Of course, not every one functions the same way and hence there were packs amongst the NUJS herd. Packs far removed from each other’s reality but offering constant commentary on the other, entertaining within themselves. And I may as well have been a part of this without knowing it. Maybe, at Biju’s shack and in a few rooms I too ran elections to these packs. In fact, I am running a commentary on it right now. And even if the other is true, that is, if I have become less surprised with myself and with everything that surrounds me, some might say I am worse off in this apathy which takes away or gives nothing to my perception as well as to my own self-esteem. And maybe it is true. Or maybe it’s all the same. We all stand by our hourglasses. Maybe the likes of GG and many others who influence us unknowingly or knowingly will initiate us into further thought. And I hope they do. Because the perception of law and polity at the individual level, projected strongly in such percepts, is essential to what may be the larger aims of this university and within it- each one of us. To see twenty year olds languish under the banner of what is widely acceptable in today’s political dominion is like remembering the first time I put a cigarette to my lips- it seemed justified and surprisingly gripping in that time and even today if I look back I rarely complain till it comes around to a severe cough or throat infections. The point is that I had been imitating all along what I felt was widely acceptable and even the norm where I grew up. And now I seldom question the origins of my apathy towards my own fate, but just accept it in a cloud of smoke. Maybe it is in that little habit that servitude towards my own ideas is reflected.
It might be true that coming to this college is easier than going to most others. It might be true that one should learn to mould and adapt to an environment that one chooses for oneself. It might be true that expectations to conform here are way lesser than most other professional colleges (especially engineering where I hear they use the ‘shove things up any one of his orifices’ method). And it might also be true that many have toiled and succeeded where I and many like me have chosen to lament. HELL, it could even be that I am totally wrong and will be for the rest of this article. Maybe this college is the easiest or most interesting ever, I will never know. Neither will you. And everything mirroring and balancing all these probabilities could also be true. But in the end what is the one thing that stands true, unchanged and unfettered in most of us and why? It is probably our ability to analyse in retrospect, quietly within ourselves. Retrospect is probably the meditative inverse of all the rhetoric and handiness we have offered to ourselves. It might not yield in each one of us what I expect it to yield and in most of us it might not even stand true. But for those few who have argued enough, are bored of it and feel that it brings with it only its own sake, it is probably time to reflect on our why we stand (or bend over) the way we do. It is time not because our world is coming to an end or something as melodramatic (read 21st December, 2012) but because five years is too long for some of us to sit on our contemplative arses. And this time will exist till those five years are around after which we will again expect and adapt conveniently in our own myriad ways to a larger society ahead. But there is little hope or satiation in hearing the sound of distant waves as they crash if you haven’t ever seen or stood up to one as it comes at you, roaring, engulfing you in its meaningless banter and leaving you wet with experience. There is a different thrill in that challenge and the taste and sound of it leaves most in vigorous anticipation of something purer than, if not as pure as that sensation.
[2] Now GG knows what we do at his shack…toss salads!
[3] Sorry, but that’s too bring the ‘universe’ effect…if you have a better word.
[4] Geeeeee…..cheap shot….but then again.
[5] in fact his weight may well be regarded as the quantifiable but not qualitatively negotiable plethora of reasons which have affected me