A walk home?

The walk seemed long at the end of yet another weary day, what with having to manage each step amidst a conglomeration of unwanted entities. These unwanted entities encompassed almost everything: mass of individuals wrongly called humans (the adjective has exactly the contradictory connotations), vehicular waste, environmental waste, industrial waste, animal waste, human waste and above all the waste of civic sense. I know the last word of the previous sentence does not pose even a remote semblance to the vocabulary of our so called metro crowd, not to mention those privileged with the garb of being underprivileged. Now before this write-up seems to sound like a waste of words under the garb of creativity, let me tell you straight it is just another day in the life of a routine individual, caught in the web of or maybe ebb of time. I say ebb because as each day progresses, I seem to decline, to disintegrate, to degenerate…I do not know how many more D’s can be added here. I wonder if it is true that life has a fair share of everything for everyone. Probably all these D’s are simply my fair share as I did not get any of them in academic or professional life. So here is life pouring all it’s D’s on me with every D competing to make its presence felt and ensure that existence becomes as D-full, I mean, dreadful as possible. But amongst all, the D that continually rules the roost is DISTURBANCE. While it is partially true that time heals most wounds, ‘cos we get used to the majority of them anyways, this healer seems like a work shirker in my case, considering the fact that it does not even seem to heal the small number of wounds it is supposed to. It seems like I am just getting used to all of them to the extent that pain and no pain simply are the same. The senses have just gone numb, even if, to quote Dickinson, “I feel a funeral in my brain” (originality was always a thing of the past).
The fact that my mind is now a replica of the conglomeration of unwanted entities I was talking about earlier is merely an understatement. This time the unwanted entities are thoughts on decisions taken and not taken, relationships, responsibilities, career, family, marriage, friends and somewhere down the list MYSELF. This time the last word of the previous sentence does not pose even a remote semblance to my own vocabulary. No wonder then, every time I want to talk about myself the only line that comes to my mind is (this time it is from a poem I have written), “…Too late I realize, I am in search of myself, my own self I have lost/ In the waves of time’s stillness a pain echoes back and tells me from myself I am bereft.” So while the waste of the street rouses a stench letting the contents of my bowels reflexively find a way to my mouth, so also, the waste in the mind rouses a repulsive desperation bringing the deep rooted “I” within my yearning soul involuntarily into conscious thought. The D’s give way to the W’s – Who am I? Why am I? Where am I? What am I? When will I find the answers? Even before the yearnings of the soul scramble to a position available in my priority of thoughts list, I push them away to a convenience called “later”, completely forgetting I am no Scarlet O’Hara. Now? Well more practical W’s are already staring me in the face. What am I going to do next? The vicious circle of job-relocation-marriage forms the perfect Bermuda triangle which by no means is equilateral. But then this has about a couple of months to climb up the priority chart in my thoughts. Even before I can think of moving this triangle to ‘later’, a line of questions march to and fro in my mind with each one vying for the topmost position on mission priority. What do I have to take home from market? Any bills pending? What’s cooking for dinner?
My Yoga instructor says if you feel stressed, close your eyes, take a deep breath and meditate on yourself. I want to do just that, but hold on, my cell phone is already buzzing. I am hoping against hope that it’s not my manager asking for a status report, which demands me getting back to office - it’s worse. Why do these financial companies not understand that I am scared of credit cards and I will not take one even if they pay me to keep it? So from philosophy to practicality to mundane chores to credit card refusals, I am in the back to square one position with innumerable questions, for each of which, I have the perfect answer that simply raises the next important question. Wow now that’s quite a phrase – answerable questions leading to questionable answers. Am I going insane? Is a 20-min walk home driving me crazy?
In this continuous race of feet, of wheels, of thoughts – I want to stop. Even if I want to, the world does not. I am swept away into the crowd of reality, there is so place to even fall. I want to fall today because it may bruise me and I do want to feel the pain, at least it will let me regain myself. This moving forward scares me because it demands marching on without knowing where am I going. “…the longer the walk, the darker the alley...” My mind thuds – Stop. Stop. Stop. I reach home. I turn the key and I already see myself cooking, cleaning, calling – preparing for tomorrow at the loss of today. I wonder, how many doors I shut, every time I turn a key?

-Monica