Please Observe.

Saturday, November 04, 2006

Thats how strong I feel about it

Over the last few months I have been walking a lot. Now this is not only due to the fact that cabs are expensive :P, but just purely out of the fact that when you walk, you have freedom. You can go anywhere; all you need is the will, and time. Now imagine you have a holiday, you have all the time in the world. You step out of your house and realise that you can go anywhere. You have the will, you want to walk. For me, walking is exciting! I can see so much of Dubai (and Sharjah) that I haven't seen before. A few weeks back I took a walk. I walked from my home to Rubin's house. It was great; the feeling is awesome. Now the flip side to walking is that, first of all it’s tiring as hell, and it depends upon the person walking. Now if the person is lucky, the weather conditions will be good for him, his walk will be a piece of cake. That's when its cool, there’s a light breeze; he’s probably got shades and good music to listen to on the way, a bag with food and water and some nice shoes to walk in. It also depends on where he’s walking. I'd say from Zabeel park to Bur Juman. Basically life's good for him.
On the other hand, some (I'd say unfortunate) people, have none of that happening. It’s probably noon and the suns on his head, he’s forgotten his shades (if he’s got any), no batteries, no cell charge, and he’s walking on literally crap terrain. On the way he'll slip and get cut badly, his shoe would get stuck in some weird foul smelling mud patch and he would have forgotten his handkerchief.
My journey altogether lasted around an hour and a half. Yeah, walking does take time, but at the end it’s worth it.

Have you ever been through a period in your life which you felt was a complete waste? I can't honestly think of a time that ever happened to me. I used to think so; it was not that great a feeling. I took the most appropriate example from my own life, this year. 2006. Every year at New Years Eve I look back and tell my friends. Actually we discuss it, we discuss how eventful the year has been, and we doubt that anything more exciting or experience-filled will ever come around again. But then we come to the next year and once again they beat the previous records against all odds. Sorta like the board results each year...or maybe that's just our batch :P.
It just has been filled with so many new things and experiences for me, and to credit myself, I guess I have passed them without any real serious problem.
Have you ever got the feeling that even though everything is screwed up, you still got something to salvage, something to look forward to? I have a book in which I write down all my pending assignments and work. It’s usually filled when I wake up to go to school and I go 'oh crap!' I dread what’s going to happen to me at school, but as soon as I remember the good things I have to look forward to, this sustaining factor removes the sense of foreboding for me.
To me, that is the best feeling in the world. To know that something good is still out there when everything is going weird.
The past year has been a great test for me; I just scraped through, as always :P, it was harsh, difficult and nothing has been going all that right for me. Every time I thought that something was going good, in another world of mine, the opposite was taking place. Sometimes both worlds were going down in flames. Everything I believed in was taken away from me. I tried to create things, I did, but they all died premature deaths. It’s not about the factors or in my case people that destroyed my thoughts. I don't even care about that anymore. If you asked me sometime back what I felt about the year that had passed, you wouldn't hear the end of it. I would have gone on and on. But it’s not even about that.
Its really about, that after walking for so long, blinded from the sun in my eyes ,still bleeding and trudging through an entire mess, I can still pick myself up and realise that I'm still walking and I'm walking for just one thing: To know that I’ve reached. That I’ve reached the place that I wanted to go. It’s my saving factor. It’s that what will always keep me going to school, even though my book is still full of unchecked boxes. If you ask me now about the past year, I'd tell you that it’s been fine, and then I’d look at my friends and smile. Even though the year has been tough I can always look back and tell you that the best things in my life happened in this year.
The best.
This year, one really important thing that pushes all the other things to the side, the thing that has keeps me walking has saved me. I can’t even begin to tell you how I feel about it. That’s how strong I feel about it.

This time the journey has lasted around a year. Yeah walking does take time, but at the end it’s worth it.

11 comments:

Anonymous said...

you know....that's such a sad story, it almost made me cry. you're pretty gud u no dat??

Anonymous said...

Horale, Tejas.

Sometimes I can relate to a composition because of how well it's presented. Other times, I can relate only because I've been in a similar situation before; it rings a bell.

This entry, like very few others, I was able to do both, and I sense concinnity both in this entry and in your writing style so far. This entry has really struck a chord and the parallels that I'm drawing against my life are startling.

Thank you for this.

Romit said...

Sometimes I feel, i know u so well.... but then again i feel i dun know u at all. Some how, u make me think of u always in a different way. This feeling has grown within me ever since you have moved or beginning of this year. Today wen i saw u outside physics tuitions... i felt i didn't know u at all... i dunno y ... but i got that feeling. Maybe we have become a bit distant...or it is me, i dunno.
I know what u have been through ...yet somehow i can't relate to the real subject of ure post.

Anyway..after all that walking pls drink a lot of water, do not get dehydrated. Really surprised wen u came walking from Garhoud to my place.!!!
good post

Nishant said...

Tejas. You've managed to spill out the words I needed to say, without even knowing it. It takes a great person to do that, and you've done it. You're absolutely right. So many things to regret. So many things to look forward to. But there's the light at the end of the tunnel, there's where the pain pays off. There's where you have lived.

Anonymous said...

seriously man, well written.

i know what kind of a year this has been for you. the ups, the downs.
the thing that i admire the most, is that taking into account the terrain, the weather, and all the other shitty circumstances, youve continued to walk, and i know you will continue, until you reach the destination you chose for yourself.

we all go through shit (sounds so cliche and 'easy said' right now, but yet so true :P)
at the end of everything it comes down to how we deal with this shit, and carry on.
its not easy to keep walking, but we have to, until we reach :P

again, well written.

and remember.... life is like a leaf.

Radhii said...

OOoh .. Tejas Menon! Even though this was long and seemed monotonous at the beginning, I read straight through to the end. Your last two posts have been really good. They've been those thinky thinky ones, if you know what I mean. And hey, if I understood the whole ' I've tried to create things .. they've died premature deaths ' thing correct, then no! All your creatings have been really good and loved by everyone! This blog included!! Do tell what your inspiration for walking is later. Ta's !

anish said...

Lose the entire 1st para, and this post will exceed what it has already achieved. The first time i started reading this, i think yesterday, i couldnt go past that - maybe you can cut it a little short.

Anyway after that - wow. Over and above the way you have written it, there is so much heart in what you have just said - the heart we see in you. You know tejas - you are weird. You go thru so much shit, shit that is really really shit, something that would have destroyed me, but u pull out brilliantly, and in your case, that's laudable. You pull thru and and use everything you love to keep you going and that's rare.

And with regards to 'the thing that pushes other things aside' - hope something happens...and pushes everythign else even more aside.

shit, the post made me a little emotional...however cliched that sounds...maybe it was the background music..."snow patrol - you could be happy" - the pure irony of it all..and now 'mr brightside' is playing - that always reminds me of you!

take care and enjoy...good luck with reaching that destination you hope to achieve - i, we, will always be there for you. :)

Anonymous said...

Nice post Tejas!
Not much to say, except that from the little I know about you, you're unique .. and I admire you.

Anonymous said...

Respect

Nishant said...

Ditto, Harry.

Anonymous said...

i know my comment is a bit late, but hey, better late than.. (oh, forget it!)
i really cannot tell you what i felt when i read this post. i thought itd be a mindless post, but once i got into it... wow. very well thought out and extremely well written.
its amazing that whenever you know your going to be in great trouble, or 'dread whats going to happen to you in school', you think of the good things. thats the way it should be. no matter what hard times you face, theres always something or someone to cheer you up. it really is the best feeling in the world.
i cant add anything else, because you said it, man. you said it all.
(sniff!)