Visit my dreams, if possible
Love is the answer when the question is too difficult to fathom. One of the greatest essences of being human is our ability to care. It’s only when we care, we become a part of the living matrix. Indifference excludes us from the circuit. If you are under the assumption that you are an independent body which has nothing to do with the world at large, then you are sorely mistaken. Every breath you take is not only influenced by the world but also affects the world around you. Every creature that has carbon in it corresponds to the life in you. Sounds philosophical but think about it. The cool breeze you enjoy in the middle of summer has traveled a long way to touch your skin. The food that nourishes you has done the same. The people we bump into as well as those we don’t are part of a design that is complex, to say the least, and quite simple, to say nothing at all. To reach the supreme stage of love, we need to step forward and care first.
Science is supposed to be cold, calculated and complicated. If that is so, what explains the various studies that prove time and again that there is a bigger force at play. It’s only after I started reading more about human psychology and behavioural economics that I realized how predictably cute our species is. Consider this nugget here: according to MRI scans, the part of our brain that is responsible for judgement deactivates when we look at the image of someone we love. Imagine how fascinating our brain is and how weirdly we are meshed. The bottomline is, if you are in my good books, you shall get an easy pass. Amazing.
My wife’s Tulu is far better than mine and it’s not surprising that she can speak 6 languages. Credit goes to Bangalore’s multilingual societies and her knack to pick up. However, if you are good at a language, it’s tested with your ability to spin wordplay at will. That is, in my view, the ultimate litmus test of proficiency. Palla is so good at Tulu — our common mother tongue — that she will throw jokes effortlessly. Puns. Here and there and everywhere. Yesterday, she called Ranga “Poork Sundari’ (gunk beauty) as he has started discharging in his left eye. Ugly morning delight. In the past, she introduced me to cool vernacular nicknames like ‘Nervous Narayana’, ‘Senti Ganeshan’, ‘Rowdy Ranga’ and ‘Nylon Nalini’. In her company, my Tulu has improved a bit. In fact, to such an extent that I coined a Tulu phrase ‘beri la ijji, bala la ijji’ — “neither have the back nor the strength of carry “— that didn’t really impress my parents.
During this lockdown, we understood, to some degree, that we depend heavily on thankless professionals like house maids, farmers and delivery executives. We, the privileged lot, who can’t do much on our own, had a hint already but the last couple of months cemented our doubts for good. I wonder how many of us became better people thanks to our recent tryst with our incompetence. Or how many of us raised our domestic help’s salary or thought of learning to grow vegetables in their balcony — if there is enough space to bang your utensils, you can grow your food as well — and started tipping the delivery guys for being brave enough to venture out when everybody else is supposed to be stay indoor.
Speaking of the delivery ecosystem, the concept of surprising somebody with a delivery can turn into an unintended episode of tragicomedy. For instance, if you stay in Kolkata and want to surprise your girlfriend in Chennai with a random gift. Your aim is to make her smile but luck isn’t on your side and instead of sending binoculars, a juicer reaches her doorstep. Not that she can’t return the package and get things sorted, the only problem is your moment is ruined. It’d have been a nice gesture to gift her something — assuming she is a nature lover who likes to pry on birds around — that would have made her day. But, no. Due to some logistical error, she had to deal with a juicer and the biggest plot twist is instead of getting one person surprised, we have two people surprised now — the receiver as well as the sender.
Sometimes, actually most of the time, Ranga is blankly staring into the distance. His limitations — limitations is not the same as limits; the former is about ability whereas the latter is about the environment — as a dog is understandable. Granted he spends most of his waking hours on the pursuit of food and affection, there must be something within him that would crave more. I look into his deep brown eyes and try to cajole clues out of him but to no avail. [As I am typing this, he is busy running —probably being chased, chasing others — in his dreams on the floor.] He doesn’t reveal much but I like to believe that we have a bond that goes beyond temporal ties. We must have known each other in our past lives. It’s no mere coincidence that he showed up outside our door four monsoons ago and is an active component of our lives. With his ever-curious ears, he tells us something but not always. I hope I could ask him to visit me in my dreams if anything bothers him. But then, again, there is no such hotline in place.
If humans could figure out their shit (read: priorities), we’d have helped create a better world for other creatures. But we are far, far, far away from that point of evolution. To understand what is going on now, we’ll have to step back into the past. After the Great Oxidation Event — which basically got living beings addicted to oxygen in the first place — earth went through a criminal phase wherein oxygen dropped to dangerously low levels, wiping out nearly 96% of all creatures. Never again has such a massive event taken place in recorded history. Going by the low standards of expectations nowadays, is it possible that our creators could punch the reset button like that once again?
Humans find it hard to hate but a lot harder to love. And therein lies the single harshest mystery of all. In a room of 20, chances are you’ll like 5-8 people unless you are Mother Teresa who liked everyone because the Vatican had strict policies. Yes, it’s natural to build disdain than fumigate indifference. That said, the creation of the other is a paradox. Genetically speaking, humans are remarkably the same wherever you go. We look at dogs and cats from different breeds and conclude that they all look the same. Yes, they do but they are genetically very different. Which is not the case with humans. Despite our distinct features, our codes match. According to anthropologists, one root cause of racism is our brain’s tendency to categorize everything — the way we do when we look at animals, birds and trees — even when there is no need for it. Another way of saying this is we see too much and feel too little.
I am big on numbers and stats. Not because I believe in the absolute nature of truth (I don’t) but because they help me in grasping the changing realities. When something that was at 13% 50 years ago but is now 79%, it allows me space to build an outlook. Unlike words, mathematical figures don’t fuck with you. They are pristine and don’t waste your time. Again, many a times, it depends on what you’re looking for. For instance, whenever people around me are talking about 9/11, I am thinking about the 2996 people who died within a few minutes. I don’t include the 19 terrorists in this figure. Similarly, when we are discussing 26/11, I am thinking about the 166 people who were massacred. I don’t include the 9 terrorists who carried out these attacks. The point being, statistics can be ruthless and deprive you of your humanity.
In a self-regulating society, nobody needs to tell you how to behave. This virtue struck me recently while I was reading about the ridiculously low population of the Falkland Islands and the almost negligible crime rate there. When you are bound by the core tenets of decency, you look out for each other. Civilization prospers when there is concern for strangers; it declines when you deliberately create strangers. Which brings us to the eternal question: who gets to decide who is good and who isn’t? For example, during the Stalin era, the Soviet Union had definite quotas for public arrests. If an officer hadn’t met the quota, he was left with no choice but to make up crimes to charge people with. It was a terrible system but the idea was based in goodness. To the system, if people aren’t being bad, it means that the officers aren’t working hard enough — they are sleeping in on plucking out the bad apples. A self-defeating process, overall, but says a lot about how little we trust each other with each other.
At the beginning of this year, my 2020 goals were a lot of things like abs, dance, languages, chess, etc. As of now, it has trimmed down to only one: learn to speak eloquently. You see, I can break down anything/anybody worth their salt while typing (read: writing) but when it comes to talking, I am lost for words. Like the popular meme suggests, the struggle is real. My wires up there must be messed up. What else can explain this drastic deviation? Now that I know the problem, I am figuring out a solution. Within a few months, I want to reach a point where I am as eloquent as my brother. Obviously, he didn’t become this person overnight but when he speaks, others listen. Maybe, with practice, that’s how you learn to speak well: by being confident in what you want to say, not what you have to say.
