save your breath

Ok, here's something very cool in the blogging world that Kanika, a very close friend and housemate (I could practically hi-five her without moving from my desk) is doing on http://stone-paper-scissor.blogspot.in/ this February. It's called the Fantabulous February with one inspirational post a day.
Click the link and behold. Here's the Wednesday,15th of Feb post,

And here's what I have to say about this picture..

It made me think of all the times I fought for the last row of seats in the school bus, which was always a privilege for the seniors, and how all of a sudden there were no seniors left to fight with because everyone leaves school someday, and whether you can or not becomes obsolete. And Route No. 4 and 5 become strips of yellow that you visit every year when you go back to school with a visitor's pass and wear something carefully chosen because you've lost the right to wear that uniform of the best twelve years. And also because your school shirt reads things you can't make public written with markers on the last day of XIIth. The faces in the buses look older of course, and trying very hard to be. And there are faces of seniors from so long ago that the kid on the last row wouldn't even know that his isn't the only face peering out the window in all of the history of Route 4 and 5. But you remember those faces of long ago, even the worst of the bullies. And you forget that some of these kids who don't know how lucky they are to not shave/wax/thread yet, know you as a forgotten face. Before long, only the window will stand witness to your having conquered the last row....but such are school legacies.

And this picture reminds me of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, you know when Jim Carrey comes from that place and meets you know who. Do watch it if you weren't nodding along!



And now, for something I'd been thinking of. A periodic ponder.

Do you find it easy to believe? How often do you find a thing worth pouring your faith in. Something strange and complex that falls in that murky half-understood world between like, love and fear.

Would you give a part of yourself to something above, below, outside, inside of you ? Something so large it makes it binocularly impossible for you to fathom, with presence you cannot deny. Is it so microscopic that you would let yourself wander in tireless search? Is it heavy, so heavy sitting on your shoulders and weighing down and all you can do is submit to it without once seeing its face? Or light and slippery, gliding with you from stone to stone, obliging you with its presence? Sight, if not the most deceptive and overwhelming, is the most useless sense when it comes to the comprehension of faith. It is mostly a more subtle bodily exchange with the very ordinary or the extraordinary that makes you humble. Like the touch of freshly washed floors. Or the sound of rustling lace.

God. BlunderGod. Underdog. Spirit. Jinx. Force. Cusswords. Crystals. Celestial bodies. The Animal world. Sacrifice. Plants and their byproducts. Food. Heroes. Family. Childhood. Morals. Alter egos. Guitars. Winning at arcades. Peace. Sleeping over troubles. What is it that you call your belief to tell me that it exists ? Would it matter if I name it differently?

In cinnamon sticks, in choking swirls of incense, in faint remembrance of something floral and green that is now a crowded building with uric odour, in the visceral smell of fear in prayers, in the oily vapours of potato chips that always sit in boxes of board games, in the heady whiff of thick candles, in the calming smell of the bath products of the people you miss. In smells, you lock a belief.

Noses have rich memories that need no comprehension and are impossible to ignore. Don't care to explain how, who in and why you believe, I could trace the arc of your eyelids as you allow yourself to inhale to see
what makes you strong and vulnerable at the same time. That is explanation enough. The effort you take in heaving your chest to infuse a moment of your life, will tell me what you follow.

For those who ask you why you believe..let them know it a matter too personal for them to question. It is no one's right to know.They may be the sort who are looking for something that they can believe in that wouldn't betray them.
Do not look for reasons, if you say them aloud, they might dissolve.
Do not explain that you are forced to believe in something that is greater than you to the degree that you can be enslaved. There is nothing that could enslave you but you.You make your day and nights. You run yourself in a way that is bio-chemically beautiful and unbelievable. And it is a miracle. But it is you you believe in least.

Let your nose guide you, not a finger you can't question, that points in a direction that defies the gravity that keeps you ground bound and makes walking with your favourite wig on impossible. Let your nose guide you and you'll find a belief. Hold your tongue, it may try to reason with what is illegal, infantile, illogical and immediate. No, don't reason with tongues when you find something to believe in.
Save your breath.