Smells like human spirit

On a shelf in my home, there lies a doll-like thing that my aunt had received from her ex-boss. I was a child when she had received it and because I was so fascinated by it, she let me keep it. It's a red, wooden thingy, with a woman painted over it and is divided into two halves, both fitted into each other in a way that you have to unscrew the upper half to figure out what's inside. So when you unscrew the first half, inside, you find a smaller doll. You unscrew that, and you find a still smaller doll and so on and so forth till you get to the end, where all you find is a little baby-doll. That, I feel, very neatly sums up most of the human race : layers and layers that one has to painstakingly unravel to get to the very core of a being.

On one of my rare visits to college yesterday, I happened to run into two friends, not big-time buddies, mind you, but casual acquaintances. We got talking. Later that day, in office, I was chatting up this apparently-wild girl, from whom I had always kept a safe distance (given my distaste for anything that is even remotely freaky). We started talking because I was trying to kill time and there was no one around to do it with. Later still that day(or shall I say the next day), at around 1 am, I received a call from my cousin, who had called for advice on some girl trouble. Ofcourse I spoke to many more people that day, but the conversations that I had with these four people remain in my memory, not because the people themselves were so engaging, but because they gave me the privilege of snooping around in the darkest corners of their heart. They kept telling me that they couldn't understand why they were telling me all that they were, but I understood, and smiled.

I think it's a gift, you know : to be privileged enough to enter the deepest recesses of the heart and having access to all its joys and pains, its fondest memories and hopes and its silent anguish, all of them unalloyed. Now, this 'getting to the core' business is a serious affair and not something that I am very comfortable with. Usually, I try to keep my distance from people, and even my closest friends are not allowed into the private spaces that are meant for me and my maker. Consequently, I do not expect other people to give me free acess to their core; that's when you are most vulnerable; most people build a rock-solid, invisible fortress around themselves. I have many friends who claim to understand people and their behaviour; I always felt depressed on that count because I felt I never 'knew' people. I have been the cause of quite some mess in my relationships, all because I never knew what the other person was all about. With me, its a simple logic : I cannot be bothered with figuring out who the real 'you' is; if you want me to know, let me know, or I can do equally well with any facade you may care to present. I was never interested in getting to know a person's deepest secrets; I have no use for them. I do not encourage people to come to me with their personal problems; I can barely handle my own.

So, it came as a pleasant surprise when I realised that I infact, with all my stupidity and plain disinterest, I understood people better than most others did; the others just about manage to scratch the exterior surface; I plunge deep down with a freedom I find exhilerating. For example, let's discuss these four people I was talking about : the first is an only son who has taken his responsibilities very seriously. He started out like a normal college kid, but has graduated into a total workaholic. He's insomniac, works like crazy, is handling three businesses (and that's apart from the law course he's doing), all because he has old parents to take care of and a girlfriend he wants to marry. The marriage can't happen till he's financially stable, and so, in his attempt to get there, he's become a nervous wreck. We were discussing life and philosophy over a bottle of Maaza, and it amazed me that a person would willingly stretch himself so; such levels of self-sacrifice, I must shamelessly admit, is beyond me. But then, my thoughts on the subject deserve another post. I find it scary that someone my age works for 20 hours a day, and still manages to take time out for family and friends. And study law. The second friend is Parsi and is a little worried about her love-life. Her guy's Muslim and her parents are dead against her marrying anyone outside the community, especially Muslims. The story's a little more complicated, but let's not get into the details. The third, a colleague, was this person who had just been caught doping in office. I have no opinion on the dope culture, but I nevertheless kept my distance from this girl. But, as I mentioned, we got talking. She told me about her family : a cruel step-mom, a spineless dad, an uncaring step-brother..the works. Her mom had died during child-birth itself, so her relatives, orthodox people, always blamed her for the mom's death; so she's pretty much been floating around on her own. Her family never calls up; and now she doesn't care either, atleast that's what she claims. The fourth, a cousin, is seriously in love with a girl who already has a boyfriend, and who is expected to get married sometime next year. It doesn't help matters that she lives in Delhi, while our hero lives in Mumbai.

Phew! These are pretty common-place stories; I would normally have remained unpertrubed. But the anguish and despair in their voices got me thinking. It's often at occasions like these that you realise what a person is really about : by their actions, their reactions, their thoughts and their feelings. And these things change your perspective, you know. Now, I don't have to worry about their behaviour; I know what causes it. And it explains a lot of things. Within these four, I found a deeply spiritual and sweet person, a confused, but determined person, a person who tries to maintain a facade of well-being, but who's churning inside, and lastly, a person who's fighting against fate itself. They struck me in different ways. I dont know what will become of them. But I'll wait and watch and see life's grand drama unfolding before me.

And it seems a very good time to wish the human race 'pax et bonum'.