Independence Day

Saturday, August 15, 2009

I feel like writing today. Not that there is anything to write about. Not even that I am top of the world yet. I am trying to think why I want to write or what I feel. Only a strange kind of coincidence occurs to the mind. Today is India's Independence Day and today I feel a strange kind of independence myself.

Independence from some of the ghosts that have chased me for a very long time in life. I was telling my wife a couple of days back how her recent trip to India (being away for six weeks) was an awakening time for me. For one, this time I made better of my fear for staying alone. I still slept with the lights on in the pathway from the living room to the bedroom alright, but that's why I said I made better of my FEAR and not got away with my fear.

It's not just the physical FEAR of being alone. I can see how the FEAR of things unknown is fading out. Not to say I was not alarmed by the huge guy on the Broadway sidewalk last night who was walking ahead of me and suddenly turned around and said something. I am not even sure if he was talking to me, but all I know was I was walking faster towards the doors of my hotel which were less than a few paces away. That safety was at hand's reach was comforting.

It was not the case though on the other night in the same New York neighbourhood exactly 3 weeks ago. That was another Friday night, when I spent one hour, from midnight to 1 AM on the bench in the middle of Broadway at 94th, alongside a couple of homeless people. Not long ago, not even the day before that one, I would not have crossed the road to go to the other side if those same people were sitting there on that bench. I would have gone down the sidewalk on my side, a few blocks further even, to get to the famous tea and muchkins I so savor from Dunkin Donuts. That's another story...

I am just returning home after taking a second term exam and I am trying to think if I had FEAR of exams before. No. It was just a hatred for exams. I just did not want to take them, but I sure had the FEAR of failure. That was the killer, not only in my academic history, but on several counts in life. There was a time in my life when FEAR of failure did not let me seek what I wanted, did not let me ask for what I sought. That FEAR has gone too, I feel. Contrary to that FEAR, I feel it is the lack of that FEAR that is my bane now. I am not even afraid of making mistakes now. Actually, that is my only FEAR!

Not even snakes. No more can they frighten me. I like to believe there is an element of God there. I think the depiction of snakes in association with some of my favorite Hindu Gods has actually helped me get over the fear of snakes. The King Cobra still frequents my vision, most often when I get in the shower and close my eyes to let the wound up tensions in my body go. But I am not afraid of him. I respect him for what he is (he is a King after all). And if I met him for real, I wouldn't FEAR either staying still in common sense or bowing down to him in my religious sense. Either way, I don't think I will fight him, but I will let him decide what he wants to do. I am not afraid of what will happen right after...

I look up and think back 2 days. I was 30 minutes away from being on the bus to New York, the day before my exams. That is when I realized my wallet was sitting snug in his rightful place at home. He likes his place and I am sure he was extremely comfortable on a warm summer afternoon. Only it wasn't helping me or my uncontrollable wife. The drama that unfolded in the next hour or so was unnerving that I needed to take a nap all the way to New York, a 100 minute bus ride. But yes, I was on that bus to New York, sans my dear wallet.

How I have missed him in the last 2 days. Every often my hand would reach out to my back pocket (yet another of his comfortable resting places), only to remember that I had left him back home in Mt Laurel. So how did I manage to get to New York, spend 2 nights at a hotel, eat, ride the subway and even stop on the walkway at the Port Authority bus terminal to hand out a dollar to the old woman I see every time I pass that way? That is not another story, but the details are inconseqential. The essence my dear, is the absence of FEAR.

I am looking out into the sunlight gleaming off the stream of cars on the New Jersey Turnpike. They are not moving at the average 60 miles per hour. Now that causes some FEAR. I remember the last exam day of the first term (this one is the second). I was going home after the exam to get dressed up for a GALA that night and return to my favorite city, but a trailer truck on the NJTP that crashed into 7 or 8 other cars caused me to sit in a hot Greyhound Bus for 3 or 4 hours. But it is a FEAR that I will get over with patience. I have had plenty of that and may be it is just going to test me again.

It is strange how this FEAR now seems to be shifting from one place to another. I don't mind if I have to sit in this bus for a few hours but my FEAR is that my laptop's battery will drain in a finite amount of time and I will neither be able to continue writing, nor be able to listen to music (the battery on my MP3 player drained out last night!). And this is the NJTP. Not NH4 in India, where, if the traffic backs up a long way, soon there will be vendors of all kinds selling their wares from peanuts to hand held fans to the anxious travellers, who will also happily lap up items of interest. Yet again, my FEAR is, I have but 2 dollars left on my person. Dear Wallet, I have never missed you so much in my life. It's all of an hour that separates us and the traffic on the turnpike is threatening to make it a couple or more.

Luckily, we're moving (not stopped), even as I move from one FEAR to another. And right now, we are actually moving fast enough for me to move out of this FEAR on to the next one. Ah! There it is. My stomach growls. I realize I have not eaten lunch and if I don't get to my wallet on time and get some cash, I can't get close to food I need and that usually causes me a migraine. I wouldn't FEAR it so much if I could just go home and sleep it off. Right now, I can't. My car will be waiting for me at the Greyhound station in Mt Laurel and I will need to drive her to the beautiful city of Philadelphia where my wife and son and the one who I treat like my other son are waiting for me to go out and have a good time.

How I would like to go to Dunkin Donuts and sink my teeth into a egg-white flat bread sandwich right now. Now wait. Then there is the FEAR of cholesterol. It is like some kind of satan who is lurking around me and threatening me from having a good life and eating all my favorite food. How I restricted myself to only one aloo tikki yesterday at the Indian buffet lunch is a wonder I can't explain but I am certain that devil cholesterol has something to with it.

The battery sign on my laptop just dropped some blue and gained white. 31 minutes left, it says. Given that I am listening to music also through the laptop, I don't think the 31 will be a true 31, it may be even 13 and there is no running from that. Right now, it seems like crawling would even be better, because we have actually stopped. I look out the window to see if I can spot the peanut vendors. I can use some now. I can actually use a full Indian buffet right now. The choice really is between death by cholesterol and death by hunger. I'd like to push death out a little so it gives me a chance to fight back the cholesterol.

We are crawling. That is good. And I still have 26 mins before I lose sound and sight. I am desperately hoping I can catch a glimpse of the green sign that tells me what exit is next on the turnpike (before I lose my senses). But all I can see is the back of a huge bus that is drudging along right ahead of us. That the average seat area occuppied by the co-passengers on my left and right is one and a half is not helping either. Ah! I spot an exit. Alas! It is only a service area. And one that a Greyhound bus will not pull into. One that I will not know what to do in even if this bus pulls up into, thanks to penury.

I adjust my body a little into the half seat I have got. My right leg is sore from hanging out of the seat for the last hour and a half, but you know what, I am just being mean. The gentleman next to me probably did not do anything himself to be so large. In fact, he has been extremely decent (he was the only one who offered me the space next to him to hang from!).

We're actually moving. I don't know if it is a mirage and I certainly hope it isn't. The lanes on the turnpike have just merged (I mean the ones for trucks, buses and cars and the one for cars only), so my guess is it is at least another 30 miles to exit 4 and that's 30 minutes at a reasonable average of 60 miles per hour. I've been doing too much of math and stats lately and I can tell. 13 minutes to go on my laptop. I FEAR that I will lose all I wrote so I hit Alt F and S. Again!

The shuffle function on my MP3 player gave me a song I don't savor too much, so I chose another one. A true favorite. Rasave Unnai Nambi from Mudhal Mariyadhai. Orange light blinking, a sign of danger. Hopefully, this song will see itself through and I will go out in style. Right now, I FEAR I may not even get halfway through it. I am counting every second. At least the bus is moving at a fair clip, so my wait time right after I shut down won't be much. Well, how bad can it be. A few hours?

My laptop is threatening to hibernate and I gotta go. It's been a long bus ride and my laptop has stayed alive all the while giving me the pleasure of writing this and the music, so I can't complain. But just as I take my mind away from this for a moment, I realise how sweaty and stinky I am. And I am going to Penn's Landing for the Indian Independence Day celebrations, where there are supposed to be thousands of Indians today (and some beautiful women too!). Am I going to look good? Just my next FEAR...