this is for ziah. aishwarya gamely responded to her tag while i stayed true to the glacial pace i pride myself with. its almost illegal, how i treat matters of online consequence. something to do with the inherent comfort of impersonality that ether can afford you. and about the theme. seven possibly shocking and necessarily weird facts about myself. before i turn my psyche inside out and lead my dark secrets to light, i have to agree with ziah. its difficult to tag what really is a personal idiosyncrasy as weird if you haven't tried to lose it. the fact that they exist is proof that you have made peace with them. they go as far as shaping into your own personal forms of protest. against the ultimate in conformity. that of regular humanity, all of which, they say, can be mapped onto a single genome.they are probably more than quirky personal traits. more than old habits dying hard. they are what set you apart.the sheep and the scarecrow. the shock of invisible red hair your personality is determined to preserve. the self-proclaimed war cry against ubiquity. they may be weird but not unfamiliar. strange but not inexplicable. hilarious but notwithout purpose. they are after all, carefully ignored unusual habits that people credit us with. and the other way around. why is this turning into a declaration of independence? let me stop my opening statement. and take the plunge.
weird fact 1 : an unhealthy obsession with the 60's
there is somethin unresolvable and gripping about the 60's. the irresistible glamor and an unhealthy nihilism aside, the fact that an entire generation of able young people swayed to the clarinet of individual expression and unregulated freedom is fascinating. i have always rued the absence of a cause in my life. an all-consuming activism, not necessarily political or socially relevant. a belief system governed by my own laws. about nature and human response. steadfastly held, in spite of overpowering opposition and indoctrination. challenging existing authority with a glint of mischief. irreverence with a hint of the devil. the 60's had them all. young people taking to the streets, hollering about their own individual take on justice or the lack of it. braving a knee-jerk clampdown and pamphleteering for what they thought was the sake of humanity. they took themselves seriously, though i guess they were far too right for their own good. students, just like you and me, standing up to an enraged political administration. seeking accountability.demanding change. fighting for peace. i don't imagine there would be a time, quite like the 60's. or would there ever be a phase in human history, when makin love was an expression of solidarity and handing out a flower was an advertisement for hope. they could have been flawed. maybe humanity would never survive so much hope. and of course, they simpered down to a slow death. but i really wish i was there. i really wish i handed out a flower and smiled.
weird fact 2 : an equally unhealthy obsession with the tragic
all my earlier posts stand irrefutable testimony to this. i can be irredeemably sad. almost nothing in the world can save me from the gloom i can nurture. i can be depressingly cynical, infectiously sullen and inhumanly distraught. almost everything in this world can make me sad. and i can spend a million hours just mulling over why i mull so much. whats weird about this,is that i need an absolutely flawless environment to be able to function normally. and in keeping with the truth of life, nothin is flawless. and i realize this stupid grudge about the stupid rule, by shuttin down. by withdrawing into the safety of voluntary inaction. self-pity comes easy when you start believing you were the victim. equally easy is being a pessimist, when nothin ever worked for you. i guess am just a dissatisfied glummy bear. the trouble is, this obsession with the tragic seems to bleed into other worldly functions. if i ever write, i only write about how sad life is. i watch a movie that ends with the usual happily ever after and construct an alternate ending where everybody gets killed as an asteroid smashes into our planet. this is not sick masochism. i am far too ordinary for that. its just me not being able to come to terms with the existence of so much happiness in the face of the obvious and inescapable evil that abounds underneath every human. can anybody ever claim to be entirely free of malice? can there ever be a utopia, which can prove the existense of a higher power beyond any reasonable doubt? i don't know. and it makes me sad that i don't.
weird fact 3 : i cannot communicate over a telephone.
if you can get hold of my mobile phone and check on my contact list, it'd prolly throw up as many names as there are people who can spell "bourgeois" right in the first go .i only use my fone to talk to aishwarya and to say yes to all that my mom asks me to do. somehow it feels too unreal for comfort. trying to picture a face behind the voice, animating the voice with an imaginary body language, infusing it with the inflections you are not quite sure you can make out. it just is too much work. the few times that i do receive a call from somebody i am not exactly dying to talk to, its a pain shuffling on my feet, trying to not get bored and coming up with some way i can end the conversation without really spellin out how big an asshole i am. i dread unknown numbers so much that i skirt away from answering any number i do not have committed to memory. an upshot. i cannot quite understand the fuss that surrounds the regular foray of mobile fones and the people ready to bow down to some contraption that lets them blog and shoot and flaunt and touch and play and gyrate. in addition to the incredible option of actually calling a human being. its not really weird considering the premium i think personal interaction should be accorded with. almost everybody i know have given up on tryin to reach me through a telephone. which most of the time is my own loss. but i don't think i can give up on the habit. here's to silence, solitude and sounds with a face attached to them.
weird fact 4 : i cannot bring myself to say cool.
this has to be the weirdest of them all. i cannot bring myself to say cool. this has to be the weirdest of them all.
weird fact 5 : keep trying to make an OST of my life
i've been a militant fanatic of indie alternative punk since i discovered box car racer's "there is", half a decade ago. the reason why it was so liberating was the fact that it seemed to be strumming out lyrics, that wouldn't have been outta place applied to what was goin on with me, back then. they fit in, right down to the last rough edge. then came jimmy eat world with "night drive" which put me to sleep as i was grapplin with a disappointing rite of passage. sum 41's "pain for pleasure" articulated my energetic confusion while "pieces" lent background to the sadness that was threatening to seep in. i flirted with iron maiden and metallica for a while, but they sounded far too archaic and irrelevant to be my spokespeople. drifted back to cold play, and they gifted me with "fix you". there couldn't have been a better representation for the promise of a second chance. box car racer returned, this time in the garb of blink 182 and with "i am lost without you", they ensured i din lose faith in the healing powers of familiar music played repeatedly. and then, there came snow patrol with "run". that song was divine intervention. it was just what god would have sung if he was signed up by a record label. it was everything. i am not exaggerating. you just have to listen to it, to know what i am talking about. i keep adding tracks to my ost. keep lookin for newer music that i imagine would fit into my ost with the downside being outright rejection of every other blameless track. for the simple reason, that its not singing for me.
and for reasons best undisclosed, aerosmith and "I don't want to miss a thing" occupy a very special spot in that ost.
weird fact 6 : i have a mortal fear of snakes.
the darned creatures weren't supposed to survive so long. never had a close call with one of them, but i routinely recall my best brandon lee education each time i step on a hose. i've never been able to overcome the stupid fear. she thinks they are graceful. that they help in eco-balance and make for exciting nat geo programming. i am not sure if a balanced ecology would do me any good after one of them gets me in the backside, someday.
weird fact 7 : i am horribly susceptible to vice.
give me a hint of the satan and the opportunity to get addicted and i'd take to almost anything. no questions asked. no will power exercised. and no remorse exhibited. there is something irresistibly sinister about the seduction of the dark side. something about practicing the prohibited. guess its a remnant of my juvenile years, but i still revel in repelling authority. i realize most of the times, that i am treading that thin line between making a statement and losing your footing. but if you were dying to know to know how free fall felt, would you not want to jump? among my latest acquisitions is a wanton liking for playing cards. i play low stakes, low brow and low class. but its begun to make sense why gambling is so frigging addictive. the sheer anticipation of making easy money, coupled with the usual ecstasy of winning in a group added to the dignity of getting away with something illegal. trust me on this, you'd not stop at embracing the devil. you may just go ahead and offer him your neck.
and that, would be it. the seven weird traits that made the grade. i should definitely be concerned about some of them. especially about the new found love for wagerin small change for gambling. but the fact that you can't help but succumb, that you'd rather live with them than try to address them, only adds that faintest hint of mystique to your personal weirdness.
