In a not quite so perfect mood today, so maybe the post won't turn out to be very optimistic. I don't think much these days, there's work and then you are home and then you want to sleep. Ain't that the dreariest thing? And the sad part is that I am sure that I am not unique in my experiences. Every person I meet, I go to work with - and since 'every' doesn't allow for exceptions, I'll use 'most' - most people live this way.
And I was thinking. Shouldn't there be some mandatory thinking time? Time that you have to think and reflect and plan and resolve. What could I do? Think about it and then do it. Something that makes me happy and makes me feel good about myself. Trivial and selfish, like a pencil scrawled self portrait. Its a disconnect. There has to be a way, a way to be happy and not starve, be useful and productive, yet selfish and conceited. Make something beautiful, make something worthy, make something that lasts, that makes someone happy. Could be one (though that shouldn't just be me) or could be many. But what remains essential and necessary is that I should be happy doing it.
I can't change the future of the country (the sheer ego of it all!), I can't invent something that will make everyones' life easier (though a fruit slicer that makes juice does sound like something an enterprising Chinese gentleman will make a fortune out of), so I should really find out what I should be doing that will be relevant and important to one more person. But it is a must that I do that one thing. I don't want to be no one. I believe that I can't be no one. Not being egotistic here, honestly. There's a miracle to life and there is an endless chain of permutations and possibilities and chances that has led to this moment and therefore this moment and the next and the one after that should mean something. I would like to teach and for that I would have to learn. So I guess I will be studying some.
I am just worried. I don't care about politics when my options are a dithering novice and a disciplinarian dogma-led scare-mongerer. I can't bring myself to care about a job which needs me to follow arbitrary ugly formats blindly, where the choice that I have is between following up with treasury or compliance. I don't care much about cricket (sacrilege! blasphemy!) and the football teams I support do a darn good job of crushing any early season hopes. I want to find the time to find myself, find what I am good at, what I have an eye for. And then do it, even if only for a while.
That's pretty much it.
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Two musical bits here for the discerning audience -
1. This one is an instrumental piece (I am going classical with a monocle and all here) - Divenire by Ludovico Einaudi - a performance at Royal Albert Hall, London. Gets me a little weepy and heavy hearted. The payoff moment comes at around the 1:50 mark. Watch it first and then listen to it with your eyes closed - I promise you that there is a tear waiting to sneak out. Listen to it on the loop if possible.
2. The 2nd one is a complete concert film - Burning by Mogwai. I have written before that I am fan. This should tell you why. Its a beautifully shot film - all black and white and ambient noise filtering in (on the screen and in the music). A very spare set, the musicians don't make jokes or say how glad they are there to perform. They make extremely beautiful music and you are supposed to just lose yourself in the sound. Try to listen to 'Mogwai fears Satan' at around the 27 and a half minute mark. No words again. Apparently their sound is not in fashion at the moment. Well, I am just the least fashionable guy I know.
A book as well - 'Bhima - The Lone Warrior' (translated from the Malayalam original 'Randamoozham' of M. T. Vasudevan Nair by Gita Krishnankutty). The Mahabharata from Bhima's perspective. Can't praise it enough. I had loved Bhimsen which Prem Panicker had put up way back when. And this is the book that inspired it.
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Is there anything special about the 15th of February? Maybe.
