January 28, 2010

Looking through the glass

Saturday evenings, either I am at home or I would be playing badminton at my campus. But this particular day, I was digging my way out through the notorious Bangalore traffic to catch the bus for my native.Finally I reached the bus station after a long journey which spanned for just a shade under 2 hours. After having dined from a nearby restaurant, I eased on a nearby bench and after some clock ticks, I found my bus at the terminal, I boarded and occupied my seat, as always , a window seat.

I have always loved watching the world through this small window, be it of my house, or of any vehicle am travelling. I get , surprisingly an unconstrained, uninterrupted perception(or perspective) on things my eyes flirt with , even though am looking through a space constrained well bound window. The air conditioned bus , had a transparent glass frame that in turn seemed boundless. Looking through the glass, I felt there was no glass that separated me from outside.

Looking through the glass, I see a child looking at the bus with wonder, I see two tiny eyes with its pupils widened to the max, I would never know the reason behind his lit up eyes, but I recall the moment when I saw a shooting star for the first time.The glitter that was in my eyes is what I see in his. Now I rarely have a look at the sky....The bus kept moving finding its way through the darkness of the night, I kept crawling down my memory lane.

Looking through the glass, I see the 'Hunter' constellation. The last time I ever noticed it , was probably when I was done with my graduation; before that may be at high school when I had heard about it for the first time. During those days, by just having a look at it, I could carve out a stout man out of a few stars. I could carve out spoons out of stars, Australia out of clouds and what not. Now it seems I have lost that power or may be I dont want to, I have lost that sense of wonder. 'Hunter' seems more a graph with 7 nodes and 8 edges than what I saw some eight years back.

Looking through the glass, I feel am looking into me. I had heard about a true incident that happened to a famous violinist who played his magic at New York metro station. People just passed on and never noticed him. The very next day , his show at a New York theatre ran houseful with ticket prices as high as 200$. I couldn't quite imagine how people could be so unappreciative and unaware about such beautiful things happening around. But now I realize it to be a hardly noticed reality.Looking through the glass, I wonder when was the last time I ever noticed that the sky was beautiful.

Looking through the glass, I see my own reflection.Running for the office, get back at night, pounce on something which I dont know is tasty or not, go to bed and repeat the cycle. I probably exist and forget to live. I probably eat to survive rather than enjoy what fills my belly. Somewhere down the lane, I feel I dropped something that I call life, something that I call the real reason.

Looking through the glass, I feel its time I realize what I seem to be losing, I reclaim what I need and not what I want.