The Buddha, Almost!

Bad times are rolling. And good folks are few and far between. Times are no longer simple. Those good old days are no more there. A hard day’s work in the field, a decent pack lunch, a refreshing cup of wine, a doting wife waiting by the hearth ready with dinner, squeals of little children scampering around you in playful mood, bedtime stories, and a goodnight’s sleep. Golden dreams.

Early morning prayer before the altar. A mug of hot, steaming suja with corn flakes, hand beaten. Off to work. Wisp of freshness in the air. Spring birds chirping among the trees. Flowers just sprinkling out into the open. The gurgle of the stream nearby. The rays of the morning sunlight over the brow. A bamboo hat. A flask full of local brew. The damsel’s songs. The spades and feel of wet soil. The source of life. Everything is perfect, almost.

It is ideal, utopia so to say. The men worked out in the field, the women stayed back home, rearing the children. And weaving. There would often be festivals, lots of food, meat. Lots of alcohol. Lots of dancing and singing. Old and the aged, adults and married, singles and the young, little children too, at the get-together.

And then change came. Gushing like a flood or a wild conflagration, sweeping away and burning down the old ways of life. Disaster and havoc prevailed. It stole the simplicity, the innocence, and the joie de vivre of the life that was. Complete metamorphosis. Chaos reigned supreme.

Time is money. I am spaced out, too much stress, both physical and mental. And it takes too much of drinking to quell that pressure off the shoulders. I am lost in the world of vanity- brands, swanky cars, power and status. Money talks! Colorful, late night bars, sex workers and gigs. Promiscuity, failed marriages, failed love, broken hearts, terrible experiences.

Broad versus narrow mindedness. Sexual freedom-everything is fair in love and sex, plus sugar daddies and sugar mamas. The birth of the ultra-modern (wo)man. Absolute fun! No bar whatsoever, just raise it higher. Living in the moment or living in borrowed times?

Nirvana. Instant crave for enlightenment and desire to levitate to a different reality. Human yet not exactly one. Animal, not yet either. Too much of Identity crisis, it is. Let’s do drugs, softer ones to start with. Chemical. Pills. Sugar. Crack. Bring it on. I like the high. I am the Buddha, almost.

Well, money is no problem. My dad’s a filthy rich man and my mom too is a filthy rich woman. They live their own lives, so do I? They don’t complain about me, I don’t complain about them. It’s a fair deal. Rest assured I just do what pleases me.

Tag: jobless. I dropped out of school. A lot of family problems. I could not stand it. I roam the streets, day in and day out. I Smoke shit, marijuana and sniff fluid. I feel good. I forget my reality.

I dance, in the bar, smile at strangers and sleep with them. Don’t worry, I have protected sex. Condoms are free, even dotted ones these days. (Well and good!) I earn quite a lot and lead quite a decent life. I save some and send it back home to my poor mother and for the education of my younger siblings. I know but that’s all I can do. It’s tough to be a woman, an unfortunate one.

I have been in and out. For petty crimes-shop lifting, robbery, pilfering etc. I am just 18. Not actually, I will be turning 18 this fall. Who cares about age? I got a girl friend who is pregnant. I am going to be a dad very soon. And she is just sweet sixteen. It is normal, we start quite early. I am just another teenager on the prowl.

Well, I did try to get a job, but life is difficult. I gave up schooling early in life. My parents could not afford it. I wore rubber shoes to school. It was embarrassing. I sat under a tree, dreaming on an empty stomach, rats running all over it. While others had packed meals. Everyday of school was a picnic for them. So one day I ran away. And never looked back.

Yes, I can, if I have to. Necessity is the mother of all invention. Kill somebody or murder? It won’t be easy but not impossible. It’s a dog-eat-dog world. Totally. I am just another dog. I will eat than be eaten.

They talk about happiness, rather promises of happiness. And they care too much about their own happy-ness, fat pay checks, bungalows waiting for them to move in, big cars, colored kabneys, and gilded silver swords. Dasho, call me that! And a smirk flashes across their faces. They have it all, everything mundanely possible. Yet they go on, chattering over and again with their pseudo patriotism, usurped ideals and ideologies.

The man in the red robes taught me that we have a Buddha inside us, every one of us. All we have to do is recognize that Buddha nature. Positive motivation, positive actions, and positive merits will come our way. So in the next life, it would be even more beautiful. Definitely, of course!

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Just filling in...

You probably think I inflict myself on you every now and then. And you probably read what I write hoping I have something earth-shattering to say? Only to find out I don’t.

Why then, you may ask, should someone who is obnoxiously erratic where writing is concerned pretend to be so prolific? No great mystery. My blog-mate who was scheduled to write today – didn’t.

And since I have no privileged insight into the mind or motives of the guy who was scheduled to write today’s blog, what you read hereafter perhaps will be very different from what the guy who was scheduled to write might have written. It did take a major chunk of my time, however, when I could have been sleeping.

I don’t have a bagful of things to write about. Neither do I have a genie I can take out of a bottle, command it to write something that will catch your fancy, and then return it to the bottle. That is why, sometimes, what you read is gibberish.

When the person writing is deprived of sleep because the guy who was scheduled to write - didn’t, even churning out gibberish is a feat.

I know, you may argue that some writers do churn out masterpieces time after time. Well, I guess they do have genies then. And if you’re still in the mood to argue, it's the guy who was supposed to write today that you should get hold of. He's known as Big B!

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I've tried in my way to be free

It remains highly comforting to us. And that’s finally all anyone wants out of a song – to be comforted.

I have a problem sleeping until the weird object hanging in my room says 3 ‘o clock. I have tried everything - everything possible to drift into slumber much before the clock strikes three. But in the end, only irritation prevails.

And in that space of irritation, music sedates me in a philosophical manner, evoking deep rooted emotions while connecting me to my inner being on an infinite number of levels. From the depths of depression to the splendid high of life, the precise nature of that musical pleasure at that particular moment eludes everything else.

So, I actually enjoy lying in the dark midway between half asleep and half awake. Perhaps, trying to get to know myself better so as to anticipate what kind of music I prefer when swinging between moods. Or perhaps, I enjoy gliding to a lesser horrible world.

“The last refuge of the insomniac is a sense of superiority to the sleeping world,” a Canadian singer-songwriter, poet and novelist – Leonard Cohen once said.

Whether that is my last refuge, I have yet to find out. But, what I’ve found out, restless in the dark, with the earphones plugged deep into my ears is that, the man’s music relaxes me, better than any tranquilizer. Listening to him, everything around me seems to be invisible – even the clock on the wall. Listening to him, I float into a diverse world.

And as he sings Dear Heather, I fight sleep to be transformed into a different place, by the sea, taking a stroll with the woman I love. Every word is just perfect along with the setting in my mind.

Dear Heather

Please walk by me again

With a drink in your hand

And your legs all white

From the winter

Though, the woman and the setting is always the same, the song evokes greater depths of mystery and meaning each time I listen to it. It is like she waits for me by the shore, with her skirt flying, every evening. Sometimes for days on end, to continue from where we parted. And every time I reappear, she greets me either smiling or sad.

I wonder, if it takes a ceiling with a curious shade of dingy yellow, a bed by the wall, with a clock dangling somewhere above in the darkness, for the sometimes silly feeling to arise.

Whatever the conclusion, at that moment, it really doesn’t matter. Instead, I imagine how elusive answers can be to the vexing questions that surround us as I listen to Bird on a Wire.

Like a bird on a wire

Like a drunk in a midnight choir

I have tried in my way to be free…

I have torn everyone who reached out for me...

I begin to think of people - the religious to the elite, and the vagabonds to the fallen. The song goes on and on, always the same, and yet the longer I listen the harder I find my thoughts roving.

To be able to get inside the song, to be drawn into the loop of its repetitions, is most likely a place where one can fade away.

Far more numerous are those with nothing to do and nowhere to go. The drunks and the devastated, clothed in rags, bruised and bleeding – they seem to be everywhere. There are the ones who talk to themselves, who tell themselves stories as if to someone else. There are the women with their shopping bags and men with their empty wallets, moving their possessions from place to place, as if it mattered.

Sometimes, they come to a decision about things without even realizing that they have. Sometimes, without even knowing it, the answers to their questions are right there, staring them in the face. Still, most of them spend their entire lives waiting for the sign not realizing that life will slowly pass them by. Pondering and probing deeper, the world seems a mixture of the brutal and gorgeous – for the moment.

Thinking of people in a state of delirium, it seems that they will always be happy in a place where they are not. Perhaps, I too will be happier elsewhere. Suddenly, I think of Samuel Beckett. His books I have enjoyed reading and some lines from them, have become a part of me, just like Cohen’s songs.

“For in me there have always been two fools amongst others. One asking nothing better than to stay where he is and the other imagining that life might be slightly less horrible a little further on.”

I want to carry on with my thoughts about life, about people, about solutions, about religion, about far away places. But, I drift back to the woman waiting for me. The moist air around her soft, almost sweet, I want to tell her that I’m her Man. Only, this time, I want to do so without fighting sleep.

…I’d crawl to you baby

And I’d fall at your feet

And I’d howl at your beauty

Like a dog in heat

And I’d claw at your heart

And I’d tear at your sheet

I’d say please, please

I’m your man…

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Big B's screwing with his mind !

He's sober. He thinks he is. I say no he's not. I say he's screwing with his mind. Big B's screwing with his mind - big time!
It's late. Pretty late. So tomorrow I'll tell you why. Why Big B's screwing with his mind. It may bore you - even bore you to death. Or just amuse you - and give you a leash on life. But you must wait. Wait for the morning light. Only then will you know why, just why Big B's screwing with his mind.
And if with the break of light, I haven't told you why, just why Big B's screwing with his mind, please know then, he's screwed up with mine. Screwed it up big time.

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