Every new year I wish to pen something down. This time I actually got around to doing it. Unlike many of the famous and some of my favourite writers (as brilliant as they may be), I do not find the idea of new year celebration ridiculous. I do have their intellect to see the spinning earth revolve around the sun, people mostly do and the sense to see things in the larger perspective. I see the universe warp and spin and bubble and burst, light up in flames, be dark and cold and cruel at the same time, at an unimaginable scale in time and space. But our smallness, I feel, is all the more reason to celebrate our existence. I understand that despite this turn of calendar, things around us here remain as they are, unchanged. But then, this is not the story of change, this is the story of hope. So, I do not carry their condescension, their contempt for depravity, their melancholy and I do not in the least, scoff with a holier than thou attitude.
But I do find a lot of humor in everybody so lazily shooting all these beautiful New Year messages and nobody actually receiving them at all. I also marvel at this very humane and brilliant construct to break a lifetime into years and celebrate every occasion with pomp. It is a time for quiet reflection of the old and a new resolve into the future. It is the time to rue the bygones, people and places and things and be thankful for the plenty we have. I would be the one to tell you that it is perfectly okay and abundantly enough to have food on the table however simple it may be, if your family has a full stomach there’s nothing more to it. It is enough to have a warm snug place to live in, in the company of family and friends, with hugs and kisses and laughter, a bit of solitude and time to yourself, to read books, watch beautiful movies and listen to music, to breathe the fresh air of freedom and to have a restful mind and a content heart swelling with peace and love. There’s no need for grandeur and extravagance.
So, this is my wish to you and me. Spend time doing things you like; with the people you like. People and places and things that make you truly happy. There’s no pressure to network, there’s no pressure to socialize, there’s no pressure to perform, there’s no ladder to climb, there’s nowhere to be, but in the here and now. Slow down, stop and enjoy the life, as you have it. There’s cold outside and hot chocolate and tea and coffee, aah, the smell, there’s fragrance of spring, the colours, the flurries in autumn, there’s morning sun and cheep of birds, the night sky, the moon and the dance of stars and from time to time, the pouring rain. So much that awaits us, so much that we take for granted, so much that catches us by surprise every time we see and feel it. It’s almost magical.
I would also be the one to tell you to disobey, to break pattern, to not conform, to go out in the rain and tap dance, be loud or quiet, the way you are, the way you like it. Build and break and fail, put together and take apart, draw horribly, write terribly, notes and poems and love letters, croon songs in a bad pitch, dance the way I do (it’s really bad), put on some heels and step on some precious toes, make mistakes, lots of them. There’s no one proper way to do it, nobody has it figured out. There’s just that kid in the playschool and all else is posturing. Let this new year be the stuff of wishes and dreams and magic. Stay healthy, spread love and find immense happiness.
Somesh | Katyayan 