Little Joys of Life

 

Every one of us carries a part within us that demands attention at various phases of life. Too many theories and studies are accredited to the field. And hereby, I accept that I have not studied any of them.

But I'm conscious enough to understand that there is a part of me that demands attention and healing at one point or the other. The side which demands to do something which I always wanted to do. The side which demands a certain amount of solitude.

So here I'm, sitting at my desk near the window on a windy night. My reading lamp is on and is giving a romantic glow to my so-called literary endeavors.

Reading and writing grew up with me. Though not more than a dozen people read my essays and articles. Neither I'm a voracious reader having books of difficult-to-pronounce Russian and French authors.

I enjoy simple things. Be it the books in my mini-library or little write-ups that are accumulating in my journal, I try to keep them simple.

I'm too afraid of mental conditioning - choosing one side over the other, without knowing the truth behind it. Neither I'm eager to influence my reader-friends. 

Sometimes I think that we are too busy accumulating more and more knowledge and awareness that it becomes difficult for us to see things as they are - right in front of us. 

So tonight, on special demand of that 'Part' of me, I switched on my reading lamp and started writing my thoughts. I found some white sheets, which actually turned yellow. The time took a toll on their appearances too. But I like them more than the fresher ones. I find them mature - capable of handling my mischiefs and the tantrums I throw while writing. I find them pretty experienced as they stick together through thick and thin.

And the pen I'm holding, oh! there is a story behind it.

When the lockdown was implied and I was sick of reading what I had, I requested Cambridge Book Depot, Musoories to send me some  Ruskin Bond's books. They were generous enough to make every book duly autographed by the author himself.

And when the books arrived, I was mesmerized by Mr. Bond's handwriting. It was a thick violet ink, with a smooth texture. I requested Mr. Arora, the owner of the bookstore to kindly enquire which pen Mr. Bond uses. He texted me the name of the pen that very night. 

In a couple of days, I was holding that pen in my hands. I felt like a superhero as I held that pen. It's a different story though. 

I like writing the initial draft of whatever I write with my hand. I enjoy the romantic encounter between the pen and the paper, spilling the ink in an anonymous fashion.  I feel that a write-up directly entered into a computer or any electronic device is a body without a soul.

A few books are lying on my not-so-clean desk. One of them is coincidentally written by Mr. Bond. It's an anthology with various essays written on hills.

The other book which is lying on my desk is called 'Meditations' written by Marcus Aurelius, a former Roman ruler, who wrote this with the intention of keeping his thoughts to himself only. Luckily (or rather unluckily, if you look at this from the author's point of view) it was published and became an integral part of Stoic literature.

An exercise notebook is lying around which has no more space to write in. I still like to fit some of my thoughts in it. 

And there is a little portrait of Swami Vivekananda, gifted by my Father when I was in college. It has a permanent place on my desk - The other things keep changing with time.

The reading lamp flickers as I move my chair forward and backward. I take this as an indication to remain calm and focused. 

Being in that not-so-perfect environment, reading and writing not-so-perfect things are what 'That' part of me demands.

These little joys of life keep me sane.

Love, Laughter, and Peace

Himanshu R. Nagpal

 

Fate of the paper...

 Dear readers, the following lines you are about to read are a one-sided conversation between the pieces of paper I write on, and me. You might find it funny or awkward that why in the world a sane person will talk to some pieces of paper? But trust me, It's better to talk to a piece of paper, instead of roaming with people in search of true companionship, and coming back home, spending all your energy and time. So, let's not waste time and read all I have to say to the pages bound hard in my notebook.

My Dear Piece of Paper

Don't curse yourself that you are just a piece of paper - Blank and turning yellow with time. We all are getting old and our appearances are not like what they used to be. Last Sunday, I counted eight grey hair on my beard. But never mind, that's how life is, and we must appreciate the time we are passing on this planet. We should be celebrating this time, isn't it? We should never curse our fate for what we don't have or what we can't change.

I totally understand the fact that you would never be a piece of paper that will be preserved generation after generation. I'm not denying the fact that nothing precious will ever be written on you. I'm not ignoring the fact that one day you will be shattered or destroyed or burned to lit up fire on a cold day. But that's how life is - we actually don't know how our respective ends will be. But that doesn't mean that we should get depressed about thinking about how will we leave this planet.

No! No! No!

What should we think about is what I call "The At least Theory"

We should be thinking about that at least we are not this or not that. Like, in your case, at least you are not that piece of paper on which greasy samosas or moong daal ladoos with that leaky mint chutney are served. At least no one will ever be going to throw you in a bin or on a roadside pile of garbage - in a buzzing company of mosquitoes and flies. 

At least you are not the annual report card of a student who is brutally flunked in school. At least he is not hiding you from his parents in a dark corner of a flush tank. Just imagine, how stinky and moist it can be. Or worse, what if his Father finds you? Imagine he is holding you tightly between his fingers and throwing it harshly on the face of that poor child. It kills you from inside when a drama of this kind is created, and the reason is you. 

At least you are not hanging on a typewriter of a middle-aged solicitor, who is punching the typewriter's keys harshly to imprint some boring stuff on you. I find this process of continuous sound of tuk-tuk damn too painful. 

So, my friend, you should feel lucky that at least you are working as a medium for a crackhead to express himself. Whatever he is writing, just don't care about it. You just enjoy the romance, the sensuality, the softness with which the nib of a fountain pen glides on you. In an era where people mould the truth, writing dusty things, sharing it in the air, and saving it in the clouds - At least someone is writing on you - opening his heart out, and sharing his soul.

So don't curse on your fate, my friend, as you have no idea how lucky you are.

The Ageless Ghost

Does that ever happen to you that you see the same person again and again in different places and on different occasions?

Do you see similar faces, whom you don't know directly, but you see them here and there? You see those different faces here and there, near your office or in your college. But you ignore them until those faces become names and those names become relations. 

This story is about one of those faces.

I was still in school when someone pushed me from my school bus. I was quite habitual by then to get bullied at various circumstances, where they find me vulnerable enough to perform their mischievous activities. Being locked in the restrooms or being slapped from behind was quite regular. And yes, being pushed from the school bus when I was about to de-board was something new.

 I couldn't see the face of the kid who pushed me, but he must be very strong as I fell at quite a distance from that age-old, yellow coloured monstrous bus. When I understood what actually happened to me, I saw a white colour Omni van skidding towards me, trying hard to save my life. My limbs, I couldn't move them. They felt heavy. I was numb and everything went into darkness after that.

When I opened my eyes, I saw a group of people around me. They were chattering indistinctively. Someone was asking about my well-being. Some were offering me water. Some were asking me about my residence. But there was this one guy who was staring at me from a couple of shoulders behind. That was the first time I was consciously seeing that face. Hair, neatly combed. Wearing an off-white bush shirt. His eyes were quite sunken in its sockets. But that was not the first time I was actually seeing. I had seen him before. Where? I actually don't know. 

His eyes met mine for a couple of seconds. He was seeing my face without any noticeable expression. And, in a blink of an eye, I had lost him. I couldn't see him anywhere.

He literally disappeared - not like some djinn or some hill station ghost. One can easily disappear in the crowd, especially in a place like Delhi.

Where have I seen that face before? Was I imagining or I really saw that face?

I ward off the dust from my school bag from my palms, hung my water bottle back around my neck, and went straight away to my home. 

When I reached home, my Dada Ji (Grandfather) was preparing lunch. My father had a transferable job and my Mother used to accompany him from one city to the other. Dada Ji was my family as well as closest acquaintance.

My Dada Ji always encourages me to read more and more books. He was a retired librarian from Delhi University. He had this huge collection of books and magazines, of course, to read and to make sure he didn't miss his job even after retirement. So I was presented with various books to read and mould up my thought process from time to time. 

Unlike other voracious readers, I never expressed myself through writing. Instead of that, I started sketching at a very young age.

I went to my little room to change my school uniform. But before that, I took out my sketchbook and drew that face in it. It was not that accurate, but yes, it was giving me more of an idea of his facial features. Though, whenever I was closing my eyes, I could see his face quite accurately. 

I didn't say anything to my Dada Ji - Not about that little accident and not about that face with sunken eyes. 

..............................................................................................................................................................

Years passed and I enrolled myself in a fine arts course while pursuing my graduation in history. It was a hazy morning and I got up around eight. I got ready at a lightning speed as I was running late for my morning class. I didn't wipe my motorbike clean and rode at a speed which we can easily categorise under 'fast'. I just reached the other side of the road when I realised that I had left my paintbrush set on my desk. I cursed myself and took a 'U' turn when a black colour SUV car hit the rear mudguard of my bike. Though the car was not at a very high speed it was enough to make my motorbike imbalanced. I was again numb and everything went black.

I realised out of the blue that my numbness is nothing but a kind of surrender. It's a position when a person accepts his fate without retaliating much. 

When I opened my eyes, I saw a little ray of light. It took me some time to realize that I was under that car and the rear wheel of that giant vehicle is at a good eight inches distance from my neck. I moved a bit and slowly came out. I saw two people were holding the collar of the car's driver. They were asking whether I was fine or not. I asked them to leave that guy. The driver came to me and asked that whether I wish to go to the hospital. I denied it and told him to go. Some blood was oozing from my right elbow and forehead. My right ankle was paining and I was facing difficulty in walking. A few people were staring at me with that usual sorry feeling. And then, I saw him again.

Hair was neatly combed. He was wearing a semi-printed, olive green bush-shirt. His height was a little shorter than mine. Lean frame. Eyes Sunken. I started walking towards him but my ankle was not allowing me to do that.  He was staring at me directly. Expressionless again. 

He disappeared again in no time. I tried to look for him but he was nowhere. 

This time, I was more afraid than curious. Somehow I reached home without changing much of my Bike's gear. I tried to walk normally but Dada Ji noticed my limping. He didn't ask many questions until he saw my kerchief all red with blood. I explained everything as we both walked towards my room, without telling him about that mysterious person. Though I wanted to tell him about that face with sunken eyes, something stopped me. His face with crisscrossed wrinkles was looking worried for me when he was cleaning the wound from my forehead. 

When he went outside, I took out my sketchbook from my bag and started drawing that face. This time I took care of all the details I could remember. I made those sunken eyes. I made that clean-shaven face with bushy brows and neatly combed hair. I used different colour graphic pens to exaggerate its features and tried to make it as accurate as I could. 

I closed the sketchbook as well as my eyes. I took few deep breaths. And something got stuck in my mind. I opened my eyes and started walking towards my old cupboard with some pain in my ankle.  I opened it and took out some loose sheets as well as my old sketchbooks. I found the sketch I had made around nine years back in a dismantled file, whose cover was missing. I walked to my bed and compared those two sketches.

I skipped a beat when I realised that the face hasn't aged even a single day. He was in his early twenties when I saw him for the first time. He still looks the same. And that was humanly impossible. I had that creepy feeling which is hard to express.

'Am I imagining this guy or he actually exists?'

'Is he a ghost?'

'Is he trying to kill me or trying to harm me?'

'Is he an alien?'

'Do I have a past life connection with him?'

After applying all permutations and combinations my mind became extremely tired. I slept for a while. When I woke up, my body was burning with a high fever.

.........................................................................................................................................................

I didn't see him for a while. I secured a job in a news agency as a core designer. The designation was great to show off, but all I had to do was creating basic cartoon sketches for various political leaders and famous personalities, which are further converted into animated videos, using VFX and other stuff. The job was tedious yet challenging. And most importantly, the salary was good enough.

One night, while coming home from the office, I got a bit late. Electricity cuts were not very common in those days in the cities. But a sudden spark on an electricity pole made that happen.

It was completely dark in our residential complex. I switched on the flashlight of my cellular phone to reach safely at home. I really don't know that from where that partially covered, dry sewer came into my way and my left leg got stuck into it. Now, my left leg was into the sewer up to the knee and my right leg was still steady on the ground. My phone was still in my right hand. I placed the hand near that sewer and tried to enlarge the opening of the sewer with my bare hands. 

It took me a minute or two to come out of that unattended sewer. I was quite fine and unhurt. I tried to cover the sewer as much as I could with my hands. I was shaking the flashlight to see the maximum area. I was not in a mood to stuck again in any sewer or potholes. 

While quickly placing the flashlight up and down, I again see that face.

I couldn't notice his clothes or his neatly combed hair this time. Still, I'm quite sure that he was looking not even a day older since I last saw him. I was literally shivering now. When I again placed my flashlight in that direction, he was nowhere to be seen. All I could see was mist and early winter fog. 

I sprinted towards my home without thinking much about uncovered sewers or potholes. I saw Dada Ji at the main gate. He noticed my shortness of breath and asked me about what happened. I took the emergency light from his hand and asked him to come with me. 

We both went into my room. He comfortably sat on the chair and I was busy making the sketch in my file. It took me around fifteen minutes to complete the sketch with a well-sharpened pencil. I took out the other two sketches from my old cupboard and placed all three in front of my Grandfather. 

For the next five minutes, I narrated the whole story. I described the whole incident when I got pushed from the bus and how I saw him that day. I describe that motorbike accident to him. And then, I told him about that incident. I told him that he still looks the same every time I see him. I also told him that I have a strong belief that he wants to kill me or harm me.

When I said this, Dada Ji picked up the sketch which I made after the bike crash, watched it closely, and pressed it against his chest. I was not able to grasp what was happening. The next moment I heard his wrinkled face all wet with the continuous flowing of tears. His shoulders were moving up and down in a rhythm when he was crying.

"What happened Dada Ji?" I asked him, keeping my hand on his back.

He said nothing for a while. He was just looking at the sketch and crying silently. I could smell something eerie. I offered him a glass of water. He was drinking it very slowly, keeping his sight fixed on the sketch.

"He is my elder brother." He said in the softest voice possible. "He died from the cholera epidemic before partition when we were still in Lahore.".

I was shocked. My lips were trembling. I felt a kind of weakness in my knees. I sat near Dada Ji's chair. I held his leg and kept my head on his lap. The silence was soothing. 

Dada Ji started caressing my head when he said " And Bhai Sahab (My Brother) was not trying to harm you, on the contrary, he was trying to protect you from those accidents. He was protecting the whole family when he was alive. He is still doing the same. He is not some ageless ghost, he is your guardian angel, my child. He protects you from the present as well as future dangers.

'Guardian Angel' these words still ring in my mind.

 Does that ever happen to you that you see the same person again and again in different places and on different occasions?

Don't Ignore that face - He or she can be your Guardian Angel.

The Art of Keeping A Journal

I have no issue in accepting that I was an extremely talkative kid. I used to gel up with everyone around me so easily. I had a lot of topics to talk about and I never heard the term boredom in the first ten years of my presence on this planet. As I grew up, my group started becoming shorter. I only had a handful of friends when I was in college.

And after that, I was on my own - sharing all the grief, all the love with myself alone. 

It's not like I was starving for a company or someone to roam around on regular basis. I was somehow happy being with myself.

When people grow up and start exploring society on their own, I have seen People becoming anti-religious or anti-corruption. But I became anti-bullshit. I couldn't take with people trying to condition my mind or putting negative (or positive) things in my mind. I wanted to (and still want to) see the world to gain first-hand experiences. 

But when you are alone, a lot of emotions creates turmoil inside you. You have an urge to share your thoughts with someone to feel a bit lighter. And it's a good thing to share what's troubling you. But we humans have a secret chip imbibed inside us, which always expects something in return for every ear or every favour. 

And I was done with all the exchange of advice. 

I have no problem in accepting that I went into this phase of extreme anger and sadness for a couple of months. I had a major problem in finding words in explaining what was running in my mind. I had this urge to share my thoughts and my confessions about the things which I shouldn't have been done. But I had nothing to give in return for that. And I had this constant terror in my mind that people will judge me. 

So when someone gave me a freebie on the new year and no points for guessing, it was a beautiful, hardbound journal.

In my initial days of writing a journal, I had no clue that what should I write about. Just like a secondary school student, I used to begin with 'Dear Diary'. And I couldn't complete a page in a single sitting in the first few months. I still had that lump in my throat of expressing myself but I couldn't. It became a daily duty for me to write it. I religiously did my duty but I couldn't avail any help from that.

One day, out of nowhere, I got this idea of leaving all the formats, all the decorum aside and start writing what was troubling me.

It was 1.30 AM when I switched on my reading lamp and wrote this sentence in my journal:-

Whatever I write here no one will be ever going to read it.

Trust me, I felt immense freedom as I wrote that sentence. All that fear of being judged went away. I started writing about a childhood incident that had an impact on me. I started writing about the dreams which used to trouble me more often. I started writing about my desires, my goals and whatnot. I wrote more than eight pages in that single sitting. When I switched off my reading lamp, it felt like I'm coming out of some therapist's office. I felt a lot lighter and much happier. I slept like a baby that night.

And from then, it became a ritual. I carry my journal with me anywhere it is humanly possible to take it with me. And I always take out some time from my schedule to pen down my thoughts almost every day. 

My family and I noticed many changes in me. I'm getting that glow back on my face which I had as an adolescent. I gel up with people and discuss things that are common between us. Of course, I'm still a proud Anti Bullshit guy, but I have become more liberal. I have acquired the subtle art of hearing without listening. 

And above that all, I learned a lot about myself. By writing in my journal, I took out time in understanding my reactions to various triggers. I discovered that there is a lot of knowledge that resides inside yourself, which is needed to be tapped. And you can tap it when you slow down and invest some time in being with yourself. It's sheer magic. 

There are innumerable benefits of writing a journal, some of them are listed down below

1) It makes you feel emotionally lighter. 

2) It makes you acquire self-knowledge

3) It helps you in developing a tangible thought process 

4) It helps you in building and maintaining a good relationship with the people around you.

There are many more benefits of writing your experiences and thoughts in a journal. 

Before ending this article, I want to convey a message to all my dear readers. If you ever feel that you are unable to deal with the situations by yourself, you should talk about that with your family or friends. And if needed, do visit a therapist or a psychiatrist. It is darn necessary to take care of one's mental health. And there is no issue in seeing a doctor. Trust me it helps.

All The Best with your journal writing journey. Do share your experiences of writing a journal with me on hrntales@gmail.com.

See you again

Love, Laughter, and Peace

HRN

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