The common man

Who the hell is this common man?

What defines a common man?

Does the wealth define whether he comes under this common bracket. Or is it his action or inaction that define common?

Statistically speaking using the percentile methodology we can clearly demarcate who is common and who is not.

But the ones who claim to be common are not so common and ones who are common do not make the common noise.

Stop complaining you uncommon commons. Look around you are uncommon. The uncommon folks on the other hand will remain uncommon with additions every period.Good. But the additions to common as a percentage is far higher. So growth rate keeps the uncommon uncommon and the common common. The sets are kept honest.

If the uncommon knows the common, and the uncommon become uncommon by fair means in the common then we are are on the right track. Else god save us!

 

 

The road less travelled

I don’t know if this is ever going to make sense.

The road, people populated, is what makes the journey worthwhile.

The funnel:

There are shortcuts, most take them. So there goes a set of people who you will never see again.

Then there are these people who are in a hurry, those big brawny vehicles, zipping past you.

Nobody stops, they keeping turning away or going past you.

Some of us follow, some of us accelerate to join in on the race, exceeding speed limits, breaking rules.

The journey goes on.

.

Blood Spilled

She laughed. Carelessly.

The horses rode the waters for a change. Slow, but the visual and the aural made up for the velocity of the horses.

The trees swayed to wind. Dusty but windy. The shrubs sashayed in the open. The grass freshened in the evening light. The expectation of rains it seemed.

The sun had made his last appearance, retiring early in the day. The dark clouds had taken over. Sun had brought it upon himself. For a while, he would have no say in to what happened below the cover of those thick cumulonimbus clouds.

The birds waited ratted out their understanding of what was next. The dogs followed suit in . The bats welcomed the early nightfall.

Nightfall. Sunset. Work day ends. He comes back.

They get in. Sounds shut. The walls gradually close in.

Blood has been spilled today. Tomorrow will be a different scene.
Or is there still hope? Hope for the mankind?

Extinction

There is more to life than just living, she complained. Philosophy, quipped the kid who had lived the as many days as her age. Or maybe more. More snigger.

She adjusted those larger than life spectacles. Her worries kept her busy for a long time now, even those silly spectacles got on her nerves. She sniggered now. More followed from everybody in the room.

She wished a lot of things, she started listing and categorizing, filing under the family, the friends, the kids, the husband, the neighbors, the acquaintances and the street folks ‘banners’. All people related, she exclaimed inside. Inside excitement was good, she laughed inwards. Small short lived happiness. The things she wished for. She wanted more. She did not wish for death. Death seemed too easy. She wanted her type to be extinct.

Rahul Dravid

There was a time when I want to scribble something, an itch to write pages,  to talk endlessly; visualizing those heroic acts, those brave confrontations and the time of our lives. Last time it was Anil Kumble, now it is Rahul Dravid.

Dravid’s cover drive, his pull, his on drive, his square cut, his flick and many more of defense and leaving the ball alone were only the visual beauty of his game. Perfection, that is what he aimed for. It showed. Persevering to be better all the time. I guess that is what it is all about. To be better. He was never rewarded enough. And criticism never was too far away either. But he was always a gentleman. On and off the field. Guess, his retirement in way shows us the way of life. But it is those circumstances, those games, those heroic acts which will never escape the memories etched in us.

Dravid is a hero. A wounded one at times. And he has fought back always. An inspiration to the way of life. A genius who struggles at times. An artist so involved. A warrior and yet to so human.

Dravid, has been a treat. But it is the Dravid who has helped when we have felt a little scared and a little helpless. And will continue to be that source of inspiration. Hats off!

The story of the unknown

There was  a man. He was unknown. He knew no one. Nobody knew him.

He lived. And lived on. Eternity it seemed. It probably was.

Nobody got him. He understood no one. It was probably why he was unknown.

His actions were in no way illegal or even immoral. But every one else seemed quite the immoral. Morality and popularity had a inverse correlation. The first step to popularity is to be liked. Our man was not easily liked too.

Or maybe there is no fairness. It is all pre-decided. Control is for ones who were on the right side of ‘like’.

One day he died alone. The world remained the same.
Unknown to him and likewise

Heroes

Every nation has heroes. Heroes who reflect where the nation will head to. Heroes hit that right nerve which creates the same emotion across societies. When a greater part of society does not have heroes, it means that the people do not have a benchmark, a height unattainable, a pass time to forget the drudgery of that everyday life and much much more.

What Ayrton Senna did in Brazil, what Lance Armstrong did in America etc are just some examples to create that effect.

Where are our heroes?

Hope the nation finds its set of heroes. They will drive the nation.

Sachin is one. But again, he is one. We need a Sachin or Dravid in every sport. In every other sport. In every sector. That is when I will start believing that a country like India can be a force.

The Postal Network

The Post:
Scribbled on paper today. Bought some envelopes. Finished scribbling. Stamps from the local store. Signed, duly or faithfully, even lovingly perhaps. An email would have been easier but this activity kept me occupied longer. There is something pleasurable about writing, wicked even. So I wrote after postponing many a times. I dabbled at named emails, voice over telephones, awkward meals and even approached a professional to seek help for this communication interlude that I had embarked upon as silence took me nowhere. So I spoke. Maybe to that elusive mother-ship that I once embark upon or even the one in billion chance of finding decrypting machine. But given the fact that I could not reach out, I today tried the less intrusive post people method.
10 posts cost me 50 bucks. And my budget for such a hollow experiment was 100, I undercut the budget by half. So much for initial set of constraints.
Final touches and I am done, I said to myself this morning. Stamps on the envelope. The from address and my alias-postal box. Then the big red container having many such letters. Drop them and that is it. After that it becomes all fuzzy and the control is lost. The postman with his blue bag comes and picks the letters. Delivers it the nearest post office. Then it is made it an even bigger heap, then sorted or vice-versa. Now trucks or buses or ships or plane. Then the heap again. Sorting and the postman delivers. Hopefully to the write person whom you intended it to reach to. But I had no such concerns, random as it was, I could not care less, then.
The Leak:
News: Anonymous letter on the move. Letter bomb? Stand up comedy. Prime time. Doctors, police officers etc with their opinion. My postal box. Break and open.  Some letters. Some bomb squad later some sympathetic letter, more  crass bashing of the author.
Blogs: Rip offs of the letter. More blogs. Even more comments. The punctuation happiness. And the abbreviated laugh.
Twitter: #postalmishap, #gmail, #loser
Facebook: Dear Mr postal man, Get a life, loser. 599 likes. Me wants posts today. Sigh, none. Hurt my feelings there postmaster. 818 likes. 40 shares.
SMS: Dude, watch the parody of the letter guy. LOL!!

My experiment with people has failed.7 people who got my letter had a wholesome laugh and earned some points on the idiot box. Maybe it is going to be on the year’s event or not. New postal processes in place as well. All bailed, every single one of them or could not care less. Most had opinions for me to go forward. The do’s and the dont’s. Thanks. Moral stories.

So much for the human touch. Now I walk and people will laugh, not at me but at me. I laugh with them.

Photography

The expensive hobby which people like showing off. In most cases people cannot click to save their lives but they do exhibit their lenses and a DSLR. Weird photos are called art. Angles which make no sense are called new point of views. Narcissistic self portraits are ‘liked’”. The camera journeys through exactly 5 treks, a 10 minute one to an hour long ordeal into the wilderness, that is time away. Honeymoon, the better half can be missed, but not the image taking, time freezing equipment. If all the 3 are found together, then overtime clicks and umpteen poses orangutan, hands on the face, the face eating the sun (well, it is possible. Practice makes man perfect), the waterfall pee and the others. Photoshop means all of the above + more likes.

Click, click and upload on Facebook, Twitter, Chat rooms, dating sites etc. Update and like karma hits you and you reach one step closer to salvation. Nice pic. Whoa! Looking pretty. With some customary punctuation and some parenthesis, eg: [:), ;P]. After counting the likes, like the other photos. Return the favor. Once in a while put up the heroes photos to break the monotony, preferably from a movie release or the movie yet to release. Karma points++

Next organize photos, by date, by friends, join by happiness quotient. Sort it by importance. Take a backup. Curse Microsoft for making Windows and accentuate it when the Blue Screen of death hits you. Jog back the memory to see what you did at what gathering. Show it to people who show immense interest in your life, your kids, your house etc. Once in a while take an old pic and upload it to the social networks.

There was a time when photos meant something. A photo in the wallet really meant something. Or a wall hanging or a show piece actually made you go back to the time gone by.

As a hobby, you spent time with the camera clicking nature or other things and went through the pains of learning the physics of photography.

Like everything else, lets overdo and kill it. Video you are next!

 

Boredom, Complaints and Life

Over the years, as I have indulged myself , shamelessly, almost on the planes of addiction, drawing enough ‘expertise’ in concluding which often explain themselves in very tangential ways.

While I sit and observe and put up explanations  on the table, the world seems to have moved on just a little bit ahead. Every single time. This often results in the front-runner-follower syndrome. To snap out of it, a different perspective is all one needs. And if these perspectives reach a critical mass, they as a collection will probably be called wisdom

People, 9 out of 10 complain. Or even more. And a large number of them say that they are bored. In a way we were raised to be ever bored. Such were the times. Excitement of the new often outweighs the existing ‘monotony’. If this is one end of spectrum it manifests as the ‘ever-excitement’ in some, typical to people who have made decisions of greater magnitude, or so they assume.

There is unfortunately no cure for boredom. Channelize it, you schmucks Thank enough, that you are bored!

The ever-excited get back the bald-blue! Invite boredom into your life.

And as they say, no matter what life just goes on, no matter how you feel. It’s what you do that counts.

- Gyaani Weedy!