Thursday, December 28, 2017

Meditations

“I have taken myself out of the complexities, or maybe I have taken the complexities out of myself”
That was Marcus Aurelius, the grand old Roman, speaking through his “Meditations”. It is a sentiment I came across a long time back and which has come back to me after a long time.
The last few months have sped by in a flurry of activity-lots of work, renewing contact with many old acquaintances and friends, the re-advent of Delhi into my life. I have never particularly cozied up to Chandigarh, yet this was the one place that seemed over the last few months to give me the comfort of the anchor that I sought.
Up until today. Today I came across, again after a very long time, the one person who for me will always remain the one reason that I can never forget this city. Jasmine.
Her absence over the last few months left a void that I did not quite understand in the beginning. It felt as if all that I was being deprived of was a few inane games and a truckload of affection. Nothing that could not be substituted by drowning oneself in a quagmire of work or by seeking vicarious affectations from the world at large.
What I overlooked was the purity and honesty that came with all our frivolities. The fact that whether or not this child of five understood a word of what I was saying, she would always react with an unimaginable, inviolable sincerity. That despite the fact, or maybe because of it, that she did not understand my words, I would never have to think before unburdening myself to her.
Meeting her revived a lot of memories but even more, made me realise the futility of encumbering myself with the transparent banalities that we often seek refuge in. That though life may be a big thing, its joys and its essence are always found in the small things.
So, today, I shun the complexities, not knowing whether they made me up or I made them up. But certain of the fact, as the poet said, that;
“Sitaron ke aagey jahan aur bhi hain/Abhi ishq ke imtehaan aur bhi hain”