lost or found ?

When you’re lost. Not in a way that you don’t know which lane or street you’re on or not the way a GPS or google maps cannot help. In a way that you’re lost in your own mind. You’re lost in what you think is best for you, or your immediate loved ones. You’re stretched between what is the best option and are scared of making a choice, a definitive one which will have implications – good or bad, you just don’t know yet. A choice that you may regret, maybe not. A choice that may lead you to wonder whether the alternate option would have had better consequences. Maybe not. The sense of not being able to be happy. To be lost. To find happiness. To see it. To be near it. To almost have it. Yet feel that you’re light years away from it, to feel it slipping away from your hands and there’s no way out of this rabbit hole. You’re just spiralling down in this rabbit hole and seeking help, shouting, yelling and crying. Begging. But no one can see what you’re going through, because you choose to barricade your heart with walls high enough no one can jump. With walls strong enough no one can break. These walls surround you. There’s no chance in hell for someone to go around it and find a loop hole, an entry – to lend a hand and maybe pull you out. or maybe a shoulder to lean on and cry for hours on end.

Because crying is a symbol of weakness for many. Who am I kidding? Crying is a symbol of weakness, seeking sympathy for the entire world. You’re mocked for it. You’re called fragile and many more names that I wouldn’t want to waste my character count for. But I hope you got the drift. To show your vulnerabilities is frowned upon. To be vulnerable or to be expressive, to let someone inside the high, strong walls you’ve built as your defence mechanism may seem the worst idea ever. Because you fear being mocked. You fear being judged. You fear being made into a joke for the world to see. And so you hide your tears and emotions in front of the world, put up a brave face and bear the brunt, unwillingly. But once you’re back in your room, all alone. You let it out, cry hours on end with your face pressed to the pillow. Hoping to not make any sounds and worry anyone. Because it will just be a cycle of being looked at as petty, trivial, weak and childish.

Come on, you’re in your mid 20s. you ought to be better. Mature. Smarter. Tougher. Mindful. All of this at hiding your emotions, putting a brave face in front of the world and losing a small piece of yourself every single day that you have to put up this charade. Not for you. But for the notion’s society holds of a grown up human in his/her mid 20s, inching towards being more stable, settled and rooted.

But you know the reality of your life. You’re far from being mature. Or rooted. Or stable. Or heck even settled. Being a mid 20s human myself, I know I am in the most difficult crisis. A battle I know nothing of. Have no textbook to refer to. Have no exams that can qualify or grade me at my performance. But rather I have the comments and taunts of people, the society – those who think they’ve figured it all. Who have excelled at life. At being stable. At being rooted. at being mature about life problems and have dealt with it with utmost grace and poise.

On the other hand, I am willing to throw everything within my reach at every problem that life throws at me. I have tried everything. Pitied at my problems, have had countless sleepless nights and have been worried sick for not being able to ace the ‘perfect’ life. Have had recurring bouts of anxiety while trying to hold it all together while watching it all slip away. No atter what you do, how much you try, and even after giving it your all, there comes a brief moment where you think you have figured the formula, or are closer to achieving the fruits of your labour. And then BOOM. Life throws a googly at you, completely out of the left field and hits you harder than you’ve imagined. Because you didn’t prepare for this. The infinite number of exams, the textbooks and resources you’ve referred to and learnt from, spending almost 20 years of your life studying, learning and prepping, aimed at equipping you to manage and handle this thing called ‘life’ –  funnily still leaves you unequipped and lost after all of this efforts and countless hours of laborious, mental and physical training.

My question is to you - then what will prep us or equip us at handling life, at faring better? Because top grades certificates are surely of no help here. 

Taken, for granted.

I keep telling myself ‘this too shall pass’ and to not obsess over every piece of news that I read. I keep praying that these clouds will go away and there will be sunshine, and we’ll get to spend our days lying down under the shade of the tree, surrounded with the people we love and good food, laughing and dancing on some country tunes. These thoughts and the view from the big french windows in my bedroom are the only things (and there is the occasional comfort food and dessert, too) that is keeping me sane – the promise of returning to ‘normal’.

From stepping out for coffee dates, sleepover at a friend’s place, a family dinner or even being excited on seeing an out-station relative or someone who’s returned from abroad with your favourite goodies, to aimlessly wandering in the city alone – this all seems like a distant memory. Times like these, make me realize that we took so much for granted – smallest of things like touching a door knob and not rushing to spray sanitizer on your hands or even talking without a mask on your face and being huddled in a group, a time when ‘social distancing’ wasn’t a thing. So much has been taken for granted.

87 days, 2088 hours, 1,25,280 minutes – since the day I have been holed up in my house, the four walls that keeps me and my family safe. I keep thinking what would have happened if I had not moved back home last November? What would have I done if I were still in Bangalore, living in a PG? At this point, I do not regret giving up the possibilities of an appraisal and a salary hike that I would’ve received if I had stayed put in Namma Bengaluru, and I thank god for this.

Since we’re all stuck at home with nowhere to go, the work-life balance has gone for a toss for everybody, with long hours and the line between weekday and weekends blurred, I have forgotten what ‘Friyay’ felt like . In the office, there’d be a spring in everyone’s step on a Friday morning – some had plans for a weekend trip to check off another place on their bucket list and get gram worthy pictures to show off, others planned to get sloshed in the evening and do ‘friyay’ the right way and nurse a terrible hangover over the weekend (with some more alcohol, maybe), or maybe just finish work, get home, complete household chores, watch a movie, read a book, catch up with the fam – just pause, before the Monday blues hit all of us again.

Fast forward to the lockdown, stuck in one place and with restrictions on movement outside the house (which have been eased way more than required, but that's a discussion for another day), our emotions have oscillated from being hopeful to restless to frustrated and to being hopeful again. At the start of all this, for most of us, the glass was half full, but as days pass by its more of the glass being half empty. Although I know each one of us is struggling to be optimistic as much as possible, doing every bit we can to hold onto a promise of not a ‘better’ tomorrow but a ‘normal’  tomorrow, and when the day comes I hope, we never make #throwback our most frequent used hashtag.