The clock strikes the chord producing an annoying sound disturbing the silence of night. I turn in its direction to check the time- 4:00 am. The wee hours approaching and not an iota of drowsiness in my eyes. Days after days, weeks after weeks…its more than a quarter past year since I've experienced a cosy sleep in the darkness of night.
Like a mechanical device following pre-programmed instructions, I get up to make extra strong black coffee and have few long sips… People came and went from life, old friends left, new ones came, best friends parted away and soon turned into not so close ones to be gradually replaced by a new set of friends.. I weigh 12 kgs more than i used to during college days which weren't too far a distant memory, merely 2.5 years to be precise.I wear spects now mostly and when I look back at my college pics, I feel I'm fairer now. I speak less than before and think more. I spend less now and save more. Small kids get away at times by calling me uncle which cud've resulted in their bashing by me 2 years back. I prefer my macbook with a fast net connection or a good book left to all by myself rather than a fun-filled outing with friends.A weekend well spent may mean not stepping out of the flat for whole 2 days too now.
Friends of college who used to swear on our friendship tales and moaned on how would they survive without each other are incidentally doing very well in their respective jobs.Those who've gotten into US/UK universities are probably busy into swearing on new friendship tales. And those who've tied the knots are ,though left with no other choice, swearing on their spouses now …
Am I passing through the mid-life crisis now? Wait..I’m not even close to thirty.Probably mid-20s crisis wud be more appropriate. Am I finally settling down to realise that there is a difference between solitude and isolation & the former can actually be gratifying? What is it about the solitude that I’m drawn so much into it?Is it because of the comparatively high-paced life I lived during my college days engulfed in all kinds of weird habits that now I run for solace? Is it because of the unkept promises of those whom I counted upon? Or is it the stigma of myself not able to do much justice to someone’s expectations? Is it because of my hurting someone somewhere sometime that I feel this constant repulsiveness from new relations? Or is it because somewhere I might be nursing a grudge, an unfulfilled desire, a void caused by someone?
Am I the only one sailing into this peculiar boat of solitude? Probably not. Are my friends, experiencing the same mid-20s crisis, feel the perplexity time and again? Are they too at times philosophical for no reason? Alienated and silent without any extra ordinary purpose? Probably yes.
Are we drifting towards a state where we’re clueless about the inherent voids in life? Are we feeling isolated in the crowd after a while more often than before? Are we experiencing that our saddest thoughts engulf the mind immediately after coming out of a good news? Are we carrying enough baggages of our past which need to be offloaded now? Is it something which stops us from being truly liberated, totally ecstatic? Are we becoming accustomed to half-filled laughters, nods without thinking,cynical about maximum beauties of life?
Are we getting trapped into what I call the ‘dilemma of prefering to be a solitudinarian or a social’??
