Vote of Confidence

In general, people have immense potential for good. Possibly, it is inherent in each and every one of us. However it lies untapped because of our lack of confidence in others. Our inability to say good things about them. Our inability to put our confidence in them. Our inability to confess to the transformations they have set off. Our inability to be frank, humble, and honest about it all. Our incapacity to confess to our weaknesses and emerge a better person out of the act. We choose to dwell upon the insufficiencies and derive conclusions from them. We spit spite and think that it can be justified because we have been blind to each other. We survive on the bitter concoction of jealousy and pride, our jaded appetites intolerant to anything more humane. As I observed some time back, the unease seems so palpable that we can taste its bitter tang in our mouths. We qualify humility as an obsolete virtue instead of accepting the truth and letting others know about the same. Instead of making others feel better because of it. Instead of at least sometimes ignoring those pitfalls. Perhaps, that is not how things ought to work. Perhaps, we need to be a bit emotional for once, without preconditioning misguiding our reason. Without ridicule leading us astray. Without indifference making us shrug our shoulders and settle for anything less than that. Let it not be so this one instance. If possible, hear me out.

Should we, thus, move a motion to instill confidence in others? A Vote of Confidence in their potential and not ours? It’s worth a try, if anything. If nothing comes out of it, we can all go back to being ourselves. No harm done. After all, we must walk down that road; the one which runs through ‘The Forest of The Night’. The one which compels us to face our demons. The one, which in turn, helps us in finding our angels. So, in order to start a process, I would use this platform to say certain things to people. Good things. So that they can take something out of this. Perhaps for the better of both of us. Yes, I do intend to be selfish, but not at all self-centered. I might miss out a few people and I sincerely regret that. Rest assured that shall happen only due my inefficiencies and not yours. Due to my inability to mould words around the good that is yours. Due to my blindness which has prevented such a disclosure so far. Due to my incapacity to see something that is inherent in you. Due to the foolishness that had prevented me from looking beyond perceptions. Due to everything me and nothing you. Please forgive the bias, if any, which creeps into this narrative. The order of this monologue is one which is the least biased of them all.

To Ghar Parivar – The debt that I owe you eludes normal statistics. So it is futile to even try making a mention of it. All I can say is that I am indebted to you for accepting me with all my weaknesses and strengths. For accepting my rudeness when it had seemed unreasonable even to me. For accepting my failures in the same vein as my numerous accomplishments. For accepting me for who I am, without any pretensions or complaints, whatsoever. I owe myself to you.

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To Chacha Chaudhary – There is something in the composure that you carry about you that tells me that no matter what, everything will turn out to be well in the end. I have been inspired by the way you have donned your responsibilities, regardless of their repercussion on your own ambitions or desires. I would go on to say that you have been an idol of sorts. In some ways. It’s strange, thus, that I have been a mute spectator with respect to everything ‘you’ in this comradeship. Let me think about it. Your capacity to love has been a subject of conversation between I, me, and myself. Someday, I wish to emulate it in a fashion akin to yours, without being misled by any preconditioning whatsoever. But most of all, I wish you luck in your endeavours. I am sure you guys will see it through and emerge out of it wiser, even if harried.

I am glad that my initial impressions of you were proved to very wrong soon enough. The only reason why I have failed to describe you is because you remain something of an enigma to me. I have still not been able to understand why we got along well. Or maybe we don’t. Would you care to hazard a guess? You are one of the few people who have given me more than I have returned back to them. I appreciate your efforts in fighting for a lost cause. And I apologize for not being there when you might have needed me. But, please, keep at it. We need more of that. For there might be few people like you. And more like me.

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To Gandhi Baba – I have known you as a pillar in my life from the time I understood the full implications of the term friendship. It’s another matter altogether that you have been at the receiving end far too often. The patience with which you have heeded to my grievances has been astonishing. Especially since it was never reciprocated with the same fortitude. Your advice always bordered on being labelled abstruse. However, with time, all of it has made sense. I have realized it was lack of comprehension on my part which prevented me from understanding your perspective. You were just ahead of your times. The support you have extended whenever I have needed it has not gone unnoticed. I have just been shy about accepting the facts. I love it when I can talk to you without even looking at you, something rare and special for me. I know you will understand everything. Thank you.

Your idealism might seem eccentric to some, even to me at times. But that is something you must pursue with all your heart. What are we if not the victims of our ambitions? I say victims because we suffer because of our aims, as you have. But please do not think that a battle lost is a war never begun. You know that even though you lost it out to her, it was not because she deserved better, but because maybe you did. Perhaps you should think about being a bit more carefree and gullible than you are. There is fun there that you are missing out on. I have heard stories being told about that faraway land. Pay a visit sometime. I am sure we will have a lot to talk about.

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To Professor Saab – You have more potential for good than any person I have known. Unfortunately, I have not been able to imbibe most of it. Perhaps not even a tiny little bit of it. But that only speaks about my inadequacies and not yours. It seems that humour comes almost as naturally to you as grumpiness to me. However, let that laughter not be at the cost of others’. The support that you extend to others is something of a miracle in itself. The time, the patience, the effort, the concentration, and the impartiality. All of it is commendable. I have tried a hand at it myself, to no obvious gains of course. Your respect and devotion to family and friends has sometimes made me feel inadequate in the same perspective. However, you inspire, and so there is still hope. Let it never be otherwise. Your diligence inspires awe (and perhaps bits of jealousy) in me and I hope that one day you will get what that merits. Perhaps the desserts might come a bit later than expected. But they will. Have faith.

As far as everything ‘love’ is concerned, look no further than where your memory takes you. You dwell upon the past way too often for comfort. I am sure you deserve to find whatever you are looking for. It will find you before you do. For there must be someone out there with as much you in her as yourself. We can not settle for anything less than the best. Now can we? And remember, being selfish has become fashionable again. Perhaps, you should give it a try. Sometimes, and only sometimes, you can rely upon my fashion quotient as well. Take care and all the best. I shall see you around.

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To Salim Sinai – You have been a strange acquaintance (friend?) in many ways. I have enjoyed the conversations, the generalizations and the abstractions we have indulged in. Often, if not always, I have wondered if I would miss out on them. It seems that self deprecation is an art that you have not only mastered, but also made contagious. I should refrain from indulging in it too often. If being disillusioned is cool, I wonder if you can take coolness to any new heights. There is this strange mix of worldliness and innocence in the way which you go about life. I love it. Honestly. Your inadequacies have amused me more than once. But only in a matter-of-fact innocent way. Perhaps you will be able to overcome them someday. Or maybe we can endure them alright. We will drink to that. And we will smoke to that.

I have a grouse as well. Something which I have mentioned a few times. You underestimate yourself way too often to realize your merit. So, I must quote Shakespeare here:

But what my power might else exact, like one
Who having into truth, by telling of it,
Made such a sinner of his memory,
To credit his own lie, he did believe
He was indeed the duke;
- Prospero, Act I, Scene II, The Tempest

Roughly translated, Shakespeare means to say that just like a usurper of the throne, by the constant wielding of power, begins to believe he is the king himself; when a person repeats a lie often enough, he begins to believe it is indeed the truth. You get the hint I presume. But then again, it is probable we have been putting up a charade. I say “we” and not “you” because I am as much a part of it as you. As much a culprit, for we look at it as a means for escaping out. A medium for reaffirming our worth. But no more on that.

You quote senseless psychics way too often. And probably you seek to find ratification for all that you do in their ramblings. But who’s complaining? As befits the scheme of things, let me do the same. For I share a weakness I am not willing to get rid of too soon.

Everyone I come across, in cages they bought
They think of me and my wandering, but I'm never what they thought
I've got my indignation, but I'm pure in all my thoughts
I'm alive.
- Eddie Vedder, Guaranteed

And do not worry. I am pretty sure you won’t go bald before you get married. Even if you do, you can always woo the lady in question by means of the pseudo-intellectualism and intellectual chutiyapa we have been practising and perfecting. Moreover, I have heard that ladies with an altruistic bent dig men with receding hairlines, a perspective on communalism, and a penchant for writers like Saul Bellow. Your Shobhaa De is safe. At least for the time being. We will drink to that too.

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To ‘The’ Med – I have been inspired (affected?) by you in ways you can hardly imagine. If I were to start enumerating the changes that have crept into me because of you, I would perhaps do injustice to others I wish to speak to here. So none of that. I am sure each and every one of those changes has made me a better person. They have not only made me humbler, but more tolerant towards the insufficiencies that plague my character. Pushing me to improve and enhance. Your talent, and the humility with which you ignore it, has motivated me to reach its heights someday. Oh, did I tell you how ambitions have proven to be double edged swords for me? I must keep away from them. Now will I?

I have been a weaker person in your company, something I had not known myself to do. I appreciate the fact that the conversations have not come out of compulsion, but a suppressed willingness. Maybe it’s your skill, and not my inability, that serves the process. I will miss it if we were to part ways sometime in the future. But only in a good way. I would, anyway, have my ‘memory mines’ to serve me in its stead. I say so because I have come to believe that good things do not last forever. Maybe that’s why I have chosen to write about it. To perpetuate it before it fades into oblivion. But I have been known to be eccentric and delusional. Never mind.

The grace that comes so naturally to you has not only amused me time and again, but has also been a subject of thought. That being said and done, your ability to switch from elegance to tackiness with such practised ease has often engaged my attention. I sometimes wonder if the skill has been rehearsed, well in advance. The knack of dwelling upon tiny details in your life, and making the most of them, has amazed me and I wish to someday imitate the feat. Till then, I shall be content in trying, and failing. Compassion. I see it inherent in you even though you have oft claimed otherwise. I expect you will wake up to the fact, more sooner than later. Or were you pretending all this while? I wouldn’t know, right? As a parting wish, I hope that selfishness comes to you as a grace and not as a vice. I say so just because I want you to get whatever you had wanted out of life. Please do not let compromises get the better of you. Do not. We all deserve better than that. Be good. I shall wait and watch.

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I steal some lines. Let it be so for all of us.

I'll take this soul that’s inside me now
Like a brand new friend
I'll forever know

I’ve got this light
And the will to show
I will always be better than before

To Everyone Else – I wish I were competent enough to mention all the people who have affected me, however subtly. Yet, as you might have realized, that is not possible. Not because I do not wish to do so. But because I stand incapacitated in such a situation. I hope you won’t mind, for that was never the purpose of all this melodrama. Would you like to carry on from here? Take care. Everyone.

PS – Yes, there IS a Calvin strip for each post one can ever think of.