Tuesday, January 06, 2009

Lost and Found

Image: Henry Weddiasmara

“Everyone belongs somewhere.”
“Maybe not everyone…. Maybe some people just get lost.”

There is a certain amount of charm in being that lost person. It’s undeniable. The whirlwind of cynical freewheeling, the moments of crisis on windy terraces, the bitterness of vodka as a Friday night savior, the complete disdain for long-term consequences, the vaguely haunting gestures of trying to get your bearings, the gloss of dismissive statements, the satisfaction of cutting sarcasm, and the haggard, yet real, smiles exchanged across a room, across a lifetime, across a dimension that is typically impassable…

There is also a sense of vacuous loss when you transition from being lost to being found, being fine, being happy…. Not nostalgia exactly. That would be to romanticize a time that cannot – should not – be romanticized. But even once the rose-tinted glasses have been relegated to the heap of dusty memories … there remains a slippery sense of having lost something in the present joy.

Lost…what? Is it the general madness? Or is it the rollercoaster extremes that lost people seem to thrive on…? And even there, to clarify, it’s hard to miss the highs, because those exist even when one is happy – almost exactly the same ones. So, impossible as it may sound, maybe it is the rock-bottom despair that is missed…? Of course, it makes no sense. Except in the most roundabout of ways…where it becomes clear that what binds us all together as a race is a complex whole of pain and happiness. And all of a sudden, it feels like only half the connection is being made. Isolated from the pain, and privy only to the content pleasures…

Humanity kicks in at this point, and it becomes easier to identify with the young boy at the signal, the tired-looking receptionist, the gas-tragedy agitators, the aging patriarch, the anguished colleague, and the numb friend. It is almost as if the capacity for pain needs to be reinvented...through improvised methods…in case one becomes totally alone in that solitary bubble of joy.

So the tears well up, almost inexplicably… at advertisements that you know are manipulating all the right strings… at songs that you would have classified as sentimental nonsense in another lifetime… at distant situations – the kind where it was easier to be a harsh realist when you had your own situations to deal with… at the third drink when you know perfectly well that you’ll stay stark sober for another two at least – but the mind plays tricks on you, bewilders you, leads you down that maze of sorrow you have inhabited once upon a time… Fighting your enemy is easier when he or she exists outside of you, isn’t it?

Have I got it right? Or is it just easier to complicate something and turn it into a shimmering smoky fable than to accept that, maybe, we’re just a dissatisfied race without the capacity to be truly happy…? Maybe the grass always is greener on the other side…? But, no… I cannot believe that… Reveling in joy, but having melancholy tug at you once in a while confirms the best of anyone’s humanity, does it not? In an essentially solitary existence, imagination is our only source of compassion… And how can we (and why should we) deny the best part of ourselves?

7 comments:

TS said...

We've had this conversation. In another time.

We will have it again. Soon.

But for now, be as happy as you can be.

Love.

Vini said...

I never thought this could ever be put into words. I know exactly what you mean and I still had to read this twice just to be sure.
I think what we miss is the Hope. Because when everything is well and alright with your world, there is really very little hope. That waking up on the morrow and knowing that this too shall pass just like the night did. That hope is such a huge high that in that 'solitary bubble of joy', you miss that. You miss the depths to which you can seek within, the clairty which comes with putting things in perspective. Happiness, contentment, joy - such fuzzy, woozy words, you are always on uncertain ground. Melancholy- measured, precise, all sorted.

Anonymous said...

This one I like, very much. Maybe because you just managed the impossible task of expressing what most feel, but few can describe.

Reminds me of "I need to hear some sounds that recognise the pain in me yeah." and ever so easily, "I let the melody shine, let it cleanse my mind I feel free now."

Truly a woman after my my own heart.

This calls for a drink.

P. said...

@TS - Hehe. I think I worked it out of my system by setting it down like this. Writing as catharsis and resolution! :)

@Vini - Yes, that's exactly it! I think you've hit the nail on the head with this:
Happiness, contentment, joy - such fuzzy, woozy words, you are always on uncertain ground. Melancholy- measured, precise, all sorted.

@psychaaaa - That calls for a drink indeed! :) Soon!!!

Shine On said...

:):) Please ask V about this conversation I had with her about a month ago....

And as always, it's hopskipandjump beautiful..

Anonymous said...

how about we are a race that does not want to be the change we want to see?

. said...

P.,
I'm not giving up on this, here blog. No sir-eee!