By NaSa
The other night, I watched a movie called ‘Firaaq.’ It’s a movie that portrays the lives of the 2002 Gujrat riot victims post the riots. Watching it made me feel hollow. It was the last feeling I had before going to bed that night. I was bound to have a nightmare, which I had because they say the thought you sleep with commands your subconscious. When I got up next morning I sighed. I was relieved to realise that it was merely a nightmare that passed. But what remained with me until a little longer was the afterthought.
‘Every Sun rise gives us a reason to get up. In fact, mostly Sun rise itself is a reason to get up. We have grown up hearing ‘Get up, it’s morning’ more than ‘good morning, it’s a new day…get up.’ Every new day is a new life for some. For some, it’s another chance to attempt what was left unaccomplished yesterday. For some, a new day is a plain, simple road leading nowhere. Worst is if the Sun rise becomes the bang of a warden’s baton on the prison door ordering the end of a meeting with your loved ones in dreams. The loved ones who were once a reality, now a story.
Those loved ones may have lost their lives while fighting a war on the border, or a terminal physical ailment on a hospital bed or a terminal human ailment of hatred on the streets. Their loss can pull you back from the thousands of extra miles you might have covered while planning your life. It is then, you realise that life’s biggest irony is death and life’s biggest joke is planning. It’s like watching a movie you’ve already watched a hundred times and expecting something new to happen in it.
My heart skip a beat if my mind takes me into a space where I don’t find the people whose existence is oxygen supply to me. It’s scarier than death to imagine a situation where you call on your most frequently dialled numbers and nobody responds. It’s nightmarish to imagine a time where that most dialled number of yours fades away and gradually stop figuring in your call list.
Once there was this person who ran around you all his/her life, that person protected you from the badness of the world, that person guided you, that person supported you, that person helped you raise your children, that person’s sole aim in life was to see you happy and content, that person left no stone unturned to make your life worth appreciating, that person had always been there praying for you….that one person…vanishes one day…For more than half a century that person was there always showering you with his/her unconditional love. Suddenly, that person cease to be a mortal!
How are you supposed to feel? You knew it was going to happen someday but you never realised that you are nearing that ‘someday’ with each passing day. You always knew the rules of the game called life but still you feel cheated. But life goes on…
Thank God, it was just a nightmare…