Was my fundamental understanding of life and its basic facts messed up before now? I have no idea. They might have well been. The daily grind, the stereotypical running of all the well-oiled machines all around me must have served to give me some kind of complex feeling of confusion and discord. While I was oiling my joints and checking my place in the efficiency graph, two lines – two lines I had heard an infinite number of times in the past, came back to me and stopped me in my conditioned reflex moment. Two lines from one of Tagore’s staggering creations, these made me stop in my tracks and, during a fleeting moment, also brought about a mild disorientation; owing to some deep processes realigning themselves in my subconscious, I suppose.
“Oder ache onek asha, ora koruk onek joro,
Ami kebol geye berayi, chai ne hote aro boro.”
Ami kebol geye berayi, chai ne hote aro boro.”
I wondered for a moment, why I had always let these lines pass by without sparing a thought for them. It is amazing, that so much can be said in so few words – the entire life’s lessons, enclosed in some diminutive, rhyming verse. While I was trying to fully comprehend the profoundness of these lines, another came to mind.
“Phuraye ni, bhai, kachher shudha, nai je re tai duur-er khudha-“
It became simple. Happiness comes from simplicity; a lot comes from a little. If you can keep longing for things close to you – small things, maybe apparently inconsequential, then you will never know discontentment. Everyone aims big, everyone thinks about the future. Not me, anymore.
I stand corrected, then. I stand educated, prepared and at peace with myself once again. I salute the well-oiled machines around me for what they are, and respectfully tell them, “I’m not one of you, and I will never be.”
I stand corrected, then. I stand educated, prepared and at peace with myself once again. I salute the well-oiled machines around me for what they are, and respectfully tell them, “I’m not one of you, and I will never be.”
