Pebbles from life's journal

The mute friend

It has been a while for I have appreciated anything profounding in my life, especially after this COVID-19 came into the picture. I know people are saying this and that about the things happening internationally and trust me I have felt the dire need to breathe in the fresh scent of life as well. I am missing my previous life like billions in the world do. The atmosphere has turned suffocating from all the catastrophic things happening around the globe. It is everywhere and there is no running away from it. Once you open the television you would witness those hawk for the journalist yelling at people—creating 'fuss' over things happening across the nation in an attempt to serve the 'true' picture of the society. It is like a mute competition is going on among the channels. The more horrible shots you could capture the more loudly you could yell about the things that haven't been done but should have been done.

Personally, I am not fond of watching news channels. I'd rather choose a youth-comedy than those yelling, blaming monsters, but when you are living with an 'aware' father under the same roof, there is no running away from it. My father loves to watch all this scripted drama on the news channels and discuss it with me afterwards, thus leaving me with me no other option but to get knowledge of the things happening around in the surrounding at least the top headlines if not everything.

I remember him cursing those in power while watching the video someone had sent him on What's App of the migrants walking on the roads in scrunching heat. He was upset like it was his fault that he couldn't serve them when there is a need. I have seen the vulnerability on his face and helplessness in his voice.

'It is like nature is unhappy with us.' he had told me when we were discussing Amphan cyclone and the Karachi plane crash. There isn't a single day went by when I wouldn't discuss it with my father. We often cringe over the speeches and statements given by those in power and lash our anger out by blaming the government in the centre. Somehow I am not unable to picture it. Life has been anything but enthusiastic. I feel it has lost the charm, but then I don't feel myself in the right shoe to whine over. I am sitting happily confined in the secured walls of my home and enjoying three meals a day (however ordinary, but at least I am not sleeping empty stomach). It isn't like there isn't anything that could tantamount to the blessing, on the contrary, I have a lot of things to boast about but there is a lack of charisma I am feeling.

It has left me to wonder over the fragility of life. It has made me realise that I can't take things for granted anymore and that we are obliged to live life to its fullest because we aren't going to live forever.

The year 2020 shall be the darkest year in modern history according to my mother. She calls it a 'cursed' year with all the bad news she discusses over and over with the neighbour aunties, but I call it the year of teaching. It has taught me something my life of twenty-two years couldn't teach me. It has changed my point of view for things completely and the way I am going to live my life from now onwards. It has shown me the true beauty of life that ignite with our loved once around us and has made me recognise the true 'mine' and help me understand the people I have been living with.

Personally, if I talk about friends, I only have a handful of contact numbers among the pool of many whom I can rely of. I don't have a huge friend circle, but a vast acquaintanceship circle I meet with daily, exchange greetings with them and have a small chat, but that's the end of it. There is nothing more. I have two best friends—one from school and other from college and between both of them I feel more inclined towards the college best friend. The school best friend has walked a bit way after our 'life' got in the way, but the college best friend is the sweetest if compared.

I love both of them. It's true that I spend the most time with my college best friend, but both of them stand their respective places in my life. Neha, my college best friend, is chubby, warm-hearted, a never say no to anyone kind of girl while Divya, my school best friend, is short, witty, cunning kind of best friend. My tuning with both of them is hilarious but at times there I feel a certain hollowness that couldn't be filled by any and that's when 'the mute friend' comes into the picture.

Apart from everything happening around in my life, books are the only solace that keeps me over the edges and makes me stop thinking. The stack of books was just a bunch of pages a few years back, but from the past four years, it has been my one true companion I have been craving for. I love to discover things in the characters of every book. Each has a story of its journey and comprises its mysteries that I'd love to explore, but it isn't the only story.

Too much of anything is hazardous, my mother often told me. She hated it when I would bury myself in the books for an hour's all together and hardly talk with anyone. It was the year 2018 when I felt the first stroke of it.

There is a thin line between fiction and reality and the one in his right mind would understand to never cross it.