Time Capsule

This one probably has been a long time coming. It has been a really, REALLY long time since I last made a post here. God knows, I haven’t really been short on time, just short on ideas. Call it writers block. But I guess sometimes all you need to come up with something to write about is to stop trying so hard.

Those of you who know me, know I am a packrat. I have an obsessive need to save anything and everything that might have paid the tiniest role in my life (tiniest role ≥ something I happened to hold in my hand for greater than 30 minutes, something consisting of a pebble to anything under the sun). It isn’t as much a need to save, as it is a guilt which I might risk facing should I throw it away. Anyhow, this idiosyncrasy extends into my virtual and binary presence, the result of which being I still have files and saves from a hard disk which I used a good 2-3 years ago. A hard disk which crashed and I had to get the data retrieved before I could sleep properly again. The hard disk now lies in desuetude, although the data remains on my new 0.40 Tb drive. The data consisting of songs, old mails salvaged from Outlook Express (Bless MS), images, and the like.

Now, my agglomeration isn’t entirely without purpose. I enjoy going through these things at a later time in the future, sometimes much, MUCH later in the future. These are sort of my own private time capsules. Things, which I might enjoy showing my kids someday so that they know what their pappy was like. On one of my recent voyages down the old and forgotten recesses of my hard disk, onto sectors which are seldom visited I came across an antediluvian model of the ever so familiar “My Documents” folder. These folders, are among my favorite to venture into, as they usually contain data that was most frequently accessed or modified or data that was casually created or saved in haste (the latter is true in my case anyway) on that installation of the operating system. These folders tend to be the last places where any activity happened before the avalanche of a newer, fresher installation either deleted them or simply pushed them into obscurity. In essence, these folders are to me what Pompeii and Herculaneum are to archeologists.

My latest expedition led me to “\My Documents\My Received Files\” section. And it was here that I came across chats from almost 3 years back (Bless MS again). Though I usually do not read these chats, I did get quite engrossed in one which I had with a dear friend of mine with whom conversations were on a low since; let’s just say certain other common commitments ended. These flights of fancy have an uncanny nature of taking a retrospective turn. Nothing can actually make a person look at themselves the way the transcript of a conversation from a different time can. That is as close a person can come to the silver screen flashbacks in real life, minus the waves and ripples. For those who can understand, my hard disk had become my pensieve.

As with any other person, I have changed in the past few years, and like most other persons this was change I did not expect. I read a lot my own statements and scoffed at them. Cynicism seems to be pervading through me, the thing I dreaded the most had started its sinister process. The Grim Reapers of hope seems to be nearing. I can almost feel their wizened cold hands pulling me under, whispering, “You are one of us now” in my ears.

Looking at myself now, I start to realize “the process”. My choice in movies has changed, my choice of songs has changed and I seem to have given up music altogether. I feel more like a Goth than like a flower child. From a stage when I could find beauty in the macabre, I have reached another where I find macabre in beauty. Beauty sounds mawkish, cloying or maudlin now. Bastions of hope have now turned into sieges of despair. Attitudes have changed, enthusiasm has repudiated to blasé. Although, I must admit, I still had an edge back then. Sarcasm reigned high. But that with the other stuff seemed to attain equilibrium. Considering the only arbiter in these cases is the person himself, it is remarkable the level of equity one can maintain when scrutinizing himself. And prejudice against oneself still counts as being fair.

I personally hate cynicism. The prospect of living my life waiting for people to screw up makes me uneasy. Moreover, being a cynic automatically makes you a skeptic, which though not all bad isn’t much fun either. Leading a life believing that nothing out of the ordinary could every happen, where people could never ever amaze me by doing exceptional good is a thought which paints pictures exclusively of grey. That, even to a person suffering from deuteranopia is not a very pleasant thought. And after coming across people who are doing amazing acts of philanthropy, by actually offering their services and traveling 8829.59 miles (geodesic) to offer them, every single fiber of my body revolts against being a cynic.

I attribute this “process” to a part of growing up, which brings me to why growing up sucks so much. I speak for myself, but for me the suckiest part of growing up is that it doesn’t really happen when you want it to. Another thing in life which seems to always know “what’s best for you” (am sure coming up with ideas belongs to the same list; they are just never there when you want them). With growing up its like, your whole childhood, you so badly want to grow up and when you do grow up you so wish you hadn’t. Only the verity of that ponderous statement can make up for its banality. It’s time for the truth to set me free now. Though, I portend the possible demise of my own spirit, I am now forewarned. And while the prospect of capitulating haunts me, the other road where I might escape it, nay even defeat it does kindle a tiny flame. May be a cynic is what I might turn into, but there is time. While it lasts I intend to make the most of it, bring me “the chicken soup” and bring “veronica decides to die”. While still at it…I sign off with Edgar Allan Poe, I can’t think of a better way to find beauty in the macabre, then by having a tryst with the king of the macabre himself.

Helen, thy beauty is to me
Like those Nicean barks of yore,
That gently, o'er a perfum'd sea,
The weary way-worn wanderer bore
To his own native shore.

On desperate seas long wont to roam,
Thy hyacinth hair, thy classic face,
Thy Naiad airs have brought me home
To the beauty of fair Greece,
And the grandeur of old Rome.

Lo ! in that little window-niche
How statue-like I see thee stand!
The folded scroll within thy hand —
A Psyche from the regions which
Are Holy land!