“You are too young to understand
it.... even if I tell you the reason”....
was a stock-reply that I was so used
to.... when ever I used to ask 'why and how,' of things ... things
that these elders 'seemed' to know! I used to even imagine that they
have a hidden agenda, a hidden reason even, for not revealing
the-reason! I used to ask 'please at least tell me why you do not
wish to tell me...'
....
I had aunt in the neighbourhood of that
village, where I spent my school 'vacation' (holidays are different,
with a hidden agenda! Vacation is simply pay the fees and vacate the
place for a couple of months... rest and recuperation for the
harassed lot... of, 'we the teachers'... that was how 'we the kids'
deciphered it 'then'!).... So it was about that 'aunt'... She
shocked me when she announced once 'that old fellow is all alone
now'... it was her husband, alone 'now'.... both were above 85....
she had a knee pain, and I was deputed by my granny to become her
walking stick up to 'that' far off house where a visit became
imminent for this aunty (some condolence...)... “How do you
know?” , I asked this aunty (much, much elder than my own granny,
then...)... 'Can't you hear .... he never farts so aloud except
when alone or with just me around... it is only a mouse-squeal at
the most when 'others' are around!”.... This aunty phooh-poohed all the attempts of that 'uncle' to hold back any hidden agenda...
her only worry was what if she kicks the bucket too early?.... She
used to take care of him like her child! He was firm in several
infirmities of old age, while this aunt was yet to stabilise into age
related infirmities (at times she was agile too!)... These oldies
provided me lots of watch-and-learn lessons... these oldies loved
innocence and never failed to respond to such innocence with liberal
trust, and open-ness!
......
Busy moms suspect a 'hidden agenda'
when that noisy kid of hers suddenly becomes calm, or lets out a
bewitching smile at her!
...
That was childhood.
And now, it is almost time for me, to
face a similar situation..... with a stock reply like “you are too
old for that.... you will never understand it!”....
...
Now-a-days, everyone is entitled to
that “abundant stock of hidden agenda”.....as if it is a
'fundamental-right'!!!.... It is so obvious, when we look at the
elaborate preamble they use before asking simple questions!...... For
instance.. sitting across us(opposite to us, etc), in a train
journey......they open with... “please do not take it
'otherwise'...” a conversation thus....... (yet to know whether I
am wise at all, to only then.... think of being 'other-wise'!!!)...
“please do not miss under stand ... ..” (right now I am
'sitting' ... properly.....at my own berth allotted to me... not
miss- standing, missing to under-standing, upper-standing... etc....
calm, peaceful... now what are you going to start? A war?...
war-ning me thus?..!!!)...... with all such 'please's' (“please”
if multiplied in number,...... expects you to ..... exponentially
'behave yourself' irrespective of the nature of surgery the other
fellow is about to do on your ego!)...
With all such 'please.... do not mind,
etc..' he ends up asking,... 'where are you traveling up to?'..
(only this much?)!!!!
He could have as well walked up to
those 4 entrances of that bogie, and along one of them there would be
a chart, revealing all that 'hidden-agenda' about my journey!...
(Obviously, a long journey it is, .... he has lot of time to spend,
and being too unsure of how poor a conversationalist I am, he uses
all his voca-bul-err-eee to fill those gaps of time... like those
old times where under the huge banyan tree, oldies have a
conversation consisting mostly of coughs, sighs and hiccups!)...
Those who do not have either the
patience for such elaborate preamble, or some guts to face the
consequences, end up keeping..... a long face, the only
form-of-protest, that our social etiquette permits, ....... for the
rest of the journey.
...
The funniest part is, when I was of the
'right' age for everything worth knowing.... nobody found time to
even look at me! So, all along, it was 'figure it out yourself' (the
way that heroine of the movie 'crocodile dundee' told that hero who
was seeing a commode for the first time in his life, inside that
small room, we call as a 'toilet', and asked her about its
utility...... the heroine was benevolent... the hero was
fortunate... I, .... had to even ..... 'figure-it-out' whole
squared... even had to figure it out...that.... I was to figure it
out by myself!)... Well I wish to be fair... my questions were
not quite easy for people stuck with just the routine..... What I
noticed was that the mind was inclined to settle down to a routine,
where it is never going to be taxing to 'figure out things' too
often.... the easiest evidence of which was the obstinate resistance
people manifested everywhere, ..... at home, work place, etc .....
about changing the places of things..... Just keep that paper
weight a few inches away and that fellow shrieks 'Who has dunn
it?'.... It is okay to ensure that things like toothpaste, brush,
etc are found at the same place... though personally, I would not
mind it being displaced at all.... it might help to start my levels
of alertness at a higher notch at the very begin of the day... at
the same time, agreed that we do not like to spend time or waste time
for repetitive actions, beyond what is warranted...!
...
On the spiritual arena.... we have
that 67th verse of 18th chapter in that 'song
divine', where there seems to be a hidden agenda in holding back
information! Did Krishna 'allow' a large scale war, just to ensure
enlightnement of one kid called 'Arjuna'... or were there several
others,.... waiting,.... like Bheeshma,..... who were like that
'Terminator' who could never 'self-destroy' themselves? Krishna had
too many secrets up his sleeve.... some were mystic, some were
hidden-agenda, some were too obvious to be even pointed at(that
raas-leela for instance!)... But we cannot blame Krishna entirely...
he has already said,...... about, 'knowing that', ..... after
which...... nothing else needs to be known, within those 18 chapters
of 'song-divine' itself!
We have Gautama Buddha, those Zen
Masters, and several others, who were 'not-so-ready' to take a
'position' about the existence of God!.... For that matter, these
spiritual masters never seemed inclined to come together on almost
any thing... though they speak about the same thing, same goal, to
reach, through separate-looking techniques! Maybe that is what .....
being 'separately-together'.... is all about...!
....
It is perhaps, the urge to
'have-an-hidden-agenda' to themselves that inspired the jointness of
families to split up! 'Privacy' was the private name for the same
concept which was publicly known as 'independence', freedom, etc...
These elders insist on all the details, while hesitating to divulge
it from themselves (a one-way-traffic!).... ask any kid, and he
would readily agree/say ....this to be also true... about his own
'financiers-provided-by-nature'!
.....
'Hai seedee-see-baath... na mirch
masala, dil ka haal suney dilwala.... '... I kept wondering, till I
discovered the reason .... this is why the north-Indian-food is more
spicy than those south Indian dishes, ... in general.... !!!
Mirch-masala- is too essential!... That dish 'Olan' in Kerala
consists of just ash-gourd slices, salt, and a dash of raw, unrefined
cocoanut oil after it is cooled, on the top.... no mirch-malasa...
for instance.. and no feast is complete without this dish! (Kalan,
olan, aviyal... the sequence of dishes on that banana leaf... is
like a rhyme.... famous!)
I tried my best, to help people to know
what it is all about.... to the extent I knew..... and in this
process, I learnt several things, .... like, why the
'hidden-agenda'.... why the futility in trying to explain... why
the difficulty in inspiring, motivating, persuading.... why
sometimes we use the tough way of provoking, instigating,
insinuating, etc... The more I delved into spirituality, the more
was the entanglements.... mystic entanglements, and before I
realised it, I was deep into it... the same
'hidden-agenda-business'... the only difference is, I have the
privilege of sharing the predicament with a lot more number of people
than I ever imagined or hoped to 'meet' even! It is a price I had to
pay (gladly too), to know that whatever we are intense about to
know... it is already there within.... it is only a question of
deepening our perception a little bit more! Otherwise, it is much
more sensible to ask 'when/which is the next bus'.... 'where is the
toilet please' ... and such other things, without much of ego
problem! We do need clarity, in knowing, about difference between
secrets, hidden-agenda, confidential, private, personal and such
allied concepts.
...
Kuch tho log kahenge.... logon ka
kaam hai kehna.... (beech mein something... something...).. and
then 'kahin...beeth na jayey raina'! The night is precious, as usual
for those three extremists... rogi, bhogi, and yogi!
psn(12th July, 2012)
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