Clear Light of Day

a brief note making compilation. the notebook i am writing in is too big, so it is a lovely challenge.

Remember childhood? There is a warped narrative of that Concept that exists in the society, in the collective lives of us, in our momentum. But none of it is really true, the individual specifics are too much; they get in the way of the Self and the Narrative that is being sold to us. Not really sold, merely a lesson, an advanced one in the Mental Grammar course.

I remember reading the book when I used to wear a school uniform – white and blue, checks and stripes. I remember reading it in stranded rooms. I remember it like another life of mine. The heat in the book is something I have lived through, in dusty colonies and enclaves of Delhi, in buildings that camber towards the illegal side, but just enough. If the rent is paid, and the noise is contained, no matter how vulgar or domestically abusive, it is all okay. I love the heat, I love that city’s face in its red, sunburnt bloom. I love the sweat, the sweltering, the blinding heat. There comes a moment when you are laying down your cards, and you realise you use the word love too freely, to the point of it being abusive to the Others, but it is the straightest way to let language convey the immensity of your notions and emotions. I love, therefore I allow myself to go on. If I could run back to Delhi right now, I would. Nothing is stopping me, except the Narrative that has been sold to me, for all I owe and am worth right now. Another summer of stepping into a warm, dusty room when you turn the fan on and the heat starts making its way out of the door – it feels like a moment of clarity akin to the one missing in one’s life.

There had never been an intention of becoming a grown up in relation to others. The whimsical, far off, yet plausible dream of Adult-ary during adolescence only involved me – a standalone figure in the vast world, the expanse of possibilities, a cave during a thunderstorm. Adolescence exists at the price of Uninnocence.

Yet here I am, a mimicry of an adult, still untainted in ways that change with each changing day. I am a little too gullible. When you are put in such a position, wherein there’s autonomy in your hands, it gets really threatening to your own concept of self-reliance. I know nobody else knows what’s good for me as much as they cannot live my experiences. So how am I expected to know about somebody else, even if it is my own kin, cut from the same fabric of upbringing?

I don’t want to feel this warped turmoil of Growing Pains inside of me, latched to my spine, making sleeping at night a conquest.