Summary of 2009

This is my long overdue summary of 2009 as I know it. I know it is already 2010, but hey they say it is better late then never! It is ridiculous to think that I have been procrastinating for so long. Perhaps that should be my resolution for this year.

Youth has a certain effect on me, and I refer to that effect where I automatically assume that life, as I know it, will stay this way forever. So I go about in a dreamy state where things last forever.

I am at a certain point in my life where I am feeling the rush of the timeline. I am beginning to feel that every moment and second of my life is starting to turn a precious shade. This insatiable urge to immortalize every minute of everyday now exists because I now know there is no turning back for anything anymore. And that the word ‘too late’ is a real phrase that can be used in real situations; when employed it means that you have officially hit the end of a very narrow one-way road.

I have learnt to be more forgiving of myself and less of others. No, it does not sound great or big of me, but yes it is something that we all need to learn. The need for a solitary and introspective life is beginning to take precedent over one that is sacrificial and giving, because at the end of it all, when all else falls away, one needs to be able to face the barrenness.

The early twenties are the period of reflective inner journeys where you discover yourself and began to put yourself as a priority over those that have shone for so long now. And I am afraid to say that I am liking this selfishness.

It seems almost as though for the longest time, I am the last person to put my foot down on what I truly want. I have found myself muttering ‘sure thing’ or ‘no worries’ to requests or information that I have yet to process properly. In addition, I am always the first person to leave things unresolved and under the rug. I do that in exchange for the happiness of others, thinking that if others were to have their way they would be happier and that I would be too because that they are. And if there is anything that I have failed, it would be firstly myself and secondly, not realizing that I may sometimes be the person who is pivotal in the life of others.

The past year is memorable, mainly for the amount of tears that I have shed. In the month of January itself, I would say that I have cried so much more than I did for the two years just past. And the tears, they never did stop even till today. It reminds me that I am a feeling individual, susceptible to the daily grinds and hurts and capable too, of being chipped and defeated and that there is absolutely nothing wrong with it.

If anything, these episodes, they illustrate that I am too, human. That I possess a fragile nature and an even more delicate heart, but most importantly, that it is okay to be the person that I truly am instead of always being the person that I need to be.

Need is starting to become a very basic terminology encompassing very few key items such as food, sleep and water. And at the same time, want is no longer that forgotten item at the very back of the old forgotten closet. There should be a balance. Although it is hard to achieve, there should be a rightful balance as per all things in this life.

I adore the moments of my peace and am startled at the times that I overstep my self-impose mental boundaries. But I am still learning to live, with the person that I am inside, and I guess that is all not so bad after all because it is a skill that I will eventually need for the rest of my life. I cannot possible divorce myself.

With that sort of happiness, which is derived from self-centeredness, I do realize that I take quite a share of what rightfully belongs to other people. The question to assess the reservoirs of empathy and compassion would still be ‘Do you care?’ but it makes me wonder what does concern and care have to do with anything. And if I did care immensely, either for a cause or for a dime, does it actually say anything that is relevant to the whole scheme of things except that I am capable of (for the lack of a better word) giving a damn.

And before this post takes on the depressive note of eternal damnation, I should steer this monologue to celebrate the joys of this year. The daily grind of the industrialized world is to meet and greet. People that’s it. And it seems to me that as populations grow, human relationships become more distant. There are relationships where I maintain which appears to be so far removed that I am curious if we are only friends within the context of social networking sites or are we even less than that.

If this year served to do one thing in my life thus far, it would be to demonstrate that emotional investments in others yield loyal compatriots while relationships earned with tears and shared fears and joys borne confidantes who reinvents the meaning of the words safe and nakedness.

As the year draw to a close, a meaningless event in a sea of years both past and present. I find myself educated in the literal sense as well as in all senses possible. I am glad to be done with 2009. But still feel an unexplained yearning for another year just like the one just past. The depths of human thoughts and emotions are indeed incomprehensible.