Fun fact: I started writing this on December 31st 2013, when I sat in my German apartment room wincing at the fire crackers in action. I did not have a story then yet. So I just wrote the first two paragraphs. But I could never finish this piece any time I tried after that day. Somehow nothing seemed to follow the first two paragraphs and I didn't want to change those two for some reason. Until now, and it is 2020! After a lot of unexpected adventures around the world, I finally ended up in a another German apartment room on a brand new December 31st again. Call it a collective experience of the world I ended up seeing, experiencing, detesting, and learning to enjoy, I finally found a storyline- sort of. May be not the best one. But something that helps me relate to it partially. I am not 100% happy with this story or the writing but it is about time I finished this damn article from 2013! Feedback welcome as always! I reserve the right to change the story of the article at a later point. At this stage, I'm gonna paraphrase the popular saying for academics- "The best article is a finished article".
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
She sat upright in the dead of night, panting and clutching her faded blue sweater by the stitch near her chest. The loud bangs outside had mortified her as a child. Growing up didn't change the effect these spontaneous explosions had on her.. Tired from a rather mundane day, she had gone to bed earlier than usual. But it seemed like a night away from solitude was forced upon her. She had forgotten that it was that time of the year; when the rest of the world seemed unnaturally happy for no fathomable human feat. The world was well on its way to being a fast paced car crash and yet, the celebrations unparalleled any other time of the year. The little beads of sweat on her forehead forced her out of bed and to the window. She stood in the dark, her legs twined in the dull colored covers that followed her across the floor. She squirmed every few seconds as the night sky reflected some familiar smells and lights. Flashes of bright light were followed by those dreaded sounds that pulled the starkest of her memories to the fore. How long would she let this influence her? She decided to make a change, something most people swore by during this time of the year. She decided to brave the festive weather, and overcome her daunting memories and her challenging present. Clumsily, she pulled on her jeans and gave purpose to the oddly colored boots that lay haphazard on the floor. The door whined shut behind her as lazily as she tottered on the stairs before steadying herself at the gate. She flinched every time the annoying loud bangs crept up on her.
Not very far out on the streets, the men sold hot little corn cakes dipped in ground sugar in their modest carts that rattled to the chill December winds. The sprawling urban landscape around the church that stood the test of time for four centuries was generously assigned to these vendors who feed the dopamine hungry crowd on such days. Little glass goblins that made funny faces were lit up on every other cart on the street. There were gypsies who sold unusual ornaments while bizarre old women with crooked teeth traded scented scarfs and fried chestnuts. The smell of mulled wine wafted in the air, intensifying as the crowd multiplied. A blur of laughing faces, many inebriated, passed by her. Wish balloons lifted off the same time as another batch of fire crackers lit up the foggy winter sky causing a dust spangled sound storm.
She made her way through the hay-strewn paths that deemed to give a medieval hamlet vibe to the streets that lay in the shadows of a sky train on elevated guide-ways. The festivities extended into the thick of the city carrying bits of cinnamon, cloves and red wine along with it. The little artificial waterfronts carried colored lanterns that recreated a starry sky on the ground. She jostled a few couples who were oblivious to everything beyond themselves. Her face half immersed in her sweater, she eyed those happy faces edgily. No face in the crowd showed any care for a thing that dampened the spirit. She longed to be one of those elated faces drunk with blissful ignorance. How satisfying it must be to remain serene and smile under the dangling lights like one would when a hot cake was taken out of the oven. How supreme it must feel to have a clear mind devoid of anything but hope, love and simple expectations. How liberating must the thought of living and living only in the moment be.. It surprised her how the world was made of hope. Where did they conjure it from? Was there a special store that she was unaware of where one could subscribe it from?
She had tried to be happy. She had tried her best to revive that energetic radiance in her, which once upon a time spread so quickly like an epidemic that it put the most powerful viruses to shame. But all she encountered was thick mist that stopped her like a trained Swiss guard as though she was about to pull the curtains off the Pope’s chamber. Mist not unlike that which engulfed her on the fateful chill December night. She remembered visiting the same shindig almost a year ago. With him. Marooned in his aura, she regaled in his charm, his confidence, and most of all his attention. Until it had abruptly stopped.
Not too long before that, she had unleashed her witty side to him on one fateful day. Oblivious to the fact that it would change her perception of the innate beauty of a man all together. A beauty almost never discussed in trendy magazines, sleepovers, or drunk night-outs. His laughter. The first time she had truly heard it, they were separated by the entire widths of oceans, age-old forests, and billions of people. Yet, it made her feel close enough to him like a mother to her new-born child. She swayed to what seemed like the purest of sounds.
His laughter was like that of a single beautiful ray of sunshine marking the end of the cold winter months in the arctic. It had rung out through his room into the sprawling valley he lived in. The mountains bounced it first amongst themselves, tasting the various hidden flavors of his voice, and then reluctantly pushed it outwards to the sky. A bored satellite somewhere picked up that unfeigned symphony, marveled at the unexpected welcome distraction, and shot it into her little phone doomed in the old parts of a metro that had become a cacophony of all unnatural sounds that man ever conceived. That unique sonata had resonated in her ears, and at that instant everything else around her had muted. She was transported to the land of delightful memories that had long been stored in the depths of the trunk and packed away to an unseen corner of the mind. Funny, how the sound of his laughter could morph into visuals in less than a second. Mysterious are the ways of the human brain. Scenes flit across her eye as if she flipped through an animation book, except with unorganized images...
The gracious annual bloom of the midnight queen in her backyard, the innocence of a toddler sending a paper boat down the muddy stream, the water droplets on the grass after a perfect rain enhancing an intoxicating smell that forces one into a sweet coma, the vulnerability in the eyes of the new born puppy on the street, the swirl of the veil when the celebrated dancer was lost in the rhythm…
His laughter had kindled random memories that lifted the spirit and made it an eclectic treat to the soul. There was a rare element of openness, certain rawness, a kind of depth that is often reserved for the most unique characters of a novel, that which could be compared with wildly grown exotic forests in the remote untouched islands of this pale blue dot. The kind that could dent her stony facial features and bring forth a humane smile. Like the kind that would appear when she saw millions of stars huddling together on a cloudless night.. She became an addict. She wished that, that laugh would chime like an hourly grandfather’s clock. But much to her torment, he found some childish pleasure in being so ungenerous with granting her wish.
Not too long after, that laughter had stopped. It had abruptly disappeared into that unfortunate December night. A night not too different from the one where she stood currently. She still remembered the scent of the mulled wine mixed with his nectarine laughter, sending her into a dizzy trip down a memory lane; that which she roamed in the present. In between all the laughter on an endless night in snow and cold, and the dazzling fireworks that announced themselves as loudly and brazenly as possible, her happiness had known no bounds. She was the elated drunk face. She was blissfully ignorant. She was the spirit of hope that had rung through the night. She was... well, WAS...
Trust humans to make errors in the most sensitive of matters and destroy the purest of nature’s beauty. The same loud bangs that once marked the festivities in the background had set everything into chaos. One mischievous tilt by an apathetic teenager altered the course of that blast. What was supposed to echo from the skies instead took his laughter out. As though it was jealous of him for stealing it’s thunder with his unparalleled melodic treat.
Over time, she had become very well-versed in the art of picking up and moving on. And yet, the rough edges of her heart seemed to mind the mild ruffling of the season’s feathers on her back today. She had grown tired of resenting the world and its machinations. She had grown tired of the garish explosions that did nothing to lift that veil of indifference to the world except just take her to her wits end. Those hateful loud bangs. They never really served anyone any purpose. Did they? If only she could somehow make them bearable. If only that laughter could be interspersed with those explosions. May be they would provide a rhythm to his sorcerous tunes…
It just seemed like too much to ask perhaps. It tore her that she wouldn’t hear his laugh again… But she would have to hear those awful, useless blasts every year, same time, same place.
With her face cut like a glass polyhedron, she stood on the edge of the festivities where the last store selling fruited rum ended and took it all in. It was strange how the memories flooded in like the waves of an ocean at dusk. Picking up pace along with the winds and hitting the shore hard as the day came to an end. How his laughter flushed her at the sound of the very thing that ended it. She stopped cowering low and removed her scarf that had partially covered her ears. She raised her face towards the skies and held her breath while she focused on each of the blasts that went up in the air. And for the thousandth time, she vowed to shake off the wave that hit her for good, not realizing the futility of her efforts.
Waves don’t end. They recede, calm down, and hit back again with just the same intensity whenever they choose. Just like a memory. Just like his laughter.
aeroyogi
31/12/2019
