They say there was never a poet who could bear the toothache in silence. The poet feels compelled to write about it.
Well the threshold for what moves self-proclaimed poets and philosophers has gone down drastically since Ogden Nash wrote ‘It’s going to hurt just a little bit..’ about his torment on the dentist’s chair. Because I have emerged today, upon eating my humble lunch, with the notion that my choices this afternoon were not mine alone, but just another brush stroke in the giant pattern of human behavior about making choices.
The clock moved forward by an hour today (great concept, day-light saving). Which means I wasn’t hungry when the clock asked me to be hungry. So I waited for the ‘right time’, and picked out something healthy- a nice filling salad with lots of healthy toppings. Leafy greens, check. Nuts and seeds check. Veggies check.
I think I did not realize that I was still hungry till I went around and without a thought, picked up a nice creamy chocolate cake right after. It was when the last bite had melted in my mouth and the surfeit of refined sugar and all kinds of cosmetic preservatives literally left me bitter, that I saw my choice in the larger pattern of human behavior.
What did it mean?
Salad and cake. Salad and cake.
Maybe I will work a job I don’t like. And then compensate by buying vulgarly expensive phones or shoes I don’t quite need.
Salad and cake.
Maybe I will start to run- it is healthy after all. Maybe I will run so much that I am running a marathon, or ten marathons.. or whatever it takes to truly destroy my ligaments.
Salad and cake.
Maybe I will let others define values and morality for me, and what is acceptable and not-acceptable, and then I will spend my evenings drowned in a poison of my own free-willed choice.. whether it is drink, or smoke, or porn, or latest season of Roadies (or even Ekta Kapoor dramas, where I get to judge others!).
Salad and cake
Maybe I will nurture no real and deep friendships where who I am is truly valued, and I will throw a lavish wedding for my daughter, or buy that house in that poshest of posh neighbourhoods, or make a habit of the most popular hashtag on Instagram (preferably related to travel), so I will at least earn their envy.
Salad and cake
Maybe I will spend my childhood buried in books, and then in my adulthood refuse to grow up or take responsibility, because YOLO (You only live once)!
Or maybe I will marry someone who others tell me to, and then focus my life force on making my children do what I really want, because my dreams are asking for an out too, aren’t they?
Salad and cake……
…..Maybe I will spend my life choosing over and over what I don’t really want, and then compensating for it with something I don’t need.
So, what are you having for lunch?!
Image: freeimages.com
