Flight

Flying 36,000 feet above the ground the world below seemed microscopic. With earphones plugged in my ears, originally to keep me from listening to a very annoying man sitting next to me who had started snoring before the seat belt sign had been turned on, I passed between worlds all of which were in my head.  As I looked outside the window, it was pitch black. Acres and acres of nothingness. I transcend into a philosophical mood wondering where my life is heading, when I’ll do something I truly love or rather when I will even find out what my calling is and live that mystical perfect life.

  As I was lost in my thoughts, looking out into the nothingness, I noticed a small flicker of yellow outside my window. It was so puny that it seemed like a firefly, just floating out there separated from the swarm. However almost immediately the swarm did come and within a matter of seconds all you can see out of the window, all that way down below is yellow. A small city is passing me by, 36,000 feet below, lakhs of people there and it’s a exhilarating feeling and it made me introspect at the same time.

  Here I was wondering about problems in my life which now suddenly felt petty. I could see beneath me a place with so many people who probably are going about their business regardless of the problems they may be facing. A yellow dot may reflect a car going on the road where a wife has to leave the house for work without resolving the fight she was just involved in with her loved ones, because that could wait but the meeting she had could not. A dot may also be a house with a family living in it where the husband was probably planning a surprise meal for his wife and wondering whether to bake the potatoes or to boil them. It made me a think whether the problem is a minute one or a colossal one; tide and time stop for no one, so why should we not keep moving on?

  It was like those fleeting lights were in cahoots to make me realize that I really have no need to be so sombre about my life. I being a huge believer in positive thinking, thought to myself, good times will come only if I believe they will. The lines from the movie ‘Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara’ rang in my head.

“Jab Jab Dard Ka badal chahya

Jab jab gham ka sehra lehraya

Jab jab aansu palko tak laaya

Jab Ye tanha dil ghabraya

Humne dil ko samjhaya

Dil aakhir tu kyu rota hai?

Duniya mei yun he hota hai.

Yeh jo gehre sannate hain

Waqt ne sabko baatein hain.

Thora gham hai sabka qissa

Thori dhoop hai  sabka hissa

Aankh teri bekaar he nam hai

Har pal ek naya mausam hai

Kyun tu aise pal khota hai

Dil aakhir tu kyu rota hai”

  The air hostess asking me if I would like something briefly distracted me and brought me back to this world momentarily before  I was back again in my own world. Its not as if everytime I look out I delve into my thoughts, I have always been a very quiet person (unless with friends and in the mood to fool around, then I am quite the opposite) and that silence hits it peak during journeys. Since childhood I have hated sleeping during traveling.

  Once travelling by road to Udaipur, which was a 12 hour journey back then, I loved looking out at the forts along the way wondering what battles were fought there ( I am a history geek so all the more reason to wonder), or when I saw a mandir on top of the hill I used to wonder what mythological tale lies behind that mandir, maybe lighting struck there, or perhaps a god once traversed those paths. During that particular journey I know for a fact that all I said during those 14 hours was the occasional yes or no and of course informing my dad when I needed to pee. For me the cliche, "the journey is more important than the destination", has always and will always be quite literally true. 

   Anyway, I returned to my thoughts following this brief trip down memory lane. I was a little more hopeful of my not so bad situation. I had been through a lot of mental and emotional turmoil recently and its taken a toll on me in more ways than one. A switch had been flipped inside my head and made me a little crazy to be honest and everything did seem hollow and I had lost sight of who I truly was and somehow that feeling of putting on a mask everytime with someone was very taxing.

  However I sense myself moving past all that and gaining a lot more clarity in my thoughts and I believe that happier times are coming and they will be here to stay. In retrospect all that I have been through has made me wiser, now the sun will rise and joy will come.

“Why fret what’s going to happen

If nothing else, experiences will happen.

Look into a teary eye sometime

A hidden smile is bound to happen.”