Sometimes or Often, Nothing Can Save The Day!

On a dull Leicester street, a group of men have been congregating since morning. The sentiments were sombre although mingled with some respite and a lot of confusion. Someone was lost but someone survived.

Hundreds of miles across the globe, curfew was relaxed in Thoubal town, a sharp feature in the bend of the Himalayas. A group of women in distress, frantically searched the family albums for what has been lost for ever.

The thread connecting the two events – a tragic plane crash.

Source: Getty Images

A curious if not voyeuristic reaction is to demand more of the above scenes. But there are more such events unravelling every passing second. Only, sometimes has become often.

You work towards a certain goal, an aspiration, an idea of happiness, a pursuit of excellence or a unity of souls, as in the case of a couple about to restart a life of togetherness with their kids after an enforced separation.

But calamity strikes, strikes the good and the bad equally. You walk out in the morning thinking your world is organised, and look forward to a beautiful day with a loved one. Until something says, NO.

Sometimes, the blackest threads, the most auspicious of days, wisest of gurus, countless fasts, sincerest prayers, holiest pilgrimages yield nothing but misery. 

You think you are doing the right thing, acting out of care, concern, welfare or love. There is an authoritative self-imposed belief that if I do good, I’ll be done good with, what goes around comes around and so on.

You deceive self, thinking there is a positive energy lurking around to embrace you if only I…

…And next you know, you walk out of your dorm room for breakfast, working on your family’s dream to see a doctor in the house, a plane crashes on you, ending the story of hard-managed loans, hours of study, innocent proposal on cards – all amounting to nothing.

Dictatorial might, mafia powers, rapist urges, political agendas and wives’ connivances make the world their playground, their fiefdom. No law, procedure, check, security, guarantee or rights you held in respect since childhood, no beautiful life you decide to embark on, mean anything to them.

Even then, if you happen to manifest a dream somehow, yours is not even a moment-worthy blip in the grand scheme of massacre.

Humans, human rights and the self-assigned high pedestal among living beings manufacture schemers. The human institutions in the form of - a lover, a close-knit family, a self-styled guru, a caste, a community, a nation or the world - make you believe in the farce of better positioning vis-à-vis an insect or a mango tree or a shark or other humans.

But none of these will ever tell you about the insignificance and helplessness besieging our positions.

You might feel a revelation; an unusual surge of bliss having climbed a mountain to feel God-like. You might feel, having built a secure life around you for your loved ones, everything is great and the universe owes reciprocity. Don’t.

It will only shatter your innards before they actually shatter.

What you think is a world, carved as an achievement on the strength of goodness and the noblest intentions, is easily subject to the will of a dictator’s plan, a terrorist’s hate, an airline official’s negligence, a way-side drunkard’s rage or a partner’s whim.

Hence the grief, the heart-break, the shock, the disillusionment, the loss of faith.

True refuge can not be external – not in any friend, lover, family, government, country, humanity or God. Its locus of identity lies and should lie within. 

And when you meet with a disaster, you simply meet it. Sometimes and often, nothing can save the day. 

For there’s no coming to terms with it. There never was, there never will be.