Chance.

What are the first associations one has with that word? For some, it’s the hip-hop artist , who's had a fairly illustrious career, who's tailgated it with his latest new god-awful album. For others, it’s the famous Indian movie, Chance pe Dance, with its quintessential Bollywood aesthetic, topped with the typical casually sexist atmosphere, and insanely catchy songs, slathered with half a story, but a full production company. But what is it really about? Discarding the proper noun versions of the word, why do we care about chance?

The term chance comes from the game of dice. And as history has proven, many of the most consequential actions are based on the flimsy whims of luck. Whether it be winning the El Gordo, one of the biggest lotteries in the world (worth more than 2 billion dollars), or the discovery of Penicillium notatum by Alexander Fleming, which changed the course of medical and the general history of mankind.

Sure, we are creatures of wit, determination and power, yet, all of us are wrapped around the fingers of delicate fate.

Kingdoms (ethereal or otherwise, have been held at the mercy of chance. Even the Greek gods divided their realms of the sky, earth and sea over a game of dice. Even they agreed (they barely agreed on anything) that fate is blind to their wants. That it truly is the one Rational, not bending to the mortal rules of passion, power and pain.

It is random.

Which again seems to be the only rule that the universe seems to follow, the order of chaos.

The game of dice was always a gamble. Kingdoms lost and won (Pandavas and Kauravas in the Mahabharat) even Church bells (as in the case of Henry VII) You win some, you lose some.

But the very idea of gambling was very foreign to me. Why would one voluntarily choose to, sink their money, their possessions, their time, their relationships, for a statistically improbable chance of winning? Why one, would lose themselves even, just for the chance of an elusive victory

These, of course, are the extreme cases, the bottom of the barrel, the exceptions. Regardless, this happens all over the world

According to AddictionHq.org, Over half of the world (4.6 billion people) gamble at least once a year and about 1.6 billion people do it regularly, with the USA and China having the highest number of gamblers in the world. And about 4-10% per cent of them on average tend to develop an addiction to it. Now you do the math, it’s a pretty high number of addicts. (I'm not gonna do the math cause I'm lazy)

I’m not here to dictate one’s choices in life. Addiction is a culmination of various storms in one’s life, not a one-cause fits all thing, so I don’t care if you do or not.

I just wanted to figure out, one of the reasons, why we as a species have been drawn to the allure or charm of chance.

And then I figured, where do I take my chances, give it my all and then some more, even if success isn’t guaranteed.

Then it hit me.

Crushes'

Crush,a.k.a puppy love a.k.a the searing fuel for all cringy teenage romances.

We’ve all been there, haven’t we? When you’ve looked at someone, and in a cheesy, rom-com Esque twist of fate, the people, the noise, the riff-raff if you will, dim out.

Time itself bends, to the will of what seems to be fate. A moment stretched to eternity like tasting the best bubble gum, a flavour so elusive, so ephemeral, so rare, that one holds on to it, with all dear life, soul and more. And as if in the spectral transient state, you ask yourself,” Is this home?”

Monarch butterflies flying about in one’s stomach, stealing glances, stretching time and perceptions, the mother of pain and passion. Yes, that crush.

The panic, shame, breathless euphoria, sometimes desire itself, all wrapped into one abstract syllable

Yes, that crush.

What joins us together and tears us apart, fuel for sleepless nights, the rush of delirious zeal, slathered with anticipation and wishful daydreaming.

Yes, that crush.

All in five letters, A syllable, microcosm of chaos and order.

Now obviously, I'm exaggerating as most pretentious, college “artists “do, blowing up something out of proportion like an elephant-sized helium balloon. Yet, this experience, at least a likeness of it, is real.

The experience of having a crush, if we pull aside the curtains of lust, skewed perceptions and well, physical attraction, is that of hope, at least, according to my pea-brain.

Hope, that the dreams in which you’ve built your castles with them, will come true.

Hope that they and you will see each other, know each other and love (whichever definition you may hold for it) each other for who you both are.

Hope that this feeling isn’t fleeting, that it’ll stand the test of time, weather, worry and euphoria.

Hope that both your inadequacies, failures and fallacies, will melt into each other, as you become complete.

Hope that someone, like a pair of spectacles, will help you see and know the world in crisp clarity.

Hope that all the years you’ve wasted, all the tears you can't unrun, and all the wrong turns you’ve made could finally lead to contentment and a happiness of sorts in this cruel, cynical world.

Hope that they are that someone, whose mere presence will make you whisper, in earnest,” This is it, I'm home.

Now I know why my friends call me hopeless romantic.

The act of gambling, in my eyes, in part is a game of hope. Hope that despite all your losses, this next throw will change all that, will make it all fade into irrelevancy.

That despite all your sunken costs, the people you’ve lost, you’ll gain it all back, and much more

You’ll be worthy again, it’ll all be ultimately worth it, all after this next twirl of the hands of fate.

For all involved in either case, hope gives a direction, the illusion of security in the future, a destined destination, created by us and for us.

This truth anchors me to a very interesting cognitive bias known as the sunken cost fallacy. It speaks of this cognitive process when people continue to invest time and resources into something that is failing or shows sign of failure, because they are afraid of losing everything that they put into it. Their time, money passion etc. All of it, will be for naught, if they stop it.

In other words, people are likely to continue spending money and sometimes everything else to sustain a dying endeavor, simply because they had hope that it’ll all turn back.

When people are in too deep, they dig a bigger hole for themselves, by trying to compensate for the hole that they have already dug themselves into.

To me, this exemplifies the dangers of unhindered hope. On how something harmless and helpful can, if unchecked, lead us to be blinded by our lusts, letting the world cinder in its flames, while we live in the dream of what could be, rather than see what truly is.

Part 3

Greek mythology has always fascinated me. It’s chock-full of tales of betrayal, deceit, hurt, passion and a whole lot of drama. From gods to mortals and those in between, from monsters in absurd shapes and sizes to ones with skins of our own.

Among the plethora of Greek myths, there’s one that has always been in my mind. It has many of the characteristics of a typical Greek tale topped with a fairly ambiguous ending.

It’s the tale of Pandora's urn (yes, it is an urn. No, it's not a box, everyone has lied to you, I'm so sorry)

According to Greek mythology, Pandora was the first human woman created by the gods. Zeus ordered her to be molded out of the earth as part of humanity’s punishment for Prometheus’ theft of fire, the secret that the gods kept away from us mortals.

A curse guised as a gift .

According to the myth, the gods gave her a jar that contained all the evils of the World and ordered her not to open it.

And as the story goes, after long, arduous moments of temptations she succumbed to the wails of curiosity. Despite all the warnings, the urn was opened.

Behold, pestilence, pride, vices, sickness, death, turmoil, strife, jealousy, hatred, famine, were all released into the world to settle upon it like a dark cloud till the end of humanity.

She had the paid the price for her curiosity and the gods malevolence.

The interpretation of things, especially for something as fossilized as Greek mythology, tends to get a bit tricky. Some versions state that the urn contained blessings, others say that there were 2 urns, one of the blessings and another of curses.

The generally preached story though, leaves with Pandora closing the urn in time to leave one, just one thing inside.

Hope.

After all the disease and suffering that was released onto humanity, the sole survivor of the god’s dastardly plan and Pandora’s folly was hope.

Elemental hope.

In his book Human, All Too Human, philosopher Friedreich Nietzsche argued that ". Hope, in truth, is the evilest of evils because it prolongs man's torment.”

The last and greatest curse was the curse of unflinching, potent hope. The all too familiar nature of it, Braggadociously brandishing a knife, before the eye of a tornado, Commanding the behemoth to kneel and beg, tremble in fear of this indomitable piece of metal, and the power of the one who yields it.

That hope.

Going against all odds, obstinately and arrogantly fighting on, intoxicated in the pride and overconfidence of our abilities, leading to the falls of death or worse, defeat.

That hope.

That despite all their misgivings, fallacies and vices, that there may still be the good, you once felt enamored by the one you loved.

That hope.

That all your contributions, the grace that you’ve shown and have been shown, will not disappear with your final breath.

That hope.

That the very next flip of the lever will flip your failures to fortune, your hardships to your well-earned rewards, your tears for all that you lost to tears for all that you have won and got back.

That Hope.

Sometimes I wonder, that as the millennia passed, assuming that Pandora was real and she, remained alive (I mean, she was the first human, after all, she must be having some benefits for it right, like lifetime access to the Fountain of Youth, discount offers to the Hephaestus line of products, that kind of stuff) did she give in?

Did she let hope Out of the urn and into the human spirit, Forever dominating our lives, and in doing so, making and breaking the course of human history?

And if so, would that have been good?

Would we have been better off, if hope it didn’t exist at all, if it was left there in the urn, to stew for the rest of eternity, unbeknownst to the rest of the world?

I’m not exactly sure.

Part 4

I think that hope in moderation, like all things, as my mother always preached on her woody pulpit, among the plants she tended to, is good.

We wouldn’t travel unknown paths, chase unlikely dreams, tread paths far from where the bones of our ancestors lay, far from perceived rhyme and reason.

Had it not been for hope

We wouldn’t dare to look for better land and bounteous produce, would never have crossed seas, for travel and trade and domestication

Had it not been for hope.

We would never dream to rise in revolution against tyranny, natural and mortal, in the face of death, infamy and failure.

Had it not been for hope.

We wouldn’t dare to dream, of a future, where mutual understanding and love live in perfect harmony, where silence in each other's atmosphere, provides comfort and ease

Had it not been for hope.

We would never fess up, consume courage and double it, to be honest to one another of what you know to be true.

Had it not been for hope.

Through my, inconsequential (in the grand scheme of things), but very much important, arguably definitive series of moments in my life, I learnt that hope is a double-ended sword.

Not a double edged, a double ended sword.

Hope is the defense against the cynicism and misanthropy that sometimes overwhelms us in the burdensome times of our lives. Providing this ethereal will to keep going on, when everything and everyone seems to go dark.

Yet, it can leave us drunk in our tiny spheres of knowledge and power, where we leave ourselves with no more room to grow, a perpetual state of arrested development.

If it isn't kept in balance, it’ll pierce us or, it’ll pierce everyone else.

Either way, pain will come.

It's funny how, despite all of this, hope drives us, both as individuals and as a species, whether we know it or not.

We don’t have the absolute certainty, that we’ll wake up tomorrow. Nor do we know whether the dreams we slog for now, will pay off. Hell, "the microorganism of 2020” is a clear indication of how nothing is certain. Not 100% per cent anyway.

All the empires that have stood in this realm, so proud, so bold, so tall, they all crumbled. All of them.

Brick by brick.

Bone by bone.

They were broken by another or worse, dusted off, far from the seemingly the immortal reach of history, never to be known to have existed.

Despite the certainty of essentially one thing in the universe, that being death, we still hope. We still sleep in peace, wake up the next day, brush the same teeth, pull the same hair into neat, socially acceptable stacks and curls.

Why?

Because, deep down, I think we hope. That's why I feel humanity isn’t doomed.

At least, not yet.

Cause, despite the perilous pestilences that envelop us, global or personal, hope always seems to find a way, at least for most of us.

We hope to fight and we fight to hope.

I don’t know why I wanted to end on a positive note, maybe it’s because I'm a sucker for Happily Ever Afters, then again who isn't.

In the current environment (political, social, biological, microbiological, historical, the list goes on) hopelessness seems to be our birthright. As a generation and as individuals, as nations, families etc.

The mistakes of our ancestors snowballing into colossal, systemic problems, the uncertainty of the future, the valuation of people based on certain economic output, among a myriad of other problems, will turn anyone sane human being, into the pulp of their former self.

All their dreams, aspirations and ideals sucked dry, due to the “practicalities “and “logical “next steps in life.

Yet we as a species, somehow, despite it all the nihilistic dread, despite all the crippling anxiety seem, to make it through.

And in defiance of it all, I hope.

I hope.

I hope.

To sustain me, in part, even guide me, even if it seems like I am hastily stumbling forward on a steadily burning trapeze line, while juggling many balls (or knives. No yea knives are a better option because people will childishly laugh at balls, I know that for sure) at a time.

Despite it all, I want to hope, that we’ll make it through, to the egalitarian utopia, that we’ve built in our heads.

Or at least die trying to.

Hope is often seen as a symbol for the weak.Kind of like faith sometimes .You aren't strong enough yourself so you believe in something stronger .

And maybe its is true

I’d like to leave with a poem that sings about hope. A poem that has on countless occasions provided that painful fistful of flame to go on, in an increasingly voidal and hopeless world

“Hope” is the thing with feathers- EMILY DICKINSON

“Hope” is the thing with feathers -

That perches in the soul -

And sings the tune without the words -

And never stops - at all -

And sweetest - in the Gale - is heard -

And sore must be the storm -

That could abash the little Bird

That kept so many warm -

I’ve heard it in the chillest land -

And on the strangest Sea -

Yet - never - in Extremity,

It asked a crumb - of me.

4000 words or so ahead .Reader discretion is advised.

Part 1

There is this singular thread that connects us all in a universal moment of

unity. It intertwines us regardless of who we are and what the world

beats us up to be. Before we are separated into our luscious microcosms of

diversity, into class, race, creed and other archaic human inventions.

It is crying ,as you can guess by the title.

“The Big Waaa Waaaaaaaaaaaa”.

We all enter into this cosmos, with a cry.

Some say it’s a cry for help, a newborn with a birthright of fear, running

through their veins.

Others say it’s a cry against the precipitous change, from the dark, veneered

protection of the womb, to the cold rush of air and insecurity bathed in

searing light, as we are brought into this world, naked and afraid.

Doctors say that the first cry of the newborn is of utmost importance.

It cleans fluids out of the lungs, opens up airways.

And well, the baby isn’t exactly prepared for the sensation that is breathing.

It's like a sharp gust of air being thrust down your throat, your muscles

suddenly are forced to move.

Forcing them to accept this reality of breathing, as soon as possible.

Nature, on the momentous occasion of birth, presents us with the

ultimatum, at the beginning of worldly life, “You either breathe or you die.”

And we’ve got to choose.

Fast.

The decision of life then is instinctual.

We cry .

And with that cry, we win the first fight that life throws at us and face the

consequences of willing to live.

We face the ramifications of choosing to breathe over death itself, at least

for the time being.

Of Choosing to be.

It's almost as if from the beginning itself, we are thrust into battle.

We start from sperm, racing to the homely egg, against our compatriots,

who are all doing the same. All responding to the thirst of life, wanting to

live on, swimming in the anticipation of acceptance and a future. Willing

themselves to live through to the end, or die trying.

If we do survive, numerous battles face us, one after the other, in light and

heavy succession. In birth, in growth, all till our death.

The constant war of being .

Here’s an activity for you.

Close Your eyes.

(Wait you won’t be able to read anything if you close your eyes.)

On the off chance, your eyes are open.

Try loosening yourself up. Notice the sensation of shoulders drooping in a

slump.

Stretch your fingers and toes, and try loosening up

Then for about 10 seconds. Just breathe.

As deeply as you can.

Inhale.

Exhale.

Inhale.

Exhale.

Do all of this while keeping your eyes closed for about ten seconds.

Don’t worry. There’s no rush.

I’ll wait.

How did you feel? What did you notice?

What is breathing to you?

However good your answers may be, I can’t hear you, so listen to what I

have to say about it.

Sometimes ,I think that the process of breathing itself is a battle, this tug of

war, for air.

We gulp in air, those molecules marching in a machinic flurry. Creeping

through our passages, into our lungs. Waiting there for a frozen moment in

time.

And for that single moment, that paused present, we are gratified, fully

quenched for our need for oxygen.

Stasis from the pull and push of inhalation and exhalation,

as they cancel each other out.

No need for more or less.

We’re content, just for this brief moment.

We're Enough.

Alas, you can’t stay here for long.

Soon enough, the whaling, exhaling need builds up, pressurizing us to let it

out, let it fly free into its home before we let in a new wave. Before we set

the continuum back on track.

Slowly but surely, time and time again, we are told, by nature or nurture,

from the Voices that hate and/or love us, that there is always one more

battle, one more war.

And that there are many more to come.

Part 2

Crying is the first language that we speak.

Not speak, not in the literal sense ….is utter the right word?

If we look at the definition, language comes down to 2 things. The tenets

that it is built upon are that of Expression and understanding.

Converting the abstract formless ether that is emotion and

information into a format that is understood and accepted by others.

And in that sense crying is a language is a right? yes, it's primitive, each

instance left up to interpretation, and can barely be held in comparison to

its other contemporaries, who have the upper hand in the game of language

because of syllables and organized value and thought put behind of each of

them.

But as a first attempt, right out of the womb, it is fairly effective for a certain

period.

I cried when I was a child, so did you, so did most of us. It's just how life

works. Nature ordained us with that this innate language. It needs no

syntax, rules or pronunciation, it's the language of incorrupt, innocent

emotion.

And therein lies, to me at least, its power.

Organized language for all its freedom, in its diversity of syllables, words and

sentence structure, can never truly encapsulate and translate our emotions

as powerfully as crying does. Crying, despite all of its well-known flaws,

helps to smoothly emulate uncut, raw emotion, because crying is uncut and

raw if that makes sense.

It's as if crying is one of the truest languages of emotion if the previous

statements did not sound precocious enough.

Our essential needs and wants as powerless beings were ,I think

expressed through this concoction of saline and raw sentiment, spiced in

with a few sounds. As children, we would cry for a variety of needs. From

food to sanitation, fear to attention and even sleep, or more accurately, lack

thereof.

We process pain, anger and joy among an assortment of others' emotions, through

these salt and mucous infused streams mixed with throaty gargles and

vibratos.

It provides this primitive yet most advanced language. Helping us to

materialize emotions, those certain shivering, anxious, thought-spirals

that rattle through our cerebrums day in and out.

Giving us a voice, a space and a contoured, covert sphere of my own ,far

removed from the intangible maelstroms of doubt and crippling fear.

As adults though,we move on to other,more efficient modes of

communication, right?

Odysseus, from the Greek legends, did it and he was commended for it.

In the XVI book of the Odessey, (255-260) the encounter of Odysseus and his

son, who hadn’t met each other in years is described so "Salt tears/ rose

from the wells of longing in both men, /and cries burst forth from both as

keen and fluttering/ as those of the great taloned hawk/ whose nestlings

farmers take before they can fly. / So helplessly they cried, pouring out

tears”

One of the greatest of all Greek mythological heroes, surviving a war, many

treacherous voyages and monsters, praised for his honour and patriotism,

oozing with machismo, was praised, sung about even, for a form of

expression which is looked down upon to a certain degree.

In their case, the expression of such emotion wasn’t seen as a flaw,a source

of shame, or even a loss of masculinity, rather it was seen as a symbol of

fortitude.

Perhaps these emotional outpourings could solidify relationships, even more

than words can ever do between people.

So,When and where did tears change, from this standard of emotional

experience and expression, albeit a very ancient, cherry-picked one, to a

shameful one?

I don’t know.

Part 3

What are your first impressions of someone who is crying or someone who

is very prone to cry? What do we or you specifically, characterize them

under?

Is it that they are weak, often swept in a wave of feelings, unable to control

it, unable to anchor themselves down, to a calm, cold, logical reality?

That they are fragile for letting their emotions rule them, instead of the

other way around?

This is a rhetorical question because I might not get an answer from you. I

don’t expect one.

But I hope that you’ve thought about it now. Even if it is for a little while.

For a long time, at least in popular culture, whether it be movies, shows and

books, crying is shown to be a sign of weakness.

A scene that comes to mind is from the movie Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2 ,Earl the police officer reacts to the preceding scene (no spoilers) by saying "This is enough to make a grown man cry ,but not this man .Get back in there ,tear "as the muscles in his face jerk that tear back in ."

This scene was played out for the laughs and in the context of the movie it is mildly funny , but the additional context of the phrase "Enough to make a grown man cry", is worrisome ,is it not ?

Over time, I do not know when, nor do I know why, but a certain stigma was

built around it. It was weaponized for the glorification or vilification of

others in terms of comparison.

To cry was to be perceived as a weaklin, you are called a girl or a number of other insults . As a result, there's a certain air

that ranges from hesitancy to shame, which prevents us from crying.

This public hesitancy slowly crept into our private lives too.

Because monkey see, monkey do.

Thus, Letting this natural coping mechanism become demonized, restricting

it to certain age groups and/or genders which further deepen scars, that

people try to seek refuge from when they cry.

Ohh the irony .

The social taboos of letting tears flow begin from the assumption that

tearing up an age-restricted thing. That it is a child using a primitive

language. That it is not appropriate at all for a teenager, adult or geriatric.

It’s seen as a sign of immaturity, unreliability, leaving most of us no option,

but to,” Suck it up","Be an adult “or the more popular, sexist version of it

“Be a man “.

Essentially, cork it up like a fine wine, till all you can see in the world is your

ache. Hoping that you’ll forget all your wrongs, all the misdeeds done to you

and you have done to others and trudge along like a zombie in this world as

time goes by.

With the little knowledge that I have about this subject, I understand that

tears don’t always indicate weakness but they help in portraying the

fullness of emotion which words fail to capture, even if such emotional

displays would be seen as weak in contemporary culture.

The act of crying as said by Dr. Recalcine Leaf, is considered to be three

things. A sign, a call and a release.

It’s a sign to us and those whom we trust enough to be vulnerable, no,

honest with, that we are experiencing an emotional whitecap. That we need

all the time, patience and the help that we can get to ride this wave out.

It’s a call for introspection, for us to look into ourselves, the mistakes we’ve

made, the time we’ve lost, the joy we share and partake in, and come out

the other side, a better human being

And finally, it’s a release. Physiological response to pent up emotional and

psychological pressure. Giving that sense of temporary catharsis and clarity.

The briny hug that our tears seem to give, whispering,” it’s okay, it’ll get

better. I know it will, I know it will, I know it …...

So that when the tears are finally wept away, we can see, if only

temporarily, a sign of hope, this unrelenting sense to live, to get up and

continue to fight the next battle, the march in the next war. Sometimes,

many temporaries can stretch to a lifetime, and maybe that itself is enough.

Or is that line too cheesy?

Tears serve a cleansing purpose. Not just in the physical sense (tears do help

in the sanitation of our eyes), but to remove, no, process this sudden or

gradual excess of emotions that may or may not be inappropriate to voice

out loud, like grief over a lost friend, bitterness, or regret of past misdeeds.

All the good stuff that makes us human.

Then again, I'm no expert. I don’t have PhD in crying. This is, after all, A

controlled embellished ramble of my surface-level understanding of things.

Am I Contributing anything new to this conversation? Am I making a net

positive, giving more than I'm taking, or is it something else?

I don’t know

I don’t know.

Part 4

There are a lot of times in my (admittedly, short, relatively inexperienced

and sheltered with a dash of privilege,) life, where I feel that anything that I

do, just seems to hurt.

It's not physical pain. Usually, those have a definite source and a natural or

artificial, known remedy. If I get to scrape my knee, I'll put turmeric powder

on it. If my Stomach aches, I might have an antacid.

So on and so forth.

Instead, it's this, well familiar concoction, of mental and emotional strains,

pains and agonies, all in a class of their own.

It's that knot in your stomach, it keeps getting tighter, till it reaches a

sustained peak of a feeling that I can't seem to describe, overwhelming you

to a high degree that you can’t see anything else, feels anything else. and

you can’t get through yourself to change it, to ease the pain.

So, all you can do, and all you do is to bear it till passes by.

Those times in life, where you feel that it hurts to be human.

Those times when you feel that you bear Atlas himself on your skeletal,

screeching back as you rummage through your surroundings, trying to make

sense of it all.

Those times when you feel so sore from the kicks and slips in life,that

getting up doesn’t seem to be a viable option anymore.

Those times where the light at the end of the tunnel flickers in the wind, and

your slink, turns to a saunter, then to sprint and then a scramble, bumbling

in a vague assurance that you’ll reach in time, when suddenly in a flash, all

seems to be lost. This journey that you were traversing on with all your

heart and strength, seems futile now. The light at the end is expunged and

worse, the light inside seems to follow suit.

What do you do then?

Can you start over?

Should you choose to suck it up, move along, not addressing it all?

Letting it fester, burn and rot within you, till you let it out in a toxic eruption,

wounding yourself and worse, those around you?

Or do you cry?

Knowing that these saline streams, flowing down your aching body, won’t

inherently free you from your gloom?

Knowing that this human nature of yours would be considered immature

among those who you respect, admire and dare I say, love?

Knowing that the only haven to do so is with locked doors, eyes and hearts

so that no one can see your shortcoming, not even yourself?

Do u still do it?

Would it ultimately matter?

These are just a few questions that pop off in my head, kind of like hydras, in

some ways. You cut one head off, and two more will promptly take their

place. Doubly loud, doubly intrusive, doubly doubt inducing, and doubly

potent. Over and over again.

Part 5

Whenever I have the chance to travel by air, I am always replete with this

sense of amazement.

Amazed at how a long aluminium can with wings that don’t flap, can.... fly.

How lifetimes worth of journeys, across seas, oceans and deserts are

covered in mere hours, something that Solomon and Alexander couldn’t do,

despite their immense wealth and Greatness, respectively.

Setting aside the collaborative wonder of the plane, the other compelling

aspect of travel in an aeroplane is the view.

Large skyscrapers, roads and trees, all seem to be shrunken, left on display

like neatly organized building blocks in a child’s room that go on to infinity.

They seem so close that I can almost touch them, as if they’re just one push

away, one flick of my finger and one draught of a breath, before the blocks

that make them, tumble into their deeply symmetrical hunks of plastic.

While the plane ascended to the clouds, it got me wondering. How much

does a cloud weigh?

I know, it seems like a dumb question, something which only annoying 7-

year-old children would ask in a series of questions like what does this do,

what does that do, why does this exist, what’s the meaning of life ?, that kind of stuff.

Well, it seems logical not to ask the question simply because. Because, well,

it floats in the sky, so it must be light, right?

To my surprise, I was wrong. Very wrong. With a quick search online, I found

out that they were heavy.

That these fluffballs, the abode of angels, creatively moulded into

trampolines in the sky, weighed as much as elephants do .11 of them to be

kind of exact.

On average a single cumulus cloud can weigh up to eleven elephants, or 1.1

million pounds or roughly 500,000 kg.

On the surface, they seem so light, like a floating feather. Yet the truth

often resists definitive simplicity.

In a slightly similar yet overthought fashion, I come across my friends,

family, who seem to be able to do it all, who in some ways reminds me of

clouds.

They have high expectations, full of hope and energy and achievement.

One plans to be a doctor, another an entrepreneur, another a musician, all

“successfully” juggling their social and personal lives, while trying to be good

people.

The “ideal “child a

parent could wish for, so to speak.

Yet they too undergo pain. They too hurt.

They too have their cumbersome clouds, wafting in their heads, floating

about ominously presence.

There are times when I'm lucky or unlucky enough to be able to capture a

glimpse of these clouds that hover in their atmosphere.

Sometimes it's in between certain light-hearted conversations about the

latest trends or books or something of that sort.

Other times it’s these scattering solitary moments as they seem to stare at

the window. Not the scenery Outside of it. Or the chalky mess suspended

within it, but the window itself. As if it is the subject of certain profound

interest, that they are right on the cusp of universe redefining discovery.

But I don’t think that the window is what they are peering into. Maybe it is

the person staring back from it.

They seem to swim in the depths of silence when the echoes of the

cacophonous crowd dissipate out of a room, when the silence amplifies,

whatever seems to be inside.

This silence, these clouds, they stay there for a split second, spreading its

foggy, protracted arms, to their faces.

Wrinkling a smooth cheek, into the old familiar home of despondency, as it

wriggles to their depths, like a railroad maggot to an apple.

Inch by inch.

Row by row.

Till it decisively reaches the eyes. The last crowning piece to this puzzle of

terror and what seems to be despair.

And then, it dissolves. Goes back to this seemingly fabricated state of

simulated calm, now overstretched because of this panic of recognition and

judgement, as if they are trying to convince any accidental onlooker that this

short-lived petrification didn’t happen, that it never does and maybe even

trying to convince themselves of that very lie.

I’ll never know whether these moments are rooted in mortification or dread.

Hatred of a past self or fear for an unknown future one. Or if it’s completely

something else. These are, after all, my perceptions of a frozen moment in

time. They may even be misconstrued by my starved Muse, eager to devour

any narrative that inspires, regardless of the truth.

All I know is that most, if not all of us have our clouds, Anchoring us to the

fathomless pit of self.

Creating this claustrophobic version of reality. And only those under their

clouds will truly know its gravity.

Far from what an amateur romantic can even describe.

Sometimes farther than their own words can put through.

Clouds that hang up in the sky for too long can make the earth gloomy and

in the same way. It can make anyone feel suffocated, like screaming in a

glass jar.

No escape, no response, just echoes, all while you’re on display, as you

slowly wither away, for lack of air and the want for something else,

something more.

Part 6

I think Tearing up, crying, bawling in its many forms is like rain.

At the worst or the best of times, it soaks us, down to the bone, before we

can change.

Starts with a mist, a foreboding cloak on our eyes, brimming up in a convex

wall, simmering in a frequency of its own, till it bursts.

It streams, forging its miry path, settling and dancing onto the delicate,

contours of our face, before the first fall.

After which it’s a flood. An all-consuming flood.

Rain has been represented as a carrier of renewal and rebirth in nature and

literature, the catalyst for spring, a symbol of hope, despite the disruption

that it represents and is.

They seem to dissolve the many pains and aches that hang suspended in our

atmosphere, and let it go, from mist to stream to flood, carrying the grime

and dust, and cleaning the crevices that exist or are constructed to be

hidden from everyone else, till nothing is left untouched.

But Clouds slowly dissipate or drift away when they are spent. And that’s

where I envy them.

It's usually not that simple in the case of human beings.

Unlike nature, our clouds seem to remain in our own atmosphere, long after

the rain has passed.

Sometimes, after my clouds seem to give up all they have and more, in the

numerous bouts of heavy sobs, I wonder or I hope, that it's all clear now.

That maybe after I open my eyes, wipe off the excess, a celestial clarity of

thought and action will somehow dawn on me, at least to a certain degree.

That Even though I am not excessively clear about everything, that maybe I'll

get candlelight, a fistful of flame, enough to light up the immediate future,

to warm up the gripping present.

To go on.

Then I open my eyes and look up.

The clouds are still there.

It’s all there, and a little more.

More imposing than ever.

A mountainous weight that doesn’t seem to go away.

They say that “The rain goes away eventually. That the sun shines brightest

after the storm rolls over.” That’s usually a metaphor for,” Don’t worry, it’ll

get better soon. Just Wait, happier times are coming “

What we are not told is that sometimes those clouds don't simply go away,

they pile on. When the clouds of our worries, inadequacies, sense of

hopelessness cannot possibly get farther, thicker and heavier, it just does.

Dimming our vision with each layer, sucking out any light that comes from

inside or outside till it's all pitch. Everything including you.

Sometimes the way to weather the storm, the way that works for me

sometimes, is to make a ladder with your own hands, high enough to reach

the sky, so that you can tackle those clouds, these puffballs in their territory.

They seem so innocent, so frail, yet they are the ones that turn into the

storm.

The journey is arduous and unrewarding, but it must be done for us to grow

It must be done for us to see the sun again, to tie up our shoes and walk on.

Through the thorny bushes, seas and deserts.

Conclusion

I’m not saying that crying has no inherent value. It's just that it's part of the

process. It’s a means to the end, its part of the climb, not the summit itself.

It's the acceptance of being scared, of being happy, being on this cusp of

growth and change.

It helps to put to rest the cognitive dissonance of emotion and logic, helping

one finally, even if or a few brief moments, reach stasis. It's kind of similar to

the act of breathing as I discussed before, an oasis. We stay there briefly

before moving forward, gives ourselves rest, time and hopefully

understanding.

That’s how I imagine it be

And yes, I do not think these exact things when I cry. When I cry, I get

consumed by the emotion that I have, happiness or otherwise.

This is just a retrospective, me looking at the act of crying to understand it,

myself and hopefully others too.

Hopefully, this essay does not come off as a snake oil sales tactic for

crying, where I say that your tears will erase all your problems and pain

away.

It won’t.

Because if it would, we would all have been transported to a perfect world,

the minute we entered, after our first cry. But I want it to help stress the

importance of crying in the process of grief, emotional processing and as I

mentioned, being human. It's not an innate solution, yes but, it’s a

significant part of it, at least in my eyes.

So don't be afraid when the tears come on. Don't be scared to open the

floodgates because this is part of what makes us human. Part of what helps

us get up each morning. That's important.