Let’s move forward, together.
Haven’t these times infected in us a sense of spiritlessness and even a modicum of anger? Let me start by speaking for myself here. My mind is, as often as not, drawn into thinking about how I have lost my ‘precious twenty-three’ to the pandemic (a year that I have watched only through screens). Not that I would have bestowed upon myself, a few achievements, but for the otherwise ignored little joys of being social.
Now, I often witness these sights of supermarkets, populated by an assortment of gracefully aging men and women dressed up in pajamas, not-so-patiently waiting to get their groceries billed and dispatched into their cabinets (of course, as you may think, they are conscious of how their perforated masks hold their noses and chins well within, not to worry). Anyway, although I said gracefully aging skins, I could still see some mild stretches, formed perhaps due to all the pent-up frustration, expressing an unconscious cry for help. This is true for all of us, I realize. It was a year that went by with unspoken words and unheard voices.
As far as we know, humans don’t handle slow-burn threats as well as one-off attacks, and the former is the current scenario. But unfortunately, we are habituated to allowing things to simmer up until they become an urgently practical problem. Nevertheless, we are all screaming inside ferociously hoping that it would accidentally transform into some use.
The other day, a friend of mine told me she had a nightmare where she failed to wear a mask and that her fear remained for several days that followed. How strange is that, I thought? I wouldn’t know, I wake up at least once a night to recover from my unfinished dreams. Anyway, these sentiments of inaction will last long, until we all collectively get out of the ‘screaming phase’ and move to ‘action’.
In a world that is already pressed for time and money, the pandemic is like one more nail in the coffin. We are barely controlling our narrative at this point. How did we come here? How destabilized are the orders of human life right now? Did we cause all this, as we evolved, triggered by our growing oblivion towards our fellow inhabitants? And, why do we feel ill in our heads during this time, even as the current technologies are using every ounce of their concentration into lubricating our lives at all steps? (be it those stock-rich video streaming applications, deluding us into living a virtual life or websites that willingly assume vigil in telling us where the virus is hiding).
I don’t know the answers, all I’m saying is we should continue to ponder upon these questions, but without forgetting to take action in the meantime.
