For better or for worse...

"This is so childish!", Sagar called out."I know you're in there. Why can't you just come out?"

He'd been standing outside for over 20 minutes and the heat wave was killing him. "Atleast let me in,dammit! I stay here any longer and I'm going to turn as dark as you!"

He knew that should do the trick. Eshwar hated it when people compared his complexion with Sagar's. Their oddities combined had ensured a friendship which has lasted several years. Sagar knew he could bank on that to take liberties at times and shower abuses at will. 

Sure enough, that afternoon he heard a lock unlatch and Eshwar stuck his head out. "I'd gladly let you wait out here for the rest of the evening but I don't want your parents to pound on my door tonight when they see their darling prince sweaty. What do you want?"

"What do I want? You haven't been seen in a week!You stood me up for that stupid charity event I signed up to help your friend Ritika. We were counting on you to finish the  Thermodynamics assignment due Tuesday.And you wanna know what I want? I want your ass roasted in this midday heat,that's what I want!Frickin moron!"

"Ok ok, stop yelling. It's bad enough that you're in my face trying to drag me out. Can't a guy go underground for a few days? Noo...Mr.Sagar has draw him out and drag him to every damn thing in his fancy life."

"You're lucky I do that in the first place. You wouldn't even have a life otherwise, you big fat hippo!"

"Screw you!I want you to apologise for saying that!"

"Apologise? Ok...I'm sorry you are fat!"

"Humph!I wonder where you come up with lines like that!"

"You know, I pull them right out of my ass!"

"No wonder they stink!"

"SCREW YOU!". But by this time, they were both laughing and they knew how much they had missed this camaraderie.

"So what's her name?", Sagar quipped."You wouldn't be in hiding for such a long time if it weren't for a girl who made you painfully shy."

"I can't talk about it this time. Not yet, atleast."

"Well at least tell me something about her! Have I seen her somewhere?How do you know her?"

"We hang out a lot. Pretty casual, you know.We just talk casually and it's fun."

"Hmm...so you guys are just friends?Nothing more?"

"I don't know. I'd like to take it further but I'm not sure."

"How long have you known her?"

"Oh .. off and on...a few months. Maybe more..."

"You weasel!You've known her for a few months and you haven't told me yet?"

"LOOK, I said I didn't want to talk about it.Let's just drop it, ok?"

"Whatever!If I'd been seeing a guy for a few months, we would have had an anniversary by now."

"If you'd been seeing a guy for a few months, it'd be snowing in Chennai considering you barely see a guy for 3 dates!"

They had been walking around the neighbourhood for a while and they stopped under a tree. Sagar spotted a man selling coconuts and he bought a large, raw coconut for himself. The water inside was warm but delicious in the midday heat. His head bent over, he sipped through a straw noisily.

"OK I'm sorry!", Eshwar spat out. The delivery made the apology quite unconvincing.

Sagar shrugged his shoulders and continued to empty the coconut, knowing the noise made by his straw was driving Eshwar mad.

"This person is really great. I just didn't want to jinx things up. I really care for our friendship and I don't want to end up losing that. That's why I've not made a big deal about this so far."

"That's fine. Whatever." Sagar was busy scraping tender coconut peels.

"And you're not the kind of tramp I said you were!Cut me some slack!"

Sagar glanced out of the corner of his eye.

"So why are you so hung up over this girl?Does she even have a name?"

"We just click,you know? I really enjoy hanging together with this person. We have a good time and we do a lot of fun things together."

"Think she feels the same way?"

"I don't know. I don't think so....I mean, how do you know for sure, right?"

 "Well, sometimes you just can. You gotta watch for the signs. Girls are pretty expressive when it comes to that, you know"

"Yeah but..oh,forget it. It's complicated."

"There's an original line. No wonder even match-making sites have started to offer that as an option when you try to pick a status on your profile. What could be soo.."

"You don't get it!", Eshwar cut him short."Things aren't always the way you see them, ok?We all handle relationships differently and what's right for you doesn't work for everyone! You might be able share everything under the sun with your guy but that doesn't mean I can do the same with mine!"

Sagar looked away and took a deep breath.

"I thought I'd ask some friends about what I should do.So let me ask you this. Don't tell me what you yourself would do. Tell me what you'd do if you were me."

"Look, I mean...I don't know...I can't...that's not fair. You know I'm pretty opinionated about these things.", Sagar fished for words.

"It's ok.", Eshwar insisted."You're not going to be forcing me to do anything.I'm just curious to find out what you'd do in my shoes.I've talked to some people and they've had lots of thoughts.They aren't friends you might know. Sometimes it helps to get an outsider's perspective."

"Well, at the risk of being an outsider myself here, I guess I'd just gauge things based on body language first. I mean, if you are really unsure about telling this person and you want to test the waters first, you should probably read body language. People can't fake that. You just know when someone is trying to send you signals to take things further ahead. I don't know....what did your other friends say?"

"Well their opinions were all over the board.", Eshwar sighed."Some of them felt I shouldn't risk it 'coz they felt it was not going to go anywhere. But a lot of people said I should just follow my heart and go for it."

"Well, ordinarily I'd say the same thing but I really think you should take some time first and try to read the signs you are or aren't receiving. It might help prepare yourself if, I mean...you know."

It was now Eshwar's turn to look away. 

"Look, I'm just watching out for you. I don't want you to risk everything and get hurt tomorrow."

"Umm...no that's fine. I understand.", Eshwar mumbled.

"If you still want to come clean, that's fine. Just be cautious and see the signs first,ok?"

"Yeah.I..I'll figure it out."

They had arrived back at Eshwar's house and the afternoon sun had cooled to an acceptable temperature.It was still very warm but the sunshine felt good.

"Ok, I'll have to go finish that Thermo-D assignment you were supposed to complete for us. The gang is meeting at Sunil's place in an hour."

"Yeah, sorry about that. I didn't mean to ditch you guys.In fact,I'll try to.."

"Nah , that's ok", Sagar brushed his offer aside."We'll finish it but can you please get out of your depression? You could put a basset hound to shame."

"Oh just get lost!", Eshwar grinned. "I'll see you in class on Monday."

"Yeah, see you then."

Sagar walked out into the street punching digits on his cellphone and tripping over a small rock simultaneously.Eshwar watched him leave and sighed.

Silly fool! How dumb are you? I wish I could tell you that it is YOU!I can't even say that to your face. I don't know if you've figured things out.Nah, you probably haven't. But why did keep harping about signs?Are you trying to tell me something?I wish I knew! Wish I had the guts but I love you too much to do this. Isn't that ironic? I love you too much to tell you!

Sagar reached the corner of the street and turned around. Eshwar was standing at his doorstep, leaning on the wall casually. He waved and Sagar waved back before he disappeared around the corner.

Poor Eshwar! I feel so terrible! I can't believe you've had feelings for me!ME! I mean,when did you even know? I thought you were always straight! You've always been my straight man-friend. I just couldn't see you any other way and I couldn't even tell you that I knew. I couldn't jump to that unless you had mentioned it. I hope you were smart enough to figure out what I was trying to tell you.

Don't make me give you an answer by opening your heart to me. I can't do this to you. I know how sensitive you are. I'd hate to be the one rejecting you but I can't wish myself to be the guy you want me to be either. That's not fair,is it? And you were putting me in such a tough spot!I wanted to hint at my answer but I also wanted to be your friend and tell you the right thing to do. 

Don't make me pick sides,Eshwar!

The pursuit of happiness

I finally finished reading "The Geography of Bliss" earlier today. I must say that I have a love-hate relationship with this book. There are parts where I loved the author's words, parts where I hated them and parts where I loved to hate what he had to say.

In a nutshell, the author hitherto known as the 'Sully Scribe' and decidedly proud to claim himself to be eternally depressed/unhappy, now intends to explore the 7 continents , traverse distant seas and scale peaks to locate the places in the world where people are happiest in general. The romantic expedition has all the trappings of adventures accompanied by epiphanies and revelations one dreams to realise at some point in one's otherwise dreary life. Strangely, as I bore deeper and deeper into this book, I had to acknowledge a growing sense of resentment...no, restlessness is the right word. SS probably tried to fight this same feeling before deciding to quell it by setting off on his journey. As much as I'd love to follow his lead, I don't have an inexhaustible source of wealth, the amount of vacation time or the comforting cheer from family (wonder how excited his wife was about this idea) to go country-hopping for months. The result is aggravated restlessness which needed to be addressed swiftly before my flaky witless alter-ego took over and executed some crazy decisions ("Mr.Manager?I QUIT!That's right.I'm off to HappyLand!")

The Sully Scribe heads to Holland which houses a 'Happiness Institute' (dedicated to the study of happiness) in ironically bleak buildings. Clutching a list of countries which lead the world in claiming to have happy residents, SS visits over 12 countries and spends time talking to their citizens from all walks of life and strata in society. The effort is well-appreciated and just when you near the end of every chapter anticipating a profound truth from that culture, the author wraps it up with a succint 360-degree perspective about what makes that country tick(or not tick) without actually describing how that relates to his quest. The observations he makes about people in a country far outnumber the reasons he quotes to explain why his quest does not end there. Nor does he completely clarify another interesting question. What would he do once he locates Utopia?Relocate with his family?Return to America and spread the good word?

After reading several accounts of his travels in Qatar,Thailand,Iceland and other lands, it seems highly unlikely that our dear SS would ever feel completely at peace in any one place. The book progressively gave me the feeling that he was making the same mistake millions of people do the world over (and have been doing for centuries)-striving for active change to ensure happiness. People change homes,change jobs,change partners,change lifestyles and even change themselves all the while hoping that there has to be something better out there that they're missing out on. Change itself is not a bad thing but change in pursuit of a better good needs to be coupled with good reasoning. What is this better good that we try to strive for? A new home? More luxuries?A better relationship?Can that change really ensure the longevity of that better good?

After sailing the seven seas, our dejected SS returns home and talks to several people from his home city of Miami who decided to move to Asheville NC. "Is this home?", he asked them after seeing how happy they were with the move. "It is for now.."

The book does a great job of describing people and their way of life. Does the author find what he's looking for? Probably not. When he returns to America, you expect him to sit back and sigh, "Home is where the heart is". I doubt he has decided to end his quest in Miami or anywhere in America.

Hinduism does a noble job of addressing this issue to a considerable extent. The things which have the potential to make us happy (sukham) or unhappy (dukkham) are not ultimately powerful enough to sustain. These are fleeting changes in the expanse of a lifetime and they are more aptly defined as pleasures and displeasures. Pleasure can be a source of endless joy for some people and pleasure can be disturbing for many depending on that source. Regardless, pleasure is not happiness-what we call bliss(anandam).

When we make changes to our lives, we tend to focus on sukham more than anandam-immediate pleasure over lasting bliss. This might be a subconscious decision which we happen to realise much later. If we are to attain bliss (and ofcourse that isn't easy), we need to awaken to the realisation that one goal cannot exist in the presence of another. Bliss doesnt come through a steady source of pleasure.Nor can the quest for pleasure deliver something blissful. We aren't perfect beings and so we make our choices and remain 'content'.

The Vedas also decry the purpose of desire. Desire develops an attraction which lends itself to a fixation and eventually an obsession. This obsession plagues our mind, and rids us of our intellect. What hope do we have left after the complete loss of our senses? While this makes perfect sense, how does one tackle the pursuit of happiness? The scriptures encourage us to seek bliss (ananda not sukha) and unite with Brahman, the universal spirit. How then does one deal with the desire to attain bliss? We could heed to the words of the Gita and perform our duties with no expectation of their fruits whatsoever. Does that still justify the presence of this desire anyway? I have no further answers and if you do, please tell me.

Another reason why this book got me restless is because I have always struggled to come up with my own definition of 'happiness'. I now understand the difference between pleasure and bliss and while I certainly haven't uncovered the secret to a blissful existence (for me), I am unable to define what could even come close.

One time in 7th grade, we were asked to use a pin-up chart and come up with answers to the question, "What makes you happy?". Today I can tell you what makes me joyful, feel content, feel at ease,feel pleased and even feel pleasured. When I know my family is safe, I am content.When I know people love and care for me, I am comforted. When I see or do an act of kindness, I feel good or rewarded. But I still don't know what makes me happy.

Do you?