13 posts tagged “confusion”
shifting the pc downstairs has left the feng shui of my room down in the doldrums
the increasing futility of my thoughts, and in fact, any rational thoughts in general, is greatly frustrating me!
dont worry, be happy.
(...)
=D
so lets start off from where we ended. its been nothing more than an assorted collection of steamy days and starry nights; our sweat drawn - our miseries compounded. these are the days when men like us give up their hair for an extra ounce of freedom. proponents of anti-art - listeners of anti-rock, when all it does is delay the attrition. inevitable. surely. look where logic has taken us. though. we shall go down in glory - with style.
(8) so tell me where, your freedom lies (8)
contrasting mental snapshots from yesterday:
- diagonally parked oil tankers on the roads
- talat hussain and co. lying around on some balcony
- altaf hussains speech starting with a half-hour (well, nearly) long ayat in a dramatic way while the people were 'staring in blank devotion as their leader spoke to them with unseeing eyes' - a bad play of words on a red sparrowes track
- cold drinks and assorted 'mashroobat' for the crowd in islamabad
- the three guys from ppp, pml n, and mma holding hands (the mma one was slightly reluctant) and badmouthing the pml q guy
- mushy and co. talking about their 'vulgar display of power' (another pantera album ironically) from inside a bulletproof box while the people were roaming around (probably looking for some drinks and food - the air of festivity suggested that you could not rule out the possiblity of cotton candies and ferris wheels)
- me thinking about a childhood friend (shahzaib).. we were 12 or something back then and i said something along the lines of 'oh man altaf hussain sucks haha' and he said 'oye altaf bhai ko kuch na kehna' - speaks volumes about the following and popularity of mqm
oh well.. and ofcourse, people dancing to dhols in islamabad and the constant gunfire and blood on the streets in karachi - a surrealistic depiction of human nature summed up by shakespeare, "the show must go on"
this issue of the online newsletter 'warrior of the light' (by paolo coelho) was pretty good.. i was never too inspired by his novels, quite the contrary infact.. but i like what hes trying to do.. people rightly say that oh hes crap and its nothing deep and quite shallow and is lame and so on and so forth.. but what he writes is really sweet and he spreads the message of warmth and hope in this world which is a cesspool of credentials where everyone is on his toes because they fear the earth under them might be swept away any time now, and that is the least one can do apart from whining and cringing at every injustice.. this issue is really simple and that is exactly what i love about it.. and its fitting that we were talking about the letter of descartes to an objection a fellow philosopher raised to his reconciliation of necessity and freedom of our will in class today.. we have the power to negate the truth; the specificity of the humans.. we can give our own meaning to necessary truths.. and no one can stop us from doing it.. who would ve thought that such existential thoughts were to be found in both descartes, on the one hand, and coelho on the other.. here goes:
As if it were the first time
I would like to believe that I am going to look on this new year as if it were the first time that 365 days have unfolded before my eyes. To see the people around me with surprise and amazement, happy to discover that they are by my side and sharing something so often mentioned and so seldom understood, called love.
I shall climb on the first bus that comes along without asking where it is going to and I shall get off as soon as I see something that catches my attention. I shall pass by a beggar who asks me for some spare change. Maybe I’ll give him something, maybe I’ll think that he will spend it on drink and just walk past – hearing his insults and understanding that that is the way he has to communicate with me. I shall pass by someone who is trying to wreck a telephone booth. Maybe I’ll try to stop them, maybe I’ll understand that they are doing that because there is nobody to talk to on the other side of the line and that is their way of chasing off loneliness.
On each of these 365 days I shall look at everything and everybody as if it were the first time – especially the small things that I am not used to and whose magic I have forgotten. The keys of my computer, for example, that move with an energy that I fail to understand. The paper that appears on the screen and for a long time has not been revealed in a physical manner, although I believe that I am writing on a white sheet where it is easy to make corrections by pressing a key. At the side of the computer monitor are some papers that I do not have the patience to put in order, but if I feel that they are hiding something new, than all these letters, memoranda, newspaper cuttings and receipts will gain a life of their own and will have odd stories of the past and the future to tell me. So many things in the world, so many paths trodden, so many entrances and exits in my life.
I am going to put on a shirt that I wear a lot and for the first time I shall pay attention to the label and the way it was sewn, and I am going to imagine the hands that designed it and the machines that changed this design into something material and visible.
And even the things that I am used to – such as my bow and arrows, the breakfast coffee mug, the boots that have become an extension of my feet after wearing them so much – will be coated in the mystery of discovery. Let everything that my hand touches, my eyes see and my mouth taste be different now, although they been the same for many a year. In that way they will no longer be still-lifes and start to convey the secret of having been with me for such a long time, and they will show me the miracle of coming into touch again with emotions already worn down by routine.
I want to look at the sun for the first time, if the sun comes out tomorrow, or at cloudy weather, if tomorrow is overcast. Above my head there is a sky for which all of humanity - over thousands of years of observation - has given a series of reasonable explanations. Well, I shall forget everything I have ever learned about the stars, and they will once more turn into angels, or children, or anything else that I feel like believing in at the moment.
Time and life have changed everything into something perfectly understandable – and I need mystery, the thunder that is the voice of an angry god rather than just a simple electric discharge that sets off vibrations in the atmosphere. I want to fill my life again with fantasy, because an angry god is far more curious, frightening and interesting than a phenomenon of physics.
And finally, let me look at myself on each of these 365 days as if it were the first time that I was in contact with my body and my soul. Let me look at this person who walks, feels and talks like any other, let me feel surprised at his most simple gestures, like chatting to the mailman, opening his correspondence, contemplating his wife sleeping at his side, wondering what she is dreaming about.
And so I shall remain what I am and what I like to be, a constant surprise to myself. This I who was not created by my father or by my mother, nor by my school, but by all that I have lived so far - suddenly I forgot and am discovering it all over again.
back when i used to live in model town, we used to play footie in the little park.. ghausia park.. for hours unending
i was the oldest (well, mentally anyways) of our footie lot.. the great times, poking innocent fun at each other, the imitations, the realisations of the absurdities that we and everyone embraced and then laughing like there was no tomorrow over them.. in a way, my sense of humour hasnt changed much..
moosa (me and his timberlake impressions.. i remember that amazing justin timberlake song 'like i love you' that we used to sing.. and how haider still makes fun of me for doing that), maaz (moosa's little brother and technically very gifted and hard working.. the sensitive one and the height of innocence).. and yeah well, the rest :P
i remember the time (me being at the zenith of my abilities) when we once had a 2 on 8 football match.. it started with me and musa (he was an exceptional player) being against 10 players.. i think they were leading 16-15 and in the end we got a penalty and the keeper saved my penalty and i somehow hit the rebound over with the open goal gaping at me.. and our contention that it actually was a goal.. the bitter fights..
us trying to do it again..
but then there was one time when they were around 6-7 and on the other team is was only me and hamza.. hamza was the keeper and he just used to give the ball to me when i was in space.. and i used to dribble every player and walked the ball into the net.. ofcourse, it didnt start out too sweetly.. we were losing 9-2 at the end of the first half.. and by the end of the second half, me and hamza had won..
i now remember amans words after the game.. infact, when i read this post on 'one' and the power of one by some blogger, his words were what came to mind.. he said "one man can not make a difference.. but if that mans shahzad, it can happen".. every time i remember that, i m injected with this pride and belief..
this is the sort of belief i m lacking in myself these days.. come on shahzad! go on! the world is watching.. give it your best shot..
i have nothing to say to you, apart from the fact that i am desolate and desperate and my existence is dilipidated..
and there verily is no hope for the future..
"only the good die young", say iron maiden.. now i know why
i am 14 years old all over again.. :\
WTF? seriously! :|
the reason why i didnt post anything here for some time was simply that i didnt really have anything to talk about.. not that i talk about useful stuff otherwise, but i dont know.. nothing..
coupled up with this, i was also waiting to bump into (my beliefs almost always seem ridiculous to myself) the pictures of the rare event in my life recently that was an end within itself (for a change, in this ocean of sorts of permutations).. the match against bahria.. i would ve liked to post something here about it (something more than that crappy little injury-ravaged post).. but now king kairos has bereft us of his blessings..
other than that, its all the same.. angsty teenage existentialism (i wont be able to use this phrase for long.. technically, my teenage has ended since this is the 20th year of my existence, but i prefer to stick to, or rather more appropriately, clutch desperately onto 'nineteen') and hedonistic temptations (that would normally constitute heresy for me) are the order of the day for most teenagers.. i certainly am no exception to the rule though.. needing a vacation from morality and summersaulting into our guilty pleasures.. who is to say that I havent already done that? well, by-definition, these things have to be fulfilling (albeit temporary fulfillment, but fulfillment nonetheless) but i feel tugged back by things, hence, i havent done anything yet.. this situation can be interpreted otherwise by a morose observer as us having the illusion of us having morality.. its our guilty subconscious that has staged this grand facade.. i like to think i m an intuitionist though and hence i plead my innocence in front of this imaginative observer.. however, even that claim can be falsified through some sort of adlerian psycho-analysis.. that though, is not the point..
the point is.. the vacation.. our shot of hedonism.. our 'pilgrimage'; every sin absolved after that since we would then be perpetually devoid of temptation (in principle.. and that is our original honest intention).. is there any room for it in ones life when intuition tells us it isnt bad? but isnt it intuition alone that pegs us back as well? oh well.. one thing is for sure though: the deliberation of the ancient greek contention 'if you know the good, you ll do the good' has grown quite teh senile.. i might post more later..
the good discoveries of late in my life have been the re-emergence of sting's 'brand new day' (a childhood favourite of mine by the way) and some of parov stelar's work (credit has to go to arsalan for this.. thanks)..
but sting's songwriting on that album is quite unbelievable.. the lucidity with which he portrays the whole emotional faculty of our brain while still maintaining the innocence in the sound is something that you do not see that often..
(8) take me where the red wine flows (8)
incidently, with my obsession of every thing unreal under the sun these days, the only thought i get in my mind when i listen to that line (infact, that whole portion of the song where the princess pleads for the thief to take her away with him) is that that single line can so simply express all my apparent illogical fascination of magic realism.. i just want an escape.. sigh
oh, and final exam week up next..
okay.. so i justt got miguels mail which is quite teh late.. but still.. blehh..
i have no clue why i m really uneasy about it.. has to do something with the last training session where i missed a tackle on umair.. argh.. i dont know.. need to get rid of the nerves.. afterall, its my first ever match of a new sport on university level and perhaps i m not ready yet..
khair, seeing my name on the team sheet gives me a good feeling.. heres the mail:
Boys,
The initial team is:
First row - Qamber, Boxy, Tariq
Second row - Omar, Mansoor
Third row - Qasim (c), Ali Inayat, Zubair
Scrum-half - Gulu
Fly-half - Fahad
Centers - Shoaib, Khan
Wingers - Zohaib, Sherry
Fullback - Shahzad
All others players must be present. According to how many subs we can have
I will add the remaining players according to number of practices
attended.
Uniforms: We have 10 green rugby shirts. Please bring them to the match.
Other people with green shirts bring them along as we'll need 5 more...
Bring proper rugby shorts as well - if you have more than a pair, bring
them along. If you don't have mouthguard I might decide to not let you
play.
See you Saturday 1 hour before the match.
Let's have fun tomorrow.
