People matters

People will ask you
Who you are
Who you want to be
And no matter what you answer
They'd hate you for it
I can say it doesn't matter
But the truth is, it does a little
Because it's not as if we really have
Figured it all out
Or know for sure we're right
So every now and then
We end up looking out at people
We end up waiting to be judged
Every now and then
We just want to be sure.
We can see people don't matter
But the truth is, they do a little
Because it's not as if we really have
Stopped judging ourselves
And all measurements
are after all relative
And of course every now and then
You will turn your back on people
You will not really care
And do whatever you're sure of, just then
and you'd be surprised at your own joy
Until something goes wrong
Until you're ready to be judged again
Even if you don't admit.

And then every now and then
People will ask you
If you miss them
If you need them
And no matter what you answer
They'd hate you for it
I can say it doesn't matter
But truth is, it does a little.

It does matter...a little...

Definitions

As if it wasn't bad enough that the regular social constructs of our world - the need to introduce or refer to someone, for example - force us to some times define and name relationships that dont really have a name, the new ones are making it even worse. I have like a 1000 friends on Facebook. Friends? Really? Google + is asking me to define "circles" for people. Where do you put someone you've never met, but share the most intimate words and feelings with through blogs and emails? Where do you put someone you barely know, but spent a refreshing 2 hours talking to on the flight you met on and will likely never run into again? Where do I put someone who is my best friend, target of all barbs and bouquets, whose arms I hang by and also punch a dozen times a day (when he's not in godforsaken amreeka, of course)? And those who are brought close again by a phone call after months and years, that sounds as familiar, as continuous as someone you see every day. All those people who intersect with my life at random intervals, and touch it in meaningful ways, yet share unique relationships not like any other. And what happens when acquanitances "become" friends. Or vice versa.

Circles are concentric, but they're not all named.

I can of course stop worrying and call all of them "friends". Or I can create a circle called "undefined".

Camouflage -IV

[[Sorry for the delay for those who've been asking for this - continued from here...well, in some way]]

It's not very easy to hide pain - it dissolves itself in the eyes and gleams at anyone caring to look at your face. Guilt and shame are much easier to hide in contrast - they get spooked and disappear deep inside the dark crevices of your existence, yet they'd never let you forget their presence. They just eat away at you till you're empty inside.

I had erred, I knew, and I never let myself forget that. I had kissed a fool, I had been fooled by a kiss. In hindsight it is easy to dismiss it as an oversight of youth, as an emotional and hormonal over-excitement. Falling in "love" without knowing anything about the person. Love, infatuation, caring - all, as they say, vagaries of perception. Lies. But that's easy to say now, judge now. At that time it was just a stealth romance, something that excited me as a forbidden fruit, a happily ever after dream. It felt like happiness, exactly the kind of happiness everyone talked about. Brief as it was, it was my bright rainbow. Until of course everything went downhill, and I found myself in a deep abyss, all alone, struggling to portray normalcy to every watching eye.

I probably should have asked for help. I definitely should have been saner. Maybe, I would still be able to trust people then. Maybe, every relationship today wouldn't have had me under some camouflage, but the real me.

Too many maybes.

[[To be continued - last part to follow]]