Skip to main content

New Year


Neither the sun nor the earth has a calendar. Time is an eternal flow. A circular flow. We make calendars and mark days and years. The circle turns linear and we perceive progress, progressive motion.  Calendars make linear what is in fact circular.

In the linear world runs history replacing monarchs with democrats and savagery with civilisation. But the earth can only make circular motions. Are we caught in a vicious circle?

The calendar can straighten out the circle. That's why the new year day matters. It offers hopes. It throws challenges.

All creation is a stepping out from a circle.

This new year fills me with a craving: my country should step out of some worn out circles and move forward. Circular motions in history don't bring progress.

I hope, I dream.

Happy New Year. 

Comments

  1. Found your post both lyrical and sad. Sad because of the Antiquity of Sadness, the ebb and flow of the grim tides of History. And lyrical because of the possibilities of Conscious Evolution. Of Man. Of Nations. Of India.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. True, Venkatesh, I had mixed feelings in the new year morning. Sadness and hope.

      Delete
  2. I too dream the same. Days where females can walk out freely...
    Do visit my blog once in a while as my resolution for the year 2015 is to update my blog regularly.

    Regards
    Village Girl

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Nice to see you here, Roopa. May your dream come true.

      Delete
  3. Happy New Year Matheikal. I agree with you - the hope that things will change, for the better, is something we feel every New Year - despite everything. Shows how resilient human beings are.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I reciprocate your new year greeting. Let's hope for better days.

      Delete
  4. Food for pondering! Best wishes for 2015!!

    ReplyDelete

  5. The calendar can straighten out the circle. That's why the new year day matters. It offers hopes. - Amazing lines. Wish you a wonderful 2015

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Sometimes I think progress is like the circular motion of mill bulls of bygone days. There is some output but no displacement. ... Wish you too a glorious year ahead

      Delete
  6. Wish you and your family Very Happy New year 2015.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Such nice thoughts to ring in the new year! Even I hope our country goes ahead faster on path of progress...may our leaders, administrators, companies, institutions all work sincerely, effectively! Happy New Year to you too!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I share your dreams and hopes, Amrita. And wish you a new year which will materialise your dreams as well as mine.

      Delete
  8. Beautifully written post, Truly. Here's adding more power and force to our country to move ahead, breaking dull circles!

    Do participate in the Melbourne contest on my blog www.numerounity.com. Simple contest to win gift voucher! See ya there:)

    ReplyDelete
  9. Liked reading your post Matheikal. May your hopes and dream come true . :)

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Adventures of Toto as a comic strip

  'The Adventures of Toto' is an amusing story by Ruskin Bond. It is prescribed as a lesson in CBSE's English course for class 9. Maggie asked her students to do a project on some of the lessons and Femi George's work is what I would like to present here. Femi converted the story into a beautiful comic strip. Her work will speak for itself and let me present it below.  Femi George Student of Carmel Public School, Vazhakulam, Kerala Similar post: The Little Girl

Sanjay and other loyalists

AI-generated illustration Some people, especially those in politics, behave as if they are too great to have any contact with the ordinary folk. And they can get on with whoever comes to power on top irrespective of their ideologies and principles. Sanjay was one such person. He occupied some high places in Sawan school [see previous posts, especially P and Q ] merely because he knew how to play his cards more dexterously than ordinary politicians. Whoever came as principal, Sanjay would be there in the elite circle. He seemed to hold most people in contempt. His respect was reserved for the gentry. I belonged to the margins of Sawan society, in Sanjay’s assessment. So we hardly talked to each other. Looking back, I find it quite ludicrous to realise that Sanjay and I lived on the same campus 24x7 for a decade and a half without ever talking to each other except for official purposes.      Towards the end of our coexistence, Sawan had become a veritable hell. Power supply to the

Thomas the Saint

AI-generated image His full name was Thomas Augustine. He was a Catholic priest. I knew him for a rather short period of my life. When I lived one whole year in the same institution with him, I was just 15 years old. I was a trainee for priesthood and he was many years my senior. We both lived in Don Bosco school and seminary at a place called Tirupattur in Tamil Nadu. He was in charge of a group of boys like me. Thomas had little to do with me directly as I was under the care of another in-charge. But his self-effacing ways and angelic smile drew me to him. He was a living saint all the years I knew him later. When he became a priest and was in charge of a section of a Don Bosco institution in Kochi, I met him again and his ways hadn’t changed an iota. You’d think he was a reincarnation of Jesus if you met him personally. You won’t be able to meet him anymore. He passed away a few years ago. One of the persons whom I won’t ever forget, can’t forget as long as the neurons continu

William and the autumn of life

William and I were together only for one year, but our friendship has grown stronger year after year. The duration of that friendship is going to hit half a century. In the meanwhile both he and I changed many places. William was in Kerala when I was in Shillong. He was in Ireland when I was in Delhi. Now I am in Kerala where William is planning to migrate back. We were both novices of a religious congregation for one year at Kotagiri in Tamil Nadu. He was older than me by a few years and far more mature too. But we shared a cordial rapport which kept us in touch though we went in unexpected directions later. William’s conversations had the same pattern back then and now too. I’d call it Socratic. He questions a lot of things that you say with the intention of getting to the depth of the matter. The last conversation I had with him was when I decided to stop teaching. I mention this as an example of my conversations with William. “You are a good teacher. Why do you want to stop

Uriel the gargoyle-maker

Uriel was a multifaceted personality. He could stab with words, sting like Mike Tyson, and distort reality charmingly with the precision of a gifted cartoonist. He was sedate now and passionate the next moment. He could don the mantle of a carpenter, a plumber, or a mechanic, as situation demanded. He ran a school in Shillong in those days when I was there. That’s how I landed in the magic circle of his friendship. He made me a gargoyle. Gradually. When the refined side of human civilisation shaped magnificent castles and cathedrals, the darker side of the same homo sapiens gave birth to gargoyles. These grotesque shapes were erected on those beautiful works of architecture as if to prove that there is no human genius without a dash of perversion. In many parts of India, some such repulsive shape is placed in a prominent place of great edifices with the intention of warding off evil or, more commonly, the evil eye. I was Uriel’s gargoyle for warding off the evil eye from his sc