Skip to main content

Emptiness


Some days are like that: vacuous.  Nothing stirs in the consciousness.  Even the annual budget fails to rouse the spirit.  Nothing matters really.  “Earth to earth and dust to dust,” the cleric at the funeral service makes a ghostly apparition in the consciousness filling its foreground with what William James described as “a sense of surrender to the empty passing of  time.” 

Shadows walk about in the haze of moonlight that has turned marmoreal for no reason.  Reason becomes a spectre that has put on dark goggles and a mocking smirk and gallops through the dying embers in your consciousness. Clop-clop-clippety-clop.

Emptiness is unbearable.  Even if it is the DNA of life.

Fill it.  With whatever you like.  Words, for example.  As I’m doing.






Comments

  1. UnknownFebruary 2, 2017 at 9:26 PM

    Sir, there are people who have nothing to fill it!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalFebruary 2, 2017 at 9:37 PM

      That would be painful! I've seen most people filling it with money, some with power and a few with dreams.

      Delete
  2. RajashreeFebruary 3, 2017 at 11:52 AM

    Wonderfully articulated - the bitter fact of life struck at odd times!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalFebruary 3, 2017 at 1:05 PM

      It's like you've gone empty all of a sudden though there are a lot of noises all around and even inside.

      Delete
  3. Durga Prasad DashFebruary 3, 2017 at 4:10 PM

    This is also a flavour of life.

    ReplyDelete
  4. sunaina sharmaFebruary 3, 2017 at 4:39 PM

    I feel that very often - and only words seem to bring some solace. But sometimes they fail too....I sometimes wish that the carefree nature of a child would be a constant as we grow up but alas ! that doesn't happen....

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalFebruary 3, 2017 at 7:53 PM

      The child continues to survive and that also creates a conflict! The child in the adult is incompatible with the society.

      Delete
  5. Renu VyasFebruary 3, 2017 at 5:26 PM

    I can so relate to what you say Sir. There are days when I react to the happenings around me for the sole reason that it is expected of me while inside I feel blank. Its like a vacuum. I function because it is something to be done. I guess it is a phase of life and even this shall pass as the famous saying goes :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalFebruary 3, 2017 at 7:55 PM

      It will pass, no doubt. In the meanwhile, it's a consolation to know that there are many who experience similar situations.

      Delete
  6. Kokila guptaFebruary 3, 2017 at 10:50 PM

    I dread that feeling. It kills life, while the man lives on. even if temporarily.
    Just like Renu has said, I do things because they have to be done, without feeling anything but it happens with me only when I am hurt.. in a way that neither I am able to cope up nor am able to let it go.
    Otherwise, mercifully, emptiness inside me is a rare thing.. In fact, I am too full with matters ranging from cosmic to trivial! :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalFebruary 4, 2017 at 8:27 AM

      Good you have a range of things from cosmic to trivial to fill the void. I have to invent things.

      Delete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Pranita a perverted genius

Bulldozer begins its work at Sawan Pranita was a perverted genius. She had Machiavelli’s brain, Octavian’s relentlessness, and Levin’s intellectual calibre. She could have worked wonders if she wanted. She could have created a beautiful world around her. She had the potential. Yet she chose to be a ruthless exterminator. She came to Sawan Public School just to kill it. A religious cult called Radha Soami Satsang Beas [RSSB] had taken over the school from its owner who had never visited the school for over 20 years. This owner, a prominent entrepreneur with a gargantuan ego, had come to the conclusion that the morality of the school’s staff was deviating from the wavelengths determined by him. Moreover, his one foot was inching towards the grave. I was also told that there were some domestic noises which were grating against his patriarchal sensibilities. One holy solution for all these was to hand over the school and its enormous campus (nearly 20 acres of land on the outskirts
13 comments
Read more

Randeep the melody

Many people in this pic have made their presence in this A2Z series A phone call came from an unknown number the other day. “Is it okay to talk to you now, Sir?” The caller asked. The typical start of a conversation by an influencer. “What’s it about?” My usual response looking forward to something like: “I am so-and-so from such-and-such business firm…” And I would cut the call. But there was a surprise this time. “I am Randeep…” I recognised him instantly. His voice rang like a gentle music in my heart. Randeep was a student from the last class 12 batch of Sawan. One of my favourites. He is unforgettable. Both Maggie and I taught him at Sawan where he was a student from class 4 to 12. Nine years in a residential school create deep bonds between people, even between staff and students. Randeep was an ideal student. Good at everything yet very humble and spontaneous. He was a top sportsman and a prefect with eminent leadership. He had certain peculiar problems with academics. Ans
25 comments
Read more

Queen of Religion

She looked like Queen Victoria in the latter’s youth but with a snow-white head. She was slim, fair and graceful. She always smiled but the smile had no life. Someone on the campus described it as a “plastic smile.” She was charming by physical appearance. Soon all of us on the Sawan school campus would realise how deceptive appearances were. Queen took over the administration of Sawan school on behalf of her religious cult RSSB [Radha Soami Satsang Beas]. A lot was said about RSSB in the previous post. Its godman Gurinder Singh Dhillon is now 70 years old. I don’t know whether age has mellowed his lust for land and wealth. Even at the age of 64, he was embroiled in a financial scam that led to the fall of two colossal business enterprises, Fortis Healthcare and Religare finance. That was just a couple of years after he had succeeded in making Sawan school vanish without a trace from Delhi which he did for the sake of adding the school’s twenty-odd acres of land to his existing hun
19 comments
Read more

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
37 comments
Read more

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
12 comments
Read more