Hikes, Liberty and Randomness

Yet another Tuesday.. don't I start my posts with this way too many times! Given my schedule this day every week, you would not really blame me, I'm sure. Here I'm.. trying to drag on for another 3 hours, before it seems reasonable to take off. So, to how life has been.

The most exciting happening after the hurricane was the hike last weekend. Yes, you are right, that is not me, I really am not this hiking-backpacking-camping person but somehow managed to get entangled in one of those scenarios. So, hiking I did for about 7 miles but in supposedly not first timers friendly site. At least that is what everyone has been telling me for the past 2 days when they learn the reason behind my limp. But it was quite fun, lost a few calories and had some amazing, picture perfect, views. Got me thinking why Indians don't do all these for pleasure and some more deeper thoughts on economy. All roads lead to economy these days, but that's different story altogether. There is pretty much nothing more to report of the actual hiking part, but the journey to and fro and the company I had is sure worth a mention. (No, it is not my yet-another-rendition-of-amazing-people, trust me)

We had about 5 hrs drive and of course all the time during the hike, so the company did matter. Some good conversations, some intellectual ones, some fun, on the whole nice people. The couple(not couple couple but lets just call these two people couple for ease) in my party was way entertaining, a little more so. With all the laughter, blushes, fights, flirting, pda they sure did draw the attention of even the quietest in my party. Talking to the guy at the end of it, I got the explanation that he likes"naughty" girls and she is all of it and there is nothing wrong in flirting even though there are lots of constraints, a boy friend included. If I had to redefine it, I would not really say naughty. It is more of the kiddish/helpless/naive/lost-child thing that a lot of women without any effort bring in. I ended up discussing this with my friend and realized a whole lot of them do(100% with 95% confidence it is :) ) What bothers me more is that men actually seem to love it, want more of it. Gets me wondering.. does that give one a feeling of dependence that they start going for it all head over heels!

I still remember, one of the earliest times I was away from home, interning. Some work, got delayed and it was soon 11 in the night with me struck in some isolated part of the city. I was talking to dad over the phone all the way back. I was pretty scared. That is when dad went with one of his ever useful advices(well.. it was an angry lash, but lets not call it that). When you are helpless and lost, you don't ever show it out. You got to put on a brave face, be very confident and act as if you know what you are doing. Even if you do need help, you do it with ease, with no sign of helplessness and at the end you get everything to work out the way you need it to. Seemed to make a lot of sense then, now and maybe always. Is this not what you do, whatever the scenario be! Acting helpless even when you actually are so makes you an easy target, so what when you are not. Why would you want to act lost? Why would you want to emanate weakness?

Shit Happens..

I know, don't start. You don't title posts in French. Don't you realize? I know euphemisms, I just dint want to use it.

When you meet someone, get to know someone, you inherently try to classify them into buckets. Some are nice, some sweet, some smart and some are just plain jerks. There are very few people who make it to your set of awesome. They have everything you think a person should have. Every facet of their life makes you think they are good at it. I sure have come across quite a few of them in my life. Not perfect essentially, but sure did make into my list of awesome people. It always makes you feel bad when you get to know something went wrong in their lives. I had mine blown off recently, twice.

Two of the most awesome guys I will ever come across. Yes, I am ready to vouch for the future, they are just that awesome. I went to grad school with them, got to know them, hung out a bit, had some laughs, shared personal lives, shared workloads, shared frustrations, shared happiness and then graduated but managed to stay in touch with calls once a blue moon. Somehow just made sure you are still in each other's lives, however hardly. In the past month, it so happened that I met one of them, which triggered thoughts of the other and so I ended up talking to both, catching up on the past 6 odd months of their lives and ripping off few more to come of mine..

Both of them had broken up, their relationships were in shambles.. to the extent that they did not want to ever talk to or of the girls, they never wanted to go back to the same places, they had lost their mutual friends, they had changed their life styles, what used to make them happy makes them sad now, drowning themselves in work, getting into bad personal relationships that affects their professional lives, mood swings and tempers, resurrecting old interests, questioning their new ones, redefining what they believe in, they have pretty much changed their whole identities. I wonder how anybody can do something like this to such awesome people. Though I did know both sides of it, I might be biased. But these are people whom you never want to miss in your lives, especially when they are ready to spend all their life with you.

I felt bad, I almost cried and both of them tried to tell me it was fine, tried to tell me they have gotten out of it, tried to tell me they are back to their normal selves. But you could feel it, normal may be but not their old selves, something was lost. That is when one of them came up with this.. shit happens. (Yes, he was the impacted one and he was trying to be sweet to me, that is how good they are!)

Life is not always all happiness and joy. Everybody wants everything to work out right, we try our best to make it happen, we strive for it, we try to get a control over things, get a control over ourselves. So many times, even when we know things are going wrong, we just are not ready to accept. We try to hold on to it, we try extra hard to make it work, we try to give in, we start feeling guilty, we start blaming ourselves. It starts affecting every sphere of our lives, yet we still cling on to it. Fighting everyday, crying ourselves to sleep, all the emotions, all the trauma, yet we want it. There is some point when you have to realize.. May be it is not worth it. May be it is high time we let go. May be it is high time we accepted it is not worth us. May be the best course of action is it to learn to live. Life never is they-lived-happily-ever-after. Life never is what we want it to be.. Shit Happens...