Stuck in a puke inspiring traffic back from work, trying to control the bladder explosion, it occurred to me why people are so mean, terse and short fused in the big cities. I got the answer, right there, in the middle of the road, waiting to turn right into Burwood from Parramatta road.
Work, a corporate jungle, a pressure cooker of pretentious existence, I think, is never going to get naturalised by humans. No matter how much make believing you do. If you are lucky you will have good boss and colleagues, or else put up with the tools, ugly politics, undermining, ungratefulness, bitching and plain stupidity while the mortgage is laughing down at you. Your mind is numb when you crash back on the car seat after five if you are lucky, go start your long commute back home. Earlier that morning, you started sitting down on the same seat. Then you hit the same road, same traffic, same road rage, toll, accidents on the way, you might even have given someone a birdie because he was two seconds late in the light, or it could have been other way round, on your worst day you might have accidentally been nicked by a cop for touching your phone, or hit someone in front of you because you dozed off…its like you are putting your brain and your life through a merry go round, for years and years. Sometimes I wonder how do people go on? On the way home you are still fiddling with your phone, car music, putting up with puke inspiring RJs, repetition of news, same old hosts and their meaningless, utterly boring chatter. Or it could be a mind numbing train ride in others’ cases, different content, but net effect to your mind is the same. You think you are free, but you feel trapped. Think? Feel? Why so different? What’s going on here?
Then home. You are lucky if you have a good spouse or family. Otherwise, a new frontier of war zone. Same standoffs, same buttons pushed, food, chores, then glued to screens. Cycle continues. Your soul never saw a fresh day, never aware of surrounding, never noticed the season, nature, others.
There is only so much people can take. Years of this soul abuse has hardened our minds, thoughts, what we want, what and how we think. This running around the wheel has killed off the man in the mouse.
It takes only the most trivial of jolt, someone cutting you off on the road, someone accidentally pushing you in the crowd, someone unable to understand what you said..to spark the fuse.
Then after slurping your bites, you crash down on a seat again, your detox, blind net surfing, facebook, your virtual smile, virtual friends, You tube, animal videos, surf some fashion, blow your mind even more, online family, Netflix, then after many hours of drifting till around mid night, you drag yourself up, still wanting some more of the Internet drip, so addictive, your therapy. Your mind is full of things, stuffs, ebay, amazon, gumtree, clutter, you have been ‘eyeing’ something, waiting for the sale or price drop. Crappy sleep, then someone drives past the drive way early morning, mixed with the sound of noisy birds chirping, waking you up, drag yourself to start your routine. It continues, life of a modern human. Rat left the race long ago, man has replaced him earnestly.
I got my answer.
Ravi Tandukar 