Wannabe OR Want to be ?

I fly across the blue sky staring down at the busy roads, filled with thousands of people, all busy and immersed in their lives. From this height everything seems vague; for I witnessed an intricate weave of black dots moving in and out of each other, slowly making way for the other colors to merge within and complete the fusion…

Each one moved onward, oblivious of their surroundings, each absorbed in their own thoughts and beliefs. Each complete in themselves, brooding over their own needs and desires, each forming a cocoon of security around themselves with their hollow daily facades.

Let me first visit a house not far from here, a young voice screeches through the windows, I try to shut out the sounds emanating from the house. Most of the sound is confined to the upper part of the two storied building… I peep in through the window and see a young man jumping around throwing himself up and down in a rhythm, screaming in tandem with the metallic sounds that drew forth from a huge music system in his room. He has adorned on his untarnished body a black shirt, still warm from the factory and displaying the slogan “I’m a rebel”. On his left shoulder, he has a tattoo defining the symbol of his favorite heavy metal band. He runs his hand over the tattoo, thinking about how he looks macho with it, his face twisted in a self-conceited grin. His cell phone rings and he picks it up letting out a string of profanity that he’s picked up of late. He gloats for few minutes about the great new music CD he’s bought and how his new girl is crazy about him. I look around and find his whole room plastered with posters like “Life ain’t fair”, “Bring it on” and “Are you tough enough? “. He goes about everyday trying to be tough and hard like the songs that he listens to… His screams echo off the walls as I turn away from the window…

Let me now move towards a certain young soul who scourges the busy streets of the city with a fresh vigor each day trying to make both ends meet. He has messy hair, frayed clothes and a heavily lined face that made him look twice his age… He moves on each day trying to find something new to do in this world where survival is no longer a free accessory. Each new penny that he manages to procure adds to the spark in his eyes, adds an extra bounce to his legs. But, in the midst of all the smoke and dust and pain that surrounded his life, you see a flash across his face, his smile - unfenced. He knows not what lies in wait for him the next day, he knows not if he’ d have to go hungry tonight. He knows what it means to be tough, he knows that life isn’t fair, but he isn’t going about screaming the same to the world. He isn’t complaining or cursing all that goes on around him… I turn away from this young soul who has indeed seen the likes of sordid drudgery right in the face…

Now, as I move away from these two young souls, I ask myself – who is tough? Who is a “want to be” and who’s a “wannabe”?

Why is everything that we do affected by the inclination of the ones around us? The clothes we wear, the books we read, the movies we watch, even the words we speak are revolving around the iris of our peers. WHY? Isn’t it time for us to break free our shackles and look into the larger spectrum of life? It is said that “There is no end to a desire”.It is impossible for a human being to attain anything close to perfection in any phase of life… But there are so many young souls around us who are already hardened by their self-complacency and by the illusionary world that they seem to float within… They seem to happy enough finding energy and meaning in anger, rebellion and in several other channels that are far beyond even basic comprehension of their addled minds. WHO IS TO BLAME? God? Fate? Life? Or the youths themselves?

If only life was so simple that you could just blame someone and get on with it…If only it was so…

Today we are in an age where the agitated, confused and anger driven individual is being provoked and given fire… I let free the fragment of my thought into the blue sky and let it wander away while wondering “Where is the end?” or more ironically “Has there been a beginning?”