It seems wrong that today should be a beautiful day here. Is it a beautiful day where you are? The sun is painted gold through the window by the remaining leaves on the trees — a heavy loss was suffered yesterday from the weight of rain. The leaves already fallen have turned brown from the excessive moisture, giving in to the cycle of seasons, the degeneration, the degradation, the entropy, the gradual falling-apartness towards temporary death.
Having no access to cable TV yesterday evening, yet harbouring too much nervousness to concentrate on work, I tapped into the great collective Internet brain, listening to friends who have stayed up all night in UK and Europe as they shouted out scores reported by various news networks, in the company of those who have begun their day in Asia-Pacific. The world was holding its breath and biting its nails. Over Skype, I consoled my sister on the other side of the world in the other hemisphere on her exams, and lamented at the lack of good fresh fruit smoothies. Later on, I caught up with Dad, discussed the finer points of a good curry with my grandmother as they hailed from the heat and humidity of the little city near the equator, in a Muslim country.
My world is round and comprises many sides. I think of my recent return to the land I still call home and how frightened I was at the distinct lack of philosophy sections in most bookstores. They have been replaced by self-help sections and a growing number of pop books on feng-shui. If you're lucky, you can find something vaguely meaningful on a half-shelf in the reference section. Slowly, surely, we're becoming less and less of a thinking population. Our global reach and ability to know the world stretches wider and faster through technology, yet our minds grow small. Soon we'll forget the historic lessons of the world and let our short-sighted prejudices, our self-righteous, self-preserving anger get the better of us for some short-term gain, probably involving making money. My world is round and comprises many sides and I don't want it to die.
People on the morning train looked moodier and more ashen-faced than usual. It seems wrong that today should be a beautiful day here. Is it a beautiful day where you are?
Posted by sniffles at November 03, 2004 11:33 AM