Go Fetch Yourself

Note: If you are one who would be easily offended, or cannot take a joke, I strongly suggest you do not continue reading beyond this line.

If you have known me long enough, you would very well know that I am not an overtly religious person. Um, even if you were to omit ‘overtly’ from the previous sentence, it would sound just about right! Actually, it would sound even more right that way! Anyhow, this post is not about my take on religion. So you might be wondering why I had to start it the way I have done. Well, all that trouble was to merely make a point that – in spite of my religious beliefs (or rather, the lack of it), there is this one story from the Holy Bible that fascinated me, and I still remember it (or at least, most of it), although I first heard it many years ago, in Sunday school.

The story goes like this – Jesus, after having fasted for some forty odd days, apparently, ran into Satan (or was it the devil?). Satan, being the bad guy, of course, tried to tempt Jesus into doing things, so as to prove that he was all that, that people were claiming that he was. But Jesus, being the son of God and all, refused to fall into the ploy Satan had set up, and asked him to take a flying, you know what; even though he knew very well that he could have done all that, and more, than what Satan had asked him to do!

To translate this to a real life situation – it is like telling somebody you would not slap them, just because you knew very well that you could slap them! Man, now how cool is that?! Jesus was my hero back then, and I wished I could grow up to be just like him! But alas, things got seriously messed up at some point in time, and here I am today.

So, if you were planning on asking me to slap you, and if I knew that I could slap you – then I probably would slap you! And that brings me to the actual point of taking time off from my schedule to write this post. Or maybe not; but I promise I will be there within the next couple of paragraphs! But first, here is a question that crossed my mind (very) recently.

What exactly is it that instigates somebody to go ahead and do something, that he otherwise had no intention, whatsoever, of doing in the first place – when challenged? Well, I guess I will start my quest to discover (or possibly, invent) the answer to this question in just a bit; but before that, I must come to the actual point of writing this post! Honest, this is really it!

Alcohol does different things to different people. Or rather, people behave quite differently after they consume alcohol, than they do otherwise. Some laugh, while others weep. Some talk more, while others shut up. Some fight, while others make up. Some get happy, while others sulk. Few, walk about in their undergarments, or buy jewellery, or get a tattoo, or get laid. And even fewer – take off their undergarments too! And last, but not the least – there are those who take their mothers to church!

Well, I am sure most of you guys can append that list with some of your own experiences, but I bet you would not have met somebody who actually gets way smarter than he is otherwise; when drunk! I am certain his intelligence quotient climbs up quite a few notches when he is high! (Pun intended!) Charles Darwin would surely have given up his work on Theory of Evolution by Natural Selection if he were ever to meet this dude! Um, I wonder if I should dedicate some time on this subject and get myself a doctorate in psychology! On second thoughts, nah; this post in itself was a total waste of time!

To part, if you have ever played with your pet dog in your garden, there would have been times when he would go about, find a stick, bring it to you and want you to throw it away – only to run behind it to fetch it for you. Somebody gave me that stick, and I threw it away.

Breaking Habits

For a very long time now, like most people I know, I used to make resolutions – without fail, as another year went by and a new one dawned. It is totally another story altogether that I hardly adhered to any of them; but it still did not deter me from making more resolutions for the coming year. Um, now I wonder why somebody ought to wait for the start of a new year to change their behaviour. I suppose it has become some kind of a fad to do it that way, and now most of us do it because our peers are doing it. And why are our peers doing it? Well, because their peers are doing it! After all, that is the same reason why we take up drinking alcohol and smoking cigarettes, right?!

Um, I realise I am diverging from what the post was supposed to be about; so I will leave it at it. Now, coming back to my resolutions – as far as I can remember, all of them, always included stuff that I intended to stop. These were not necessarily bad stuff, as such; but just weird stuff – like incessantly swearing! It is funny, actually, how you go about doing a certain something in a particular way, and it somehow, subconsciously, gets etched permanently in you; and ends up becoming a trait that defines you – some of which, you may at one time, decide to change.

In the recent past, I have learnt that life offers you situations to get rid of certain habits; and these, often, have a much higher success rate than trying to lose them through resolutions. Here is an anecdote that I would like to share. I almost always am listening to music while I am riding the motorcycle, or driving the car. Of course, that is not a habit I was planning on stopping, and I also know that it is not weird! But what certainly is weird, is that every time the player blasted out Show Me How To Live by Audioslave, I used to shift a gear down, open the throttle, or step on the pedal; and quickly get the tachometer needle hovering around the engine redline! Normalcy would return, some five minutes later, on completion of the song!

Lately, I have taken up bicycling (a little more seriously) and I ride about 50 kilometres a day on my MTB, during the weekend. And as you might have guessed, I listen to music, even while biking. There was this one day, when I had ridden well over 50 kilometres and was headed back home. I had just about started ascending an upslope (that stretches a little less than a couple of kilometres) and the music player switched to Show Me How To Live!

Um, I did start pedalling quicker to get myself going a little faster, but I knew I did not have the energy left to sustain it for another five minutes! Besides, shifting a gear down, in this case, would only make it worse for me! So I got pedalling at a more comfortable pace – reluctantly, convincing myself that I did not necessarily have to be moving very fast, while listening to that song! Well, that was how I broke the habit of over-speeding while listening to Show Me How To Live!

Speaking of breaking habits, I am also reminded of another incident, which I guess, can be included in the same post. There was this group of friends, whom I used to visit quite frequently. On one such visit, while using their loo to take a leak, I noticed that the bathroom door did not close completely. A quick investigation later, I figured the door had warped, and hit against the frame, preventing it from being closed. Honestly, I was not very comfortable peeing with the door ajar. Moreover, I thought it would be rude if I peed with an open door, and so, brought it to their notice.

Oddly enough, they seemed to know all about it and told me it was okay to use the loo, without closing the door completely! Um, so that solved a problem. However, a little risk still remained that somebody might (accidentally, of course), walk in to the loo while I was using it. So, I quickly devised a plan and suggested that the person using the loo would have to sing a song, as long as they were in there! That was to be our sign, to let us know that the loo was occupied; and in the process, would avoid any potential embarrassing situations in future! Pretty creative, huh?!

Anyhow, so this is how it went. From then on, each time while using their loo, I would close the door as much as it would, and then sing until I finish my business! Everything worked perfectly fine; that is, until the last time I visited them. As I swung the door to close it behind me, I heard the quick latch on the door snap into its place on the frame. Even before turning around, I already knew that the door had completely closed.

Crap!

Perhaps, they had gotten it fixed. But why would they want to do it? Why now, after we had a protocol set up, and followed it so rigorously?! This was not right. There was no way I was going to pee with a closed door! But I did want to pee! Argh, it was quite a dilemma, I tell you!

Anyway, after a little thought, I walked back to the door, kept it ajar, got back, and started singing a song! Some habits, are not meant to be broken!

Here is wishing you guys a fabulous year ahead!