the library
Wednesday, February 17, 2010
♥ Wednesday, February 17, 2010
I make a hasty approximation: her flock of hair says eighty. But considering the size of the chinese words she's looking at, I'll go with sixty years old. Beside that lady is another- she's looking at this magazine called bazaar and the rate at which she flips the pages and the manner in which her pupils bounce up and down, speaks volumes about its content.
Here I am, in the library, seated adjacent to a pillar with a plug that gives power to this laptop to continue its literary function. Laid out before me like a carpet before the emperor is two rows of chairs with strangers devouring their respective readings. I like it here.
There is an amazing similarity with all of us here- The lady sitting diagonally opposite me is prying through a travel guide with the an inquisitivity that can only be described as ferocious. Right in front of me is a lady who's closed eyes and clenched teeth gives an impression of a subconscious resolve. As for a resolve to do what, your guess is as good as mine. And here I am, pounding away against a keyboard way too tiny for my hands, trying to the deny the inescapable fact that I have readings scheduled for today. We are all in some sort of pursuit of our dreams maybe, some in the form of denial, the more practical ones fall asleep.
We are connected by the randomness of our decisions to be here. I have no idea why I am in this specific library apart from the hope that vicinity and opportunity are connected. And in that random decision, I have come to give witness to the present.
I have come witness to this fact: That more people give homage to the present than we care to believe- the world has given us the impression of a better tomorrow so much so today's of little significance. In the library, where everyone basks in the quiet now of their readings, being transported to the amazing world of CS lewis or the boggling mysteries of Agatha Christie, or to the utter hopelessness and despondency of Aldous Huxley or George Orwell one cant help but develop a sense of great reverence of the now.
There is great reverence because it is deep beneath the walls of the vatican where a Dan Brown thriller unfolds, or lost in the woods of a Neil Gaiman story that one finds his or her quiet. It is the streets of Afghanistan that we run along and the roads of Golgotha that we find tragedy and heartbreak. There is a place for us, in the library. And there is peace in the quiet. It is way too noisy outside- there is always a place to go and we are always speeding. That is why we crash.
The library finds itself in a very neat contradistinction to the road- the people move less here and live more. And it is now, after displaying my own respect for those who've done so, that I retreat behind the solace of my readings.
