Of Nightmares and dreamscapes

If you know too much, there is never a way to un-know. 

I’ve been alone a lot over the last few months, and in the midst of a few big changes in my life, I have embraced solitude by turning to the one thing I used to love as a kid growing up – the joy of reading. 

As a child, I remember long languid summer afternoons spent lying down and reading - entire volumes of RK Narayan's tales - the sweet sweet stories of Swami and Friends, the lovable homely Malgudi Days, and all of the young adult fiction that the 90s had to offer.

Over the last few months however, I cannot claim to have read such lovely benevolent books. The highlights of a very specific type of reading that I have been engrossed in are - the Rape of Nanking, the horrors of Unit 731 and the induced famine in North Korea that killed a third of the population there. Not even twenty years ago. I do not know if it is some kind of morbid curiosity that my own dark side has been unable to resist, or if it is something else within me that makes me want to know more about the horrors that humanity has inflicted upon itself. 

The list goes on. An Auschwitz survivor book. Pages and pages on the Rwandan genocide. Mexican drug cartel violence - happening even today just a few hundred miles south of the border. Western governments ordering drone strikes to obliterate entire villages in the rural middle east - on mere whiffs of suspicion as to the inhabitants of the village - again, probably happening at this very instant as you read this. 

And yet, I realize, my brain isn't strong enough to hold its own and be peaceful with what it learns. I have nightmares. Painful things happening to loved ones. Mysterious unseen monsters that cast shadows, fill the walls of my apartment with gloom and a macabre sense of dread. Sometimes I dream of being a child again, staring into my mother's eyes - I am shorter than her waistline in these dreams, I vividly recall standing in the tiny kitchen of the house we used to live in until I turned nine. My dreams reverberate with the sounds of my father's motorcycle as he turns into our street, returning from work - my earliest memories in life revolve around listening intently at dusk for the booming Royal Enfield motorcycle to come racing up our lane.

Occasionally, mortified, I turn to ancient eastern philosophy for solace - the Dharmapada - the words of those who heard the Buddha speak, and the Upanishads - first person accounts of self discovery as professed by ancient sages in India - dating back to 3,000 B.C The whole of eastern philosophy has but one purpose - to instill a sense of awareness in one's mind, that life is transient, fragile, very short-lived, and that the sole aim of one's life is to live gently, consuming only as many resources as needed to survive, and not causing harm to others. There is no mention of a tusked God, or a savior of people, or of a list of things to do that will get one to heaven. Because - there is no concept of heaven or hell, both can exist on earth and within one's mind as a consequence of one's actions - it is all an infinite chain of Karma - the law that says the nature of your actions ultimately determine the nature of the events that occur in your life.

I do find moments of peace. A hard day's work at work brings a satisfaction that is inexplicable. A few evenings with good friends, a much awaited visit to my home - to be with family again after two years, is approaching and I cannot wait to be with them again. I have a vacation planned with my childhood friends, and I cannot say how excited I am for that. 

Several unanswered questions though. How are people okay with obsessing over the specifications of the newly unveiled iphone, instead of even bothering to read about the chemical bombings in Syrian schools that just happened last week? Children died of burns. While the 'western world' as we know it awaits the new iphone and hotly debates how Samsung will respond, and who will be cast as the next Batman, and whether Kim Kardashian will have a lasting marriage. 

I know now - of all the things we try so hard to achieve in life - money, good  company, knowledge and happiness, peace of mind is the hardest to find. When I do find it, I will cherish it like I have cherished no other thing in my life. Until then, it is onward, through more nightmares and dreamscapes.