Lessons that life teaches us - II

We are the post-modern scum of the earth. We stand for nothing meaningful or deep. We are not the ocean, just the condensed vapour settling on a refrigerated cola can. We've got hip-hop not Bob Dylan or The Doors. It's not about the music or the lyrics; it's about the half-naked women (I have nothing against half-naked women by the way). My point is, in this age of instant gratification only sensual pleasures count. Superficiality is enough to please.

This feeling has been inside me for a long time. The feeling that something’s wrong with the world, but I could never put my finger on it. Until the day I rode my cousin's new bike. A Bajaj Pulsar in case you were interested. It was comfortable and convenient. Attractive features, a smooth ride, decent pickup, good mileage, and no soul. It transported you, but did not converse. It offered conveyance, not a ride. To quote my friend Aasish, "It moved the body, not the soul".

I've always been enchanted with history, especially modern history. And now I realized that it’s because each era stood for something, and although mostly tragic they at least had an identity. We are not just the middle-men of history with no Great War or Great Depression; we are the soulless intellectually stunted mass-produced off the assembly-line clones of time. We don't have Che, not even John Lennon. We're happy we've got Britney and Paris Hilton.

God help us.