Communication Gaps

 There is an awkwardness that accompanies communication .


Once we were on a trip to silent valley, the accommodation was provided by forest officers. There was only a metal shutter separating the two groups. If you could slowly push up the shutter without waking everybody up, you could possibly talk to the people on the other side. 


I once tried to write a letter to London, but then what was I supposed to do write. Later I realized sending letters to London was costly. Moreover they would take some time. In the midst of all this, one of my friends' father passed away unexpectedly. I personally knew this person and expected him to welcome me and call me a unfocused tall guy yet suddenly one morning he was absent. It was as if he was never there. 


Video calls with people who are not near you are awkward. There are also problems caused by being in different timezones. These words and calls and talks are the problem. Maybe I should move away from my hometown and be near the people I care about. That is communication too. 


But I have been told that it is apparently “overkill”. Meanwhile conventional communication is getting progressively awkward. While grand actions like ‘leaving town’, ‘giving flowers’, ‘waiting for years ’ etc, without appropriate communication are bound not to have the same effect as you wanted. 


I wish our Intentions counted not only our actions and words. Maybe If we acknowledged the awkwardness of communication , we may survive. 


It is very reassuring that we meet a limited number of people in our lifetime. No one from Kerala is going to have a friendship with a random girl from a nomadic tribe in Turkey. No one loses anyone given to him. 


You can't avoid talking to people either. Maybe if I avoid them, they won't remember me. But the tragedy of human experience no matter how much you isolate yourself someone will always find some stupid thing and attach themselves to you. 


But then why must we avoid conversations? Because conversations come to an end. And with that human connections and relationships as well. Suddenly it is time to go home, or the bar gets closed. One comes to the realization that playtime is over. That it was only you looking for a good time, and suddenly she is leaving in the next train to Bombay or Delhi.


Over the years I have been able to anticipate goodbyes . Sometimes I find myself leaving before the goodbyes are even thought off. No I am not leaving, I am catching upto you. Wherever you are going I am coming there as well. They will ask, did you forget me? No I did not forget you, I just don't want this moment to stop . I don't want to tell stories about our time together, I want to spend time together. I want to extend this moment to eternity. Goodbyes were never an option. 



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