When I looked out of my window, the ugly patchwork of brown plaster stared back at me. Renovation is going on in the opposite building. Just like an old fractured person who walks with a walker, the walker surrounding and supporting it from three sides, the opposite building is also surrounded and supported by bamboo and iron poles on all three sides. The old and creaky building was in an urgent requirement of repair.

When I look below my window an almond tree and its green leaves smile back at me. They are my source of oxygen in this concrete jungle. High rise buildings from the next lane play peek-a-boo from behind the fractured building. I sit with my cup of Darjeeling tea and laptop on my window seat and start writing this post.

A girl came on the opposite window. She is wearing a pink crop top and a denim shorts. She has a cigarette in her hand. She came and sat quietly on her window sill and started puffing. She is in her early twenties. I look at her and try to read her mind, what is she probably thinking. Is she thinking about her studies, career, or boyfriend?? Why is it so difficult to read the mind of another person? I love to observe people. I love to ponder deep into their thoughts and dig out their stories and then mix them with my own.

A small boy was in another window. I know this boy, he plays with my son. The boy was standing and looking out. Maybe, he was looking out to see if any other boy had come down to play in the park. Small boys have simple thoughts.  Small kids do not have too many things to worry about. They are happy with small things.

A crow was sitting on top of a pipe and trying to tear something. Birds and animals only worry about food and procreation. I was impressed with the perseverance of the crow as it was tenaciously struggling to tear something. I got bored looking at the crow after few minutes. It was repeating the same act. I peeped into a flat right next to mine. An old lady was watching some Hindi soap opera on a giant screen. She seemed engrossed. Maybe she would learn few tactics from the opera and apply it on her daughter-in-law.

The girl in shorts finished her cigarette and went inside. She came back after few seconds. She was now holding a book. I tried to look at the jacket of the book and it looked familiar. Even from a little distance I could recognise the book. It was The Fault in Our Stars by John Green. I had recently finished reading the book and loved it for the famous quotes:

“That’s the thing about pain. It demands to be felt.”

Some pains are physical while some churn your heart, your very existence. The kinds of pain that you would love to avoid nevertheless they find a way to destroy your soul. The pains that make you feel guilty and vulnerable. You often try to deny the pain but it chases you demanding to be felt.

“Some people don’t understand the promises they’re making when they make them,”

When they break the promise you feel the pain even if you choose not to feel it because “pain demands to be felt”.

“You don’t get to choose if you get hurt in this world,…but you do have some say in who hurts you.” And we often make wrong choices.

I almost feel like screaming and telling the girl the thoughts I had about the book but I refrain myself. Let her enjoy the book in her own sweet way. Each book appeals to each reader differently. I stopped my mind from wandering and tried to focus on the view outside. It is getting dark. Birds are flying back to their branches, kids are playing and screaming in the park below, lights are switched on and I have to get back to my proposal document. However instead of the proposal document I write a poem.

“I looked out of my window

My eyes wandered a bit

The world stared back at me

And oggled my wounded soul

I tried to hide my wound

But my wound is naked

For all to see

The ache from a distant love

And broken promise

I tried to deny the pain

But the pain demanded

To be felt.”

 

‘This post is a part of Write Over the Weekend, an initiative for Indian Bloggers by BlogAdda.’