“..people
have a way of leaking into each other like flavours
when you cook..”
- Salman Rushdie
A
phone call from work interrupted her thoughts. She pretended not to
see it. I
could have fever today,
she thought or
maybe I will just tell them that there is indeed a landslide nearby.
Immediately, she felt a pang of guilt. The same guilt she had
experienced on feeling relieved that the bike accident she had
witnessed the
last
day was not with her dear friend, but rather with some stranger who
had a similar clothing as her friend. The motorist was not injured,
but she was surprised at her immediate and involuntary but selfish
reaction - as if his well-being mattered any less. Anyway, the
monsoon was going to be a long one, she thought, so she should maybe
save the excuse for when it actually happened and ceased to be an
excuse. She decided to go. Absent-mindedly she turned on the radio
and got ready for work.
It
was just another day for her. She got up after snoozing the alarm for
the second time and immediately followed: a cup of steaming hot tea.
She looked out of the window. There was nothing much to be seen, it
was foggy and misty. There was a certain chill in the air,
reminisence of the huge downpour last night. Such days reminded her
of childhood when this would have meant no school owing to heavy
landslide somewhere between her home and school. The rest of the day
would follow cuddled inside a blanket and dreamily reading her
Sleeping
Beauty
tactfully covered inside a thick biology book to avoid discovery. A
trick she learnt from her brother who hid an Archies
comic similarly. She was quick to learn, observe and absorb.
She
had familiarized herself with the drill on her way. On the left side
of her gate would be curious neighbours, a little above would be a
small white puppy who would enthusiastically bark at any passer-by.
On her way, she would meet a cobbler in his shop who would
acknowledge her and she would do the same. In between, she sometimes
met a few familiar faces who would politely smile and pass by.
Sometimes, there were a few who would ask how she has been doing and
she had a standard answer for all – irrespective of how she was
actually doing. She knew that all other people she would have asked
the same question would have answered her likewise and so these days
she had decided to try something else. She would small-talk about
objective facts like how badly it rained last night or how frequent
the power-cuts are. At
least these are common experiences between us,
she thought. Once in a while, she would go a step ahead and
compliment someone for a pretty dress. Complements, she thought will
lighten up someone, but she was careful not to do it too often, lest
over-doing ruined the charm.
Day
after day, we interact with numerous people. On a non-hectic day, my
person-to-person interaction will be one, two.. she started mentally
counting in her head – fifteen she decided, resolving to make a
note of how many people she would interact with today. Most of them
are often the ones who go unnoticed and are non-existent until we see
them again. Some guy in the canteen, that colleague of another
department or maybe the same cobbler she encountered on the way. In a
split second we greet and thereafter forget them. Others are mostly
our friends or family, near or far. Then finally come the last set of
people who are no longer a part of our lives, but who once were, till
the parting of ways. They are also the ones who occupy a larger part
of our thoughts on a quiet day. Nonetheless, inspite of all the
numerous interactions that we have, all of us have individual
personalities. How much of one's personality is influenced by the
other person's? Is there any way to measure and quantify it? She kept
thinking. She had felt similar fascination on learning that 99.99 %
of all human genes are the same and yet in all the world, no two
people match each other completely. We still retain our individuality
inspite of numerous interactions, or
do we?
Or
maybe the sum total of all of that was us. If there were two people
who would talk honestly about a third person, would their views
match? Whose would be closer to reality and what would this reality
actually be? It would be too simplified to think that the ones we are
emotionally close to are the ones who know us accurately.
This was easily contradicted with some of her experiences where
people opened up to strangers uninhibitedly than their dear ones. She
was reminded of those lines from Midnight's
children
that was stuck on her mind:
People
have a way of leaking
into each other like flavours
when you cook.
The honking of car horn brought her to the present. Irritatingly, she
looked at the driver who was equally irritated on seeing her
recklessly cross the road. The fifth one of the day, she thought to
herself, also resolving in mind to make a mental note, next day, of
the people who make her feel good, bad or indifferent. Perhaps
there are a lot of factors that affect this 'leaking' of
personalities, she continued thinking. We imitate - consciously or
otherwise - the ones we admire. Or we behave a certain way with
somebody for reciprocity, because
that-is-how-that-somebody-had-behaved-with-us.
We are extra-nice to people we very much like. Which one then would
be the true me? Or maybe there is nothing like true me. Our
interactions are connected, intermingled and maybe
we don't individually exist,
she concluded. She looked at other people nearby and often wondered
what their story would be. She loved to hear if only they would open
up to her. If they didn't, she often had a habit of making up small
stories in her mind. Today she met an old woman who had hopped onto
the same car she had got on. Her expressions were hard, she looked
troubled and she noticed that her thin lips quivered a bit as she
spoke. She was reminded of the Queen from Alice
In Wonderland
and couldn't help smiling to herself as she imagined this woman
repeating the Queen's refrain: Off
with their heads! She
had an overtly active imagination. It kept her mind busy and herself
quiet - which people often mistook for snobiness.
Her
work place arrived soon and as she got down from the car, she gave
the old woman a smile and did not wait for her reciprocation. She had
felt sorry for whatever she was going through - an illness, some
trouble at work, uncaring children - her guesses were many but not
conclusive, and the least she could do for her was smile. As she had
walked a little further, someone seemed to call her name from behind.
It was her friend who had forgotten his umbrella and wanted to share
the one she had. As he went on chatting about the previous day
happenings, the girl counted seven
on her head and continued to play the role of a listener with him.
