I’ve just finished reading the most beautiful lil book entitled ‘The Cellist of Sarajevo’ by Stephen Galloway. Set during the war of
Listening to the Adagio as I write this, I cannot help but recall the book, which according to the Washington Post, has captured to triumph of the spirit in the face of overwhelming despair.
The city that I lived in was caught in a mire of woes over the weekend, stemming from a demonstrative march of over 100,000 individuals on our Internal Security Act. Over 500 people were arrested and the city was crippled by the force of the voice, determined to rise from a whisper to a scream.
One moment the people are walking or
running through the street, and then
they drop abruptly as though they were marionettes
and their puppeteer had fainted.
As the online papers provided a Twitter-like update, and as I read it from the safe confines of my study, I tried hard to formulate a particular opinion about the whole situation and the enfolding actions on both sides.
It irked me that a journey, normally lasting only 10 minutes ran into over an hour, and the whole time my kids were hungry for their lunch in the backseat of the car. And that for the whole afternoon I was worried for a passenger on a bus, not sure if when getting off, he would be caught in the onslaught of things and running emotions.
It irks me that when in speaking, one has to be conscious of the fact that walls may have ears, and if you say the wrong thing at the wrong place, you’re gonna be needing lots of good family and friends to drive to a certain location, bringing you basic things like a bar of soap, toothbrush, a towel.
It irks me that these groups of people held on to their convictions so strongly; they did not care about the mess they have made of the weekend for the many others who share the same space.
It irks me that I do not have the same depth in their belief and conviction that I chose instead to stay holed up at home.
It wasn’t always like this.
Not long ago the promise of a happy life
seemed almost inviolable.
We are far from being caught in the face of sheer adversity such as a life of strife in a war-torn country. Where water, electricity, food moves from being a basic item to a luxury item. Where crossing the road is done at your own peril because you can never tell who has their sights on you. And I hope in my lifetime, I do not have to come face to face with such a situation.
For in truth, I do not think I would have the inner strength to survive that.
As it is, I am finding the world to be changing at such a pace, it freezes my mind. Where if you do something good for someone, there HAS TO BE a hidden agenda behind it. Where if someone brushes to close to you on the streets, you instinctively clutch your bag a lil closer. Where there is no such thing as a free lunch anymore.
It freezes my mind cos I do not have any personal trauma associated with the above, yet already I am traumatised. Which leaves me to ask: Is there any more goodness left? Or room for the hope of good in this world? And if there is: Can it start with me? And if it can: What can I do?
That something could be almost erased
from existence in the landscape of a ruined city,
and then rebuilt until it is new and worthwhile,
gives him hope.
I had been struggling with a particular issue over the course of the last year, which became a bit more pronounced in the last week. I have been pondering long and hard about this whole thing and striking a balance so that the way forward is crystal clear, from every possible angle. I have also been reading books, articles, forum advice on the same issue.
It has become clearer now: the option to relent, rebuild and shape can never go wrong. And it is an idea that I need to be at peace with, in order to move forward productively and deriving some measure of goodness out of it.
The fingers on his flesh told him that he was loved,
that he had always been loved, and
that the world was a place where above all else
the things that were good would find a way
to burrow into you.
Just like I must find some way to be at peace over some of my stands and viewpoints in life. And if the elevator closes on me even though the person inside knows that I’m running for it, it doesn’t mean that the whole world has lost all sensibilities of common courtesies.
Luke always asks me when we pass a toll-booth, why is it I greet the toll-collector. My reply to him is that they work in isolation. And if my mere short 2 words brings some comfort in helping them remember that they do not exist in isolation, then I would have done something good and nice for the day.
I would have done well today, in remembering my own words. But I’m finding it hard to remember then when I think of how the other party might be feeling. And if I could have gone any easier or phrased it any more correctly.
I read somewhere that “You cannot make it as a wondering generality. You must become a meaningful specific.” And as the notes of the Adagio filters into my sphere for this afternoon, I am taken back to the scene and that quote. Perhaps that was what Vedran Smajlović was trying to achieve: to be a meaningful specific in the face of death and despair. And to give some semblance of meaning to each of the 22 lives lost so they are not a wondering generality in the total casualty of war.
The music demanded that she remember this,
that she know to a certainty that the world
still held the capacity for goodness.
The notes were proof of that.
There will always be two sides to the same coin. Flip the word EVIL over and what you get is LIVE. I may not have the strength of convictions today in the same issues as the other person on the street. But I am striving to do my best.
And I must remember that… in order to always arrive at the right set of choices and eventually the right decision, without losing myself in the process … in order for me to remain being a meaningful specific to every person I come across.
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