GO TO REHAB!

So Amy Winehouse joins the 27 Club: Jimmy Hendrix, Janis Joplin, Jim Morrison, Kurt Cobain, all dead in their 27th year. All assured of posterity. All the more cooler for dying at 27…?

Sex, Drugs and Rock’n'Roll! Ya, baby! How is that not cool?!

Fucking mutts. We love their music, yes! But what fucking mutts.

Some feel that they have set the movement (of people who use drugs) back decades with their high profile addictions. That with Winehouse’s death, ANTI-drug slogans will be unearthed, dusted off, repainted, and brandished vigorously at of those of us who want a simpler approach to drugs.

Globally, we may say the war on drugs has failed, and that criminalizing drugs does not and will never work… try convincing our Ministry of Defence. But with Winehouse’s death the ministry is not what needs convincing. Her death, at the magical age of 27, refocused the world that knew (of) her on the detrimental effects of drugs (albeit determining cause of death will take a couple of weeks).

The premise: If Winehouse died of drug ABUSE as a result of her ADDICTION, surely every person that uses drugs is an ABUSER and ADDICT… is not difficult to believe, although far more difficult to prove.

Is it too simple a premise? Yes, far too simple! But who would deny that Winehouse was another HORRIFIC example of what drugs can do to talent and life?

The question remains though, whether such high profile deaths are reason enough to dismiss alternative approaches to drugs, that allows for the use of drugs by some people in much the way alcohol and tobacco is consumed by others?

Simply put, not everybody melts down like Winehouse (if indeed that was what it was).

But surely enough people react to drugs like she did? Surely there are countless, nameless examples of how drug ABUSE has shattered lives and torn apart communities?

Undeniably.

Is this reason enough though to reject outright the idea that drugs can be used by some without the expected spiral into mayhem? Is it not also undeniable that like alcohol, drugs have different effects on different people? Is it not also undeniable that some people can (and do) still use drugs and live productive fulfilling lives?

There is no easy answer to these questions. We have miles to go before we sleep on this. But we need to stay awake now, and examine these hard and difficult questions and make hard and difficult decisions.

No one is asking for the legalization of drugs. People react differently to Mary Jane. Some find her smoking hot. Some are disgusted by her and throw up all over their shoes. There are also extreme reactions which include paranoid schizophrenia: "Mary Jane doesn’t love ME anymore, she prefers fucking I!"

Legalized, the opportunities for these different reactions will increase, and perhaps, that fine line we walk will no longer be possible. Perhaps the negative reactions to Mary Jane will result in unwelcome scrutiny. The blind eye will not turn. The good eye will have a microscope strapped on. The Dangerous Drugs Control Board will find us, incarcerate us and bore us to death!

But that is not the question here. The question is what do we do about approaching the individuals that use drugs? Our one size fits all abstinence policy in Sri Lanka is laughable. The relapse rate is high. Data on relapse is therefore notably absent.

Do we leave people who use drugs alone?

“Leave us alone! We know what we’re doing. We understand our limits.”

The overriding need for man to gather into groups and societies won’t allow for us to be left alone. Nonconformity has always threatened society until society learnt to allow for nonconformity that conforms. To not conform to the nonconformity that society has so kindly granted us, is betrayal.

Yesterday, a man in one of the North East states of India was battered to death for trying to escape from his rehab by the local community. Not news really. Just another failed drug ADDICT who didn’t CONFORM - If you’re a drug ADDICT, fine! But, GO TO REHAB!

“They tried to make him go to rehab and he said, no, no, no… so they beat him to death”

Ya, well. Time to listen to her sing as we think this one over, and revalue our values.

Sometimes

Sometimes I wish, to forget everything that I like and everything that I hate, start with a new value system, forget my perspective, forget the things I look for, forget the things I try to find, forget the kind of people I want to be with, forget the standards that I have set for myself, forget the responsibility that I expect from myself, forget that I represent someone and somethings, forget the legacy called myself.

Sometimes I think, fun is most important thing in life, why do I have to worry about the future, enjoy the life I currently have, taking it day by day, no past no future. People, money and relationships, bring the fun element in. Do I really have to care, if the others are having fun too?, is it not enough that I am having fun?. But what is that “Fun”, I have almost forgotten what is fun to me. Not to sound cliched, I have begun to find fun in things I hated, sometimes I feel I have settled for this “fun”.

Sometimes I feel, that I am boring myself, nobody else is doing that to me, but its myself. I am turning myself into this mechanical person. I can literally feel people getting bored around me. sometimes my ideas and thoughts bore me too, thats when I feel I have hit the rock bottom. I have got music, books that keep me interested. Lately its been blogging, blogging has really been awesome. But the question still remains, what next?

Sometimes I wonder, what would have happened If I had different priorities, would it be more fun?, would I have enjoyed more?, should studies not have been my priority?. I have seen people who were at as good as me, not worry about studies so much, still doing same or better things than me. I am definitely not jealous of them, just wondering, was I wrong in what I chose?. Did I chose the wrong idols?, Was someone needed to be in my life all along? or is it just an illusion that the other side is greener.

Sometimes I realize, I am not alone in dilemma, I read what people write, about their fun, their happiness, their problems and their feelings, somewhere I can see that everyone has somewhat similar problems. Sometimes I also seriously doubt, is it me who is picking people with similar problems to read?. Its possible that people are troubled by something similar, what If? kind of a situation. Realization is something which is a continuous process, but why is it that it always difficult to realize?

Sometimes I react, with total awe of my own feelings, and sometimes with total disgust, sometimes with anger, sometimes with helplessness. The common thing is that I react, somewhere I read today “I am alive not just breathing”. It struck me, so many of us might be doing contrary right, just breathing. I want to add something to my reactions. I want to react wildly, take a real bad decision, completely unplanned, completely surprising myself, may be sometime soon.

Return

I think of days,
A late morning, A long breakfast, A quick bath,
Loads of games, longer lunch, and never ending chats.

Days never ended for the next one to begin.

Yes I agree, It was the same me,
It was the same day,
Its just those people, who are missing.

Gone, Lost, or some never cared,
but,
Sometimes, few, do come back

Feel like dancing???

The subject for this post is something I have very less information about, I have always been fascinated by it, but never ever tried it. There is high probability that I might be talking total nonsense.

Kids have amazing ways of expressing their emotions. If you see them playing, even when they are playing with the toy, they are always singing some made up song, or doing some actions, which are as good as dancing to them. They are shy, I mean if they spot people watching them, they end up quiet, but still they know how to enjoy themselves and express their happiness. I love to see kids dancing. They may not have the elaborate steps, nor the grace or perfection, but I like the fact that they dance for themselves, they dance because they feel like.

I have known many adults who dance as a form of art, some more who dance because of the formality associated with occasion, some dance as a profession. I don’t know any person who dances for fun you know. Like they show in movies, when happy just make that simple swirl or a ketchup dance step, or even the movement of the hands. I can just imagine one person I know who is capable of doing this, but may be even she would do it may be once in a billion years.

So have I felt like dancing before?, mostly no. Even when I am happy, I more of the talker kind. The amount of sentences I speak is directly proportional to how happy and excited I am.
I kind of want to meet and talk to happy crazy people, people who dance when happy, people who don’t care what others might think, people who don’t mind getting wet when it rains just for fun, people who go and have loads of ice cream when its raining cats and dogs, people who wake up at 12 just to have a chocolate.

Just a teeny tiny admission except for the dance part I have done the rest of the things I mentioned above :) ..

As far dance goes, any happy dancers around?

The age story

I can’t believe it, its been more than five years since I finished my School and started my professional life, I just can’t believe it. I remember my initial days at my work place, I felt so naive, so inadequate, and people around me appeared so strange. I thought this phase would be short lived, but I was wrong, even after two years of work I felt like a fresher, just out of college, still insecure at work.

I guess it was not much to do with profession, because I always felt very young about myself, I never felt any change in me with the growing years. Always felt the same old me. I always used to wonder why I did not feel like a grown up. Why I always felt like a youth, why I did feel the need to take up the responsibilities like say my father did.

Every day when I look at the mirror, I hardly notice any change, the receding hairline does not make me feel old, nor the fact that I my face size has probably increased by about 25%. I hardly see any years, because I look at the mirror and hardly notice myself.

May be the fact that not much has changed in terms of responsibilities or commitments has contributed as well, I still do not financially support anyone, nor do I provide emotional support, the people in my life are almost same, and there has been hardly any change about my aspirations.

My interest in entertainment has not changed much either, I still love to watch the episodes of Glee, Wonder years, Friends, and One tree hill, The teenage and school kind of sitcoms makes me wanna watch them, just the way I was attracted to them years back in school.

So does it mean I haven’t grown up?..

I would have blindly said yes some days back, but not after yesterday.

I logged into the Facebook yesterday, and saw that a friend of mine from school had uploaded pics of hers, rather that of her new born baby. I clicked on the pics and saw some of her family pictures, she had changed so much. I kind of saw what I was trying to see in myself, the “age” factor. One thing I clearly remember about her was that we had our birthdays on consecutive days, and she was a day older than me. Suddenly realized If she is old and I OLD too, some how me being old was rather evident through my friend rather than me.

I looked around profiles of people who have been my batch mates from various years, and with every profile and the picture albums I began to see how much people have grown both in terms of body, and in terms of where they stand in the cycle of life.

Yesterday for the first time in my life I felt Older.

Do we really see our age in eyes of our peers?.

I hate numbers

Over last few days this thought has been lingering in my head. Have you ever wondered what on this earth prompted for people to discover numbers?.

According to me “numerals” have to be the single most dreadful discovery ever made by mankind. If I were to do a countdown of 10 most dangerous discoveries by humans, the “numbers” would top my list. You’re right, even over the most dreaded nuke.

We have this habit of assigning a number to everything, you name it and we give it a number. If someone says I am good at a particular thing, we will go ahead and ask him/her to rate him/herself on a scale of 1 to 10. I mean how does it matter, isn’t it good that he/she is happy to be good at something. what difference does a 7 or a 8 make to her. Only thing it can do, is to break the confidence levels and make them eager to get there, by hook or crook.

Its not like we want our life to be at a CMM level 4, where we want to quantitatively manager every single aspect of human existence. Still people attach measurements and a number to everything. Age, weight, height, waist size, salary, time taken to get to work, distance to the playground, years of marriage, you name it we give it a number.

How cool it would be if we didn’t have numbers, we would have no way to measure anythings, that would make us so much more happier. People would be no longer jealous of how much their colleagues make, no one would feel sad on the number of kg’s they have gained, no one will feel bad at the number of car’s in the neighbour’s shed.

No numbers, would mean, that people do not let their lives hinge on those few numbers, instead would worry about making theirs more holistic. Happiness would be happiness again, it wouldn’t be measurable. Money would be for buying things, and not for checking balances, Size would be for satisfaction and not for comparison, house would turn into homes rather than the number of sq-foots or the count of bed’s and bath’s, there would be no anniversaries but only celebrations.

Ah!, who am I kidding, we are humans, we always will find a reason and then a means to compare, if not numbers, something else it would be.

Deleting Facebook Friends

When the whole world is trying hard to get to a million twitter followers, a hundred thousand friends , a hundred groups and 1 true friend, I took a different route this time. I opened up my friends list , it was so hard to find where it was hiding. I had 900 friends. Man , 900 people are my friends and I have no clue where the hell each one of them is. No wonder my privacy settings wont help me any longer.

Do you have over 200 friends , its highly unlikely you interact with all of them. If you do , you are really lucky. You have 200 facebook friends and 200 friends on facebook. It is not the same thing, it is different. Facebook is meant to be in touch with friends ( not with those you know, or you once know , and now its no business between u and them, dont add up). A pretty face telling you mutual friends, or just pester on "Add a Friend" would let you add one, then second and ....

Do you see a person and read , Eyesha Ali is now friends with Mariyam and 20 other people. Suddenly Eyesha Ali is rich , her friend list is long. The fact is only Mariyam is a friend and 20 others tagged along just because I saw friend request from them, or knew them. Then for 2 years 18 of them never talked to me, for those 18 the door is open.

So when I started looking in the list, I could easily delete 50 of them , even without thinking twice. The only thought was, "Was this guy my friend"? But yes, the challenge is hard when you look at refined list. Take a deep breath , delete the friends you dont interact with, most of the time , since they dont interact they won't even come to know you have deleted them. Or you wouldnt come to know if they deleted you. There is no reason to have a heavy FB friend list when every information you have here is at stake.

I did it today, I know some of the people reading this might have been deleted. For those people, I am not sorry , and if you could have better interacted with me , or let me become a friend from facebook contact, you would still be there. A person who gets out of list was not supposed to be in it in the first place.


Thank you Facebook for helping me find friends and those not so friends