Buses, Rain and the incomprehensible beauty of being human

A wave. One of the simplest expressions of “hey there! I notice you amongst all these masked faces” is all it takes to make someone’s day. Now I know I’ve pretty much answered the question in the subtitle with the first statement, but give me a chance will you, fellow reader? Thank you, and sorry for those who wish to continue reading these ramblings of a madman.

Let me set the scene for you: It’s a gloomy day, and so is yours truly. He has just awoken from his quite-not-well-deserved slumber. Checks his phone, because of course he does: its 11am. Classes started hours before, and this socially-anxious yet attention-seeking, reeking of cup noodles from the day before pile of meat realises that he has no one to call when he just needs some uplifting. Sure he has quite a lot of friends at his new college, but quite of a lot of anxiety does he have too, he is afraid to disturb the peace of silence. He craves social interaction yet the moment there are more than two people in his vicinity he is overwhelmed by conversation. You see, I am the weirdest kind of ambivert; filling up my social battery is an upstream battle against the saltiest of rivers, I am thirsty yet I am drowning.

This fine day I had not seen anyone I knew, I felt pretty lonely and sad; sad enough that I did not even want to call anyone (yes I know how twisted it is that while looking for interaction I actively avoid it). I did my morning routine, went to the mess, had my breakfast or lunch or whatever you could call it at this hour. I go outside; its raining like crazy, I had no umbrella and my most prized auditory possessions, my earphones, were in my room. Music is the only thing that calms me down, and I did not even have the company of that now. And so here I was, walking in the rain back to my hostel; alone.

Feeling like I’ve wasted all the productive parts of the day and with a guilt of waking up too late, I get my bag my umbrella and I go out into the wet and miserable world. I wait the typical 10 minutes for the next bus in the rain. The world felt so cold, maybe because it actually was a pretty cold day, but symbolism or whatever, you know. All this melancholy I carry, and for what? I still know not why I become so sad sometimes; I am quite literally living a life that me a few years before would’ve cried tears of joy looking at, but this is just me. But all it took to remove this sadness from my brain was a simple wave from a familiar face, on the other bus. In physics we learn energy is conserved, that things can only be converted from one form to the other; but then I felt I had just violated those laws; all that sadness just disappeared, and in its place arrived a filling feeling; one that felt so human, yet is so indescribable. Where did this come from? A wave? Really? Am I just that depraved of any human interaction? Maybe you could say so but I believe otherwise; perhaps all it takes to make someone’s day is a simple acknowledgment of their existence. We throw all these extravagant parties; make reels about it and post it online, but do we really feel the gist of it, do we capture the essence of that emotion, or is it just monkey see monkey do, we see others make all of their “fun” and “happiness” so visible on social media. Perhaps they gain truly the happiness they want out of it, but does an imitation of happiness really yield us the true human feeling of happiness? All it takes is short-term stimulation to release dopamine, even social media can do that for you, but I REFUSE to believe that this little chemical bears ALL of the brunt of this feeling that we cannot even put into words? There must be something deeper right? But then that is a conversation that strays too far from my… uhh… ramblings here. Ironic. I know.

On the bus, a thought came over to me. What if I just walk alone, explore this beautiful campus in this miserable rain. Quite intelligent I know… Sometimes even I wonder how I got into an Indian Institute. Anyways, I’d already missed most of the lectures and I had quite a lot of time till labs so I decided I’ll just have a walk for a while; and so I did: FOR A WHOLE TWO HOURS. I didn’t even know there was so much walking I could do in a day. Turns out all it takes to remove this feeling of being suffocated by yet devoid of social interaction is a walk alone and a wave? Am I even making sense? I hope no psychologist reads this, or they might actually seek me out and murder me for this atrocious disrespect to all the complexity of philosophy. But then again, maybe there is quite a complexity in all this simplicity, maybe there was a chaotic orchestration of events presented to me by the universe just at this moment to make me feel like an individual, someone different, a unique entity with its own quirks and shortcomings.

And all of a sudden, the world, slippy, wet and miserable all so quickly became so shiny, the water to my thirst, a thirst I had not yet realised the water to. Then I reached the CSB and realised I forgot my lab coat… oh well.