My Antidote

 A great escapism from reality. That’s what this novel, The Kite Runner, is giving me right now. It’s been sitting in my bookshelf for ages and it’s only now that I’m devouring it. A friend gave it as a present, or rather, a souvenir. And I think about her now. I love novels because they transport me into a world distant from the one I live in. The world I live in is harsh. It doesn’t compromise. It can chew you and spit you out like sweet-less gum. Now I read this book and I’m in space, piloting my own UFO. I feel omnipotent and untouchable. I feel like God, hovering over the lives of characters, knowing what they do, what they think, what they dream. It’s a lovely feeling. This novel is my antidote. It’s a drug that sedates my pain and washes away my sorrow – even if it’s only for a while.  

Truth Hurts

“I’m lost in a snowstorm. The wind shrieks, blows stinging sheets of snow into my eyes. I stagger through layers of shifting white. I call for help but the wind drowns my cries. I fall and lie panting on the snow, lost in the white, the wind wailing in my ears. I watch the snow erase my fresh footprints. ‘I’m a ghost now’, I think, ‘a ghost with no footprints’.” Extract from ‘The Kite Runner,’ a novel by Khaled Hosseini.

I’m reading this book now, and there’s one vital lesson I just learnt; ‘Better to get hurt by the truth than comforted with a lie.’ It amazes me how Khaled’s very first novel could be so powerful.  Truth indeed, can hurt. But the pain wears off with time. A lie, no matter how comfortable it is, will shatter you big time the moment it's revealed. Big up to Khaled for such a gripping and inspiring tale.

Where is the Love?

How, really, can one identify true love when lust and infatuation masquerade as love? Genuine love can’t be shown merely through chocolates or roses or material possessions. It can’t be attained through lust and copulation. Love has true values. Love is wonderful. Its kind and patient. Its attributes are admirable. What plagues us these days is not love. We are infested by Hollywood’s notion of love – lust and sex. We have forgotten – no, not forgotten – we don’t know love. It’s difficult, therefore, to experience bona fide love. As a result we are misguided. Authentic love can’t and won’t lead you astray. Love is simply sweet. I love love. But where is my love? Where is my love in this whirlwind of confusion?

Remembering Phillis Wheatley

Our Black History month just ended. But Black History scroll is long - longer than time itself. Today I reminisce over the life of Phillis Wheatley. History says she was born somewhere in the Gambia, or perhaps Senegal, in 1753. She was sold to slavery (yeah, heck!) at the age of seven (7). That’s how young she was when she was packaged and sailed across waters to the Americas in a slave ship called ‘The Phillis.’ Phillis Wheatley isn’t, of course, her birth name. Wheatley comes from her slave masters’ name who named her after the ship on which she was brought to them. The name her mother gave her remained in West Africa – in tongues and memories of her family.  Phillis became a poet. Yes, she wrote poetry and became the first black person to be published. It wasn’t easy, but she did it, despite the hash slavery circumstances. Somehow, she was laying the first slate that would pave way to a string of black writers of later years. We writers of today, published and unpublished, established and aspiring, are standing on foundations laid by Phillis Wheatley.  We need to strive to make it in the rather hash and cruel conditions we sometimes find ourselves entangled within. I, for one, will write. I will write zillions of words. I will write until my computer runs out of pages. The coroner will find ink in my veins and blood on my computer keys.