Thoughtful Thoughtlessness

All her life, she was free yet trapped in a cage, the door of which she thought would slam shut if she tried to move out. The door wasn’t closed after all, but for her, moving towards her dreams could close those doors forever. She trapped herself inside that cage fearing that someone/something else would do it to her. She was different. She wasn’t the one who believed in glitters but was the one who appreciated the creation of sawdust which made a chair look better, for she believed that improvisation was the key to success. She was a strongly opinionated person who would stand by her opinions if she felt she was right, but she wasn’t a vocally opinionated person- she would do everything only in her head. Not because she thought she might be wrong, but because she thought “what if” her opinions didn’t match with others’, what if someone objected her thinking. So she learnt to keep her thoughts to herself. The fear of the slamming door also repressed her voice. She knew she was th

One fine afternoon on a small planet called Xeniter, 4-year-old Ben was inconsolably sobbing because he wanted to meet his friend Emma, who just moved to the other side of the planet. 738 miles away, Emma’s behaviour was no better than Ben’s; she too missed her best friend. This is exactly when Emma’s mom dialled Ben’s residence. The two friends were more than elated to hear each other’s voice. They spoke for hours- about big problems like toothache, lack of new toys, and things beyond the understanding of an adult human mind. Ben then noticed a big 9-shaped particle in the sky. It seemed to be a 9-shaped light-emitting star. He shouted in amazement “There’s a BIG 9 shaped bulb in the sky!” Emma ran out to the balcony, but found a 6-shaped particle instead. She said that it wasn’t a 9, but was a 6, and Ben argued back. They both had a big fight over that particle’s shape and ended up not talking to each other for months, until they learned that Xeniter wasn’t flat, it was round an