Rediscovering the Crows...

"Casting shadows, way up on that winter sky, as you stood there, counting crows..."

I've been counting crows again... I think, I do it every 3 months, or so. It's almost like a quarterly dance routine composed in my own space...

Songs, scents, taste, texture -- it reminds us of so much. Mostly, the better times...
School... Friends... Aloneness... Stuff we said... Things we did...
Nostalgia -- I believe that's the word people use to describe that sense. I love that word. It represents so much of something that’s just bigger than us and our regular emotions. It's like being controlled by a memory, rather than, being in control of it...

Most songs have a nostalgic sense attached. They remind me of all those phases I may have been through. In fact, the songs create the phases -- they set the criteria and categorize each phase in a specific cd cover... It's almost as if I m not reminded of the phase by hearing the song, rather, the phase reminds me of the song I’d be hearing... I don't know -- think I m losing the boundaries between where I am and where I used to be...

However, just to simplify something complicated (or the other way around), I guess, it's fair to say that my life has been split into a series of different songs...

Coldplay, Aimme Mann, Jimi Hendrix with his Castles made of Sand, Tori Amos, Bush, Jewel, Dizzying up another girl, and everything that Cameron Crowe threw at me with his films... That's life...

And yet, off the million songs I may have heard in this lifetime – the counting crows always hang around throughout every experience. Their music can take me anywhere, because, they’ve been everywhere I have.

Raining in Baltimore can take me to Australia, as I walked down the mini-forest on my way to the university (sometimes being attacked by a Magpie!).
Rain King would bring me to a class with Dr. Kaup, sitting next to Nidhi Nagdeve, pretending to study, even though I’d be using the internet to research on another momentary obsession.
Goodnight Elizabeth, I’d be at my local Starbucks, doing another sketch, dreaming another dream.
And a Holiday in Spain would be all about driving down an empty highway (in Dubai), just before sunrise...

I've been hearing Murder of One lately. I just found the original version a few days back -- and have been fairly observed. The whole song, is like a rain-cloud hiding behind the sun. It hides so that it can travel from place to place, with the sun, gather drops from every ocean, until it can hold no more... Eventually, much like everything else, it will collapse.

And, under its shower, I’d be standing arms wide open, eyes wide shut, accepting, with gratitude...

That, to me, is Counting Crows...

"Walking along the hill-sides, in the summer beneath the sunshine, and feathered by the moon-light falling down on me... Change, change, change..."

End Quote -
"Success, not greatness, is the only god the world serves."
- Drew Baylor (with Cameron's words)

Songless Sparrow...

He gets up every morning...
Dull...
Dead...

Starts his day much like you and me. Brushes his teeth, picks out his weekly aligned formals, polished shoes, pen, wallet, cell-phone...

Goes to work, meets and greets another regular asshole with a not-so-interested "Hey..."
A courtesy smile, if you may.

Sits in his little cubicle. Looks in front, the computer screen, "please wait -- loading", and he notices the thumb-pinned picture in the background.
A memory...
A memory of his better life -- the life he wishes he could live again...
Forever.

He would smile, but, he has seen it so often, it has lost its surrealistic appeal. It's become pale, just like everything else around him. This yellow office, with blue-collar slaves. everyone pretending to be best friends - patting each others back. But, what they are really doing is checking the condition of the other's spine -- so they know the other person's weakest spot, and soon, attack.

In an isolated prestigious corner sits the boss. His space is much bigger, but, you know it's only a bigger cage. He may have decorated it with his achievements and memories, much like the Lion in the zoo with semi-dead trees and the dusty table-fan. However, the Lion is not as insecure as this man.

Trapped, with a limited vision through his cage, the Lion dreams of breaking free oneday -- while this man, the boss, fools himself into believing "this is exactly what I wanted... This is happiness"

He remembers the story of The Madman, by Kahlil Gibran --

"In my father's garden are two cages. In one sits a Lion, that my fathers slaves brought from the deserts of Ninavah; in the other, a songless Sparrow. Every day at dawn, the Sparrow calls to the Lion, "Good morrow to thee, brother prisoner."

The PC loads by now, and our hero, our songless sparrow, tries to shift focus to the smaller picture. Clicking and typing, he tries to lose himself... Tries to forget himself, just to get through for the moment... But, tomorrow, like every other day, he will see the same picture, he will notice the same paleness, the same fakness -- as he will, once again, be reminded of the story of the Lion and the Songless Sparrow...

The End...

ps- This one shaped because of an email to Bat. So, partial credit to her...