Let's Talk

People are like the graffitti of a dog's urine on the sidewalk - smelly and evanescent.

They come in all sizes and colors. Some are good. Some are bad. But all of them are stuck on you. They leave their mark that is indelible - like that gooey thing on the underside of your shoe. And picking them apart is disgustingly satisfying.

"Fucker! You are a writer?!"

He was wearing thick, dorky glasses and his eyes were bloodshot. He had a t-shirt with words that were as inconsequential as this man in my life. The things a writer has to do to write - they are laid down in the contract. And top among them is to converse. So, I played along.

"Yes," I replied, trying hard to resist my temptation to turn my back and order for one more pint.

"Fucker! That's bullshit man!"

Some people really test you, making you discover new limits of patience.

"I am sorry?"

"Yeah, you should be! No one can be a writer, dude! Asshole, that's not a job!"

A few people around us had taken to staring over the top of their glasses, happy at the prospect of a bar brawl.

"I write for a living."

"I don't buy that crap! You're just sittin there with your beard and your kurta and your pen & paper, tryin to impress some arty chicks. That's all you're doing - selling your wares like a whore!"

This should have angered me. And it did.

"And what do YOU do?"

"I work for a software company, dude!"

I stared at him long, trying to make him see that he was a lost soul. Trying to beat it into his head that he was a nobody. No passion. No dreams. C'mon 'dude'! See the irony!

"I make a lot of money," he continued, refusing to accept defeat. "I buy a house. A car. Date a chick. Marry someone else. Grow old and die."

What was this person doing - digging his own grave?! Was this a practical joke that he was playing on himself? I discreetly looked around the bar for any hidden cameras with Pogo's label on it.

"And that is better because......?" My raised eyebrow ought to have burnt down his sceptical ones. But he ploughed on.

"It is better because my life ain't complicated. I don't bother about my dreams. I don't give a shit about my passion."

"But what about what you really want to do?"

He sat there, sipping and thinking.

"What was the biggest sorrow you've ever had to face?" he asked, countering my question with one of his own.

"I lost a loved one recently." Why was I even answering?

"You aren't dead because of that, right? You pulled through. You will pull through when you lose someone else. I pulled through even after knowing that I can't do what I want to. And that, motherfucker, is the kicker!"

I looked at the seat he had vacated after that punchline. It was closing time and the other patrons had left, disappointed at not seeing a joust.

"Sir? We are closing." It was Mani, the bartender.

"Tell me, Mani. Why do you work here?" The question had shot forth without my meaning to.

"I like listening to conversations, Sir. That'll be 450 rupees."