By Aalam Singh Batth
I hear babies cry
(Louis Armstrong~ What a wonderful Life)
I watch them grow
They’ll learn much more
Than I’ll ever know
And I think to myself
What a wonderful world
Yes, I think to myself
What a wonderful world
Ooh, yes
The sun was rising up and I was driving down the road for work, although it was Monday morning but my mood was good. In an unprecedented turn of events, I had a very disciplined and pleasant morning, just like the mornings where you don’t wake up exhausted and angry, the sleep had done it’s job, for it had refreshed my body. Which was in stark contrast to the chaos of getting late that I have concerningly acquired as a habit. I knew that there was no way that I would be late for work that day. But it wouldn’t be a Monday morning without something upending my sanity. There was a swarm of people in cars driving recklessly without a care of their surroundings and violating all kinds of so called ‘traffic rules’. In truth, there are no rules, just traffic and lots of people, not humans but people. There are many things that are uncertain about people, but one thing that for me that has been a rule of thumb, is that wherever there’s a huge swarm of people gathered around, it’s either something good or something bad but it sucks to be in that crowd. How do I know that it sucks to be there? Because I was stuck in that swamp of cars. Traffic at peak office hour is a rat race, people want to get ahead and be as reckless for nothing but road position as if they are in a Grand Prix fighting for the world championship. However there are some terms and conditions that stipulates; nothing should happen to them or their car and it’s the job of the conscious ones (humans) to protect and make way for them. The dangerous thing about the ‘swamp’ is that once you’re stuck in the swamp, the only way out is to also be reckless and unforgiving, that is; you become ‘people’ not ‘human’. We are humans when we question everything and care for the well being of everything in our surroundings . We are people, when we view everything except us as mere objects to exploit or manipulate. We can be humans for some and people for others.
So, there I was stuck in a traffic jam debating the people vs human debate in my head while listening to ‘What A Wonderful World’ by Louis Armstrong, it’s soothing vocals and backing track was starkly contrasting to my external stimuli. At peak hour of traffic I saw humans transitioning into people with rage in their eyes, veins popping, and shouting all kinds of motherly cusses, it was ironically cinematic in a very melancholically soothing way. There were trees turning brown, red roses turning black, blue skies turning grey, blessed day turn into rue and the faces of human growing pale into people we barely know. In the swamp either you turn into people and save time in overthinking about how doomed we are as a species or you remain human and spend time overthinking about humans turning into people, or maybe they were people to begin with. Amidst the cacophony of slurs, blazing horns and lights high beaming I could see people turning red, veins popping, gun blazing. It was if they were possessed by some omnipresent force, they would shiver as if having a stroke and then turn into absolute savages. On the other hand, I could see some crying in their car, asking for forgiveness to their god thinking maybe it’s him punishing them for their deeds. While there were some hoping everyone else on that road would disappear, that one’s success is the other’s failure. Everyone wants to help others, if it helps them in any way, if it’s not monetary, it’s personal or goodwill. There’s a deeper narrative behind everything, we are taught to be humans by people in institutions pretending to be human.
I often find it funny and confusing that it’s naive to be kind and sincere, while its smart to be wise on the face of it and to be ruthless and unforgiving deep inside. No two people are ever the same but they are similar. While it may seem attractive to look intellectual and trendy, whilst chasing one’s goal under the maxim ‘More is better’, the maxim of ‘less the better’ becomes isolated and less preferred for some. Soon enough the cars start moving and just like a group of dogs chasing a treat, all the people in their cars started moving, and at that very moment, no philosophy or psychology matters, no problem or issue is as big as reaching to work on time. After all, everyone would like to think of themselves as humans and others as people.
*Reaches work, sees the same people from the traffic at his place of work.*
*Gets pushed by people, gets cut in the queue*
*Shivers, hands shake, deep breaths, eyes roll back*
*transitions into people, pushes other people back*
*the human inside his conscience tries to reason, “if you do the same what’s the difference between human and people?”*
*the person mutters to himself, “it’s just money, sex, fame and violence.”*
Give me a soul, so that I can breathe, take it away so I can succeed.
