Phoenix

This is probably the first personal post on this blog; comes after a long hiatus too. Apologies. The whirlwind in life had settled priorities in a different manner. But now that I find myself free of certain priorities, I think I can promise to stay close to this love of writing that I have.
While I am at it, might I also very shamefully confess that the horrendous beast called Writer’s Block has for long held me captive, and here I write, still under its chains, struggling to break free. You see, I had always prided myself in managing to let my emotions flow through the fingers, out from the pen. Lately,even though the emtions have been full, the ink seems to be elusive. From now on, I will wait for the day where I can lose myself in the world of rhymes again, to release myself of the human bondage of emotions and excuses of this world. Quite a heavy baggage to lug around in life; one that I unabashedly confess I had a swayamvar with. This is a promise I make here today. Since I don’t know how many out there care to hold me to my promise, I shall do it to myself.
Thing is, you need to prove yourself time and again, to gain the respect that you were previously used to. Thing also is that respect comes only to the winners. Hmmm. Not really. Let me rephrase that. You might have respect, you might not have respect, but in victory, you humble people (there are also cases I have seen in the recent past where victors were generous enough to give their own humility away to people. Believe me, that’s not what I am talking about).
Let me recount an anecdote to you. And while I am at it, you are at liberty to opine whether I am blowing my lungs out in the big loud trumpet that I possess, or that I am speaking of this as a mere example. While I have given you the liberty to opine either way (Freedom of Thought, enshrined in the Preamble, as my enthusiastic Constitutional Law Professor would have added at this point), I shall also give myself the liberty of clarifying that it is the latter.
It was a squirrel that carried the message of our extreme, profound idiocy over all of Law School the other day. Yes, a tiny squirrel that turned into a big reason for everyone to laugh over. If you know the background, you might catch the pun. But since you don’t, let me tell you that squirrel is a part of a definition challenge in Parliamentary Debating, wherein the Opposition rejects the definition of the motion put forth by the Proposition, claiming, plain and simple, illogicality.
Fortunate are those debators who encounter a definition challenge. Careers in debating have spanned without being witness to a single definition challnge, let alone be a part of it. The best debators in our college have seen at the most only one. The seasoned, international adjudicator, who has adjudged over hundreds of debates has also seen only one. Should it take any effort on my part to tell you the fortune that we possess for being part of such a rare and historic event right at the beginning of something that cannot even be called a career yet, but merely a few experiences here and there?
You get the point. We were the junior-most batch, against the senior-most batch. And needledd to say, we lost. But we were cool about it (allow me to recount the only consolation), as I have repeated over and over again, in efforts to salvage the sheer stupidity on our part. One of the speakers on the opposite side said that if we could prove that murder is equal to death penalty, then our definition would stand and they would gladly concede defeat. So this is what I say: what is the State ultimately doing when it awards someone a death penalty? Through the death penalty, it murders the person. Thus, murder = death penalty. So there. That didn’t win us the debate (we never expected it to), but that did win us a few bangs on the table.
What ensued were snide jokes over ‘definitions’ and ‘first years, please clarify’ all the next day, before the next round of debate. This spilled over even during the debate: the obvious contempt and amusement on the faces of our opponent were hard to ignore. “We accept their definition,” was their opening line. Somehow, through the course of the debate, the smugness slowly melted away, into anxiety over the course of the debate.
We had defeated a senior time. The smugness had paid its price. The underdog had risen. The laity had bowed.
It was quite a sociological study how their attitude changed post-debate. The “we will slaughter them”, “they have no chance”, was replaced by “dude, you guys are really good. We were nothing like this in our first year”, “dude, I am really sorry”, (handshake) (another there).
Yes, it felt good to win. Yes, it felt good to make the upset we were traditionally expected to make. But it felt best to turn the tables over, to rise like the phoenix. Okay, maybe I am overdoing it. But I notice such stuff. And I did this time too- how everyone reacted to us differently after the debate. And it felt good to prove everyone wrong. It felt good to prove myself wrong too. But that’s a different matter.
Surprisingly, the obvious-contempt-turned-awe in the seniors did not arouse acerbity in me. Somehow, after yesterday, I too perceive them in a different light, one emitting from respect. I don’t have an explanation to that. All I can say is that I feel proud in proving that we might not be pros like the others, but we’re not a useless bunch of first years making a fool of ourselves either. I feel proud in feeling not hatred or contempt over the others, but more respect than I used to. It’s not like we’re brilliant debaters, but it feels good to win this acknowledgement from those who are, as also from those who had signed us off.