That's all that matters
I don’t remember the first time I wrote something. People used to say they liked my scribbles. They would encourage me. I tell you, it feels good to be encouraged when you are a novice. There is a fear of ridicule you know, what if people think its rubbish? That would break my heart; I might not even have the courage to pick up the pen again! I have bad ideas, I would think. Sometimes my sister had to write an essay for school, I would help her out with it. Or if there was a recitation contest, my friends would quote Coleridge or 'Niraj', I would make up something of my own. It didn’t matter if I won, but it would atleast say ‘self composed’, and I loved it.
Today I write pretty often. Sometimes they love it, sometimes they don’t, so I guess they no longer matter. Believe me when I say this, but it is demanding. Ideas don’t come everyday. Sometimes they elude me for long, as if they are teasing me. It can be frustrating, the mind seems to have blocked, and days go passing by, sheets of paper, cups of coffee. I don’t want to be part of the rut; I want to create something new, something I would be proud of. It’s not easy, sometimes I have to literally drag myself to pick up the pen, force myself to think, think hard. Random thoughts would keep hitting the head, a chaos, disoriented, mystifying. Suddenly, somewhere in that chaos a pattern begins to emerge; maybe on the desk, maybe walking on the street, maybe in the loo or maybe while eating lunch. And then an adrenaline rush, like a dam has been let open with water gushing on all sides, leapfrogging into the senses. The mind goes numb; it’s in a state of matter unknown to man, as that hour of creation arrives. Its getting shape, the artist works on, diligently, passionately, unaware of the world around him.
And finally, after a single stroke or countless emendations, he simply steps back, takes another look, smiles and says: WOW, this is my work, and that’s all that matters.
