At any given moment I cross a thousand lines, a million moralities, a billion norms. If anyone were to ever take a hike inside my mind at any moment they would judge me, try me and finally crucify me. If they were to take that journey within their own minds, they would deny, they would lobotomize, they would hide themselves from those sinful thoughts that generate on their own, and most of them, poof, disappear moments later, maybe for lack of encouragement or scope of practicality.
I thought the other day of making love to this colleague of mine. All she did was bite her full swollen lips in a particular way (which she does when she is considering something) and when she turned her breasts were straining against her dress in a way the threads gave way to the shape of the nipple. Just a moment, a miniscule moment; in real time a few seconds and in my mind a few more, but I crossed the line. In reality I told her, you could come to me whenever you need.
A friend of mine looked remorse and sad. After a lot of probing— you know how you have to sometimes coax and cajole to get people’s secret out which they are dying to share but wait for ritual before they do— he told me with overpowering sadness in his voice that he had broken off with his girlfriend. Immediately I felt happy and thought, oh finally, she is available. In reality I told him, I think everything happens for a purpose and I am sure you will find your true soul mate.
A relation of mine was sitting on the bed and as she stooped down to pick up a fallen article her breasts dangled free in those precious few moments before she sat up. I was thinking within those precious few moments of holding her breathing breast in my hand dancing to a swaying music. In reality I said, the other day at the party that prick was ogling at your breasts like crazy.
I think we all have these thoughts of sinner. They are pernicious, they are debasing, but they are delicious. I think we all have these crossings but we once we cross we forget them, we move on feeling cleaner till the next nano-second. I am strange, and you are stranger. I collect them and keep the subplots alive; you hide them because you feel dirty. Though all of these wild musings happen within the protected and reserved forests of our mind, we still leave behind clues, no matter how like a skilful tiger we have tread the vegetation; a leaf trampled here, a twig broken there. If you notice all the things I actually said immediately after these occurrences, they had some connect to the liberty my mind had had taken. If you are thinking I am the devil you have got it, because you are a devil too. Hey, what line did you cross right now?
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4 comments:
there is a dr. jekyll and m s/r hyde in all of us. some of us, like you and me are aware of it and we wear it like our second skin as is meant to be. the others swirl around in denial. we dont cross the line. they do.
you are bang on. about crossing the line; am reading step across the line, a collection of essays by salman rushdie. great stuff!
I know you so well, and I wonder if you'll ever share the seventy thousand stories that you didn't mention here. I know this because I have the same scenarios, play out the same little dramas in my head, those labyrinthine what-ifs and my dirty little wants, even when they capitalize on someone else's bitter loss. I guess this is what makes us admen, that we're evil like this and we admit to it so freely. We have no shame, but releasing ourselves from shame gives us a new sense of heightened morality, because we don't make judgments before we see the drama play out in our own heads and know that we, too, have desired, we too lick our lips in anticipations never to be.
Good words.
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