…was my refuge. I could crawl into the space between the notes and curl my back to loneliness.”

- Maya Angelou

“How vain it is to sit down to write when you have not stood up to live.”

- Thoreau

The man who walks alone without talking to himself is truly lonely.

….quiet secluded life in the country, with the possibility of being useful to people to whom it is easy to do good, and who are not accustomed to have it done to them; then work which one hopes may be of some use; then rest, nature, books, music, love for one’s neighbor….

- Tolstoy

Master | 19th July 2007 | Bombay

In 2007, you would have expected Jayjay to be happy. Everything seemed to have happened as any ordinary person would have liked it. He had a job. He stayed with friends in a small but comfortable lodging in Mumbai. The salary was good, and he had his bike. Jayjay even bought a fancy mobile phone, something he had never had before.

But something, evidently, was missing.

“I couldn’t sleep well at night anymore, “Jayjay reminiscences.”I just never got tired at all. I was too comfortable.”

The truth didn’t hit him like a thunderbolt. It accumulated on him till the weight of his depression was too hard to handle.

“Looking back, the fact that there was nothing specifically wrong made it worse,” Jayjay says, humbly.

“I have been injured or penniless, and you know what to do in times like that. But sometimes when your life’s cluttered you just can’t see the world the way you liked it.”

These days he is back into training. He’s jogging. He’s decided not to think of his job. He spends time on the ball. He gave away his phone to his friend Master, who was recovering from a knee injury.

The silence helps.

“Once you get started, once you find that you love this game, it’s easy to come back to it. Football forgives its wanderers,” Jayjay says, his interest in Gibran and Wordsworth showing through. “I think the best thing about this sport is how everyone loses their way at least once. It strengthens your love of the game. You don’t feel like losing it twice.”

These days Jayjay is back to being a fit 72 kgs. Slowly but surely, he’s scoring goals. He has scored 4 goals in 9 games for Malabar FC, but 3 of them in the last 4 games. That’s a definite sign of improvement.

And does he think of life after football? Jayjay smiles at the question. “It’s easier if you don’t think. Life’s much easier when you are running with the ball at your feet.” Life’s getting better for Jayjay. And for those of us, who have watched him play, know he’s getting better too.

Amen.

നീയും നിലാവും കാറ്റില്‍ സുഗന്ധവും ചഷകം നിറയെ മധുവും,
ദൂരെ നിന്നും ദൂത് വരും പോല്‍ മീര്‍ തകി മീറിന്‍ ഗസലും

…and what a time it was, it was
A time of innocence, a time of confidences
Long ago, it must be, I have a photograph
Preserve your memories, they’re all that’s left you

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breath a word about your loss…..

the song is over,

thought i’d something more to say..

And you wish you’d never taken that last detour sign
And you say to yourself just what am I doin’
On this road I’m walkin’, on this trail I’m turnin’
On this curve I’m hanging
On this pathway I’m strolling, in the space I’m taking
In this air I’m inhaling
Am I mixed up too much, am I mixed up too hard
Why am I walking, where am I running
What am I saying, what am I knowing
On this guitar I’m playing, on this banjo I’m frailin’
On this mandolin I’m strummin’, in the song I’m singin’
In the tune I’m hummin’, in the words I’m writin’
In the words that I’m thinkin’…

-Dylan (Last Thoughts on Woodie Guthrie)