Optimistic Fractions

Because I have nothing to say, I will just resort to blogging profound-at-the-time conversations with friends.

Me, on hearing of the break-up of a couple I'd been fond of: I don't like the world.
Doobie: But this is only a fraction of the world! There's more to it which you will like, however small that fraction is. ^_^ And you will love it and it will keep you going. ^_^
Me: And what fraction is that?

Doobie: Depends on what your expectations of the world are. Everybody has their own fraction. ^_^
Me: Wow, you're on an optimistic roll.
Doobie: But I do believe that.
Me: It's a beautiful thought. I will also believe in it. I will, in fact, blog about it.
Doobie: GIVE ME CREDITS!! I AM WISE AND PEOPLE NEED TO RECOGNIZE THAT!



~Sam

Hate and Love

Hate. It's such a strong word, isn't it? So much stronger than love. Think of Hitler. Think of aggression, of wrath, of the violent father's fury, of seething jealousy. Think of anger, of a human scorned, think of sore egos and nurtured scores. Think of the storm, wiping everything in its path. How could anything withstand the forceful tsunami of hate?

Then think of love. Think of the boy in the striped pyjamas. Think of childhood, think of innocence, of forgiveness and acceptance, of a mother's healing hand, of embracing the good in others and in yourself. Think of trust, of wounds healed and scars faded, of the waves washing all that is ill and all that is good into the past and leaving clean sand. Rejuvenating, regenerating, rebirthing. A renaissance. Think of second chances and a stranger's smile. Think of the birds rebuilding, think of the bud peeping through after everything has been wiped out. How could anything resist the gentle persuasion of love?

~Sam

Transient Beauty

"I havent seen you in ages
Sometimes I find myself
Wondering where you are
For me you'll always be eighteen
And beautiful
And dancin away with my heart."
-Dancing Away With My Heart, Lady Antebellum

Human relationships are all so bittersweet, no? All moments in human life, in general, actually. And since life mostly consists of relationships...

I mean. Everything passes. That's an unalterable fact. The person may stay (though they usually don't, stupid globalisation), but that one beautiful moment will pass. There will be more moments, but not that one. Memories capture them to some extent, but that just adds to the bittersweetness of the whole experience, of all experience. Transience adds value-short lived things are the most treasured, shooting stars the most loved- but it also makes your heart hurt.

And you don't want things to be permanent, even when you do, because they won't be the same if they don't pass. Like in Shrek 3. Even the most perfect day lived over and over again can become imperfect. And I guess it's better to have a short, beautiful experience, than to make it stretch and ruin it.

But how do you stop wanting it to last forever? How do you make your heart understand that it's better this way, that life is a collection of sweet moments, not sweet forevers, that leaving some joys behind makes way for new ones, that farewells make way for reunions?

~Sam

With regard to the third panel.

I do not want my life to be this.
I do not want my life to be counting calories, running miles.
I do not want my life to be answering to society, fulfilling strangers' expectations.
I do not want my life to be defensive, answering questions from those who don't deserve to ask them.
I do not want my life to be routine.
I do not want my life to be worried.
I do not want my life to be unhappy.

Yes, I will do all of those things, sometimes. Most times.
But I do not want my life to be just that.

I want to eat a cupcake, five cupcakes, without thinking about the consequences to my thighs.
I want to tell someone to fuck off when they ask me why I'm doing things so strangely. People who ask through looks and smirks, who have not the courage to use their words. Because if they had the courage to ask, they would have the sense not to want to.
I want to get up and fly to Paris, simply because.
I want to smile at the old man with his little dog, whom he used to let me pet back in seventh grade, without thinking that he's a kidnapper.
I want to laugh off getting fired and immerse myself in a book. Jump into an inviting pool fully clothed. Run down the street to hug my love.
I want..to live.

~Sam

I'm not even sure why we have viewers anymore (if we do).

Hi, it's time for the normal spiel again, i.e., it has been a long while and I am in no position to write something deep or coherent [shit loads of work left, and a friend is making the strangest noises as she experiences Confessions of a Shopaholic-the movie, not the book-for the first time]. So here is a bunch of things I've thought since the last time I blogged, in no particular order.


Loving is giving more, and getting more than you'd ever imagined you could or would.

Beginnings and endings are so special to us, to all of us, as a race. One rarely comments about the beauty of the sun at high noon-it's always a sunrise or a sunset that wells the heart. Maybe because they actually are more beautiful, but the same can be said about births and deaths, which have a way of bringing us together in a way that most occasions don't. We celebrate birthdays every year, a symbol of a beginning; we celebrate weddings and moving and retirements and farewells, because they're a new beginning, and an ending.


Not yet.
Not yet decided,
Not yet written.
Not yet a star,
Not yet a somebody.



Putting something into words is such a big deal. It imparts such a sense of certainty. Permanence. Words are so..lasting.



I am intensely fascinated by bruises, both metaphorical and literal.



Epiphany of the week: I've realized that I actually have hope for the human race, despite all our contradictions and our wars and our stupid silly quarrels and our egos and our occasional insipidity. Despite our Hitlers and our Idi Amins. Because we still have Schindlers, so many Schindlers that we don't even know their names. Friends, lovers. Who sacrifice for us, even if it is something as simple as staying up all night just to let us rant. And despite what Ayn Rand may have preached, I still do believe that to sacrifice for someone is the greatest thing you can do for them, and, in the right situations, for yourself.


~Sam

Too much

Sometimes, I think having too much of something turns out worse than having too little. Being too smart, too rich. The ones with average insight, the poorer ones, their lives are so much simpler. When you're happy, satisfied, content with just the bare essentials. When a tiny step forward is a giant leap. Much as I hate Economics, I do see the whole decreasing marginal utility principle applying in my life: the tenth slice of chocolate cake is not half as tasty as that first bite. And while you still might keep eating it because the basic aim of our lives is to get more, and more-you've already crossed your optimum level of happiness.
But you can't not want more. You can't..regress..to ignorance, to poverty. Nor can you really keep still: once you begin, you always hunger for more, even as you move from necessity to indulgence to gluttony. From need to contentment to a constant dissatisfaction.

I just can't

The worst thing is not that the apocalypse hasn't happened.
The worst thing is the sheer number of people that want it to happen.

~Sam

The tragedy of adulthood.

"...only a few days separate their meeting and their deaths. We can see the play, then, as a tragedy about time, and how little there is of it, and also about youth, how we assign passionate importance to things and people when we're young because we don't have the breath of experience to behave more moderately-which is maybe the tragedy of adulthood."

"As Harry Granville Parker puts it, Romeo and Juliet is a tragedy of youth as youth sees it. If you're young or have ever been young you know what it's like to be pulled in many different directions as you try to discern whether feelings that are brand new to you are more like flashes of lightening or an eternal ocean. And you know what it's like to live fully and fearlessly and maybe even a little foolishly and the occasionally tragic thing is that you are just grown up enough for that kind of thinking to get you killed."

"But the universe will not bend to them, or to anyone. No matter how real your love, you can't avoid fate, and you can't alter time..Romeo and Juliet's hubris in believing they can change the world leads to their demise."
-John Green, on Romeo and Juliet.



Why does every word out of the man's mouth ring so true to me?
Both Shakespeare and John Green.

~Sam

December

As of now, my most favorite month of the year is December. Because the weather. And because it's the ending, and the time for reflection and retrospection and introspection and bonding and talking and loving and hugging. And cuddling and warmth and soup and bread. And because it's a sign that we're alive, and things are moving, maybe not where and how we want them to, but moving. And changing. Breathing.

There's just so much to December.

~Sam

Writer's envy, writer's dream.

That awful feeling.
When all you want to say, has already been said.
Said better than you could ever have said it.
Thought better than you could ever have thought.
Put better than you could ever have put.

When you wish you had been born earlier.
That you had spoken, written, thought, put faster.

And that feeling.
When what has been said, becomes what you wanted to say.
What has been thought, what you wanted to think.
What has been written, what you wanted to write.

When you wish that what you love had been yours.
Yours before you had read it, heard it, seen it.
That you had written it, thought it, felt it.
That you had brought it into the world.
That you owned it, because you had said it.


And then that feeling.
When you step back, and you look, and you admire, and you accept that it isn't yours.
And you love it all the more because it isn't.
And you strive all the more because it isn't.
And you hope-just hope-that one day.
One day, you can go from envying, to envied.
From loving, to loved.
From yearning, to yearned for.
From taking, to giving.
And that you can contribute, you can contribute, something, however little, to that brilliance out there.
That you can be on the other side.
The writer's side.


~Sam 

Looking out the library window.

Crows wheel around the sky,
dull, wet clouds inch by-
the tired trite toll of time.

The spokes of the fans rotate,
the race of tapping fingers escalates-
it is already nearly too late.

Figures hunch over every bench,
tired, like soldiers in a trench-
with knowledge, each trying itself to drench.

Voices are hushed,
footsteps rushed-
silence lurks in the carpets lush.

For there is work to be done,
and all else shall be shunned-
until it is time again for joy's return.

But it is not time yet for joy's return.



~Sam
It sucks, doesn't it?

The Necessities of Life As We Know It

• Food/water/meat/coke: For subsistence, and existence.
• Sleep: To make you want to wake up.
• firstname.lastname@gmail.com email id: Because everyone needs one.
• Facebook: To pass that extra time that you inevitably find, no matter how busy you are.
• A celebrity love: To obsess over when all seems lost.
• Chocolate: To make it worthwhile.
• Trees: Because there's no poem as pretty as a tree.
• Air: Because our cells like it.
• A friend to bitch/rant with/at: Because bottling in is Bad.
• Love: For life.
• Music: To erase the noise.
• Books: To cleanse your mind, eyes and heart.
• Drama: To liven things up.
• A soft bed: To languish in.
• Sales: To make you happy without making you broke.
• Hugs: Because we all need someone to hold on to.

~Sam 

Random world, random rules, random ramblings.

Don't take candy from strangers, they say, strangers who might just be innocent, kind-hearted, idiotic people who find you cute and want to share their extra chocolate with you.

Be serious, they say. Be mature. Act your age. Why? Maturity is so overrated. The more mature you are, the sadder. And boring-er. So stay immature, stay awesome. Look at the fun side, and enjoy life.


In other news.

Why does water make everything so much more awesome? Mere glasses become time-traveller-looking swimming goggles. Slides become water slides. Holes in the ground become those amazing, extraordinary things that only a person completely deprived of creativity would have named a swimming pool. Air filled pieces of rubber become water balloons (so much awesomer than normal balloons). Air becomes rain.

I love H20.





~Sam

Just another apology (and a reblog, sort of).

Yeah, we suck, we're sorry. We have no excuse either, except..did you know, if you reach far enough and fast enough, you can actually see the temple being built around you in Temple Run? =O

Anyway, this is a beautiful poem by a beautiful friend of mine that I came across the other day. One of the best I've ever read. Do feel free to comment if you enjoyed it.



Do you know this feeling? 
When you're sitting in your balcony, 
Watching the first rain,
Alone.
(But not alone.
Not really. 
The whole universe is watching this sight with you.) 
And you are the perfect degree of wetness. 
Just enough for the cool wind blowing,
To feel icy-cold,
Not enough to go inside and write a poem.
And the raindrops dance in these intricate patterns,
And you think of surface tension,
(And perhaps, if you're particularly poetic,
You think of the tension between human beings.)
And you see the lightning,
And you think of love and how ruin is so beautiful,
And you think about how fast the clouds are fleeing,
And you know they are going where you are,
Away.
(But they aren't, really.
They have to go north and you are going south,
Because we all of us can go only to the place,
Where we are meant to be.)
And if your new hair cut can't survive this deluge,
You don't really care,
You sit there anyway.
Because you know that feeling,
Of watching the first rain,
On a June evening,
From your balcony,
Alone,
(But not alone)
And the perfect degree of wetness.


~My dear friend Sakhi. 






~Sam

Because it's lovely.

I'd kill to be able to write like that.

"If I should have a daughter, instead of "Mom," she's gonna call me "Point B," because that way she knows that no matter what happens, at least she can always find her way to me. And I'm going to paint solar systems on the backs of her hands so she has to learn the entire universe before she can say, "Oh, I know that like the back of my hand." And she's going to learn that this life will hit you hard in the face, wait for you to get back up just so it can kick you in the stomach. But getting the wind knocked out of you is the only way to remind your lungs how much they like the taste of air. There is hurt, here, that cannot be fixed by Band-Aids or poetry. So the first time she realizes that Wonder Woman isn't coming, I'll make sure she knows she doesn't have to wear the cape all by herself because no matter how wide you stretch your fingers, your hands will always be too small to catch all the pain you want to heal. Believe me, I've tried. "And, baby," I'll tell her, don't keep your nose up in the air like that. I know that trick; I've done it a million times. You're just smelling for smoke so you can follow the trail back to a burning house, so you can find the boy who lost everything in the fire to see if you can save him. Or else find the boy who lit the fire in the first place, to see if you can change him." But I know she will anyway, so instead I'll always keep an extra supply of chocolate and rain boots nearby, because there is no heartbreak that chocolate can't fix. Okay, there's a few heartbreaks that chocolate can't fix. But that's what the rain boots are for, because rain will wash away everything, if you let it. I want her to look at the world through the underside of a glass-bottom boat, to look through a microscope at the galaxies that exist on the pinpoint of a human mind, because that's the way my mom taught me. That there'll be days like this. ♫ There'll be days like this, my momma said. ♫ When you open your hands to catch and wind up with only blisters and bruises; when you step out of the phone booth and try to fly and the very people you want to save are the ones standing on your cape; when your boots will fill with rain, and you'll be up to your knees in disappointment. And those are the very days you have all the more reason to say thank you. Because there's nothing more beautiful than the way the ocean refuses to stop kissing the shoreline, no matter how many times it's sent away. You will put the wind in winsome, lose some. You will put the star in starting over, and over. And no matter how many land mines erupt in a minute, be sure your mind lands on the beauty of this funny place called life. And yes, on a scale from one to over-trusting, I am pretty damn naive. But I want her to know that this world is made out of sugar. It can crumble so easily, but don't be afraid to stick your tongue out and taste it. "Baby," I'll tell her, "remember, your momma is a worrier, and your poppa is a warrior, and you are the girl with small hands and big eyes who never stops asking for more." Remember that good things come in threes and so do bad things. And always apologize when you've done something wrong, but don't you ever apologize for the way your eyes refuse to stop shining. Your voice is small, but don't ever stop singing. And when they finally hand you heartache, when they slip war and hatred under your door and offer you handouts on street-corners of cynicism and defeat, you tell them that they really ought to meet your mother.

Thank you. Thank you.

(Applause)

Thank you.

(Applause)

Thanks.

(Applause)

Thank you.

(Applause)"

-Sarah Kay

~Sam

Reblogs

I've come across a lot of deep stuff the past few days. Very enlightening, very hope-giving. Here's some of it:

From: wonderingsince1993.tumblr.com

Wishing

Do you know that feeling when you wish and dream and hope and desire for something so much that you feel like it’s slowly killing you from the inside? When every great thing that happens in your life does not seem great enough? When you feel a void in your life even when you’re on your feet and your hands are full 24/7?
Do you know that feeling when no matter how perfect people perceive your life to be,your mind keeps thinking “All that glitters is not gold” in a loop? When you’re convinced that the life you want will never be the life you get? When the sky is ablaze with beauteous sunlight but all you notice is the vexing heat? When no amount of comedy sitcoms are able to make you laugh?
Do you know that feeling when the one person you are willing go to the end of the world-to the end of time itself-for is the one person whose identity is withheld from you by destiny? Or when you’re convinced you have found the one you’re meant to spend the rest of you life with but that person is completely oblivious to your existence? When you’ve realised that the opposite of love is not hatred,it’s indifference? When all you wish for is to be noticed just once? When all you wish for is just a second look? When all you wish for is one chance?
Do you?

The Spirit

What is essential for the survival of a man is an indomitable spirit.
Ever since I can remember,I’ve been this kind of girl who randomly stares off into space and people would ask me what I was thinking or worrying or dreaming about. Well for the most part I just dream about what I’m going to do when I starting earning my own money and the exotic places I’m going to visit and the guy I’m going to fall in love with. Up until a while back,I was convinced that my dreams would just remain that-dreams. Every grand plan that I made was always suffixed with “As if that’s ever going to happen.” First,I just wrote off everything to destiny and convinced myself that if something is meant to happen,it will. Then,as time went by,I convinced myself that none of my dreams  are ever going to come true and signed it all off to reality.
Then,an epiphany happened. One night I was helping my mom out with dinner and I just thought aloud,”I want to see London someday.” And she replied,with a snort of derision,”Get real. If something has to happen,it will. That’s when realised. I thought to myself,”Who is my mom to say that it’s not going to happen? Who is ANYBODY to say that it’s not going to happen?”
I accepted the fact that I don’t know what’s going to happen tomorrow. And neither does anyone else. “Realistic” people are convinced that everything that has been or has not been happening will remain unchanged and that dreaming only leads to disappointment. But then what kind of living is that?
I want to travel the world. It’s too big for me to not go wandering around in it. And I’m the only one who can help me in fulfilling my dream. Who is to say that I won’t? And even if someone does,I have to uphold my conviction that I can do whatever I want with my life. I have to make my own destiny. And ever since I’ve realised that,the future seems like a brighter place. To keep it that way,I have to turn a deaf ear to the people who say that I can’t and preserve my indomitable spirit.

From: Anonymous


The truth is, average people aren't happy. Look at it this way.

What do you do with a life? You think, you do, you feel.

What makes a person average? Average thinking, average doing, average feeling.

These people are not happy, because they are average.

They care about things that only immediately affect them, they don't think with effort.
They don't do the things they want to do, they are afraid,
Their emotions are average too.

They will love, but their love will be selfish, it will be for comfort, for shelter, from all the things that they are afraid of, from all the things that will affect them because of their lack of wisdom.

They will be loved for the same reasons too. Because love requires understanding, and only another average person will understand them.

Wouldn't you rather be someone who thinks harder? Not only about the things that are, but things that will be. Things that will not only affect you, but also others around you. 

Wouldn't you rather be someone who has ambition? Not only to do the things that you have to do, but want to do. Things that will not only help you, but also others around you.

Wouldn't you rather love someone to share your hopes and dreams with, and help each other in achieving them, or indeed achieving them together? And not because they want someone to comfort and shelter them, so that they can feel okay? The same way you would have wanted if you were average.

Oh, and ignorance is not bliss. 
Ignorance is having an infatuation with the star cheerleader in school because you don't know about the absolute angel who lives down the street. 
It's Transformers 3 being your favourite movie because you didn't know about Inception.
It's being preoccupied with movies and seeking attention from the cheerleader when nations are corrupt, and constantly at war. 
It's about thinking these problems are important because you didn't know about Anthropogenic Global Warming.

Ignorance will almost certainly be the reason that you deprived yourself of life’s greatest pleasures and indulged in stupid, trivial things that come at a great cost, for your whole life. And it will also certainly lead to your ruin.

If a little logic and reasoning is utilised, the fact that striving to be more and knowledge/wisdom are very much intertwined, becomes clear. 



~Sam

Birdies in the sky.

If I ever got a tattoo, I think I'd get one of a bird, simply because they symbolize so much-both as an inspiration, and as a caution. [Update: As of now, my tattoo status is this: Never getting one, because pain, and AIDS, and permanence, and deciding, and ew, but hypothetically, I'd get a trio of a nightingale, a mockingbird, and a bluejay circling on the part where my wrist meets my palm.]

Love. Fragility. Strength. Perseverance. Peace. Determination. Beauty. Sharing. Togetherness. Simplicity. Belief. Innocence. Naivete.

There's just so much to learn from birds. How to overcome, everything. Rebuild, again, and again, and again. Migrate, again, and again, and again. Love, live, lay.  I sat in my garden today and just watched them. There was a little water on the ground, waste water, left over from when the garden had been watered. They'd creep in, in twos or threes, always in pairs-a bird was never alone for long, even if it came down alone. Some would drink, taking a sip and then looking all around, bobbing their little heads, looking out for danger. Some seemed to be bathing, sinking their upper bodies into the water, then shivering violently to get rid of the droplets, and flying away to perch on a tree, preening. Then again, they'd hop down, repeat the same procedure over and over again, four of them, in a little puddle of water, completely ignoring the little birdbath kept near the tree for their leisure.

Until I looked up once and they were gone.

It would be cliched to say I learned so much from that half an hour's experience, and also false, because I didn't learn anything new. Everything which was to be said about birds, has already been said. We've all thought about being them, and they've been the muses of poets for decades.I even have an unfinished post sitting in my own drafts box, entitled "This is me thinking about being a bird."

And yet, this post.


I would want to be a bird, for their freedom, for their togetherness, for their innocence and for their simplicity, everything I mentioned above. I wouldn't want to be a bird, for their life, for their dangers, for every moment fraught with risk, for their misplaced innocence--sit still for long enough, and a bird will fly its way right into your hand, to be crushed, destroyed, or frightened away.

Birds, butterflies-they were not made for this world, like flies were, or humans. And yet they survive, and they show us how to survive. A tiny, tiny little creature, inquisitive, daring, bright, beautiful--showing us the way of life. And, perhaps, its meaning.



~Sam

This is how our baby was born.

"Baby" obviously referring to this esteemed blog that you're looking at right now.

So if you've ever wondered how a Grammar Nazi and a chick who hates proofreading landed up writing a blog together, wonder no more! For this is how it happened:
Malko: You should listen to Breakeven.
Me: By?
Malko: The Script.
*some sort of confusion*
Malko: YOU'VE NEVER HEARD THE SCRIPT BEFORE?
Me: Of course I have! You're the one who introduced me to them!
Malko: Oh yeah. Of course. I'm awesome. XD *after a moment* You're awesome, too. Webeawesome.
Me: webeawesome! @hotmail.com. Future email id for queries about our awesome bestseller book.
Malko: Yeah! OR...we could blog! WE SHOULD TOTALLY BLOG!
Me: YES! Yes yes yes yes YES!

Fin. (Because that's so much better than "The End").



And if you ever wondered how a Grammar Nazi and a depressed emo chick became friends in the first place: Thus is the combined power of facebook and Dan Bergstein.


And yes, this is the totally awesome 100th post we promised you guys. Totally anticlimactic, right? *looks vaguely apologetic*



~Sam

Its funny how precious every moment becomes when you realize they're limited.

Wow. I sound like I just found out I was going to die or something. Well, I didn't. Though I would like to. I mean, I would like to know when would die. Not that I was going to.

Anyway.

 Its weird, but despite everyone knowing that we're going to die some day, death is always unexpected. Its like the elephant in the room. I remember wondering how Brutus could be so calm on hearing of his wife's death in Julius Caesar. I think I understand now, what he meant when he said that by meditating upon her death, i.e., by understanding that one day she would die, he has found it easier to accept her death. No way have I reached that level of maturity yet, to be able practice that, but I do understand now, and I don't find him such a heartless jerk any more, which is an improvement I suppose. I just..I wish we knew when we were going to die. A cancer patient gets a prognosis, but spends her life miserable at the thought of death. If I knew when I was going to die, I wouldn't waste it being unhappy. I would do my best to enjoy what time I had, to live every moment to the fullest. To just live. That's what I meant by the title-at the endings, the farewells, the close of the chapters, the last days, that's when we begin to treasure every moment. Why? Why must we not care about something until its about to run out? I'm not just talking about life here, this goes everything from pie to oil. Why can't we treasure what we do have just as much as what we're about to lose? Why is the girl who plays hard to get more appealing than the best friend? Why are we so stupid? 




I just feel that if we had as much respect for life as we do for death, the world would be a much happier place.


~Sam. 

Why Freedom is a Myth

I wrote this for something else, but I have't updated in a long time, so here you go. 

Liberty, equality and fraternity.  Perhaps one of the most famous phrases of our times, these ideals were to be granted to all in the Utopian world imagined by the French Revolutionaries.  Unfortunately, the world today is no utopia. Let’s take just the first of these great ideals for now-liberty. Freedom. Independence. We may have won the latter years ago, but mankind in general is yet to attain the former, at least according to me. Freedom is a wonderful ideal, but in the end, that’s all it is. An ideal. A myth. A dream. An unattainable dream. Having to finish that presentation for work when you don't really give a damn about what you're talking about. Having to study for that test tomorrow when all you want to do is sleep. Having to smile, and talk to that lady when you’re bored out of your mind. Having to choose a career, a stream of study, anything because that is what pays, and that is what “society” respects and expects. Having to think five times before buying that pretty diamond necklace. Having to pander to social mores when all you want to do is kick and scream and shout and scratch. Is this the liberty we all believe we have? Is this “the right and power to act, believe, or express oneself in a manner of one's own choosing", which is what thefreedictionary defines liberty as?  Is this freedom? To me, freedom is, more than anything, the gift of choice. The choice to do what you want, when you want and how you want; to live the way you want, and die the same way.  To not be tied down by responsibility, or work, or grades, or marks, or ties, or anything. To be free, of judgements and expectations; discontentment and distress; fear and facade. Unfortunately, that is, always has been and in all probability always will be, just a dream.

~Sam