God was Murdered

I was raised in a relatively posh boarding school in the midst of the serene mountains of Dehradun, India. Barring washing my boxers, I did not have to do any chores & got everything I asked for. At age 17, I moved to Australia. My mother paid almost a ransom for a tuition fee for my college education. And till age 25, I kept burning money like I was crown prince. You know the funny thing is I doubtlessly believed that was real life. But, within three days of being back in India, I realized I had lived my life in a crystal bubble. Now, a decade later I know for dead certain that I was living in an elaborate bubble. I was a first class citizen in India for the first 17 years of my life. I was a first class citizen in the first world of Australia. Then India woke me up with a smug smile & a machine gun & massacred the shit outta my bubble. Here are the things I realized. I found that I was blind for 25 years. Not the eyes kind, the real kind. At first I thought I

I was nine. I didn’t know much. I knew when I bowled, batted, or stood in the field playing cricket, things were perfect. I didn’t consciously think they were perfect, but cricket  centred me like smoking hash & stealing babies centres a lot of people. Cricket was my daily orgasm in broad daylight during my summer holidays when the sun was out on a mission-to-kill everyone in May. Often, when I’d return home, my mother’s face didn’t like my orgasmic face. She’d scream ‘Four hours you were playing in the beating sun – who will take care of you when you get ill & turn black?’ I always stood there like an idiot & moments later rushed for the fridge for cold water. Now that I recall those moments, I realize I could relate to the first part of her tirade but not the latter. At age 9, I had been ill earlier & I knew I didn’t like it – and my mom had to take care of me & I couldn’t play cricket. Illness was the opposite of the orgasmic experience cricket gave