چن کِتھاں گُزاری آئی رات وے
مینڈھا جی دلیلاں دے وات وے
Dearest! where did you spend the night?
My heart may need proofs to calm down.
Every rendition of this couplet is sad because the meaning is sad and the whole scenario is as dark as the night when reasoning is trying to hurt. But it’s too old and outdated. The world doesn’t work this way anymore.
Modern world is of IT, Google, and online profiles on different platforms of every other person. Close Interactions started from MSN messengers to poking on Orkut and went ahead to chatrooms to one-on-one chats to Skype videocalls to today where run-time locations are known. What can you do if the insignificant other is insignificant not just metaphorically?
Modern world has modern problems too. Digital blackmailing. Actual or edited pictures and videos. The mistake, which never felt like a mistake, becomes a life threat. A picture or a video can become a scandal and then you are needed to accept it and heal the insignificant other. Neither you committed the mistake, nor you had the fun, yet you have to carry the baggage. It’s a modern world of enlightenment and evolution and you need to have an open skull.
In old times, an ex would have been an ex. A mistake would have been a mistake. Past would have been a forgotten past.
Today, an ex is a connected ex on social media. A mistake is not a mistake but a surprise to cherish. Past is revived whenever a chance is there.
More exes. More connections. More chances. More fun. Sometimes, there are two exes in a single location. Cousins, close neighborhoods, and joint-family system stuff.
And more rendezvous. Which are not rendezvous but carefully crafted plans where you are left out strategically. You don’t know that. You may never know. You may remain stupid who cannot connect the dots – like stars in a dark night.
Now the final point: What if you know?
Nothing changes. Misery may enhance. Your curse to fate and destination may get abusive. Your anger and frustration may hurt yourself. And… nothing else. It is all part of fate which is planned, and you are just left out. Sometimes, you may get to know things directly from the insignificant other when threat looms; like digital blackmailing or surfacing of an archived picture or something. Then you are needed to carry the luggage and deliver it safely with honor, because it is the honor at stake. Apparently. Ironically, the honor never even existed; only you were unaware.
Anyway.
Just when you were running domestic errands, the insignificant other may have been in another world, igniting the passion of past. Because you are too boring like an old salad and everyone deserves a different platter occasionally. Right? Absolutely.
Truthfully writing, there is no significant other. It’s an illusion of an idea that hides, cheats, and creates an impression of a perfect being. This idea failed right on its inception. You are your own castle to stand and to defend. You are your own honor. Your honor!
P.S. just in case, the ‘Insignificant Other’ is you.
Thank you!