Not so 'New'ton!

There have been times when I have wished that I could not anticipate my next step. Perhaps wish that my next step would be in Venice or Rome, but please please not back home. There is nothing to look forward to, nothing fancy that is going to happen. Every next step has the standard footing. You always step on solid land supporting all your mass. In Chennai, with lots of cows it might be a little different, but cumulatively speaking you can't really hope for something exciting out of your next step. That is why I love the concept of weightlessness. Now don't go classifying me under the list of geeky scientists who waited for fruits to fall on their heads so they could stumble on astounding phenomena. In my defence, it was sheer luck. I keep telling my parents that he was born earlier, at a time when 'It' was not found, and so when the apple fell, he just christened 'It' one tech-savvy name called 'Gravity' and bang, his showcase fills with awards and he becomes a scholar. Its fate, that's what it is.


Logically speaking, if I had taken birth back then, and say, a pomegranate fell on my head, I would have done the little math I knew and named it, well, say 'pomegravity'. See, I could do it too! He just jumped the gun, the lucky fella. Optimistic person that I am, I still sat under trees wondering if I could get a brainwave. Dogs chased me. No math there. I discovered this phenomenon called 'fear'. Now that I am part of the herd, I realized I should atleast bother to offend those great discoveries that eluded me. So I have always been bent on defying gravity. I've got everything that there is to go to outer space. Just that one thing, money. That's what went missing. So I'm still at home now.


Weightlessness is such a beautiful thing to experience. Imagine being at a place where your next step could be no step at all. Well, its like stepping on nothing. That nothing is not the literal nothing, it is, say nothingness, though there is no such word. See, its complicated. We'd have to get to physics and then you'll see how bad I am at it. No I don't think its worth the gamble. Think about having no mass to support you as you drop your foot on the ground. As in not ground, but yes, dropping it. Moving down like free-flow salt, feeling like paper, with everything zooming by, and nothing to step on, it must be an incredible feeling. I have always wanted to just get into an express elevator and like they show in all those action-flicks, bust the cable and fall down free. Weightless. Those few seconds are worth the death I tell you.


The sad part is, I live in Chennai and the tallest building, a meagre fourteen floored apartment was such a celebrated affair that they advertised for it all over the city. Eventually it became a residential complex, and as usual clothes came up to dry on the balcony rails. With buildings this tall, by the time the cable rips, you'd be R.I.P. To make things worse, lifts in Chennai are like aeroplanes. Children love going up and down in the elevator, and pressing the button is like free candy. They just keep running down flights of stairs, pressing the button, and rushing down again. Finally when I stop at the ground floor, I'd be monitoring a mini-creche, and two buttons would have come off the panel. Such an enriching experience. Oh, and that button-pressing thing - I used to be the fastest at that in sixth grade.


Its not practically viable, and I already got an earful for asking my dad for a luxury sedan. I don't think asking him for a time-capsule would sound very convincing. My space flight's become a far fetched wish now. I'm going to try weightlessness though. With my physique, the demands are that I starve for a month. If I do suvive the ordeal, I swear to God I'd be weightless. I hate to blame fate though. Damn you Newton!

-Supermur.