Maputila

Maputila, the tiny Pumpkin, the cutest pumpkin ever. Tiny, mini, miniature, and all yellow. 

And no, Maputila is a name I made up just because.   

(Image credit:www.crafthubs.com)

  

That Just-Perfect Angle: The Age of Images and Old Age

This piece is both a catharsis and an idle reflection: the former for the steaming orgy of grand delusions, and the latter for my fascination in things that comprise the former.

Circa 2005, The Morung Express: My first real mobile phone was a Sony Ericsson z700i. The device had a magical facility to it called 'camera.' The word "selfie" hadn't even reached the world then. The word 'Selfie' is believed first used or first used on the Internet by an Australian man Nathan Hope in 2002. The enterprising man posted an image of his hideously busted lips following a happy introduction to beer.

The word 'selfie' would invade our lives 6-7 years since. Anyhow, my colleague Sorei Mahong and I took what we know today in context as a selfie. Or a Twofie, whichever fits your butter.

Selfie: That first-person view of one’s self, fearfully doctored by profoundly embellished notions of goodness. Selfie: That intimate declaration of acceptance lovingly pacified by confident assurances of perfection–or the denial of imperfection.

Selfie: That just-perfect angle that balances the truth of every man as an island with the angry falsity that he’s the centre of the universe.

Selfie: A person’s deeply intimate meeting with own fantasies, when he looks into his own eyes.

Today, selfies and the art associated with them are anything but a novelty. They are virtually everywhere—delightful to the point of mild euphoria, ubiquitous to the point of noticeable fault, and tiresome to the point of overt insult.

I'd been thinking about that movement of hedonism and was talking with Momma about it the other day. The conversation stirred up this question:

One day I'll run out of youth, taut skin, and romance and fire, and reasons to make love with selfies. I'd have become old, wrinkly, and wearied.

Be assured that I'm not vetting our love—by delusion or by fact—for images. Therefore, let me be clear that I’m not denouncing our obsession with appearance. In fact, as awkward, ordinary, and insufferable as my face is (I have a small but successful acne business on it too!), I occasionally dip into a selfie or two too. A brisk calculation just might crunch a number of around 4-5 selfies to my credit since 2005!

Simply, this note is merely an attempt to express a contemplation to explain the difference that can be between

• Beauty as a fond reference that causes remembrance in people

Example: 'Naro was the queen of Facebook likes when she was young. Now at 40, she already looks like the behind of an asparagus gone gloriously wrong'

And

• Beauty as a token of legacy that causes fond remembrances in people.

Example: 'Naro was much loved in college because of her humility and compassionate work for the people. She is that beautiful even at 90!'

One day, we will fade into age—old, wrinkly, and wearied. We will have run out of good looks, youth, and out of selfies. How then would people remember you as: a beautiful person, or a person who was once beautiful? What they come to think of you will be beyond your control.

More importantly, how do you wish to determine the image people would remember you by? That is something you have control over. How? Simple: You can start with looking at people with the same eyes of beauty that you look at yourself.

And you’ll find that just-perfect angle. That just-perfect angle that will shape the face of your heart and life—and shape the eyes of people who look at you and your life. That just-perfect angle.

An Open Letter to cancerFighter, Braveheart Lamtsala Sangtam

Dear Lamtsa, 

I wish for a kinder circumstance, and for better words to come, and come even easier to say to you. There was a minute that I was writing these sentiments as a private mail to you after reading your status-update on Facebook. 

Then, there came this thought: perhaps offering this letter in the open would somehow carry the winds of your story to the people, friends and strangers alike; narrate to them a piece of your tale of courage, and plant lessons of faith wherever they fall, on arid creag beds and rich loam alike. 

Those wonderful lessons to serve to instruct our feeble lives with your warrior's self: she whose name was forged in the furnace to burn blessed meanings into our minds and hearts. 

Lessons from you about what it truely means to fight real battles, learn what it means to grin genuine grins in the face of a terrible, terrifyingly blind adversary, and learn what it means to be a true conqueror whose struggle opened eyes. 

Lessons from your fire through which each of us would grow to learn better about love, life, and other blessed mysteries so that they would come to burn fiercely throughout our lives—offering warmth in times of harsh cold and shining down comforting light in times of darkness. 

Lips and hearts in Nagaland and beyond are praying for you in acts, in faith, and in acts of faith. And here I am too as if worthiness clothes me. As inadequate as my person is, allow me to say these words to you: Knowing the kind of life and filth that I live, you should be the one praying for me that I would come to have the glorious faith you burn on, the bottomless strength you carry, and the melting cheer of indomitable hope that you shine out. 

Seeing the depth of goodness,  the strength and God in you, our hearts are broken in a new, wonderful and beautiful ways. Please then, break our hearts further! Please then, shatter them into a thousand pieces until we become beautiful again!

Frailty and failing are my person, and I feed on transgression and wear weakness for clothes. Even the slightest upheaval in my life troubles my knees and leaves my arms weak. 

But you, look at you. Look at you. I should be seeking your prayers instead—to live the way you live, to stand and fight the way you fight and grip God with the strength you grip Him—and how! 

Yet, if we seek the same grace and the faith that you have, it also means as much that our hearts stand with you—even if from a great distance we can only watch you fighting your soul-sapping fight. 

I cannot imagine what fortitude your loved ones, especially your parents, relatives, and your partner, Mhathung Odyuo, must be mustering every day. God bless their hearts. God bless their hearts. 

It is only so much we can say. It's only so much we can do. 

With embarrassment at my inadequacy and failings, and as if I were even a Christian by plain definition, I join the many true believers in Nagaland and beyond who are clawing at God for you. If the prayers of my faithless self even counts at all, even if my prayers flow from a mouth dripping with sin, please do know that your name is being spoken in my small prayers. 

Return in victory soon. 

God, life, healing, and every blessed mystery to you, Lamtsa. 

In Jesus Christ's wonderful name, Amen.