Which Drug Are You On?

12:39 AM Mystery , Our World 0 Comments

                 Every-day after work, Sahil has to take a bus back home. The ride is usually an hour long which makes Sahil very choosy about his seat. Mostly, he takes the window. The cool breeze and the scenery of the bucolic Maldivian beaches gives him a good feeling. He also has his earphones on most of the time "Music helps me relax" he says.

                Sahil rarely talks to anyone on the bus. The passenger sitting beside him might sometimes get Sahil speak a line or two, usually generic bus-travel questions like "Which stop comes next?" or "Is this my stop?". But mostly, Sahil is mute, talking to himself and lost in his own thoughts. Standing for long hours and answering dull questions posed by customers is a regular part of his job. By the time his 10 hr shift elapses, Sahil's feet are throbbing with pain and his energy is fully drained. His mundane and dull job saps the life out of him and makes him feel trapped. Sometimes he wishes how he could just get on a plane to Kashmir and enjoy the beauty of the Himalayas, or go explore jungles of Amazon, or go diving at the coral reef in Australia. But the reality is that Sahil has grown tired of his life, he has no hope of finding a better job.

                 Right now he's listening to a song named "Viva la Vida" by Coldplay, a popular English band. The deep bass combined with Chris martin's piano has got his heart racing. The tempo of the song and the perfectly synced guitar chords have got his feet tapping, all-in-all Sahil's insides are crying out loud, forcing him to wave his hands around and dance to the tune. Perhaps if this were a night-club or a party he would have given in to his urge, danced and hopped a little.

                Plugging in the earphones made Sahil's mood go from 'fed-up with life' to 'I feel awesome!'. The transition taking not more than a few seconds to complete. In the recesses of his imagination he went from being trapped in a cage to flying free like a bird, able to go anywhere he wants. The song gave him a strange feeling of happiness and achievement, it made him feel special, it made him feel really good about himself, right now Sahil is something he never could be for even a minute while working at the supermarket, he is Euphoric!

                 In another time zone, 3000 miles away in the great city of Moscow lives a boy named Dmitry who is the same age as Sahil. Dmitry works at a hotel as a cleaner and waiter and earns 500 rubels a day, which roughly equals 8 dollars. Although the pay is nowhere commensurate with the arduous 14 hr shifts he works but, the times are bad in Russia. In his village, Dmitry is considered as a well-to-do teen who has managed to support himself, unlike the scores of other boys his age who idle away time still 'looking for a job'. 

                 Dmitry's job is tedious and stressful. At the end of the day, all he wants to do is lay down and go to sleep. But he's got these worries in his head that prevent him from doing so, “Times are bad, I wonder if I can keep my job for long?", "The money I earn is very little, how will I ever manage to have a good life?", "My life's getting boring and dull, I feel like a prisoner in this world!"

                These are some of the questions Dmitry has a hard time answering. But living in the big city has exposed him to a few interesting things. One of which was a 'white crystal' that can make all your worries disappear. Or as one of his co-workers more elegantly describes 'Makes you experience Nirvana'. Dmitry tried it once, regretted it later. But something drew him towards it, a longing for the bliss he felt and thus, he tried it once more and since then Dmitry became a meth addict. He has been so for the last couple of months.

                Smoking meth makes Dmitry's mood go from 'fed-up with life' to 'I feel awesome!' . In the recesses of his imagination he goes from being trapped in a cage to flying free like a bird, able to go anywhere he wants. Meth gives him a strange feeling of happiness and achievement, it makes him feel special, it makes him feel really good about himself, right now Dmitry is something he never could be for even a minute while working at the hotel, he is high, and he is Euphoric!

                 I think you almost got the point I’m hoping to make with this story. The point is that music is similar to drugs. Although there is little congruence in the effects of Drugs and Music has on your body and mind, there is definitely a lot of similarity. The same analogy could be applied to Alcohol, Movies, Sitcoms and TV shows, video games, etc.

               All these things have the power to make you go away from reality, albeit for a short amount of time. But in that time-span, they make you feel something that doesn't really exist. Is this good or bad? You be the judge, this is just food for thought. And also something I felt I should write a 900 word long blog-post about!