To whine is human, to ignore divine

HERE COMES MONSOON AND THERE BEGINS OUR NITPICKING AGAIN... ‘OH MY GOD!’

If it seems that I have misquoted a popular phrase, then pardon me, please. For to err is human, to forgive divine, and to tweak a ‘saying’ is the need of time. Backed by our constitutional right to the freedom of expression, we can grumble lawfully about almost everything. Be it encroachment upon our parking space, sluggish development, plummeting stocks, escalating corruption, or a tall figure’s fall from grace.

Being vocal may create awareness and positive change, personally or socially. But I bemoan that we are always complaining, almost to the tune of daily greeting. Gone are the days of a courteous “hello, how are you?”. Today, the most common opening statement hurled at you is: “Oh God, how hot and humid it is! As if you were waiting to be enlightened or coming straight from Antarctica. Ranting about bad weather is in, as obligatory reminder of nature’s atrocities. Lest we forget how cruel it is.

Sharing pain lessens it but oft repeating one’s misery is neither going to placate the sweltering sun nor going to fast forward the hot spell. On the contrary, incessant climate updates rub salt into your already blistering wounds. Don’t dodge this smouldering revelation tossed at you and bypass your way to casual conversation. Civility demands that you, too, chip in enthusiastically with your tale of agony and sizzling one-liner’s such as “Yeah it’s hot like hell, this muggy weather is making me crazy,” and then carry on merrily with the mundane. You can’t play a spoilsport in this interesting game of weather bashing.

Even I am part of weather whiner’s gang. I am rather the biggest cribber of all times. I love feeding my folks homecooked food but this passion wanes through the week and vanishes by the weekend, when it has to be rekindled by dining out. During summer, my romance with kitchen turns volatile. I dread entering the humble hearth that seems the mouth of a fire-spitting dragon. Offer me the bait of luscious mangoes but even a mango a day doesn’t keep acne and stomach ache away (at least for me).

This grumble saga is not a summer special episode, there are many seasons to this daily soap. Here comes monsoon and there begins our nitpicking again. A season venerated by poets, romantic hearts, and Bollywood. But for us mere mortals, monsoon signifies scuba diving in slush puddles, braving road cave-ins, brimming sewer, dengue fever, and swarming creepy-crawlies. Now the conversation begins with: “Oh my God, when will it stop raining?”

Our perennial grouse against climate has left Mother Nature perplexed. How can we cry foul when we are the one’s responsible for tampering with the environment, leading to global warming and an uncharacteristic weather cycle? As you sow, so shall you reap! It’s time we human beings stop whining and clean up our act or be prepared to face divine ignorance that incites nature’s wrath.