The Unspoken Connections: Love in a cafe

It was just another of those days when I was sitting at the coffee shop sipping through my second cup of coffee and having just finished Paulo Coelho's “Veronika decides to die”.
I had three hours still to go for my second meeting and it was too much of an effort to travel unnecessarily through Delhi's arduous traffic.
The book had still not gotten over me, I was still contemplating about the fact that if we really knew when we were to die we might end up living better and making a quality time of our life trying to beat the clock to death.
I prefer to visit this coffee shop often and the crowd at these afternoon hours is the same, young teenagers in their low waist jeans and girls in their colorful spaghetti tops. Some times I wonder if this generation is actually living better with lesser contemplative
minds and the so called conscience that's seems to be eating into our generations. I rather at times also wonder what are actually morals and the dictums of the society, for with all the travel that has taken me to places I always thought that morals and dictums of the society also change with time. But then I am not too focused to actually dwell upon these matters. I see a group of young corpo’s. You can typically identify them with their stiff starched cotton shirts, the ties and a single laptop between approximately three either lying at the side of the table or pitched on the top with empty cups of coffee and a
pensive mood always beaten by those sales targets.
What really caught my eye that day was this couple in close to plus minus forties engrossed in each others eyes and oblivious to all these youngsters around them. I could see the love that flowed between them or maybe it was the imagination just out of the book that I had finished, but they definitely had caught my eyes. The look the gaze
between them was certainly different from what I could see in the eyes of the other younger couples out on a date. There was no twinkle or shiny star in their eyes but a definite something. I just had this feeling that I had read about it somewhere but exactly what and where I was unable to locate in the memory cupboard of my mind. But the fact was that my eyes were suddenly not following those peppy, chirpy pretty young things.

I have always loved watching people in crowds, while I am traveling and everywhere I can get a chance. Somewhere down the line it started as a time whiling activity, to a hobby and now one of my more favorite and passionate past times. Its really so much fun, using these people to enact the story in your mind on the imaginary stage of life.
Its always such fun to watch people from distance, be they alone or with some one, and play mental guessing games and contemplate what they might be thinking, discussing, sharing their thoughts, the kind of backgrounds they might be coming from, so on and so forth and weave a story around them allowing them to deliver the imaginary dialogues of your imaginative mind. Believe it or not I have even got some of my friends hooked to it and they make me sit observing these people in the coffee shops and then pick it up as the chewable material for discussion. So much of vibrant playfulness in this game.

But let me come back to the coffee shop. Some of the faces here are regulars. The same groups of teens and young hanging around after their college lectures or school discussing the new movies, the boring lectures and yes the most important fact “ who is going around with whom”. This I believe has been one particular topic of discussion (before it transforms into gossip) that hasn’t been influenced with the generations (I really feel that God’s creativity when it came to generation gaps was quite monotonous). I really wonder how have culture, music, ideology and literature still survived by still falling in the law of averages in discussions. But I know they some how have.

The second group is of the young corpos. They seem to have gathered after the first round of the sales calls for the day. By now I have realized the meanings and inferences of words like “bull****” that is being referred to the sales target. Words like “ creep or ass****” have a general indicative reference to either the boss or the client who has backed out at the last moment and cut down his procurement making the poor sales corpo’s targets to suddenly fall short of its already “ in minus achieved sales”. The routine has been just as normal and predictable. The only difference in the routine is the sharing of a brownie, once in a while, when finally a major sale has been clinched or the ordering of a cooler beverage after the poor corpo has managed to some how reach after a hard mentally exhaustive sales pitch, for which the confirmation is yet to come and his opening line is “ screwed up man, (with a gesturing finger)”. But day in day out they have always assembled. A new face is always the induction of a new staff in the team. It’s never a client. In today’s competitive world the ever so beautiful camaraderie goes for a toss as it loses hands down to fierce fear of competitive poaching.
Wonder what happened to those simple good old days.

I just love to see these unknown faces, observe them and tell my own stories woven around them.

At this point somewhere you must be getting curious to know about the couple that had drawn my attention and rather inspired the germination of today’s story. But you know what, I am going to enjoy myself with that mix of mischievous and some what sadistic pleasure and let your mind hang a little more in that state of curiosity.

Carrying on let me come to this third table. A husband and wife in their fifties. Now you may ask how do I say a husband and wife? Oh, well this category is the easiest to find and be spotted and for this material is sadly least inspiration for innovative thinking. Some of the most common traits and observations. The husband will always ask the wife what she would like to have and her answer in majority percentages would be “anything”. The husband walks to the counter and checks the menu, looks at something in particular and asks for her nod for that particular coffee and the wife would suddenly ask for something different altogether. Case 2, she doesn’t differ, the husband gets the coffee at the table, the wife takes her first sip, and her comment is “ the coffee at the other place we visited last time was better than this”. Case 3. The husband doesn’t ask for the wife’s choice and gets something on his own. Before the poor man can even place the order tray on his table the wife asks “ what’s this?” followed by a pause, “ Didn’t they have the other thing?” well now don’t get to excited looking at the case studies here. The whole gamut of creative exchanges comes to an end here. What follows is the slow drift towards silence there after. The wife trying to update on some supposedly juicy gossips in the close circles, or the familiar tales of familial bickering, the husband giving non-participative, indifferent nods. His eyes wandering in blankness, inadvertently thinking, about something, that sudden important work which invariably pops in at these specific times. The jolt of awakening back into the coffee shop is brought by the reminders of the demands of one of the kids and rejoinder demand of the other child. I have always wondered how and where are all the topics of discussions are lost for this category. Did they really end up exhausting themselves of all the topics, ideas, and romantic talk just during there courting or the early marriage years or did they some where get whiffed like bran in the grind of family, responsibility and children?

My mind and roving eye having been through all this had stopped at that table where sat that forties something couple. This was one table that I had not been able to get my eyes and mind off all this while.

The man seemed to have a gay abandon around him. His hair gave that ruffled look which comes with the riding of the breeze, his eyes the heady mix of deep ocean that come from having seen much through them along with a playfulness that comes from a gypsy heart. The serene look on the face marked with a mystical mischievous smile on his lips. Dressed casually smartly the way you see the new techies now a days who have climbed up the ladder but still seem to rebelliously defy the mandarin dress code. He was definitely younger to the woman in front of him. The lady was surely older to him but did not look as old. The eyes had a child like innocent smile but definitely did tell you that they had traveled the weather beaten path of life. The crow’s feet and the glow on the skin, each told a different story. She was dressed in chic trousers and a floral printed shirt that talked about a rebirth of a rejuvenated, bouncy beautiful heart.

There were not much of talks exchanged on the table but you could see that the communication was not verbal but the eyes that seemed to have been doing the talking. The body talk was subtle but also visible. The focused look between the two pair of eyes silently screamed that this was love. She was playing with the hair on his forearm and he was running his finger on her arms. She as if saying I feel like being in your arms and his gesture reciprocating I care for you. Both of them seemed to be unaware and oblivious to the world or the time around them. Infact the time seemed to have come to a stop on that table. The hands of the clock on that table seemed to have been hypnotized by the two pairs of eyes. Even the single cup of coffee between both of them seemed to have resigned to its fate that it may not eventually see its empty bottom also, and the bubbles on the froth dying there one at a time death with the unstirred grains of sugar floating on the top.

I had not seen them earlier but wondered if they got together regularly or often? Or was it a special occasion? But the fervor of celebration that comes with reason or day specific celebrations was amiss.

They definitely are not the young teens in infatuation, which they believe to be deep love. Are they married? Possibly yes but definitely not to each other because here there eyes and body gesture were exchanging so much though. Was this one of those hip and in fashion extra marital affairs. Well it did not meet the prerequisites like the amorous looks in the eyes of the man looking to pep his otherwise bored married life. Nor did she look like one of those bored housewives, whose kids have grown up enough to be sufficiently independent on their own or with the frequently traveling husband who with his work pressure did not seem to have time for her, barring the once in a while, oblige her in bed, times. I really know its not one of those one line definition things. I wondered if they met often what talks would they be exchanging between them? Was it only the flowers, rainbows and butterflies or the problems of day to day and issues like family, responsibility etc? Was it just getting together day in and day out to get engrossed in each other’s eyes? Would they be discussing how they traversed the paths of life before they met each other? I suddenly felt an impulsive rush to walk towards them and ask about all of this but then I thought this trespassing could be God’s carnal unforgivable sin.

The table seemed like a single location but a complete set of beautiful Hollywood classical romantic movie in which the director may have preferred to opt for the elegantly and agelessly beautiful Susan Sarandon and Tom Cruise in the young vibrant but mature role. Given an option I might have suggested Russell Crow in my role,” That of the story teller “.

I just checked on the time not because I wanted to go but because I did not want even the intermission to come so soon for this beautiful movie.

Suddenly my eyes caught the glimpse of the carefree movement of the spoon stirring the sugar, which seemed to be for no reason to me. I guess the sugar would have melted on its own by now, unable to hold its existence on its own for so long. The eyes were still locked in eternity, oblivious of anything around. The spoon guidedly picked up some froth from the coffee and adorned the lips of this ageless beauty on their sides while being glidingly guided to the tongue. A small tab of the tissues on the edges of the lips and the special knowing, acknowledging smile on the boys face which just came and disappeared as fast as a lightning on a cloudy sky, could have been easily missed by me had I not been as engrossed in the table as the couple themselves. But now my mind was calculating all the messages and communications that had been exchanged by the signaling of those two small gestures. Her finger played with her locks for no reason, or was it the mind telling her to look as beautiful as possible to enchant her man. The playing with her dangling earrings was the only sign that they were not in a trance.

Simultaneously on the other hand I sent a small prayer “ O God don’t let them finish their coffee too soon, for if they finish the coffee they might leave too “. And honestly I didn’t want them to leave so soon, definitely not now when this story had seemingly just taken birth.

If this is how and to the extent the eyes and gestures could talk silently, I really wondered why the human race developed any verbal language, when over the span of time it has just ended up with the people just playing around with words. But then on the other hand without the words how would storytellers like me would have reached you all. But here the tilted head of the woman, resting on her palm, they eyes drowned in the world of silent poetry being recited by the boy’s eyes was a heady concoction altogether.

My mobile had already rung a few times trying to jolt me out of this romantic world, where nothing seemed to matter. Here the time seemed to stand and wait, the age seemed to be defied, looks and the salt and pepper shades of hair had no meaning, the sensation of thirst and hunger never seemed to travel up to the mind. And on the other hand was the swamp of the real world trying to pull you in its matters of looks, money, society, norms, rules etc. Here it was the complete unison of detachment with a soul-to-soul attachment. Yes this is what it was, the meeting, merging and unification of two souls. Soul an abstract, fluid form of existence, that we read about, have heard of, but never seen in shape, smell or size.

But suddenly I was seeing here not one but two souls. Merging into the sublime, fitting into each other perfectly like yin and yang and completing the circle of life. Transcending from the deep pits of life and birth and rising to that next higher level, so complete, so pure and so white with all the assimilation of all the myriad colors of the rainbow, with an angelic halo around them. I could finally sense that smile come to my face. The smile of success, the smile of achievement, the smile of satisfaction that comes to a young child when he has solved that seemingly unsolvable riddle on his own, when he has completed his first 500 piece jigsaw puzzle. All I could think of to define between them was a bond, a bond beyond the pre-defined rules and definitions of any relationship between a man and a woman. As natural as the river that had crossed many a terrain to go and merge to be one with the ocean. I wondered if they would have found each other accidentally or was it a definite search to find and reach that higher level, the orgasm of a higher life, “ Moksha”. These two did not seem to have met accidentally, for the satiating glow on their faces was of a knowing, understanding completeness. They seemed to have crossed those many terrains of life to form a young eternal bond of souls. The youth never dies, it never grows old, and it just hides in some corner of our lives, but still as innocent and full of vigor when it was born. Its just us who prefer to see the superficial and deny the honest truth to our self of the eternal existence of youth. The “Bond” that had transcended the levels and barriers of age, lust, emotions and expectations.

I still had unanswered questions about them. Would they be walking back together arm in arm or would they walking different directions once out of the coffee shop door? If they walked in separate directions, would their walk be in a daze with the lingering thoughts of this meeting? Would they be carrying each on their minds or would they also be pulled into the swamp of life like me when they walk out of here? It still was so open ended for me. In this belief that I had put myself, about their completeness, were they complete or still just as open ended as me? Would they be sleeping over the night as fast as possible waiting for the new dawn, when they could meet again, to take that plunge into each other’s eyes? And I knew none of it actually mattered anymore. I was still, out of habit, looking at them as two bodies, but they were one unified soul. If they went back together they would be going to their home, not a brick and mortar house, but a small and definable cozy place full with their warmth and completeness. And if they walked separately it might be two bodies but they would be each carrying a part, a portion of a unified soul that had been formed and forged with their souls. How habituated have we become of guided visions that we are just able to see and admire the tangible solid blocks and in the process overlook and miss the aspect of feeling the beauty is suddenly something I wondered.

Suddenly the waiter came to me to ask if I would like to have something more and the whole thought process of mine was distracted from its focus, you know it’s the feeling which a writer experiences when he is writing and scribbling his thoughts with a flow and suddenly a stranger comes tapping the arm asking to borrow the pen. I also decided to take my break and leave. I came out and thought I had a new story to tell today and I lit my cigarette. The cigarette ended without me knowing how much of it I had smoked. The storyteller in me had found new strings and threads to weave, but suddenly I found myself being exposed to an unknown turf. I do not know about them. But driving, and still having all that I had seen running across my mind. Today a storyteller had not been able to weave a story, enact a play and let these two characters deliver the dialogues on the imaginary stage of life. This time the storyteller had been read a story. A strange fable, a folklore from a strange far away mystic land where still rode the Unicorn. I wanted to light another cigarette, to try once again the formation of those perfect smoke rings, something I had not done in many years. Maybe I was inspired to search my eternal youthful soul.