Move On!

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A living language has a democracy of its own. A recent news report says that US academics want certain words and phrases to be banned from usage. They must be  joking, surely. Even an autocratic regime can only ban words it doesn't like from print and public space, but not their usage in private. Much less the Obama regime. Maybe the acads are tired of these words from over-flogging.

One phrase is 'fiscal cliff'. I can understand this. Even I don't like it. It sounds ugly. Too many 'f's and 'c's...But there it is!

But I am surprised that the next word they want banned is 'guru'. Really! I never knew that this word which was our fond way of hailing each other in our college is so widespread in the US that it irritates. Yet, I am sure it will survive...it is so pithy. And the news report says that 'guru' suffers from overuse by news pundits.

'Pundits' will be the next.

Another report says that 'whatever' and 'like' are among the most annoying words of 2012. I never used these two words during my KGP decades, but I do use them fairly frequently in my blogs. They are like so handy or whatever...

The phrase that annoyed me most during 2012 was: 'move on!'

It is intended to mean: 'forget and forgive and let go of your past!'

Or: "Don't look back!"

This always reminded me of the Biblical story of Lot's wife. Lot was a pious chap living in the twin cities of Sodom and Gomorrah (like Hyderabad and Secunderabad). And as you can guess, they were brimming with sin. And God got fed up with them. And wanted them to be destroyed. So, he sent two angels to do the job. As they were walking down the road, Lot saw them and invited them into his house and fed them and cheered them and warmed them and pleased them. So, the two angels asked Lot to flee his house with his family by sunrise and run to the safety of the nearby 'good' town of Zoar. And be quick. And don't look back. For, if you look back, you will be turned into a pillar of salt.

Lot and his family ran. And soon enough, the angels destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah raining 'brimstone and fire'.

But, Lot's wife was a wee reluctant to leave everything of hers behind her and so looked back. 

And she was at once turned into a pillar of salt as promised:

  http://www.womenwalkinginthespiritofchrist.com/2011/06/pillar-of-salt-syndrome.html

I have been suffering from this pillar-of-salt-syndrome. I just can't 'move on'. I turn back all the time and recall events and moments of my past, particularly my KGP past. I dream of KGP on a daily basis. And even while awake, memories of KGP fleet by. It is funny. I don't recall, even with effort, the big events like my getting a hard-won Ph.D. nor  the Appointment Letter of the Professor Post (soft-won).

But li'l li'l moments in the class room, in the Harry's shop, the double-egg-omelet-bread-butter-chai in the Railway Restaurant with kid-son. 

And the li'l li'l humiliations. 

Talking of 'moving on', there was, in our youth, a smart phrase: "Look back in anger". It is the title of a John Osborne play. It spawned the phrase: 'angry young man'. And within a decade it was adopted by reviewers of Bollywood films. All these angry young men  have grown old like me and not so angry anymore...just bitter. They do look back in anger at being swept away by the younger and angrier generation. And the angriest of them all sunk below the sea level till great good fortune bobbed him up in the epochal serial called KBC by everyone from the Director of IIT to the Cook in the Hostel:

 

  http://srbachchan.tumblr.com/ 

Want to blog on, but the hip joint is hurting...son says it is spondy from bad laptop posture...

Time to move on...

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