Human and Pajama! An Intellectual Discourse

Ok, ok, you got it right: that intellectual part is joke! But "Human and Pajama" is a serious matter.

"Tu aadmi hain yah payjama?" (Are you a human being or a pair of pajamas?) is a typical North Indian reproachment, often used in jest, and sometimes in all seriousness. I always found it amusing; but never really philosophically tried to analyse it. Not until today!

Today, in a retrospective mood, I started thinking about this. Why does one compare a human being with a pair of pajamas? What part of a pajama does a humanlife resemble, if at all? And if so, how?

My analysis of my own life reminds me of my friend "Kol" (Banana), who after meeting me after a gap of almost 6 years or so, commented, "You are no longer the same old fellow; the fire is gone. Life has mellowed you down, and very drastically." I used all the abuses at my disposal in a vehement effort to appear tough and refute his claim that day. But later when I looked back at myself, I found that really life mellowed me down.

I am still stupid, stubborn, arrogant and moody with a mercurial temper; but the fire is gone. I no longer provoke people for no reason. I try not to take too much liberty with people, I don't try anymore to prove my point at any cost. My life has taught me to accept the fact that I am not the center of the Universe, that most people do not give a damn if I exist or die, that most people who laugh(ed) at my jokes need not necessarily like(ed) me, or appreciate(d) me for my clowning. Life has taught me to accept that the world consists of different kinds of people, and that I cannot change a single person or an event, irrespective of how hard I try to do so! In other words, I have become much more flexible, or elastic, over the years.

That reminds of the elastic of a pair of pajamas. when one buys a new pair of pajams, the elastic is always taugt and it holds the body with a firm grip. But as time goes by, it becomes looser and looser and then at one point, it becomes difficult to wear a paiur of pajama without the fear that it would go down without an warning (Of course, an ever-expanding beer belly can help solve the problem termporarily, if not permanently!).

And that's when I got my enlightenement. Like the elastic on my pajamas, I am too have. over the time, become elastic and accommodative, and it's my life that made me so.

So now I see how as a human being (as least, in principle) I have so much similiarities with a pair of pajamas?

Am I then a human being or a paor of pajamas?

Can't I be both?
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Note: Dedicated to Campus Cruiser, who gave me a waiting time of 45 minutes due to which, a royally screwed, hungry and exhauted me now eats Bananas and writes Bullshit!