Towards the Sidelines.

Being on the sidelines takes one out of the game. It is not an influential position to occupy. A player on the sidelines becomes an observer forced to wait and watch and, perhaps, hope. For someone who desperately wants to play the game, being on the sidelines is not a voluntary decision and it is a painfully restless experience.

For the young, this is certainly the case with regard to living. Youth wants to be in the thick of things. It wants to be noticed. It wants a voice. It wants to grab what’s available and swing it towards success. It doesn’t want to wait and watch. It wants, desperately, to play the game of life and, more often than not, to shoot the winning goal. Oh, that dizzying feeling of activity, power, influence, aspiration and imminent success!

As we grow older, we are sidelined. For most, this is not a voluntary decision. In a world that is obsessed with youth and action, it becomes obvious that one no longer fits. You might say that the above statement is a gross generalization and you would be right. There are many who refuse to be seen as older and irrelevant. They teach themselves to remain young and continue to play the game.

Half a century of living is done for me and I find myself asking now, “What exactly is this game that I’m required to play?”. The game no longer interests me. I find it unendurably boring. The sidelines have been calling to me for a while now. It’s a nice place. I like being older. I am still relevant to myself. I am now free to choose what I wish to think. I am under no compulsion to find any validation for my quiet, inner world.

Cafes are the sidelines where I sit. I have my favourite tables at my favourite cafes. When I used to travel on work, I always found cafes in which to spend my days. I occupied one table through the day, thought, read, wrote, finished my work, played some of my music in my ears, smiled at strangers, drank cups of coffee, and watched the world drifting by.

In a city by the sea, I sit under a sun-umbrella on a patio. I will be here till the sun sets and a sultry evening settles. I have become a familiar face at this café and I get a smile from the person who waits at table when I come in. A narrow road skirts the café and beyond that is a vast, blue, placid sea. There is salt in the air, drifting on the back of a gentle breeze. Cars swish by, two-wheelers rumble along, vendors walk by with their wares, and some ragged children chase each other on the sandy beach. A stray dog climbs up onto the patio and curls up in a shady corner. Nobody shoos it away. I take it all in without really being a part of it at all. This is how life comes to me. Another cup of coffee arrives. I light a cigarette. I don’t know the name of the person who serves me. He asks me what I keep writing in my book every day. I smile up at him and say, “Oh, whatever is running around in my mind just now. Nothing serious.” Time passes, the sky is smudged with sunset and the sea is a sheet of colour. The café is suddenly crowded, full of talk and laughter. I leave in a while.

I am still moving to the sidelines. I choose to do this. The last decade has been unsettling and enlightening in equal measure. It has been a decade of goodbyes. It has also been a time of realigning myself to my spirit. On the sidelines, I am learning to live another life. When I am called to participate in what’s going on out there, I do. It helps me survive. I am no longer identified with the carrot at the end of the stick. I feel grateful for what it provides but I don’t want to belong in it. I have said goodbye to my own patterns of reaction to its tragedies. I have said goodbye to its slapstick comedies. I have stepped away from people who are toxic. I have stopped thinking of work as the central motif of life. I have cleaned a lot of clutter in and around me and it has left me feeling lighter.

A world exists outside. It always will. It should. It exists with its trappings. Everyone who is caught in it comes to think of it as a setting in which things happen to them. For a large part of their lives, they wonder what to do with what has happened to them. Then, they take decisions, act on things, change the setting, and wonder again.

What if you come to the sidelines some day and realize that you have happened to life? All things familiar shift with that knowing. It’s not easier or better. It’s a powerful shift because the nature of responsibility changes. You see with a flash of clarity that the world is inside you. You have been gathering a world inside yourself through every single experience you have lived. It has sat there pointlessly and because this world is not transactional in nature, you have had no use for it. What if you come to the sidelines and realize that all you ever have is who you are? Everything begins there. It will end there.

I have lived in the Garden City for close to twenty years. In those twenty years, it became my second home, nurtured me, and gave me the gift of my inner world. I lived alone in a beautiful studio apartment sheltered by leafy trees. Life was quiet. I met very few people, worked alone, did all the things I loved, and explored the city. Of course, I found my cafes!

Sometimes, I go to my haunt as soon as the café is open. It is empty. It stretches inwards like a driveway. There are tables on two sides. It is orange and brown, smelling strongly of coffee, reminiscent of Sunday peace, filled with country songs. I wave and smile at the person at the counter, collect a bottle of water, place my order, and walk back outside to the courtyard that slopes towards the street. My table waits for me there against a row of potted plants, under a sunshade. I settle down. I will work here till it’s time for lunch. The street is not empty but it is not cluttered. Old, beautiful trees line the footpaths and arch towards each other like friends. A jewel-blue sky is glittering between its branches. Summer gold from a blazing sun has sprinkled the dark tar with dapples. Across the road, an unkempt bit of land has grown wild with trees and plants. Beyond that, there is a glimpse of white buildings. A bicycle rests against a tree. I bring out my book and my fountain pen. I write letters to myself.

On other days, I find my table in the evening. I will stay there till the café closes around midnight. I’ll be the last one out. The café is not empty now. Many of us are ‘regulars’. We greet each other, stop to ask after each other, but we don’t interfere with each other at all. I wait for the world to come to me. The sun has sunk into a velvety darkness and the sodium vapour street lamps are blurring the night with gold. A guitar begins to play and I listen to a young girl’s fiery voice flinging a melody to the skies. I watch a man put his book down, light a cigarette, and turn to watch her. I notice two people working out the crossword in the papers. The street is shining with neon signs atop shops and restaurants. Cars are cruising by. Something light-hearted catches my eye. They are probably in their early twenties – a young man and a young woman. They are on opposite sides of this street. They are doubling up with laughter, flinging a paper plane across to each other, running unsteadily to catch it and fling it back across the street. I can’t help the laughter bubbling up inside me and I think, “That’s how love should be!” One by one, people leave. The darkness has deepened. The silence is growing. I will leave too. The café will stay here, dreaming against a sleeping world.

On the sidelines, I have gathered inside me the ability to instantaneously conjure up a mood. It could go either way, of course. Something I choose to give my attention to could bring in a mood of sadness and if I choose to chase that, it would turn into melancholic despair or even anger. But I have come to see that the opposite always exists and I am absolutely free to focus my attention on a mood of quiet joy. When I chase that, I am light, I am open, and I know without a shadow of doubt how beautiful it is to be alive right here, right now.

Except for some Pollyanna rubbish, of what use is that? Nothing. You can’t use it to negotiate the real world, can you? No, you can’t.

The day you realize, on the sidelines somewhere, that you happened to the world, you might sense that you send out ripples. That inner world of sadness or joy is your capacity to create your life. If you become the victim of a mood that was triggered by careless observation, life will bring you the victimhood you have practiced. If you conjure a mood whenever you want, life will remain an adventure of possibilities. It’s that simple, really. You choose to be who you are and you will never escape the consequence of who you choose to be. That’s life.