Plastic

He was a ghost of the past. Exorcised by the slowly eroding waves of time.
Wandering through the streets of memories, reliving the days he was alive.
Every man has his ghosts to contend with. But the worst of them are the ones who cling onto you, however hard you try to shake them off they always come back. Some place or aura surrounding someone seems to bring back the clingers.
One never realizes that these are the ghosts of people and places that you ran away from. A temporary escape from the things that would haunt you for the rest of your life.

* * * * *

He watched the endless parade of men and women talking to him and laughing with him. He could define the whole experience in one word. Plastic.
Plastic smiles, plastic surgery, plastic glasses, plastic faces, plates, spoons, earrings, handshakes, emotions, shoes, feelings…everything was plastic.
After all that was the name of his first book.
“Plastic”
he was nauseated by the smell and taste of the whole occasion. It was like a hangover, splitting headache and a rubbery after taste.
And then the ghosts appeared.
One by one, slipping through the crowd, lost and confused by this mire of humanity worshiping the one man who had blasted away their cocoon of protection with his words.
Mere words had blown away the shell in which humanity was crowding around. Only he knew the truth. He knew how powerless were his words. They had cracked the surface, but it would soon mould itself to its original shape.
Then his words would be powerless. They would lie there in polished wooden racks, slowly yellowing with time or would lie on a table sucking in the moisture, the dampness dousing the fire of rebellion.
* * * * *

Seema: what made you write this book?

Ranjan: I was sitting on my table and reading a book. There was this plastic glass, which had cold lemonade in it. As I took a sip my eyes wandered over the pen stand. The pens, ruler, paperweight, files and everything else seemed to be made of plastic. Then it all began.

Seema: did you know what exactly you were going to write and how it would shape up?

Ranjan: every writer has a vague idea about what he is going to write. Only as he writes does it crystallize into an object that has shape and nature.

Seema: have always had this inclination to write?

Ranjan: its been more of an on and off affair. I thought of it as a hobby and not a career.
Seema: you are a chemical engineer by profession?

Ranjan: yes. I did my specialization in chemical from MRN College of engineering. That I guess is the reason for my obsession with plastic.

Seema: can you tell us about you schooling and your childhood? There seems to be no information about your past.

Ranjan..Uhh..it is…uhh…something’s are better left alone…

Old ghosts had been awakened. If one searched the closets no skeletons would be found. But the ghosts existed. They always did.
* * * * *

Some days they left him alone. Only the clack clack of his fingers drumming on the keyboard and the whirring of his thoughts existed. And some days they slowly invaded the space in his mind, cajoling and coaxing, screaming and cursing. After all it was their world that he was dissecting. The plastic world of unexpressed thoughts and unsolicited clichés that echoed in empty spaces.
Is it right?
The one question that he tried to answer a million times but failed.
Is it right to break the false sense of security that man has?
Is it right to unravel the strands of the cocoon and expose the creature to the harsh sunlight?
For that is what it is. A creature, devoid of originality, living on the thought of a few men who broke their cocoon and paid the price for it.
Recycle, reuse and reduce. The philosophy of today’s world.
Recycle the old ideas, heat the plastic and make it flow. Cast it into the same mould with small variations. A small clog removed from here, the surface smoothened, the size reduced a wee bit.
Viola! The new grass on which the next few generations can chew and chew never realizing that the juice had been drained away a long time ago.
Reuse the cud again and again and again. Old products and ideas replaced by a variation of the oldest themes. The millennium cud. The juice never seems to go out.
Reduce the capacity of a man to think. Systems and structures, hierarchies and orders. The assembly line was perfect. Small jerks and vibrations never cause big damage. Tighten them and they never existed.
The three R’s running the world. And the ghosts. The ghosts were always there. Who could ignore them?
Everyone did, except him.
Rajan Saha
The plastic man who broke the bonds and catalyzed the reaction. If only for a few seconds.
* * * * *


PLASTIC

A novel by Rajan Saha

“ Man is born free…that is the biggest misconception of the twentieth century.
Man is born chained. He is chained to his creator by a thin tube. Since this is cut with the first breath one takes, it is assumed that man is free. The child does not see the protective cover of plastic that keeps him away from the reality of his surroundings. And thus he begins to rely more and more on his plastic shield even as he grows older, staying away from the reality, content in his own world. His space expands and so does his experience. But never does he never contemplates the nature of this’ experience’.
What he experiences is manufactured, doctored and prescribed, to be taken in large doses for small doses can leave one unsatisfied. And it is the unsatisfied mind or body that seeks out new peaks and questions the existing ones…”

That was how it began. What started it?
The answer lay with the ghosts.
Ma…pa…uncle Danny…..smooth faced principal of st. Peters…and every other man and woman who entered his life. They were all anachronisms. Just a little heating, a tap here and a twist there and they would fit into the mould of today, perfect!
The greatest quality of plastic.
Recycle it…..reuse it…but it never reduces.
* * * * *
Rajan Saha – the author of plastic…now reduced to a ghost. A real ghost in the sense for he never left his home. High in the hills where the mist hides the wounds of battle. The battle between the forces of earth. Mountains and hills, blisters on the skin, clouds and mist were like sterilized cotton that eases away the pain.
People had talked about his book and his thoughts and his ideas. Some understood it and kept their distance from him for who would challenge the ghosts of the past in support of a mere mortal. Some just read the words and gushed forth their views on the symmetry and scientific actualities. Most of them did not even bother to look at it.
He thought he had thrown a stone into a still pond. Only later did he realize that what he thought was a stone turned out to be a pebble and the pond was frozen.
The pebble skittered on the ice, leaving behind small scratches that were frozen over the next day.
The sheet o ice remained unmarked.
And the ghosts left him alone.
They had overestimated the power of words. A mistake that many a fool had commited and had paid the price for it. But the ghosts remained the same.
Recycled, reused but never reduced.
* * * * *


After word

I talk about creation and innovation, I talk about restructuring and reorganization of old ideas and forms to create new ones that are not very different from the old.
One might ask what have I created?
My answer to them is Nothing. I created nothing.
I have just recycled the ideas expresses by many people who were unfazed by the ghosts of society.
I have reused the saleability of their ideas to sell my not so innovative thought.
I have reduced their voluminous material into the pages of this book that is easier to handle and understand.
That is why it is called a novel (because there is nothing novel in this)
Recycle, reuse and reduce – this keeps the world going.
Why add a new dimension to the complexities of the world?
I do not want to take on the ghosts of the past.
Let someone else find the courage after reading this ‘novel’.

Rajan Saha
14th may 1984


This was the page that the editors refused to publish fearing the reaction and backlash by the critics. He let the book be published without it, never realizing that he was the first person who found the courage to challenge the ghosts after reading his novel.

* * * * *