Saturn Retro 2013, 36- American Gothic storyline

Day 43, Annual Saturn Retrograde 2013, 1^st April, April Fools Day, Monday. As repeated n times before, Saturn Retrograde is a time of progress, and breakthrough for Sun ruled people. And regression, retrospection, pullback for Saturn ruled people.

Seems like a thousand years, since I last wrote. But it’s obvious. I’m a Saturn ruled in Saturn Retro. Hence the OBVIOUS slowdown in everything. Including blogging. The past week, I’ve noticed the Sun ruled people around me gradually emerging into clarity, focus, a sense of purpose. Getting on with their game plans. Channelising the abundant sun energies. My family friends, stuck in the ghostly house, mentioned in my previous post: “Exchange program” finally moved to a brighter, better, airier, safer place. And  yesterday, I had gone to help my Susmit and his sister move into a new place at East of Kailash. And I want to share my experience of horror, and human endurance with you..

We had gone to pick up luggage from Susmit’s sisters earlier place. In the midst of a harrowing Lajpat Nagar, a dark, dingy staircase provided access. As we ascended, I was astonished with the thick darkness, in broad daylight. No natural air, ventilation, or light. Except some dim bulbs, here and there. Finally, crossing a last dark corridor with wet, dank clothes drying in dark door-fronts, we entered the place. A two room unit Manu and her friend were sharing. Except a two feet window which opened into the dark corridor, and another two feet window in the bathroom which opened out into a dark shady vent, the room had NO WINDOWS/LIGHT/ NATURAL AIR. It was like a pitch dark godown for storing sacks of grains. But which housed these frail looking angelic girls through one entire year. On the surface, these kids looked hip, trendy, young, posh, spoilt rotten youngsters. But within, had endured a long hard existence without even the basic human rights of daylight, sun light, and air. Manu works in a BPO, and her daily working hours are from 6pm evening- 3 am night. They reach home at3:30 am, and sleep in this dark godown through the entire day, bereft of any sunlight. Wake at 3 and leave at 5pm. An unimaginably horrifying, inhuman existence, beyond belief. I have seen Susmit’s sister grow up before my eyes, a baby-faced, frail, delicate, almost anemic creature. Brought up in the “laad pyar” of their Uzan Bazar riverside home. But never could imagine the horrifying underlying existence, beneath the deceptively soft looks.

I looked at myself, bearded, earthy, labour class type, struggling artist looking. But what an UNIMAGINABLY spoiled rotten , lazy, existence I myself led. And yet, all the time I was cursing God for his “torments” upon me!!  I wouldn’t last a SINGLE week in the dark hellhole. That these two  frail, sparrow-like, girls had endured for almost an year. I helped them shift their loads of luggage into their new places. Reducing some of my mountainous, lethargic, spoil-rotten, laziness karma. Later evening, as I sat exhausted yet contented at their friends place, who had helped them shift. I sipped some rum + Thums Up, and sat, thinking to myself. A sweet, smiling face often covered a dark underlying story, within. And discovering such dark unraveling, getting exposed to such acute underlying darkness,  can be often, truly UNNERVING! I remembered my favourite “comic book character” Alan Moores’ Swamp Thing, make his long dark, unraveling journey across American horror, darkness, in the Amercian Gothic storyline (issue# 37- 50). Today, by the blessings of Lord Shanidev, I too,  was making my own dark, purgative, and unraveling/ unnerving journey. Getting exposed to  unimaginable horrors in these past six weeks of annual Saturn Retrograde, 2013. I’m finally getting to enact/ act out/ role play the “long cherished adolescent fantasy/ (nightmare) of the American Gothic storyline. 

Things are never what they seem on the surface. I wondered, what dark horrifying secrets, the super-models, actresses, the fashion-istas hid within. Beneath their bright, glamorous, magical and starry existences. And my flesh began to crawl. With cold trickling sweat.