From Buzz Lightyear Realisation at Tulsibaug to being the Little Prince's Rose...

Last Saturday, I went on a shopping spree. My friend since high-school will be married by end of this year and engagement preparations are at its peak. Hence a visit to famous Tulsibaug for jewelry shopping is a must. The place is always overcrowded and exhausting, and while selecting designs of bangles, anklet, necklace and what not, I felt like Buzz. Remember the scene in toy story when buzz lands in a department store, where hundreds of Buzz Lightyear are on display. It was the same feeling. I felt so un-unique, just like a product out of manufacturing unit. All these people around me, aren't we almost similar in every way. We all almost have same dreams, to have a happy life, wonderful family, enough money to not have to think about it too much wonderful friends and respect for ourselves in society. At the core of everything, these are the most elementary desires. And then we are all living a difficult life. So what actually makes me different..? How am I different, and this realization of being similar, monotonous, this uniformity, no colors, no shades made me sad. Why is that we can only imagine ourselves to be like an absolute entity of 0 and 1.The abstractness is beautiful makes you feel different unique one of a kind unlike on-off switch, black and white, men and women. And this idea bothered me for weeks, how can I be same I want to enjoy my difference and celebrate it.

One day, as usual, I was reading "The Little Prince" and I came across a paragraph. The little prince when visits Earth, he sees a rose garden, he is shocked to see so many roses in one garden. In his imagination universe had only one rose, the one at his planet, the one he has left behind. And now here he realizes his flower is just one among so many. He is dejected at this idea, similar to me,mortified at the thought of being just a common human being like everyone else, but he says something to those roses:

“You're beautiful, but you're empty...One couldn't die for you. Of course, an ordinary passerby would think my rose looked just like you. But my rose, all on her own, is more important than all of you together since she's the one I've watered. Since she's the one I put under glass, since she's the one I sheltered behind the screen. Since she's the one for whom I killed the caterpillars (except the two or three butterflies). Since she's the one I listened to when she complained, or when she boasted, or even sometimes when she said nothing at all. Since she's my rose.”

And this very thought has overwhelmed me, in spite of ulterior similarities I am different everyone is different because of our loved ones. It is their time, their emotions spend on me makes me unique. It is my ideas, choices I make, sacrifices I do for my loved ones makes them unique for me and different from the rest.