the artist

                       THE ARTIST

 Karen is a kid everyone will smile at. She is cute, mannered and probably the most pleasant kid you can come across. One can easily throw away the worries in her presence. Karen’s mom works in a local university while her father works as a security officer with the same university. They live near the campus and also have two sons who are elder to Karen.

 Karen grew up to be the known girl in her school as she sings good, she is a regular performer. She is not so ok in studies but not bad either. Her popularity jumped up with a local talent show. Things are great for her except the of late quarreling of her parents. Her parents used to be nice to each other for most of the time though there were some heated arguments now and then.

 It is almost a year that they are not the same, now they quarrel frequently and they linger over those…; the heated arguments continued for hours and they are getting longer and longer.

  Unfortunately her father’s drinking habits worsened acutely too. Her two brothers are already out of home doing some college somewhere. Poor Karen is the only audience for all this messy development.

 Things didn’t get better as the days passed. Finally her parents ended up in a divorce. Her father’s drinking habits and unstable behaviour forced the judiciary to handover the guardianship of Karen completely to her mom. Karen loves her dad very much, but now she has to miss him. Yep, it is just thus so!

The only thing that she could never understand was that why did he become like that?

 Unfortunately she never got an opportunity to see him again. Her mom got a good job in Texas so they left New York. Her father stayed back somewhere in Brooklyn, New York. Initially he was in some job but, it was not for long. Afterwards not much was known about him, even his whereabouts.

It is not rare for a broke to become homeless in a city like New York.

 In Texas, Karen rather had some peace though uncomfortable not seeing dad… forgetting him. She lived with her mom close to a stream with clear water. The stream has huge pipes laid across it over which one can sit and watch the shoals (huge group) of fishes. Just on the other side of the stream is flower garden maintained by the university. Added to all these visual delights are the squirrels that check you everywhere…

This place made her feel better.

It has become a pastime for her, a wonderful time watching all this and getting lost. In addition she had the occasional visitor tortoise that always amused her.

 Fortunately her mom too found a nice guy that helped her get over and some peace.

 Sooner Henry, her mom’s new guy started taking them to dinners. He is a nice person with good manners, more than that he is a caring type of person. Sooner the three were comfortable with each other as if they are a family and things were definitely better for Karen. It’s kind of a surprise for her, she never expected that her parents would ever break up but they did, she never thought that things would be so calm and pleasant so soon; nice Henry, her new step dad is not a bad surprise.

 Time didn’t wait for any. It passed real quick; her family lost track of her father and it didn’t affect her much. She continued with her interests and school. Of late Henry presented her with music composing software. Henry even helped her with the tutorial for using the software. She felt so lucky and just happy, she is now obsessed with composing music with this software!

 Three months later she gave a performance of the song that she felt to be the best of all the songs she composed using this software in her mother’s university. It is a good success. She kept working and posting them on YouTube. Sooner she became famous and successful on YouTube, quite sooner she became a teen celebrity! Life is fast! Now Karen is not just Karen but, the most famous upcoming singer. Sooner the teenage star became the face of magazines… paparazzi’s haunted her everywhere.

She is on the TV shows, interviews… Karen is just no more Karen.

       Her busy life paused transiently when her mom informed about the separation with Henry, the man who brought her out from the blues and pushed her this way and the success! She was always fond of him. But, it was; not it is. It is just that she is busy not that her feelings towards him changed. Her busy schedule didn’t give her much time to think about ‘the Henry’ faraway in Texas than some phone calls. Now, she is having a palace in California but virtually living in the metros like New York, London, and Tokyo etc… she is hardly home.

 She continued her life in music. Her songs ranged from emotions of love to party culture and just fun. All the songs made her a big name. She got boyfriends who themselves are celebrities and very successful. But, none of them happened to be the perfect guy? But, she is quite young yet to worry about settling down.  She gets that glimpse of worry but she hardly worries. There is always the next awesome guy in her life and her boyfriends never lasted longer.

 Now she is 21. Whatever may be happening at personal level, her career never let her down. Like the people say it is ‘her time’! People are mad about her; she became the most sought by the media. Paparazzi never relaxed with her; they relentlessly followed her. The tabloids had great time with her personal details.

   No later than that she starts a new relationship there will be many stories even about breakup of this just started relationship the very next day. She started seeing someone secretly; she will break with this guy real soon… they quarreled last night… and further: Karen dined here; Karen partied this Saturday night at…... all the stories; always something about her. Also, media and people had good fun ridiculing the incongruity between her romantic songs about love and the regular breakups.

 The first time when it happened, Karen certainly was hurt with the breakup. But, quite soon she understood that her boyfriends are more concerned with her success than herself (very expensive expectation to think about a boyfriend who will love her just as her).

 With that realization she rarely cared about her boyfriend than someone to hangout. Always, there used to be a silly quarrel before the breakup, however it be. I guess we should not be surprised that she drugs. So erratic and yet so successful, the best combination to become a worse drug addict in the course of time. She is no exception but she is not yet a drug addict to be precise; she just tries them in the parties etc...

 The time is still in making for her destiny, not yet! Her destiny is not just the pop diva, beyond that!

 After a long time the media sided with her, they printed some good words. At last Karen found some love? It is Neil an upcoming singer¸ young and handsome; they both were a good pair and they both had quite a good time. Karen started loving his company in real than like the previous ones, probably she loved him really! The media resorted to its breakup stories as usual after the few initial good words; the stories were false till that fateful night.

 They had a petty quarrel as they used to have now and then, but this time they dug it deep. All of a sudden she shouted at him it is over; probably asserting her dominance.  Actually the fault was openly her but she didn’t like to admit out of her ‘successful ego’ probably… or that she is just in that ‘cranky mood’.

Neil left her immediately, the words ‘it is over is just too big for this boyish guy with enough pride/self-respect’! After calming down a little she has called him but he didn’t take the call. Then she sent the sms(cell phone text message); no response! 

She kept messaging him and calling him all the night. Neil didn’t yield. She fell asleep late in the night and slept only for a little more than an hour. She couldn’t sleep more than that. She woke up and opened her computer with that heavy mind rather to have an escape and some time off. Unfortunately, the first thing on the desktop is the screensaver, beaming photo of Neil and Karen holding each other. A deep boring pain started accompanied by a fast paced heart. She quickly opened the browsers to engage herself in some time-kill;

 The first page she opened gave her a rude shock; she found a full page article about their break up! Too much in too little time! Just she couldn’t handle it; she started on her party pill, the ecstasy (drug) tablet!

       Her brain got full activity now: How come the media know about something that private? That recent? I tightened security so much because of those paparazzi, media people. This is so private and inside my place, it couldn’t be them. It is impossible news unless, unless unless… Neil did this dirty job.

   Adrenaline surged in her system. She checked the news portal again for that article about their breakup. She just got mad or wild or both. By the morning, there is an article in another popular website, dumper gets dumped; Neil dumped the famous star Karen. It was something beyond her ability to cope. It hurted all that, that could be; the cell phone is soon in shatters ( as she threw it down), she took few more pills from her secret shelf…

Within few more hours it became the topic of the day all over: ‘is Karen’s boyfriend fed up with her? Is he going to leave her?’

  Just a quarrel over few hours is breakup? She felt everyone is against her! The cruel media is against her! The jealous people are laughing at her pains! The entire world is against her! No one, no one is for her in this world, she is alone. That bastard rogue Neil, that…her thoughts and cursing continued. Probably she might have killed him, if he was in front of her at that moment.

She took some more of it (drug) frantically. She kept on doing weird stuff until she fell asleep; she had an escape for a while with these drugs. But, her downward spiral started. Her destiny revealed…!

Before, it was a party stuff more, though stress had its share in making her take the drugs. These times it is desperation. She needs to escape reality. She needed it again and again more than a coffee in little more than a month. Soon her life was in shatters and the media celebrated each and every possible snap of this downward spiral. They filled the papers with tales of her bizarre.

       Media is happy, more copies sold, more hits on their websites. Probably all the common people harboured some envy towards her success unconsciously; they had a lot of fun. The TV shows started mocking her, some people made fun of her on you tube.

All these things accelerated and aggravated her deterioration, her bizarre and her addiction. Days passed.

  That day, she had a recording with Sony; let this one go straight I would be back she told herself…… but she couldn’t even get out of her bed. Now she thinks: it will be bad, worse if she doesn’t go to the studio. But, she couldn’t; just she couldn’t get out of this damned bed and ‘ironically, she barely wanted to be on the bed’. This contradicting turmoil suffered her further. Finally she understood that she can’t go a single step out of this isolation. She just can’t face the people now. She just wanted to be with herself. And being with herself just like this will push her down further, the loop!

  She wearily smiled at the thought of the media reports that would come by the evening that she didn’t turn up for her recording with Sony. She made some energy to get up to the shelf to get her very packets. She watched herself in the mirror. She is no more the slim Karen but a plump lady; she gained weight which sagged her feel further.

Again she escaped her misery for a while. It didn’t last long. Soon dreams mixed with the distorted images of her past and harsh reality of present tortured her. She rolled on the bed for a while, but couldn’t help. She got up and felt like banging her head till it breaks.

 Suddenly, she grabbed the keys on the floor and took the car for a ride; she desperately needed an escape!

  All of a sudden, she doesn’t know what happened but, blood drops started rolling of a scratch on her forehead; she hit a pole at the signal!

Inference:

For people like Karen who are sensitive, they can perceive everything more than a common person. They enjoy the nature more than common people do and they have a very high potential to become an artist. They respond to all stimuli in life, and they respond in depth beyond common person.

 Most of them naturally become a success in the field of arts if they are “guarded enough”. I am stressing the guarded enough in the sense that ‘these creative people are born to be broke’ depending on the way their life evolves. If proper family support and further if they are lucky enough to have also the support of friends, life partner, activities… etc… etc… probably they are saved for their life time.

   Their chances to be a broke are directly proportional to their success in life and the speed with which they get it, and the age at which they make it. If they happen to have a success very young, they have high chances to be a broke. The more successful they are, the more they are cut from the normal life. Their closed celebrity life in turn confines them and stresses them. Unfortunately they are more prone to respond big in the negative way to worse situations in such a confinement. So, when they are a celebrity and things are not good they have the perfect opportunity to spoil themselves.

 

 They feel everything better than normal person that they crave for it when they like it (so more prone for drug addiction?) or more agitated by things when they don’t like (so more agitated by personal disturbances…). I guess this is the most ideal combination to be a drug addict!

 I have no intentions of scaring sensitive people here, but if they can understand their vulnerability which is the mirror image of their strength they can handle it for their best.

 Understanding a problem is the best help especially when the problem is inevitable or keeps coming again and again. Understanding the source of problem itself can leave a soothing effect and then one  may not feel that he or she is cursed? 

Unfortunately getting used to these problems blindly and helplessly or escaping (which is never possible) is the approach taken by many.

Once again, if you are to fight a man who is invisible, how much you bet on yourself?

Learn about your enemy (both external/internal - here) before you start the fight!