I am God!!

When I first saw her, she was selling garlands outside a temple.

I’m fine with people who believe in God. I was brought up that way too. For a certain stretch of my life, I believed some god would come down to earth, lift the weapon in their hand, poke my eyes out or pick me up and fry me in a hot oil pan if I did anything bad. Back then, I didn’t know whether that was belief or fear. Now I know it was foolishness.

Later, I made fun of believers. That was my rogue phase. Smoking cigars, drinking hard, occasionally smoking pot, wearing carelessness like a badge. The kind of swagger young people claim as their right. I thought I was God. Honestly, why wouldn’t I? I could be a stone, watch human suffering like a movie, and say, “I’m punishing you for the sins of your previous birth.” I could be a stone, sit with open hands, smiling like a blessing machine, and say, “I’m rewarding you for your good deeds.” It’s not fucking hard to be God. Just be a stone and play the game.

I’d walk up to believers and poke at them with questions, like it was sport. If God is real, why is he allowing children to suffer?

I lost whatever was left of my belief the day I read a newspaper story: somewhere in India, a five-year-old girl (fuck you, newspapers, five-year-old is a child, not a “girl”) was gang raped inside a temple. If God has the right to push those morons to hell later, why can’t I push that damn God to hell now? for standing there as silent evidence, doing nothing in the moment, and promising justice as an afterthought?

So yes. Stone. Cold stone. Just cold stone. Just cold black stone. 

Then one morning I woke up with a superpower.

I became God.

There was a crown on my head. People fell at my feet and begged for a good life. I was confused. Because on the outside I looked like God, but inside I was still the same person who didn’t believe in him. Whoever handed me the power changed only my appearance. Such a bad job. Maybe it was God himself, no one else could do something so lousy.

Anyway, I started my journey as God. I thought I’d change the world. Erase evil. Then I realised quickly that even as God, I didn’t have that kind of power. Disappointed, I went to a temple to see how people would receive me, what they would ask, what they would expect from my silence.

That’s when I saw her.

When I first saw her, she was selling garlands. It was 5 AM. The conversation went like this:

“Granny, started so early?”

“Yes, thambi. It’s been my routine for the last 75 years.”

“Seventy-five years? How old are you? When did you start selling garlands?”

“Ha! I’m 80. I lost count. After a certain age, your birthday is just another station in your journey. Some passengers get on, some get down. My mother sold garlands at the same spot. I started when I was five, just coming with her.”

That station line hit me.

I choose the depth of my conversation based on the other person whom I am talking to. If you want to talk weather, I’ll talk weather. If you want to talk vector DB, I’ll talk vector DB. If you want to talk Viktor Frankl, I can go for hours. If you want to talk life, I’m always up for it. Small talk, tech talk, deep talk. I love it. I enjoy it all.

She felt like the right person. So I kept going.

“Seventy-five years selling garlands… isn’t that boring? Didn’t you ever think about a career change?”

“Career?” she smiled. “What’s that? I have to feed my family.”

“But did you feed your soul?”

“Where is soul?” she asked, genuinely. “Is it something inside you or outside?”

“Soul is… metaphysical. Mysterious. Something you fill so you can feel happy. Like when you go to a waterfall and listen to the sound and you feel… full. You know what I mean.”

She studied me. “Are you a saint? You seem young, but you speak differently.”

“I speak differently only to a few people,” I said. “Most of the time I’m trying to fit.”

“Fit where?”

“Fit into norms. Fit into rules. Fit into society. Mostly stepping out of the spotlight.”

“But why would you do that?” she asked. “Doesn’t talking differently fill your soul? what you called that metaphysical thing?”

I laughed. “You’re smart, granny. I love fitting. I love life. I love people around me. I’m an ordinary person. But I like moments of deep dialogue. I’m only 2% deep talk. The rest of the time I’m full-on. just living with happiness and gratitude .”

“Fair enough,” she said. “I can see that. You’re a funny man dressed up like God.”

Smiling at her observation, I pulled out two Davidoff Nicaragua Toro and asked, “Do you smoke?”

“Yes.”

We lit them. The morning began to brighten, slowly. People started noticing this strange combination of God with a crown, chatting with an 80-year-old oldie, smoking cigars like it was the most normal thing in the world.

I asked, “Why are you still working at 80? Why can’t you rest at home? Don’t you have family to take care of you?”

“My husband was a drunkard,” she said, she said with no emotions like she was describing weather. “He beat me every day. He died when I was 50.” She paused for a moment , collected her words and added. “I felt a small ray of happiness when he died.”

I didn’t know what to say first. “I’m sorry you went through that. Do you have children?”

“I do. Three. Two boys and a girl. I can’t go to my girl. You know… it’s an insult.”

I nodded. “And your boys?”

“The first one followed his father. Drunkard. Now he’s in hospital. I have to take care of his family and two little grandkids. The second one is struggling. No permanent job.”

“Sorry,” I said, and it sounded thin even to me.

She held the flowers close to her face, as if they were trying to help her see. “I’m losing my eyesight. I can’t build garlands as fast as I used to.”

I looked at the temple behind her. Looked at the stone gods. Looked at the morning crowd. And the anger I carried all those years rose in my throat.

“So God isn’t helping you,” I said. “He’s letting you sit outside his own house and sell flowers to survive. He doesn’t even turn his eye to your life.”

She took a long puff before she answered. “You are right. I have a tough life.”

“So God is not real,” I said. “He lets you suffer.”

She looked at me calmly, the way old people look at young people who think they’ve invented truth. “Son, I believe in God.”

“But he isn’t real. Do you believe in God, or do you believe in faith?”

She smiled. small, tired, unoffended. “You can put different words and sound smart. For me, it’s something to HOLD ON TO when I have nothing left.”

“I can give you intelligence to hold on,” I said. “You don’t need faith to hold on.”

She turned her head slightly, as if the answer was obvious. “What would I do with intelligence? Invent something?” Then she pointed with her cigar towards the temple crowd. “People come here with faith. With faith, they buy garlands and put them on God’s statues. If they didn’t have faith, no one would buy garlands. I would be out of business. My mother wouldn’t have fed her children. I wouldn’t have fed mine.”

She tapped her shrunken stomach lightly. “This hungry stomach is ruthless, you know. It won’t take two days’ food at once. It won’t spare you if you miss a meal. It demands to be fed again and again. Other people’s faith gave me a living to feed this ruthless hunger.”

And then she turned, just like that, to her customer. Back to business. Back to routine. Back to life.

I took a long puff. Another long long puff. Another. Another. Until the last fire burned my lips. I was lost in thoughts.

I didn’t carry much that day. Just a few thousands. I knew she wouldn’t take it if I offered. So I dropped it silently into the rag purse lying there and asked her for a hug.

She gave me a warm hug. Then a kiss on my cheek.

The wetness on my cheek dried in the next forty-five seconds. But it has stayed wet in my memory. still wet. twelve years later, as I write this down.

Walking back, the crown felt heavy.

Of course I am God now.

I could take faith away from her, rip it out like a bad tooth, but what would I give her back to hold on to?

I could give her intelligence. Rationality. The sharp clean blade of logic. But isn’t intelligence its own kind of suffering? What would she do with it? Intelligence isolates you. Intelligence is super cool, yes, but it’s lonely. Sometimes you have to shed intelligence to enjoy life, because life is beyond intelligence. Life is messy. Organic. Foolish. Made of small moments and stupid memories that somehow become the only things worth living for and worth dying for.

That morning, I decided not to tease believers anymore.

I decided to let her have her faith.

Because today,

I am God.