Her name was Ranjaboti. A girl from our honors class in college. One day she read out to the class a poem she had written, “Alone is not Lonely “. The poem stayed with me forever. It came to me in a room full of family guests and made me lonely, it came to me as I walked back home in a crowded street and made me lonely, it came to me as I lay awake at night and made me lonely, it came to me in the middle of a fun party I hosted and made me lonely. Those lines had an omnipresent power over me, to enter the center stage of my thoughts to see whether I was alone or lonely ! Being lonely is the hearts secret paramour. And in letting the poem seep into my thoughts I banished aloneness !

The structure of social norms were planned ages ago and well intended to bind me and my kinds to a life of set patterns, lest we get lost in our self created wilderness. The question of lonely or alone had just put a question mark in this structure. The image in the mirror disturbing my opium induced contentment , always reminding me of someone very familiar but forgotten. A rebellious mind cannot be easily chained, therefore it had to be lured to a place called ‘ happy place ‘. The need to be ‘happy’ has always been the biggest obsession of them all. The road to happiness asks for compromises, silenced questions, acceptability and obedience to norms. Happiness is a goal to achieve for which we must walk the extra mile. And what happens when we refuse to be happy is often recognized as melancholic depression. Melancholy is like a lazy hum and not as ambitious as happiness. But to chase happiness constantly is like chasing the receding waves of tides, to lose perspective of the distance travelled in pursuit, till the waves come back all over again and then you need to swim back to the safety of the shores. And in choosing happiness over melancholy I banished my aloneness ! 
Ironically enough, my romantic illusion of melancholia keeps me happy. In not wanting to fulfill every need, in deprivation , in denial of engulfing gratification, I find more solace than in complete surrender to the opium of happiness. My poison is less lethal, it does not numb my senses in ecstasy. It keeps me awake, to the sounds within. I chose being alone to lonely. Lonely is what the world may do to you, but alone is your own choice. Alone is a pricey mistress, it has to be wooed into your life through an art of beautiful imagery. And living in the illusion of my soul I banished my aloneness ! 
The aloneness should be so complete that even silence should shatter like glass. To create silence is easy, but to be with yourself in that silence is challenging and closer to bliss. When my mind starts wandering , it is neither the darkest or the brightest hour , I simply let it dwell in the undefined moments of silence . The mind makes noises till it tires out and seeks refuge in a word less state of existence. The symphony of words keeps me lost in my own state of trance. Truest sense of being alone would be when my words seize to exist, when there will be silence even in the hour when I am most awake. And in waiting for that silent hour I banished my aloneness !  
Words… merciless , shameless words, keep crowding in. Words disturb my state of alone. My words mock my vacant mind, my blissful silence. Yet the aching hollowness caused by the lack of words erodes me. Words keep knocking till I open the doors. Words are traitors playing cunning games with my mind, pushing me away from my quiet. Words make me greedy for creation, for baited anticipation of reciprocation. Words make me feel like a monarch when I chase an escaping thought and bind that thought forever. Words are dangerously slippery, they slip out of my mind and claim existence in the universe to be echoed again and again. Words love the sound of reverberation. Descartes played with our minds when he wrote “I think therefore I am “. Why cannot the I exist in a thoughtless state ? Logic leads to questions and answers for every question must have an answer or so we were taught to believe. To construct and deconstruct keeps the mind busy, and occupies it in a semblance of happiness. And in indulging my word empowered happiness I banished my aloneness !
This whole confusion was started by Ranjaboti , had she not written that poem and read it to the class, the battle of Alone or Lonely would not have started at all. Only if I could find her one day, I would put all the blame on her and rest at ease. How do I find her in this maze of alone and lonely. Do we stand alone because we are lonely amongst others , or are we lonely because we are waiting to be alone forever. It is never easy to escape the chaos of the world around. Therefore every time I chose to banish my aloneness I fail. The people, the melancholy, the happiness, the words and the silence , they all claim space within me. And yet in seeking the answers to all the unanswered questions of my mind I banished my aloneness once again.