It was my second episode of an afliction of that type.I have been affected with the same ailment once before also.But that incident ended uneventfully .That time I was infected with s similar type of organism known as ‘bollywood superstar.’
This affliction is not like any myocardial infarction or epidemic dengue fever.But it is a similar thing which can affect anybody at any age.The predisposing factors can be a low mood,sadness,feeling of incompleteness or failure,or simply boredome .There can be other etiological factors also which a psychologist may be able to explain better.The name of this disease is ‘celebrity fever’.The symptoms include an ache in the heart or brain which constantly irritate the affected person so that he or she ends up with doing many shameful or indecent acts.The symptoms starts after seeing or hearing the performance of a celebrity or coming in contact with something related to him which touches the affected through the heart.The affected person craves to be in contact with the celebrity just like a cholera patients longs for water.People who had a mild manifestation only are called as ‘fans’.Most of the time this disorder doesnot lead to any good or bad sequelae.Mostly the condition is temporary , innocuous and self limited..But sometimes it can lead to a chronic state of obcessive compulsive disorder.
When I was in adolescence and then in my twenties I always thought this disorder can never affect me.It is just like one thinking about hypertension or diabetes.When at twenties one thinks ‘highblood pressure and diabetes?not to me!’.But at forty the same person can be seen sitting in the OPD of a G.P or a physician.
This time I got this fever due to another organism known as a ‘novelist’.It happened unexpectedly by an accidental exposure to the causative agent like in any other fevers.
This fever with writers and poets occurs usually when one reads their articles.But in my case I havn’t even knew before that this person had written some article and which was a huge success.I was just wandering in the networld because recently I had lost a single and particular direction of my life due to so many factors.I was feeling all messed up like a garbage truck.From many years of experiences of life,I have learnt that discipline can destroy one’s ability to lead a very normal human life.Because disciplined persons become more obcessed with perfectionism which leads to more success,the two factors which can take a person away from a normal simple life with all open and public human emotional expressions.So I discarded my trials towards the discipline sequence and turned my face in somewhat an opposite direction.
So when I was wandering from one social network site to another and was trying to search someone I knew from the past.But I ended up in this person’s profile and photograph.I liked it instantly in one glance.Then I knew this one has also written a novel two years back and which was accepted by the youth wholeheartedly.I lernt from the site that he has his blogs and a website and he accepts friends on other social network sites as this one is already overloaded. He has a proper professional qualification.He is good looking and healthy.He likes many things that I like for eg.-music ,dance, books etc.
Initially my brain tried to prevent my urge to get to know this person by rationalization.If he is like me so what?many people are like me.Humans share many similar genes due to many factors explained and unexplained.This was coming from my immune system which was trying to help me out from the presence of organism it felt already in my blood. But later other factors like inherent weaknesses to infections succeeded for eg.:-jelousy.It included thoughts like this.’the person is too young.With a single book he won the heart of thousands.I am here in almost middle age.I lived through thousands of novels and stories through years yet couldnot write a single line properly and acknowledge my presence in this world.All stories are compressed and repressed inside my skull.Many are in torn and fading states.All in a haphazard collection which in between try to expand and rupure my parietal bones.And I live with a pen and five useful right sided fingers which are equally undisciplined like me.!
So probably to suppress this depressive state of thinking and affairs my mind soon worked out an idea.It was this idea which helped the infective thing to spread through my brain cells.So for the next two days I planned or schemed so many defferent ways to contact this celebrity.When I start some adventure like this it acts like coffee or sedatives.Stimulating and encouraging. Yet addictive and depressing.
Once you start you cannot stop them unless you pulls your reigns of self control strongly and tightly back.
I let the reigns go..I decided to allow the horse wander freely .No harm would come usually from a short hillside ride in a fresh morning.It would be back by itself in a day or two.After all every horse has its own rights,when it is not under control by outside factors.
I contacted one of my female friends who is a poetess and a so called networking friend of the celebrity in concern.She gave me his mail ID.I wrote him a mail as sweet as I can.As I knew I am the patient here not the celebrity.Then I send many friendship requests to him on all social sites wherever he was present.My friend told me’he is a sweet guy.I chatted with him once’
Within a day or two the celebrity added me as his friend on a social network site.He had around 5000 friends on that site.And I have around 10.So I doubted he added me by just a click and not even seeing my name.And I also thought he may have a secretary to do the triage and then the clicking job for him.I could understand his position too.He is only one .But the affected are more than ten thousand.Afterall he is just a normal humanbeing and not a superman.
With this type of healing thoughts I came back to my normal self again in two days time.My friend told me’so many people may be dying to talk to him.’I understood.even I myself remain invisible mostly in chat windows to avoid overcrowding!finally I concluded my chance of becoming a true friend to this person is almost equal to less than a zero.And this conclusion helped my fever to subside.
Now being a person curious to know how the mind of me and others work,I probed more into the probable cause of my affliction.I found it as the inability of my mind to adjust with whatever and whichever comes in my way.It seeks its own types.It search compatibility even when it is aware of the fact that ‘mingling should be done with people different or less privileged from you to improve your knowledge and help the growth of you and others’ .Mind knows many things.But heart is fragile and yet more powerful than a rational mind.
After doing all this exercise when I was sitting in my cabin seeing a patient in distress and pain and advising her a cure for the problem I felt myself as a celebrity for the first time.I remembered all those days when I was deeply involved in polio campaigns and health checkups in slum areas. I was also treated that time with not anything less than a celebrity by the poor bihari labourers and their wives .I remembered how the priest of a hanuman temple[the baba]used to bring me water by himself and pamper me with hand worked fans during the hot afternoons of power failures when I rest with my team for an hour or two in between the polio programme .How eager was he to give us some choorna he made himself which he believed will help for digestion after walking below the hot sun all day.
Then I understood the meaning of a celebrity and found each person around me is one in their own way.If I can become a figure in life at which a few people can lookup at times of need I can definitely become a ‘celebrated soul’
But it doesn’t mean that I will not be affected by same kind of fever again at another time.Afterall I am also just a simple humanbeing.!
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