As I Sing My Life's Anthem

Fellow human, please tell me that I am not the only one who is this influenced by a book, for I am scared that the society might question my sanity. On April 28^th, 2012, 3 P.M., I read aloud the last word of the book Anthem by Ayn Rand. It was ‘EGO’, it literally means ‘self’ and it was then I think I really recognized and actually acknowledged my ‘self’. On October 30^th, 1990, 1 P.M., I was born first to my parents. Years passed. And when I completed Anthem, I was reborn, to Ayn Rand and her book, my second set of parents. I am neither Ayn Rand’s biological son nor her adopted one. But I am undeniably her ideological son and her philosophical one.

Ah! You ask what Anthem did to me. What can I say? Firstly, can I verbalize such intense a metamorphosis? I don’t know. There’s no harm trying and so I am. At first it was like a simple story, a story of some man with a strange name. Slowly and steadily I became aware. Each page I turned was like a pill of courage, courage which conceived confidence. Each page elevated my soul by a mile. I don’t want to jargonize by mentioning ‘Objectivism’. I just want to tell what the book told me, what the book tells everyone. It tells that you are important, you can decide what to do with your life, you have no necessity to live in bondage, you can be the master of yourself, you can dream as you will and can realize those dreams. It is no crime to live life for you. It’s no crime to choose what you want to do over what others want you to do. It’s no crime to love your own self. It’s no crime to be what you are.

At times when I was reading, tears rolled down my eyes and I had gooseflesh. At times I stopped reading, held the book in front of me, gazed at its cover for a while and then kissed it so hard that my lips pained. Reading Anthem was like being cocooned; when I completed, I did get wings. Now come and see me, for I can fly higher than you can imagine. After I completed Anthem, I kept it along with the Hindu gods in my mother’s puja room. She threw it away and told me that I am mad. Fellow human, please tell me that I am not the only one who is this influenced by a book, for now, as I sing my life’s anthem, I fear if I am a fanatical lunatic.