Random Thoughts

In the early 90’s, a new newspaper named “The Independent” hit the newsstands in Bombay. There were billboards all over the city announcing the arrival of the newspaper claiming non-partisan reporting. There was one particularly interesting billboard near VT that I saw only once through the corner of my eye while riding by. It showed the illustration of a loaf of bread with one slice removed and a knife applying butter to the slice. And, the caption read,

“There is safety in being in a cluster, but THE INDEPENDENT gets the butter”.

It is a caption that I have gone back to, again and again over the last 15 or so years - like going back to a page with a bookmark. This simple billboard sent a very intense beam into me – an intensity that I still feel. Even the flashing, bright billboards in Las Vegas seemed dark and dull in comparison.

It must have been very unsafe to be independent. The Independent didn’t survive for too long on the newsstands.

Foot Note: "It is easy in the world to live after the world's opinions; it is easy in solitude to live after your own; but the great man is he who in the midst of the crowd keeps with perfect sweetness the independence of solitude." - Ralph Waldo Emerson
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