India, May 10 -- I have barely slept in the last 48 hours. There is a semi-war going on, escalating every passing day. But honestly, I am not scared or anxious. Why am I not scared yet? Maybe, it's either India's multi-layered air defence system or my usual middle-class irrational optimism. Kuch nahi hoga (Everything will be alright). I am sleep-deprived. Following conflict from far, but not far enough, is a new experience for me. During the Kargil war in 1999, the internet and I were both young - not many memory bookmarks, nothing to scroll. But war in current times is a unique cocktail of humour and tragedy. This is the first time we have missiles and memes together. Taking turns to reach us from across the border. Following such a war evokes a spectrum of feelings. Fear at one end and thrill at the other; which side of the spectrum you are on depends on how close your family is to the border. I am in Gurgaon, with my parents in Lucknow. But I know a girl who works in Delhi, whose parents are living in Jammu. She broke into tears the moment her first call didn't go through to her parents. Even semi-wars are tough. You also learn about missiles, jets, drones, and air defence systems. You learn it is actually a sales-exhibition of military hardware, for defence manufacturers to show to the presidents, oligarchs, dictators, drug dealers, and others who will place orders the moment they see your jet killing another jet. The share prices go up/down pegged to the life and death of citizens. In a world where kids are born to eventually grow up and enhance shareholder value, this, sadly, makes sense. There is another carnival during the time of war called TV news. Imagine a news panel where a 60-year-old expert is dissecting a topic, bringing in his three decades of experience. Everybody is listening intently, and suddenly an air siren goes off; it is the BREAKING NEWS siren, everybody bows in reverence to the power of breaking news, even though we eventually find out the massive breaking news is basically the home minister going for a meeting to the Prime Minister's Office. The expert has lost his train of thought, the anchor deems the visit as "kuch bada hone wala hai (something big is about to happen)", despite the minister just doing his daily job. All of it, just for the sake of commercial breaks! My only sympathies are with the on-field reporter who's at the LoC, with missiles flying over his head, risking his life. I know they love their job, but it is a gig where they just get 15 seconds of airtime before they are cut off and the anchor moves on to an "expert" sitting in the air-conditioned studio. We hope the reporter opens a YouTube channel in the future. The war is still on. Nobody knows how far up the escalatory ladder we will climb, but with each successive rung, we exchange a bit of thrill for some fear. The radius of indifference may shorten. But we still believe in the Lindy effect - the longer something has existed, the more likely it is to continue existing, or to put it crudely in my native tongue - kuch nahi hoga. Here's to hope....