. blink

apologies for being in suspended animation. thank you for your emails and all the wining. it has helped me get back in gear; and yes, duffel bag - more on pushkar, very soon!

Pushkar Diaries

The Masochist in me

There has to be one somewhere in there, laying dormant and jumping at the first opportunity of vicious pain. 

"I see him there, typish in his way of sitting and looking around - snooping eyes with arrogant grace. My heart skips a beat, there is a sudden pit in my stomach and my bladder cries foul.

A part of me wishes to smile, another part of me turns my head away. A part of me wants to wave out, another wants to not spoil it." 

I don't really miss Pudgy Fingers, but there is a certain quality that i miss. (That's the big fuck up when you take synecdoche seriously in life.)  

Does pretending that i did not see him, make me any calmer? No.

Does letting go help? No. 

K is stuck in a limbo, and it is not a happy place -

the worse, she so deserves it!

Ps. Dear Oyster Seeker, without you, i would not have realised this vacuum, this folly and the unreasoned feeling thereafter. I am in deep gratitude.   

Loves

We live a variety of loves - some make multiple love stories and some singular immortal romances. I'm yet to figure out the difference. I guess, the former is a marked journey (Vicky Christina Barcelona, Gone with the wind) and the latter lends itself to a historical significance or a fictional value (Love letters/ Bridges of Madison County).

Torch said something that plucked at my soul - "a Romance is always complete within itself, where the end is not held against the lovers. It is a wonderful portrait, where the warmth foils the complex barters within. Romances in general do not evoke envy, they are above all ill-feeling; it's a higher more mature kind of love. It is expected to out-live its lovers, and the element that wins in it is the fatality of the love, and the temporality of the love.A romance is lived in a speed jet, and re-lived for lives later. It’s like your tailbone, you do not need it anymore, but its presence reminds you of a time when you were someone else.

The latter is a different ball game - A love story is wonderful when it is, say, a puppy -love, or a sexual-fight, or pure tragedy, unfulfilled and crazed with careless passion. Although, the folly is magnified, the horror of it - glorified, the distance elongated, the fate is marked, and marked in RED. Also, they have the ability to wilt, unlike romances.

Only unstable, can–not-live-with, open ended relationships make for great love stories – where the journey is often more violent. The beauty, is in its abruptness, there is something bitter about it, and something very intoxicating. Like sucking on a grape meant for making wine and not eating. Nonetheless, you know the fact, and you acknowledge it, and when you do -  the story ends."

Suspending Time

K is hoping that the following does not read as a parenthetical piece of philosophy.

All science, philosophy, mathematics etc… foster on certain postulates. Time as we understand today is called ‘empirical/ transcendental time’. Time as man records is called ‘eternal or circular time’. K believes that everything which exists in nature has an aura, and therefore a frequency. Simultaneously, the cosmos/ space/ god/ conscience/ collective unconscious or whatever, responds and resonates its own frequency. All frequency is energy.

K understands that Time is eternal, often parallel and cyclical in nature; just like an orbit. Like an orbit it also briskly intersects other time zones at some point.

Our debate of doubt commences from the seed that reincarnation or past life is an absolute (either redundant or eternal, however still an absolute!). Our conditioning teaches us that human living is gauged and bound by time. Hence we have the concept of age, and what is deemed most appropriate in that age. Then when the cycle of life is over, we are supposedly reborn, or not reborn.

Notwithstanding this notion, K understands that ‘living is an act’. An act involving a premise and a conclusion, her nimble mind has yet to discover the details of those. What she has discovered is that this premise and conclusion are relative to the nature, capacity and clarity of each individual. We keep living till we have concluded the said task, reason for being or fulfilled our Karma.

(Karma as ancient scriptures record is the reason, the ventilator, ability that each person is born with to fulfill in his or her life. It is the search and the quest of every life. This continues as long as you have done the job, you were supposed to do, ignoring empirical time.)

However, if time is parallel and cyclical in nature; then so are living beings. To put is straight – All our lives, are running parallel to this life at any given point in time. And certain people including yogis, physicists, psychologists etc… have traveled into past life or out of the body into space or into another dimension to observe it and return with answers to their questions. Here an appropriate example would be of time travel machines. Traveling across empirical time is just like crossing your by lane, to reach the highway (eternal time).

When we speak of visions and of ‘the connection/ the vibe’ with another living being, we speak of a faint memory of an energy/ relationship/ soul that we shared with that being. Visions are often understood as ‘resurfacing’, when two orbits interact or when some part of the subconscious mind evokes a parallel action in another time, as a response to the frequency / energy shared – you see visions. It could be a vision that your rational mind may not fathom but you have summoned it.

The next question that Apple Wings asked was, ‘then why do people have no memories of these supposed relationships?’

The reason being that human conditioning is so consistent and hence has become so strong that sometimes it can become a part of your genetic code. All living is in ways like a math problem where we hold an incorrect equation as a premise and then go on to prove whether it can be right however we conclude with the premise being incorrect. Our folly being accepted and empirical time being degenerated.

Human development psychologists state that all children till they learn to speak have an inbuilt reserve of knowledge – knowledge of the eternal time. They have their sense of judgment, reasoning, goal setting, survival etc…. all in place. Learning works as unlearning for this child. Our education, structures, language, sense definitions - all delude the mind.

Though our lives, we are consistently learning an incorrect premise – be it calling the cat as a cat or grasping that money is the most powerful tool in this world, or worse, wanting to make history. French philosopher Derrida observes, ‘the relationship between the signifier (red) and the signified (anger) is arbitrary.’ We have learnt to define our senses, not discover them – we use them to define other objects which are already defined within the structure.

These are stale observations – and unfortunately our knowledge is formulated from them. Knowledge is what you gain when you let the ‘other’ speak – it could be an object, it could be a feeling, it could be a person. The sensations that you receive are your knowledge! This knowledge can not and should not be the same for every other being.

Try attempting this – let a cucumber tell you how it will taste the best. Now the act of eating a cucumber – is as we said an ‘act’. An act is often devoid of empirical time. And it is most ideal that we look at it as an act. Every thing we 'do' should become an act, ideally speaking.

Therefore, it does not matter what you have achieved in the ticking of the clock, it matters that you have experience and achieved what you were designed to achieve. As Gautam Buddha or Osho puts it - get your empirical senses out of the way - either by abstinence or by boredom from overindulgence - when the mind is cleared - the ability to respond to the eternal energy will get stronger and clearer. Once the tone is set - you shall know revise the knowledge you were born with, and locate the destination of your journey. A destination devoid of empirical time. The Gita asserts that until your Karma is unfulfilled, you shall return. The Gita also says that the seed is within you and it is left to you to locate it and foster its growth till you have borne the fruit of your desire.

Rhonda Bryne often states the same in simpler ways. Ways in which Quantum physics defines the form of energy and its merger into white noise.

Dear Apple Wings, I’ve tried to put it very simply, so am vaguely hoping that you have found your answer.

9-10-2009

You can buy an old house, but you can not build one.
The uniqueness of each rotting piece narrates a history of a strangely lived life.
The lives of its inhabitants merge with its own personality and gradually the hose becomes a home. A place lived in and fought through.

10 - 09-2009

K is feeling the pain of a woman she never was.

Satring at her cellphone at every turn of the night, counting every breath of time. Waiting for a name to flash, yearning for Nancy Sinatra's voice - fearing the truth of the song, for too much is held at Silence's risky blade.

"I was five and he was six
We rode on horses made of sticks
He wore black and I wore white
He would always win the fight

Bang bang, he shot me down
Bang bang, I hit the ground
Bang bang, that awful sound
Bang bang, my baby shot me down.

Seasons came and changed the time
When I grew up, I called him mine
He would always laugh and say
"Remember when we used to play?"

Bang bang, I shot you down
Bang bang, you hit the ground
Bang bang, that awful sound
Bang bang, I used to shoot you down.

Music played, and people sang
Just for me, the church bells rang.

Now he's gone, I don't know why
And till this day, sometimes I cry
He didn't even say goodbye
He didn't take the time to lie.

Bang bang, he shot me down
Bang bang, I hit the ground
Bang bang, that awful sound
Bang bang, my baby shot me down..."

....@#^&

My success does not absolve my failures,
My failures do not justify my success.

CITY ... again

What I feel about this city is identical to the cross-fare of emotions a child goes through. An autistic child, whose room is being re-arranged. I shall miss the sundry market across Fountain, just as i miss the book-sellers each day. It’s a pain few understand and most forget. To live with it, is another story altogether.

OBS

This comes later than expected.

"When you are desperate to 'fall in love',
when everything is often right,
you succumb to
the most intrigued or
the most wonton"

The worst is,
everyone around you knows
your in a pit,

but this knowledge never reaches you.

And when it does,
it's often a time for truce."

So is life and so are love stories.

I hope the true works for you my Style Icon. Am too much in my shambles to advice, judge or consult with you.

Tragedy of Some...

Some women are born foolish and naive.

The kind of women that inevitably find themselves in a tug-o-war,
where the possible choice should be NONE.

The kind that forgive a thief for stealing from them -
just giving him a benefit of doubt, for all his grief.

The kind that can smile and greet their 'whore of an ex-boss'
when they randomly bump into each other.

The kind that write a cheque to the headmistress at the sickest 'school-reunion'
to strengthen the 'School foundation' when the very institution
and the lady in question made their lives a living hell.

The kind that will forget an underhand cheating, lying habits of a friend seeking help.

The kind who is fooled by the lovers plight and an enemy's weakness.

The kind who retreat their swords when their right is proven wrong

Scarily for an wit-less K, she is one of them
and we exist everywhere
That is most tragic!

stream of consciousness

email reply :

'I fit the age bracket (24-27). In almost three months I will cross it! Hmmm why does it not scare me?'

IT F*@#ING SHOULD!

Candy Man

The Candy man died.

Loud mouth was in a state of enthralled pain and grief which will take weeks to subside. Childmom was kinda okay with him not being there any more. Wise capitalist and K ceased to react.

The Candy man was dying for about a month now, he was diagnosed of a rare disease that swallowed the kidneys and then attacked other organs. He was a part of my childhood- the better part of it:

'Every time we all got together he would pamper me spoilt, candies are what he brought for us in huge bags! There was pan pasand, sawd, flavored lollipops and all phoren chewy toffees. Gradually bubble gums, chewing gums made their way into the bag and then came crayons, erasers, scented pens, fragrant papers, pens that nullified ink spots or fehlers and the host of godly goodness. He knew my weakness for stationery and would shower me with pencils (the flexible ones by ‘stray cat’) sharpeners, erasers (in various shapes, colors and sizes) he was the first man to bring me my first ‘non dust’ eraser, most of all he was the first guy to introduce a timid 7 year old to Fusen chewing gum, and it’s ability to blow into a balloon still firmly tugged into my mouth. I have for years collected those ink tattoos on the flip side of the wrapper.

(Your childhood often has the roots of your soul's desires in them. The sticker and tattoo is probably one of them. It translated on to my body decades later, in a much respectable and discrete fashion though.)

The Candy man did not visit us at regular intervals but he with ‘Moon smile’ came too often to relish home cooked food and my mother like the eternal ‘Annapurna’ would welcome them with a long menu of ‘I know what you like!’

They both loved my mother – like everyone loves the chicken for its tandoori. And she was more than happy to feed Somalia’s population with much devotion and care. I never complained – a) I was too small and b) I was clearly benefiting from their visits. They were a welcome change with jokes, laughter and a whole battery of funny and exciting stories and gifts. The gifts may appear meager today but for a toddler they were magical!

The Candy man came from the sandy part of the country. And gave me the impression of a Kabuliwala; also he was special, because he was the only Muslim in our otherwise right-winged, fanatic Hindu Brahmin household. Thinking of it now, makes me admire him a little more – he must have really had something more than every other Hindu, to be welcomed with out a knock into our home. He, as expected never spoke of meat in the house, never brought up religion, had impeccable sense of hygiene and helped mom with the chores without being asked for or told to.

We moved to Bombay and subsequently his visits reduced. There was a pale emptiness to the new home we had – albeit large, it always smelled of diminishing royalty. My mother, just like every righteous women – patch worked the house into a warm, modest yet large hearted home. New set of leeches took over and we were older to distance ourselves from the smiling faces. The faces were nice but not warm and they did not get us gifts. They bought Cadbury dairy milk! And I missed fruits, missed stationary, and I missed the young men with all the clatter and their stories of Shillong, Nepal, Nainital, Bhuj, Jodhpur – I missed the ‘Bhabhiji aap ko ye batana tha, Bhabhiji aapke liye special laya hoon, Bhabhiji aap ko bahut miss kiya…'. I missed it, the new lot called her ‘Mrs. Dadhe’. Not even remotely warm.

He came long ago, almost a decade later, and I saw him, older, father of two – talking fondly to his daughters about our antics as kids. He was in the sunny verandah in our once beautiful home. We had relocated and were miles away from him – I think he understood that. We saw him never again – we were farther in mind than the distance.

It’s been over a month when his wife called to inform us of his impending krankheit. And the seriousness of the situation only seeped into Loud mouth (he was much older, and knew him closely; better than us, for sure)– as for my optimistic mind, there is a cure for everything in this world. So, I slept over it. A week before Loud mouth decided to take a journey to him – he died.

A fortnight later when Loud mouth has collected himself over multiple evenings of whiskey; his absence seems to hit me! The late riser, slow learner and the watchdog of life that I am – I type out all that I remember of him. I am unwilling to forgo what remains of him – he was the man who made a grouchy child smile. The Candy man will be fondly missed.'

Scarier than Strange

Every Monsoon, I notice that something in this city has drastically changed. And not for good, something that I miss.

Like the previous year, this year too there are no frogs! It's raining but NO FROGS.
No croaking, no mating calls, no springing up along the stairs, no screeches from my maid, no kids diving into a large puddle in the playground to grab the biggest frog, simply no sight of them!

Every year (since more than a decade) some crow couples build their nest in the hibiscus tree, in the courtyard. Over the years, the numbers have diminished. 2008, there was only one who , build its nest really high up in the tree. [my grandpa taught me that when birds expect heavy rain, they build within the closures of the tree; when scanty, closer to the light and the sky. So every year I'd predict if it was going to rain good or not.] This year there isn't a single nest!

There are lesser sparrows flying into the house every morning, and even lesser bitches birthing a litter in the compound.

Something has gone wrong; I have a terrible feeling inside me, something that I can not reverse.

Than you Jeff

Reading 'A Prisoner of Birth',  helped K word something that she felt for eons but could never pen it with the simplicity she wanted to achieve. today she has - A man's qualification, demeanor and speech does not define his character. 

it's been a common foolhardiness on our part and am still trying to wipe it my conditioning.  For Childmom - who's a prime victim of shortsightedness.

Akimbo in Bombay Rain.

This post comes delayed, very delayed. K ’s mind has become as erratic as the rains. K awaits a cathartic downpour, but all she receives is a plenitude of a trickle.

Rains are magical to Mumbai, they are the witches Morrigan summons every year to protect this Venusian mistress. The smell of the city is like no other, its moods unmatched. Her pendulum nature is quite an addiction.

A walk from Churchgate station to Kala Godha at 8.30 am sipping a cup of hot coffee in a consistent drizzle, gives you a lesson in love. The fragrance of human commotion is visible and forgiven, for the sheer pleasantness of weather. The over looming aroma of coffee and gudan garm; alternating with the sharp smell of cutlets and samosas submerged in fuming palm oil, to the crisp fragrance of freshly baked bread, and somewhere at an unexpected juncture you can smell god in potted mogras.

The wake-up calls from the Koyal, the man who jogs at the oval from 8.15 to 8.45 every day, the septuagenarian on the 3^rd floor of Court View stands from 8 am onwards by the window watching grumpy, sleepy migrants haul their bodies to work every morning.

How can one miss the man who changes his wind-chimes every monsoon? (The earliest I recall was a large bronze sun; a ball of shimmering gold. The next came, long hollow bamboo shoots, making odd khadak, khadak sounds, annoying but familiar to the heart. Presently the aluminum/steel trinket brought from a $1 store has taken over. it hangs in there, on the so called balcony - a testimony of a Chinese worker's craft that made its journey into a South Bombay apartment.

(A walk across the Oval deserves to be a stand-alone experience to be narrated)

The silence in the Quila court corridors is far more pleasant than the joy of justice at vormittag. The Army restaurant, where no defense personnel ever ate, has opened its shutters as a scrunched child labor swabs the floors with hot water. Across the lane, stands a muted, large, beautiful structure with never opened rotted gates. On its broad stone steps, drug addicts, infested with flies sleep away, abandoning the city’s mirth.

As K walks across welcoming the Rhythm house only for its architecture, she nods at a familiar set of brown eyes. He silently stands at the opposite corner, looking at the black horse painted across a pub, named after a whore- house street. He smiles at her, she responds, they talk about a new element that they discovered in the horse that day. ‘It is in motion’ if you observe carefully. She agrees.

They part ways, he heads to the blindingly blue synagogue and she disappears into the opaque beige lanes.

Love Again....

It's fascinating how i never get bored of writing about love and b'bay. Both are phenomenal emotions indeed!

K confesses
~"it just ran its course. It was an act of perfection - complete in it's candor, with a premise and a conclusion. I think we lived it fully.

I have learnt that you can not hold someone’s love against them.
Just as you can not hold your absence of love against you."

Equinox

Often when I think that things can not be worse than they already are. When the dark is only growing darker and that the rays of Ra must have faded away, I think of the dark lord. I know he'll bear the first tear in the morbid skies and spew light; for lies in his heart is the prism of equinox

Randomness from the heart

I need to insulate my nerves, against me.

Poetics of Wisdom

I learnt, when in the final year of Masters, that everything i perceived as original till that moment was, in fact a product of time past. My so called spurts of wisdom, creativity, intelligence and counter catechisms - were in fact already expressed in different and sometimes much better forms. Hence everything that has to be written is already written, even what I’m about to write.

I think thoughts from a borrowed consciousness,
the same that existed before my electronic or paper notebook arrived.

They were captured and then extinguished
like mine will be when the blog dies,
when the book decays.
Then sometime a million years later
when modes of expressions have deferred and differed
someone will think my thoughts
thoughts that were borrowed from a consciousness
before mine.

As Soul sista often teaches me - all expression must be made, irrespective of its audience, devoid of failure or success. Some thoughts are heard soon, some later; some just float for generations and build the rule-book of time.

Once Upon a Time...

She seived the water resting in the hills.
The purity of his mind made it immortal.

A blue boy made a tear in its karma.

The blue boy was forbidden from heaven.
The blue boy was worshipped by man.

Why Hera and Aphrodite can't be friends

K is a woman in her late 20’s, who drinks a triple shot of espresso with lime juice.

J is a woman who bakes cakes.

K never baked a cake, a cookie or made a sandwich for him.

J was his nurse, friend, mother, sister, back-up date, cleaner, et al.

K was the woman who strolled in and out of his bedroom, never halting at the kitchen or the drawing room.

J was the quintessential ‘good girl’

K was just a ‘girl having a good time’.

Almost half a decade later, K very unwittingly bumped into her at the lights and chandelier store. She did secretly want to bump into her, but probably with a speeding car!

J was standing there critically appreciating a tiny piece of wall lighting that K thought was unpraktisch. Her halo was the unchanged, silky hair, every strand in place. Sans crease churidaar draped with a south cotton dupatta. Perfectly color coordinated shoes and bag.

Contrasting her sanitized demeanor; K looked like a jamboree: Her wild her left loose, silver hoops dangling from her lobes; denim capris, white and blue floral shirt, her awkwardly matched brown Baggit tote with beige ACG’s – were incomparable even with her shadow.

K was about to suck in her breath and rush out without purchasing her ‘best buy’ light fixture; when J turned! K swelled her bosom, sucked in her paunch and just like a ‘blast from the past, greeted her. Pleasantries were exchanged.

J’s accompanist, an olderly lady, (who was shown no recognition for staring at K), remarked – “Isn’t she the one ‘the hustler’ was screwing behind your back?” I appreciated both – her galls and my restrain.

J: “Ya, K, I've never asked you how it felt to be the second woman?”

K: “Well, it was fantastic, almost Utopian! You get the perks, without the brunt. So tell me how does it feel being a successful human dishwasher?

J: “Ohhh, the famous caustic tongue! He had forewarned me. However, I am his wife now. We tied a knot last year. I wanted to invite you, but he never let me post it through. He didn’t want you there! He said, ‘He did not want to face his mistake.’ Do you know what that means K?

K (smirking at the jerk): “I bless you for your ignorance, and for what you have. It is something I could never live with…”

K turned to leave and as the guard opened the door, J yelled – “What is it that you could never live with?”

Him.

Freedom from oder Freedom to....

Section 377 was repealed today by the Indian law. Thereby, granting freedom for every Indian citizen to choose her/ his sexuality. Today is a celebration of sorts - after a long grueling battle with the law, we now need to look at other aspects of homosexual and alternative sexuality.

We are now free from arrests, assaults and abuses. Will this freedom translate into the freedom to live peacefully? Will we stop socially assaulting people for their choices? Will violence in gay and lesbian relationships decrease?

A step is taken; a ladder is yet to be built. We need to use this freedom to make the world around us a better place to live.

The Other Side of Singleton

In the mood to complain:

K has always loved her coveted ‘single-and-emancipated’ status, however, there are times when she is at war with herself.

~ Times when friends can't make it to a planned pre-scheduled event, coz the hubby is out of town or mother-in-law is visiting or worse, the baby is sick.

~ Times when on an outstation holiday, she is compelled to share the spare bedroom with their nosy-parker kids.

~ Times when she sits at the tail end of the dinner table coz all the couples sit together.

~ Times when she baby sits really ill mannered screaming toddlers that she would gladly push down a flight of stairs, ( if she were guilt free).

~ Times when she is searing with anger at the cunning with which they cut her out from her plan. Poor K then makes them a meal, or checks on the house help, or just watches TV till they are ‘fully satisfied’.

~ K also does enough amount of lying for them, especially if either of them shops beyond the stipulated limit. It is to be understood that the extra is ‘gifted’ by her! The scene changes as partners complain about why they were not gifted or why was I spoiling their partner!

~ Times when her easy life, appears flippant and unstable for the married town whores.

~ Times when they criticize her for not having their problems and hence the lack of seriousness towards them.

~ Times when she is dragged into ‘him v/s her’ fight and she can not refuse to take sides. And when she does, K gets clearly blamed for the entire argument!

~ Friends don’t remain friends once they get married – they just become married people.

Tales from Samovar

There was a time, there is a time and there will be a time. The time won’t change but everything around it will, and if it wouldn’t it’ll be mighty tasteless.

That’s what happened to an impulsive K, when she strolled out of MB and walked straight into the Jehangir Art Gallery ,turned right and entered Samovar. K, was heavy with expectation, burdened with memories of art love & debates; and filled to the brim with passion of a young adult, who once wanted to spin the parliament around. And Samovar, like Kayani, Sarovar, Metro cafe, Café New York, Café Cadel, Ideal Café, etc… had been a witness to this naïve madness. At times, K thought that it was the place that made her who she was. The environs demanded her to be idealistic and revolutionary, or maybe it was her slowly growing mental age. (Especially the café near Horniman circle, whose name she can not recollect, whose owner hoped that she would write about his café one day, when she got really famous. Well, she will.)

Samovar was a little different. The owner did not care; the waiters always took the wrong orders, and everyone there was pseudo elite – talking Kafka, Monet and Braque. The overheard conversations, the quick notes in the scrap book, the Google(ing) it all in the college library – was then a shameless way to acquire more knowledge. Samovar was also a place where K saw Mushy the first time – years before they actually met. (On random note: K saw Pudgy fingers the first time at Gokul’s, before she met him 6 years later, in his office!)

Sitting there, K mulled over everything - the unchanged, crammed, familiar furniture, the shaky wooden tables, host of oddballs sipping on the lassi, art novices and barons, the mesmerized newbie’s face and somewhere, sitting solitary in a corner, was a woman waiting for her déjà vu moment.

The moment did not come. There was a suspension at the very heart of the experience. As K walked out of the gallery, she knew that she had out-grown the Essel World of ivory tower talks. The books are now back into the shelf on Art and Literary Criticism. Noone she knew referred to the ‘Beauty Myth’ before picking up a copy of Vogue, or a pair of pumps from Aldo.

A change in approach...

".... and shall we know the nomenclature of such a fine display of providence?",
she asked.
He replied, "the cat deserves the best and the happiest and the fattest codfish!"

now, there is so much to be happy about!

Evil Come Evil Go

There are multiple Beelzebub’s and ratched's in K life, but the Slithering Walrus has not really gotten off her head.

The time will come when retribution shall be satiated. Till then, the Scorpio lays in patience. A gift - like its foolish, courageous flight.

Irked with work!

on sunshine's birthday yesterday, conversations veered from jaw hurting laughter to extreme frowns. Every single woman in that room had developed an aversion to work for someone - be it an organization or a person. it just seemed liked the worst thing in life!

Although K echoed the sentiment, there was a ringing question as to why there is so much of hatred towards companies and their policies? It wasn't just K's strangeness that invited wrath uncalled for but it was something bigger - like a gangrene.

In another recent conversation with Loudmouth, he claimed that every employee feels that s/he is underpaid and every employer feels that he is paying more than the employee's caliber. i do not know whether to agree or disagree, as the ratio to unhappy employees against unhappy employers is unmatched.

Companies are here to make profits, and they'd never compromise on that. What are employees here for? to gain letters of experience or learn a trick or two in corporate politics or to just become more proficient at doing the same mental and physical activity?

It did not dawn on us till we calculated how much we earned for the time and the talent we bartered for. It just did not seem to be worth anything - it seemed that we had run into severe losses, and we were the key culprits of the same.

who needs a job? why should we listen and work for someone who makes more money from our talents than we do? we must really be stupid to let this happen to us, and to believe that it's the most secure thing in the world!

Random Quote: "perizad khola said this in the indiflick Just Married - that when wit dawns on you, you should never waste time."

In circles. . . .

there is a certain strangeness with people around me. it's the trolls verus i . it's an awakward war. my strangeness against their marinated wisdom.

the name of a rose

say, how do i define myself?
what is it that characterizes my blog?
say if i title me in a book, what will it be called?

~ ideally it could be called :

# chronicles of an eponymous fool

you tell me, my lost reader, what suits me the best - the anti-heroin, the name chanter, the grumble bee, the soul searcher, the eternal watchman at the gates of the world.

tell me.

Revenge is Good

Yes, it is and it is as delicious as a cold blueberry cheese cake. K realized this when she understood that 'she' was her only job in life!

In three recent conversations with the Chameleon, the wise capitalist, Oyster seeker and Childmom - K witnessed decadent emotions unfurl only because they were not combated in time. The volcanic eruptions within her were almost a deja vu when she saw the wise capitalist upset over past incidences, which she could have avoided if she had chosen to be equally cruel.

So what stops us from avenging our wounds? is it something within or is it just conditioning? A social jargon that tells us that we must forgive and forget, that we must move on and leave the perpetrator into the hands of fate? The common gyaan is 'It is wrong to harbor ill feelings, it is wrong to think ill of someone, lest feed them their soggy toast.'

K has come to think otherwise, revenge is liberating. It is going to set us free of all the negative energy and thought that we have bolted into our unconscious under the garb of social decorum and high spirituality. Avenging negativity, positively or negatively itself works wonders for our mind and our self esteem. Tried it accidentally previously, and K does not have ill memories of that individual and the incident.

Revenge is like disposing waste instantly - verbal or non verbal. Just clean ur self of all the garbage that you have piled up out of ur naivety and shallow goodness. You will feel really better once you fill urself with pure impeachable goodness - not a borrowed and acquired one!

With an almost history of ill incidences with negativity, K has concluded that she shall entertain them no more.

Demeter - Persepone - Hades

Does this trio ring a bell?

It's one of the oldest and most classic examples of rebellion leading to tug-o-war.

K is suffering this one right now!

The word has been spoken...

Dear Oyster Seeker,

"Maybe in the name of Love,
I may dive with you,
may swim through trenches deep
and seek blue light."

The maybe's of my life have led to a bitter heart and a numb mind...
The maybe's in my life have also whirled-in a cool breeze from a dull May sky...

The Long and Short of it.

Every one asks questions. I got this test that I'd had to fill up for me - not for the dear friend.

10 things you need to do before 50.

1) Achieve my mental figure.
2) Become wealthy and then wealthier.
3) Finish my book, rather books. One is still a draft and the other one is almost 3 pages done!
4) Learn to be concise in thought and economic in space.
5) Have the courage to edit inexcusable and unnecessary prolix.
6) Avoid being self deprecating.
7) Be less sensitive to humor.
8) LIVE, this life, the way it's meant to be lived.
9) Hold the people I love the most.
10) Make the above nine a reality.

Journeys...

Pebble collector, in another blog post of hers, wrote something very quirky. It was about the journey that pebbles take to end-up at her window ledge. Similar to the journey some words take to end-up in a post, a blessay (blog essay), in the news paper or on one of the wrinkles on your brain. It's quite fascinating to think of this fantastic journey, and to realise that it's not the most well sounding, or textured, or eclectic word that finds itself in your notepad; its just the right one. The one that explained the soul of the sentence in the brevity of a word.

freedom and happiness

The becoming of self is often out of freedom.

The becoming of a wife is often out of duty.

The becoming of a mistress is often out of love.

The Prejudice of Love

There are so many things I would have done differently. Every time, I look at my mind, I pledge a band aid. I pledge to be in a time machine. I pledge to be a different me.

There are many things that I have not been able to forgive myself for, and this, by far, tops the charts.

" I shan't give -up, if you are standing by.
Behold my love, behold courage -
hold the shield against the sword of my love,
and against the dagger of your love.
We may survive this one,
as we brush against death, dirt, stars, debt, love itself and each other. "

Missing

Listless breeze. Lobotomized mind.
Lost friends. Lackadaisical spirit.
So many undid memories, Unattended moments.
Abridged karma. Deleted relations.
Avoided friends. Temporal promises.
Blocked out hearts. Lofty loves.
Wanton thoughts. Dead end

Blah

Togetherness is a very particular concept.

Order and Outcome of an Arrangement

In K's opinion, people attend engagements and weddings not for the solemnity of the occasion but to critically appreciate the arrangement.

Subjective emotions spurt at every 'and he's chosen her as a life partner'? The her said with much dislike and repel. Well, when K was neutral (in her subdued sarcastic way), Wise capitalist and Chameleon went all the way to disclose their judgment of Style Icon's bride to be. Childmom kept mum, and the 'eternal objective moral support' that he is, the unfledged loudmouth was 'supportive.' A unanimous opinion of the wise was, that he lacked foresight.

K was happy that the Style Icon was happy, the quality of what made him happy mattered little. It is, again, very subjective.

In a quite conversation with Childmom, K recalled a chat with the meat eater, uber chic, and pretentiously desi Wasabi, where he was disappointed with a lady he met and while voicing this with mirth and cunning eloquence - he was honest enough to admit that the criticism of her traits were only because he genuinely did not like her. If he had; the mannerisms and the thriftiness would have been overlooked generously. All to end up falling in love with a Jain vegan!

And K realized that YES, That's what it is! Like in a love marriage or an arranged - you just like a person and when you do - all the barriers that you had wisely chosen to sift out the unwanted disappear. Age, profession, interests, food habits, qualification, finance, intellect - na, none of them hold much good. There will be more sly ways in which you would want to show how wonderful the new found soul mate is, how most appropriate the decision.

I sometimes do not believe that arranged marriages are thoughtful barters as they claim to be, at least, 21st century marriages aren't! I like this element of careless love, the eye locks, the quite hand holding (beneath a shawl)... and the stolen moments/ kisses in between work.

Love can never be arranged - it's in a moment and it can not be learned; it is not a habit, an ability or an acquired skill. It does not come with time, with two people who have chosen to live comfortably together under favorable stars.

Style Icon's marriage in my opinion is more love than arranged. And I like the sound of it!

Heat - city

It feels like the devil swallowed this city whole! The muck of sweat the stink of stress will eventually claim the mind.

I await the nights of many waxing moons and the pull out my hand for a few drops of dark drizzle.

Polyester Courage

Sometime, almost a month ago, K finally amputated her dead extension. She had let it be as it had no ill effects on her daily chores, what it impacted was a small part of her mind that insisted on caging memories. Red, pungent, languidly spicy memories.

6:45pm, Carter Road. breeze wafting through our hair, aiding to cool off the sticky shower wetness. The sea across signaling a late sunset. A table in the corner, distancing itself from hand held lovers with permanent smiles; afraid of self cynicism and vicarious pleasures. A phone call. A 'we will talk later' reply. A 25 sec eye contact and the phone was handed over. Ten mins later a firm, harsh but polite message was sent. All this amongst chattering, doughnut nibbling, leg pulling, coffee sipping and dissecting Tommy Hilfiger's men's casuals.

It wasn't K, could have never been her. It was Oyster seeker. It was K's present asking her past to bugger off.

An sms to Black Pearl disposed everything that K had held into her. Dispossessing herself from his memory was something that she could never get herself to word. Now it was said, like a sign on a billboard across the western express highway.

" He used to be handsome to eyes that saw more than what appeared to be.
He used to be 'princess Sophia' to arms that felt the warmth of his heart.
He used to have potential to a mind that saw his talent.
He used to be a memory of places, people and funny incidents.
He used to be a name, then an acronym, then a trait.
He used to be a random sms, a phone call from a deleted number
He just used to be .... "

In Conversation

ON a really dead day K meets wasabi online, not expecting to have any soul searching conversations which are by far limited to 'none', she does what one must do in a circular movement of time. Here's the out come* -
Note: If you read carefully, it is very very spiritual, almost leads to the seed of the angst, a woman's angst, K's angst !


Wasabi: ?

31 minutes

8:16 PM me: hi

was away

8:17 PM Wasabi: mmmm hmmmm

kai chalu aahe

5 minutes

8:22 PM me: nothing....

8:23 PM how's u been?

8:24 PM Wasabi: not too shabby...how about yourself?

me: what's with the marathi font?

Wasabi : getting back to my village roots

8:26 PM so you're not hooked up as yet?

13 minutes

8:39 PM me: lol, then you should re-locate!

to the roots!

8:40 PM Wasabi: yeah....i don't know if i'll fit in my dhoti though

8:41 PM me: it's free flowing material, sure you would.

8:42 PM Wasabi: are there designer dhotis in India now....i'll be up for it if Ralph Lauren has gotten into the dhoti market

23 minutes

9:06 PM me: Ralph Lauren wouldn't even know how to drape one!

9:07 PM but i guess Gaurav Gupta & Raghavendra Rathod have come up with some really interesting dhoti and cropped jacket drapes on dhoti and kurtas.

9:08 PM Wasabi: damn.....i'll be a sexy villager then

me: you can try those - but i do not think your inclinations are serious --- you better stick to your trousers and steak!

9:09 PM Wasabi: so tell me about your life -- i thought you would have been married by now

9:10 PM me: no ..

i do not want a village or pseudo Indian firang idiot

Wasabi: whattt????

those are the best

9:12 PM me: I have come to believe that guys - under their very unthinking skin are drilled into treating the land and the lady as a mistress of roi (return on investment) and entertainment. what is more unforgiving is that they are unwilling to shed that skin!

9:13 PM Wasabi: whoa....that's deep

why do you think so much

:)

9:15 PM me: because I have a mind, duh, although i guess it may just give up and rust one day in the search for ignorant bliss.

9:16 PM Wasabi: hmmmmmm

9:17 PM me: I read a fat book long long ago

i think you should have to

too

would rather

9:18 PM Wasabi: i read book with pictures in it

me: it's called hitchikers guide to the galaxy

Wasabi: yeah i heard o fit

9:19 PM me: it is very insightful in quirky ways -

Wasabi: it's better than "atlas shrugged"?

:)

9:22 PM me: the architect of the world says to a mere mortal who has lost his way home and has gallivanted across the galaxy

Wasabi: aah

9:23 PM me: slartibartfast:I'd rather be happy than right on any given day.

9:24 PM however the objective right thwarts happiness

9:27 PM bolti band

?

Wasabi: too hi fi for me

:P

9:28 PM me: Sure- sometimes I think people should need a visa to walk into my life and talk to me....

or my likes

9:30 PM Wasabi: i think so

me: intellectual flippancy is a dastardly crime

Wasabi: damn....then i have been sentenced to death!!!

9:31 PM me: most likely you will, unless you say something intelligent in the next 10 seconds

Wasabi: that's too much pressure

me: You will thereby be hanged until declared dead!

* End part of this futile and fruitless conversation was duely discarded.

K misses someone terribly right now,she just can't figure out who!

Hilarious Truths

K in conversation with Oyster Seeker & childmom, for something so important as a life changing decision:

K : How's he?
O: LOLOLOLOL .... if you sigh louder, he'll blow away like a wilted leaf.
K: Okay, no jokes, Seriously man...
O: Okay, compare this - my penis has more girth than his forearms!
K: (Shell Shocked) whao... what? Hmm. NO. Do not repeat!
C: hey lead me into the conversation.
K: Na, nothing. I do not think it's a good idea. O says, the man in question is rather weak.

So much for political correctness and the ability to see the 'goodness within' and live with someone irrespective of how they appear.

Superficial me. This time, no apologies!

Comparative Happiness

Midnight is not an ungodly hour for a post like this to be written.

After a long and a little boring jaunt, K returned home - unhappy, unsatisfied, without income and without the consistent element of fun that this "K has to take a break from work - and its recession, so 'credit card burners' be dammed, it's worth it!"

Randomness apart, K missed a few things: Writing for sure. And interacting with quirky people, feeling divest of ideas and emotions.

What K has learnt yet again is :
~
Think, think carefully before you talk. K is cultivating this menial habit of 'do I need to respond?' before she actually does. The catalysts to this wise decision were the street smart Oyster Seekerand a proverb - 'wise men talk because they have to say something. Fools talk because they must say something!' - According to this one ' K's definietly the biggest fool ever alive on this planet!'
~

Why do we do this to us? Why do we trap ourselves with what is to be done - instead of what we'd like to do? K found an answer to this queasy question - it's just that we like to compare our happiness, just like our sorrows... and we do that often unconsciously, at least K did, till today.

To dissolve the abruptness, here's what happened. Three women got together - K, Childmom and funny face, and got along talking about their childhood memories and as Childmom regurgitated all her experiences with K and with the wise capitalist - it dawned on K's nimble skull that she was like those people you see in restaurants, the ones who look at another man's plate and say ' I'd like to have what he is having!' They rarely look at the menu card or contemplate on what they think would be the best for them. They just want to have what they think will provide pleasure to someone, in return having a fragile assurance of their happiness.

It was not a shocker, but more like a revelation....every buy, every attitude, every friend, every need was cross examined - and an hour later, K knows better. Or claims to know better.

Are some people born like this? What makes us become the way we are?

K's hunting for the answers, and instead what flashes by are all the mistakes that she made - personally, spiritually, professionally and emotionally. Mistakes that she thought would make her a happier person in comparison to someone she detested for being happy. Mistakes that she made in arrogance, mistakes that were a part of plain careless foolishness, mistakes made in greed of a part ignoring the whole....

This world is getting smaller and more networked each day - K has almost come to a full circle with surprised strangers linked to childhood friends. Lovers who she bloated over and now would not wish to even lay a fake claim to.

For everyone who is reading this - ' A lot of things in life are unwanted; a lot of mess can be avoided, if you just stop and think, think if it is worth the dammed trouble.'

The root to all this was a plain comparison of - 'If she is happy with 'xyz', then I have to have them in order to be so'..... a befitting mindset will lead you to a landmine that is presently K's skull.

Now the fun side of this ghastly slow work of local intelligence -

I can assure you that with all the bloodless blunders you make (now can we even count them?) - you are going to have a lifetime of adventure! The highs and the stomach churns is what you got to learn to deal with.

Remember only sinners can turn to saints who inevitably make history - neutrals only breath and cease to breath.