Grimus in the morning

“He was the leopard who changed his spots; he was the worm that turned. He was the shifting sands and the ebbing tide. He was moody as the sky, circular as the seasons, nameless as glass. He was chameleon, changeling, all things to all men and nothing to any man."

From ‘Grimus’ 

Mid summer madness

And the wind blows again 

Some more drops fall 

 And the wind beckons

 My coral made bones 

 Nestles my frame in hug 

 Absorbs my conscience 

 

And the wind blows again

 Flitting the leaves hard 

 Pebbles shine as the rays fall

 Tessellating the road 

 It addled my brains 

 And I stood in a frail frame

A birthday to remember

I thought to myself today if I have become a grown-up. I wondered if now I am supposed to have that regal poise when I talk about me or when somebody asks me what I want for my birthday.

 The thought arose when my birthday just went by and I didn't feel sad about it. I remember, when I was a child my birthdays were of supreme importance. Anything else around my birthday was a mere footnote in time. And anyone who forgot wishing me was temporarily ticked off my list and how I always thought of myself as the queen in one of the ferret fantasies and foibles. I would always think of my birthdays as the astrally blithed days when everybody around me would look cosmically and eternally happy. And now when I turn 28, I am not a child anymore! 

Life is strange in its own ways. You feel bogged down by petty things.  Like yesterday, I felt awful about something.  I didn't know what. Since morning my day was dripping boredom.  One incident dangling from another made my sloppy mood grow bigger.  I behaved erratically with V also.  I lamented growing up to have become like this. 

The only incentive of growing up is perhaps having V in my life. Thank you Lord for small mercies! 

Happy birthday to me after all :)

When I took 'Wake up and smell the coffee' too seriously

When I was leaving for work, it started to rain. It being a Saturday, the traffic was smooth and to appease me further it looked beautiful outside.

Spots on the drenched road shone like moonlight. We stopped at a signal and I saw a girl with a blue umbrella... The umbrella flew with the wind, handle broke and a part ripped a little. She tried hard to contain the last straw to help herself from getting soaked in rain. I looked at her and smiled while she tried hard ensuring her umbrella doesn't defy gravity.

We moved on, reached office. I wasn't happy about coming to work, not on saturday. and I guess happy is too a 'glint' word here with the organizational politics brewing at my workplace. I took a heavy sigh, spoke to few colleagues.

I am definitely not in a mood to work... Tepid coffee at work wasn't doing the needful. I wanted it to fill me with peace and wistfullness.

The politics here has started to grow and it is pricking like an icicle. I wanted that cup of coffee to thaw this stubborn, clump of jagged icicle inside me.

Oh! how I wish... And i work for a development sector!

Life is too short, I will pick my ironies whenever I see them.

As you dislike it

I was scheduling a training program at work. It is one messy job to begin with. You try talking everyone into a common time, which should match with the facilitator, you write polite emails requesting them to do their good and you even drill those mean heretics to follow your norms. It is exhausting!

You send them meeting invites; appointment request and even polite emails pleading a confirmation in the end, but to your dismay you end up meeting them or calling them to see who is turning up and who is not. How difficult is it for the people to write a one-line email/confirmation.

After receiving my polite invite somebody at work walks up to me and asks with discern if it rains will this useless lecture be canceled? I knew I was giving caviar to the general… I looked at his face which still had the grin he flogged while asking that question and I imagined tying him to a stake and shooting full arrows like Saint Sebastian. I smiled at my vivid visual and said “No” with pressed mouth.

I am too tired of basic lack of etiquettes and the thankless attitude of people. How I wish Miss Manners could float away their impertinence in her magic carpet.

Paddling my own canoe

Last Sunday was fun. I went out with bhai, had a hearty meal at ‘Urban Tadka’. Went to Crosswords, and bought few books. While browsing through the books and reading a few paragraphs from few I realized I am subliminally drawn to SR or Salman Rushdie’s books. I read a lot of books written by him and have thoroughly enjoyed every time I read anything written by him, even if it is a small newspaper column. V doesn’t like SR. He argues that SR’s book lacks content and he just writes longwinded paragraphs, dense phrases and idioms. He doesn’t write about anything, he just writes complicated English. I on the other hand do not agree at all. SR is one of the few things V & I are not on the same page with. I often tell him that saying “SR is not a good author” is like saying the water is not wet.

This time I bought two children’s books which SR wrote. I have started reading ‘Haroun and the Sea of Stories’ and loving it. The ruins of an old city, the allegorical description in the book and the character of young Haroun spews delight.

I also bought ‘Luka and the Fire of Life’, another children’s book by SR and a Lauren Weisberger’s book for guilty pleasure. I love her books also. She writes glamorous books which are ridiculously irresistible. The protagonist has a shiny, glossy, manicured life and carries a quilted leather bag. She wears posh outfits and returns to her musty apartment. She longs for love, wants to create a niche, sometimes feels energized and other times is enervated. She is wild, weird, naïve, juvenile and demented. We find ourselves in some or whole parts of the tale!

************

Yesterday I was again alone after two weeks. Bhai left for Nagpur and I came back to my empty apartment again. I closed the door behind me still talking to Ma and assuring her that all is well. Bhai called several times to just chat and I really missed him. Yesterday Dad and I also chatted for long. My Ma & Pa-in law also called to check on me and the telephonic-conversation went on for an hour. I changed, washed and ate while chatting with them. It was 10 in the night when I finally asked my Ma-in law to hang up, take rest and assured I will be fine. I was exhausted. I touched my forehead and felt my palpitations were quivering like some sea animal. I went to my bedroom, changed the sheets, switched on the AC and took this month’s Reader’s digest and read till V pinged, we Skyped for some time. I told him how much I missed him.

I read Reader’s digest and fell asleep while reading something on parental trap with the book in my hand. There was some loud, scratchy song which was playing last night. At half past 12 it stopped, I think then I started to fall asleep. Some pigeons dashed against the Ac at 4 (maybe) and I was jolted with the loud noise. I got up and saw I had some more time to sleep, so switched off  the lights and slept till my maid rang the doorbell at 7.30
You can get tired doing nothing also!

Ek this dayan

There was lot of things i would like to improve in the recent film I watched. For starters, the entire second half. The predictable whodunit part in the part after interval took the plot way below the standards set in the first half of the movie.


Bobo (Emraan) is an accomplished clairvoyant and magician who does amusing tricks and is loved by audience; his live-in girlfriend, Tamara (Huma) and Zubin (his soon to be adoptive child) until he starts hallucinating and commits mistake on stage. This also sees the return of Lisa Dutt (Kalki) who has come back from abroad for Bobo. The mystery in the first half is adrenaline gushing and keeps your eyes peeled. Bobo seeks help from a doc and gets visions of a lady called Diana whom his father dated and married. Apparently it turned out she was the dayan (witch) who was responsible for his sister, Misha’s and Father’s death. She was the reason of all misery that struck his family. He sees in his vision that he nicks a part of her braid to take away her evil power and she gets reduced to ashes and promises that she will come back for him. The doc dismisses Bobo’s visions saying it was his imagination but there was definitely more to it than met the eye.

Second half sees the suspicion Bobo has, the accusations he hurls on Lisa and his relationship with Tamara & Zubin. The plot after this point becomes predictable and I felt like I am watching Rosemary’s baby, little twisted.

I liked the movie because the graphics were nice, the first half was gripping and Konkona scared the hell out of me. There was something eerie about her cryptic walk, her glances and the way she knuckles down on the characters she plays. I was impressed!

The movie also came with an afterthought, that power of woman is so incomprehensible like druid’s dribble. It has been said in mythology, urban legends and folk lore. I can think of a line by Wordsworth,

A dancing shape, an image gay,

To haunt, to startle, and waylay

************

Today while coming by car-pool to work, I overheard someone talking:

X: “How is Ashiqui 2 (a recently released movie)?”

Y: Yea, ok for one time watch

X: Star cast?

Y: Some Kapoor female is the actress and Vidya Balan’s brother-in-law is the actor

X: Oh nice!

The lead actor is Siddartha Roy Kappor’s (UTV) brother. Siddartha is married to Vidya Balan. And the actress is Shakti Kapoor’s daughter.

Tables are turning for Bollywood it seems!

Days without you IV

I watched 'Samantha Who’ today and I laughed hard. Bhai doesn’t enjoy watching tv series so after he was through with IPL I watched it while having dinner. It was nice after a tiring day at Borivali. I came across few nasty things in the morning so I got worked up and was in a pretty foul mood. V called from London and he said he could sense that I am pretty upset… didn’t tell him why but I assured him that I am good after speaking with him.

I am not finding the climate bad now; I am just finding the air rueful. It is like, I have a chip on my shoulder. You know how feeling disordered is? It is like every jot in the universe knows that you are blue so it just shows you how much more gloomy it can get.

I have to go to work tomorrow and it will get crazier. I just hope I do not get to interact with those few irritating clowns at work. And I get back home fine.

The moon has a faint glow again and the smoke laden sky looks dark and gloomy. It looks so metaphorical outside. An artist can look at the sullen sky, dip his creative nib in this ether and come up with a stroke of genius. 

Days without you III

Mumbai has become hot...really hot. Today while I was coming back from my office canteen to my building I reckoned how excruciating the heat has become. The dry, parched land and the blinding sun flashing ruthlessly on you is too much to take.  I went out with an office colleague. She had some stuff to buy and I tagged along for buying few goodies. But stepping out of air conditioned office became a huge mistake. M kept on talking about her visitors at home, how her fridge went bad last night and how Gujarat is hotter than any other place.  After walking for sometimes and then settling for the shuttle she reckoned that the jerking sun has become a streak of fire and if we do not run for our lives, we will roast.

I am waiting for the monsoon. I am desperately waiting for V to come back here, in our home. And when rain comes, we will sit on our wooden chairs in our huge balcony… we will talk weather and will admire the small trinkets of clouds and small puddles which will appear because of heavy rains. We will listen to the pitter-patter of rains and will adoringly glance at each other. Then V and I will sip on our hot coffee porcelain mugs and will think how beautiful life is.

My fancy head is accumulating throngs of wants… they are piling faster than some tarantine movie.

Days without you: I

Moments pass, days fade and weeks goes by… before we realize it is another day, new week and fresh month. I have been thinking last month, same time that V would go to London and I have so much to do for his stuff and packing and et al. Today he is miles away and I am here.

After coming back from work I watched my usual:  Dharma & Greg, Packed to the Rafters and watching One Tree Hill now. In between I also chatted with family; while I was standing and looking at little eddies of wind which whirled dust and torn rags. For a change, the climate is better than the super-hot yesterday.

Coming back to the television series, Packed to the Rafters is amazing. I love the characters in it. They act and sound so much like my own people. Today when Julie danced with her dad and accepted that he is going senile, I was chocked with emotions. Seeing the duo in the series opened my flood-gates and I felt relieved after I cried my heart out. There was this noise inside my head since V left. This noise didn’t let me sleep and bristle the hair of my back. But now I feel much better.

I laughed my heart out watching Dharma & Greg and Everybody Loves Raymond. I sometimes wonder, what I would do if I were to live without TV or internet or books. BTW I have started reading another one by Erma Bombeck. She writes funny and I love her writing. It is over the top comedy… She is like Martini, shaken but not stirred.

Yesterday ma-in-law made me chocolate yogurt – a choco-berry actually. It was yum. After lunch I felt nice lapping on my dessert. She also gave me some Swiss chocolates to nibble. I was lovelorn and it was chocolate. Need I say more?

My thoughts are running frenzy and I am writing them as they are playing blizzard in my brain. So I am perceptibly ‘phenomenally distracted’. The moon has a faint unsettled band and there is clumsy noise of the vehicles on street. Today I am tactless as well as evasive… Guess my hobby of dabbling in myself has outgrown me!

A little read

I am reading a rib-tickling amusing book ‘I lost everything in the post-natal depression’ by Erma Bombeck. I found this book trapped between other unread pieces. I usually read books when I am commuting, traveling or want to have a great time. And about picking this book, I am subliminally drawn to humor, satire, sarcasm, in fact all kinds of hilarity. I can quote few of my favorites from this book:

****

The husband is fond of back-yard cooking and has invited people for supper and the meal is taking longer than usual. Here’s the excerpt of the wife-husband conversation:

Husband: “Just a little longer. Are the guests getting hungry? Is it really that long?”

Wife: “Are you kidding? It’s the first time I have seen my fingernails grow.”

Husband: “Just a few minutes and the coal will be ready”

Wife: “Do you mean to say you haven’t put the meat on yet?”

Husband: “Give them some more hors d’oeuvres”

Wife: “It’s no use. They are beginning to get ugly”

Husband: “Go and check everyone to find out how they want the meat: rare, medium rare, etc.”

Wife: “13 raw, 14th one ate his coaster and said that would hold him”

****

Wife gets her hands on husband’s car, there’s a fender bender

Wife: “Where are you going?

She asks when she sees him leaving his dented fender and bolting towards the house

Husband: “Don’t move your car. I am going to call the police”

Wife: “Police?? For crying out loud, I’m your wife”

Husband: “This is no time for Nepotism”

And I giggle after reading this!

****

The ultimate one that got me rolling on the floor with laughter was:

I regard the obituary of the girdle factory with mixed emotion. It is like your mother in law moved out because there are snakes in your apartment.

Hahahahahah!



Happy New Year!

My first day of New Year at work was quite a day. With not a great wrapping up to year 2012 I wished New Year to preen through nicely and nothing makes me skeptical about people. It seems the wish made my day bloom like Brooke’s poetry.

I usually take the ac bus to work for obvious reasons of comfort and pleasant trip. The upholstery of these buses is clean and cozy. The people who travel by them do not push and jostle. They do not make the world know why their maid didn’t turn up for work or their demanding boss breathing down their lungs is discussing another assignment while they are traveling or how mad they are on their neighbors. So the travel is quiet, peaceful, soft and discreet.

On my way to work this bus was unusually crowded. I was disappointed on seeing the pack of people clinging on to each other like they do in routine train and bus. My sloppy mood grew bigger and bigger when I had to hold on to hand rail and didn’t get any seat. There was certain haggardness in the way I was carrying my bag and tiffin. My bag was little heavy and I was holding the supports. So it was a rough ride to work. I drew my attention towards the other immensely crowded red buses. I drifted my thoughts towards the otherwise clean people who were standing next to me. The thoughts were comforting and I fixated my glance on the streams of sunlit roads. You don’t see such roads in Mumbai because it is usually stockpiled with vehicles and people. I was on expressway and a comparatively lesser crowded zone. So I smiled.

Suddenly an elderly gentleman offered to hold my bag since he saw I stood in extremely prickly position juggling my things. I smiled at him and gave him my bag. I saw him reading some IIT guy’s memoirs. He was old but not feeble. He held his old-fashioned bag beneath mine and read unremittingly. At a junction near Airoli the crowd narrowed down but still seats were full. A seat close to a middle-aged man emptied and all standing passengers threw their yearning glance on it. The polite man offered me the seat, though I refused earlier but noticing that delaying it for another second would land it in other’s lap I sat. I felt quite better because my legs had started to hurt. I could not thank him more. He didn’t look tired. In fact he looked fresh like water lilies, radiating a positive aura and smiling beautifully at everyone.

I realized that no matter how wretched or worn out one can feel it ends with a sunny day. We live in disappointments, betrayal, envy, deception and what not but we often forget to appreciate the little things that make us smile and thank lord for a beautiful life. I have made a different resolution this year, which is to appreciate every little thing which made me smile. It could be a child’s laughter I heard, beautiful flowers I saw at the passageway in my office, my colleague’s effort to crack a joke, my husband’s love-filled morning kisses, my mother’s concern if I crossed the road properly, bus driver’s responsiveness when he cautions the passengers to watch out for two-wheelers on getting off the bus and every other little thing which made me beam.

Its cheers to life!

Happy New Year 2013

2012: The year it was.....

The day looks quite sullen at work. My office people are mostly on leave because of New Year, Christmas and winter vacation. Their absence makes the office look like one of the deserted islands. Since morning, I have spent spades of time in the pantry…just sipping coffee, then soup and sometimes hot water.


They said the world will end in Dec 2012, nothing happened. I do not know whether to be happy about this or be sad. The year is definitely not ending at right time. It would have been okay if the world vanished and we never had to come across the heinous crimes committed by our own people. I thought so many times, there were so many arguments which raced in my heart and there is so much disgust for the mankind that is waiting to erupt from the volcano of my heart. This world is such a sickening place to be today…

The Indian brave heart passes away after going through so much pain and anguish. Her body suffered so many bruises, she survived so much abuse and yet she had the will to live. We, towards the end of every year, have so proudly been affirming and acknowledging the emancipation of women and the shoulder to shoulder growth of females. It seems this liberation has become the yoke around her neck.

I am not happy at the way I am seeing the dawn of 2013. I’m angry and disgusted, and in this rather restricted pallet it is impossible to instill hope. It usually takes one incident to galvanize people but now with the series of brutal acts – one more grisly than the other… I wonder how long it will take to gain sanity again. Probable never… maybe by now we have trained ourselves to shrug and take everything in our stride…

A prodigal friend

Few days back I felt awful about something. There was a very good friend of mine who turned into one of those blighted characters who do nothing but devastate. I noticed that long back but after a hearty conversation with a close pal I realized how despicable he has become. Somehow learning and accepting the ‘forgive and forget’ story has been very difficult for me. I have never been able to bring my head round to this idea of first forgiving the contemptible act and then forgetting that.


My prodigal friend does it again. He has always been this dissolute. He would do things utterly wasteful and take it for granted that he will be forgiven. I have often given forgiveness a thought and have tried to implement. But here in this situation I think I will pass. I thought and re-thought, groaned inwardly and even made mincemeats of my principles. I knew, not forgiving this person will later lather me in my own guilt. But I was ready to take chances. My head felt heavy. Every good memory with this friend played slideshow in my heart. I have to do it – I thought. I have to throw this person out of my life and for good.

After my much contemplated arguments and theories settled, I felt him as a yoke around my neck. So I decided I am going to cleanse my mind and heart of his misdoing or whatever. I felt my burning temples caused by my incensed mind go frantic. If I have decided to snip any further contact with this person I should let him know. I can’t just be angry at his obnoxious behavior and then when we cross path sometimes later, he shouldn’t expect any exchange of pleasantries. So I wrote to him stating how thoughtless his actions were, how hollow his ideas are about me and how much of a thankless job he has done as a friend. After writing to him, I felt very light. My circumscribed thoughts ran all over and patted my back for letting go of my anger and letting go of an ugly scar.

I wish he also trims his bloated existence on others and gets a worthy life. Isn’t goodness supposed to spread through osmosis?

(Un)Usual evening

He sat with her at the edge of the roof stone. There was no ambience, no well-lit décor, sans color and luminosity the mood appeared gall and wormwood. The breeze hit him heavy while her wind-whipped hair flickered like shadow of fire. Their conscious moves intermittently moved like the rolling ball in hollow tunnel. Their muscles flexed and expressions changed like puffs of vapor. The moment passed by like the tedious walk in a long and droughty corridor.

She should have told him everything before he found all about her. He was pained more than he could cry and whimper. He was after all the wrongly shot hog. He was burning in wrath, anguish and distress. The blood curdling silence grew in there but an eddying mumble rubbed him the wrong way. She admitted to all with downcast eyes showing packed remorse. Nevertheless, that was not enough. He wanted her to feel the same pain and anguish his heart bore.

I could use some of my time for watching television today because yesterday I worked hard to finish an obscure assignment. Work from home sometimes just thumps on your brains, its doubling mirth. And yeah you get to work double than your desk. Sigh! I had watched a lot of TV series already. Grey’s anatomy was featuring on the TV since morning. It was so recurrent that I thought I have got ensnared in a time loop. It has never entertained me like other series so I thought to flip channels when I came across a scene from some Hindi soap which looked interesting (partially). The above description was something I was watching while nibbling each morsel of my lunch. I wanted to understand why so and so (actually a whooping %) of women of our country watches these daily soaps. The above was shown in some good 20 minutes. Those 20 minutes were the longest, I swear. I didn’t know what expressions should have been right for the usual soap scenes; canned gaiety? A raucous guffaw?? Or may be just bare giggles…

Sweet little things

While walking on the side tracks of my office glancing on beds of shoe flowers and chrysanthemums I felt happy. It reminded me of the small garden we had in Dhanbad. My mom would plant all kinds of flowers and grandpa would tell me how those flowers were essential. He always had fondness for beli or Bella flowers in English. He said they are smaller but never pettier. They had the most amazing smell I ever sniffed. I would often pick them and keep it in my hand thinking that someday the beautiful whiff of the flower will transfer to me. It is strange how very small things leave a mark and how big things fade in oblivion!

***

Today while having my evening cup of coffee, a pantry guy offered me his hand-made ginger tea. I do not like tea. I hate the after taste, tea leaves in my mouth so I avoid it as much as I can. But this time I asked him to pour me a full cup for I was touched by the way he was considerate. It has been ages since people asked you for a cup of tea because they were making one for themselves.