Baubles in Babbling...

Lethal Hunger... Bleh

2011-12-15T04:58:00.001-06:00

A lethargy called Lassy Lethal and a boredom called Banal Bleh were the best of friends and often, one paved the way for the other. Wherever they went, welcome was in short supply. The first thing anyone chose to do was exorcism --- for this act, usually the misplaced craving called Phantom Hunger would be summoned. At the very start, Hunger really seemed to work --- Bleh appeared to be banished and the only thing that could be said about Lethal was that he was benign. Soon, it became customary to call Hunger as soon as Lethal and Bleh paid a visit. Hunger started running into Lethal and Bleh so often that, charmed by their engaging personalities, he became fast friends with them.

Things changed. Hunger wanted to see more and more of Lethal and Bleh. Bleh would make a person either sit or lie all day long, Lethal would keep them there and Hunger would work on those love handles. The love handles would prevent any other activities, and Bleh would know his cue and take the stage. Lethal would provide the inertia and invariably, Hunger would be called upon to solve the matter. And on and on it went in a vicious circle where the only thing that changed from one round to the other was the size of the love handles.

Contrary to their name, these love handles don't usually bring Love. They bring new clothes though. However, new clothes mandate shopping. The frequency of shopping increases with the number of rounds of the circle. This increase in frequency requires the construction of a plan for ease and efficiency in shopping. Shopping can be easy if what is needed is found immediately. Those that can be found immediately are usually labelled "Petite".

What's left to do but Diet and Exercise?

It's yet another vicious circle.

Where Is It?

2011-08-21T05:15:00.000-05:00

Happiness. Where is it?

I've often asked myself when I was the happiest and always, I get the same answer - when I was 10 years old and in my beautiful home in a valley that nestles in one of the most majestic mountains of the world. I had an elder sister who looked out for me when I most needed it, needled me when I was in a mood to squabble and ran around with me in our gardens, laughing, as we chased our dogs when they refused to take a bath. I had a mom who was a medical doctor when she wasn't being a mom, ran the house on the emotions of love and understanding rather than the principles of discipline and authority and cooked me delicious food - the likes of which I haven't had since. I had a dad whose love was the strong and silent kind, who adored driving to holiday destinations, peppering even the most mundane of them with the spirit of adventure and enjoyed his younger daughter's pretty awful rendition of the current top ten songs on the music charts.

And I know I can't go back there. Not anymore. May be we are not supposed to go back. Things change as we grow up and go our separate ways. That involves more than a little heartache.

But I ask myself - where is my happiness now? Is it in knowing that your home still has most of the magic it did when you were a kid? Is it in doing a job so well that you get lauded for it by everyone? Or is it in learning new things and implementing them to your satisfaction? Or is it in buying a gadget you were hankering after ever since it came out? Or is it in having friends with whom you can bond over shared interests? Or is it in having that special someone whom you know you can call at any time of the day or night, looking for a shoulder to cry on, even when things are not bad enough for you to bawl over?

All the above should be enough for anyone's happiness and yes, they are. However, now, with the years, the key question has changed. It's easy enough to be happy - there are so many opportunities for it. Now, the key question is - Contentment. Where is it?

This opens a whole new can of worms, doesn't it? However, first and foremost, I'd definitely like to state what I don't mean by contentment - contentment is not akin to stagnation of any kind. Contentment is security, peacefulness and satisfaction all rolled into one. Contentment is knowing that even if you're unhappy in the worst possible way, you have the will and the reason to go on to become happy.

Contentment is knowing that when you want someone else's company, you can certainly get it, even if now you're in a room, reading your book and enjoying your own company. Contentment is knowing that you can take more time on a task so as not to compromise on its quality, without the fear of losing your job since you're already well-established. Contentment is knowing that you will be allowed your share of eccentricities without them putting people off. Contentment is knowing you're a likable person when the guy at Starbucks puts extra whipped cream on your mocha because he appreciates the light conversation you bring along at the end of his heavy shift. Contentment is when you create your own world where someone very like you once were will always remember it as the happiest time of his/her life.

Contentment is a warm, lingering feeling in the stomach and happiness is a swift flame.

With The Dark

2011-08-02T23:16:00.002-05:00

I've always noticed it to be so - my somewhat fumbling attempts to pen down lines that rhyme always result in an end-product that is rather sad and depressing. I really meant to make this a poem about idyllic yet adventurous childhood, when we usually find something to entertain ourselves, no matter what the time of the day is. Instead, the poem turned out to be something else entirely. Anyhow, I'm putting it up here. Just don't judge me because of this. :-|

With The Dark

Cheerful and bright, eager to grow

She did naught but what her fancy dictated

And the only times a frown creased her brow

Was when the darkness invaded

With the dark came the time to go to bed

And an end to her adventures of the day

But then she made up stories in her head

And brightened up her nights this way

School was looked forward to

Every thing edible was delicious

There were so many things to do

The possibilities were endless

She would grow up soon, she swore

And live the very same way

Sampling everything that life has in store

Being happy each and every day

Alas, oft broken are childhood vows

Growing up is but a pain

More than highs, Life offers lows

And wrecks our resolve with disdain

Each day was fraught with terrible monotony

Friends were few, she was bored

What she couldn't do was deemed cacophony

Yet she seldom did what she adored

With the dark came the time to go to bed

And an end to her frustrations of the day

But then she made up stories in her head

And willed them to bring sleep her way

Slay the Ghost

2011-07-02T18:50:00.001-05:00

The hills were haunted.

At the summit of the highest hill, she stood shivering in her thin white cotton dress that was flapping around her legs, teased by the winds. Scared and cold, she questioned her very sanity in ascending the hill. There was no human sound on the hill - all she could hear were the winds and the flap-flap of her dress. Strangely, the leaves of the trees did not rustle or if they did, they did it quietly so as not to disturb the ghosts.

Ever since she was a little girl, she'd believed in two things absolutely - one, that ghosts were the restless souls of evil people who wanted to torment the living out of spite and jealousy and two, ghosts preferred the nighttime. Now, when she was older, she wasn't so sure.

It was day yet - 6 in the evening - or so her cell phone clock told her. The sky was so laden with dense clouds that even the harsh winds could not make them scurry away. A trickle of the sunlight somehow seeped through the dense clouds and lent visibility to her world.

She rubbed her arms with her hands and continued to shiver. Yes, she was now older but she wasn't sure about ghosts being souls of dead people. The living made more terrible ghosts and the memories of the living were infinitely more terrifying than the memories of the dead. The dead made her feel sad and bereft, the living filled her with outright terror and hate.

There was a distant rumble of thunder and where she expected a torrent of rain, a light drizzle ensued. She still stood where she was before, now wet, shivering and scared.

This was the place where she had once come with her two kids for a nice family picnic. This was the place where they had all laughed, raced each other over the slopes and squabbled over food in the picnic basket. This was the place where they had all napped under the shade of the trees after a very heavy picnic brunch. And this was the place where they were thus asleep when a runaway convict from the nearby prison had stumbled upon them.

It was only two months ago but so much had changed in her life since then that it seemed like a vision from some other age. To say that the convict was surprised to see them there would be a gross understatement. He hadn't expected anyone to be picnicking on the hills along whose paths he'd planned his escape route. His running feet had woken them up and before she could put two and two together from the clothes on him and the mere expression on his face, he snatched up her older son and held his neck with his muscular arm. Fear of capture made him needlessly violent and he'd warned them not to budge an inch as he tightened his grip on her son.

Through her own haze of fear and the whimpers of her younger son, she remembered her own voice - it was meant to be soothing but she could herself detect a definite note of fear in it. She was trying to persuade the convict to leave her son alone and was offering her husband's services as a lawyer to help him get free. She remembered the impatience and scorn on the convict's face. She remembered how he'd pushed her son aside hard while running away. And the most terrible of all, she remembered the sickening thud she heard as her son's head collided against the big stone.

She'd lost her son and the convict was caught again. What purpose did her son's death serve? What was the point in living at all, if life could be snatched away so pointlessly and easily? Would her living ghost ever be exorcised, as he deserved? His trial would begin the next day and he would be pleading insanity and hence, innocence. Would justice ever be served?

From a little afar, a man stood in the rain, watching her. He noticed the way she rubbed her arms, he noticed her shivers, he knew there were tears mingled with rain on her cheeks. Love and a need to comfort, both her and to himself, made him walk up to her.

He said, "His trials' tomorrow. I promise you, I will see to it that our ghost is slayed. I will slay our ghost. I promise you that."

Her husband's voice carried a note of determination that she hadn't heard before. Sorrow had made him stronger. As she looked at him, she saw that he could make it possible. He would ensure that justice be served. She held his hand and they turned to walk away, ready to exorcise their ghost.

When she looked up at the sky again, the winds had managed to dispel the dense clouds. Now, a rainbow was smiling and she felt hope rise in her heart.

Again and Again

2011-04-17T02:20:00.001-05:00

He had the power to make the mountains red, the sun green, the sea brown and the rain orange. He knew that he would never be condemned for it because leveraging his powers according to his whims was something which, from him, was expected, even commonplace. Sometimes, if he was brutally honest with himself, he knew that there was another reason why he'd never have to fear any sort of condemnation - simply because no one cared enough to do so.

He was an old, old man who had colored chalk at his disposal to exercise his powers. He drew pictures on the sidewalks of Seattle's busy roads - of the ferry, of a shabby building, of a mother walking her child to school, of the frenzied hours of the traffic, of a flower, of a butterfly, of a harried executive with a briefcase, of an old woman with a walker, of a truant boy jumping in the puddles during the rains, of a urinal, of a dog on a leash, of a homeless person with a sign asking for food - of anything and everything that caught his fancy. His earnings were only what the passers-by dropped in his bowl but then really, how much money did an old man living alone in a ramshackle attic of a dilapidated building need?

He didn't use paints - not because he felt that he had no ability to paint a picture worthy of being put down on canvas but simply because he couldn't afford them. He never regretted using chalks because they cemented his belief that one didn't always need expensive things like paints, canvas and easels to create wonders. His work, insignificant and needless though it might seem to a majority of the world, made him feel productive. He looked forward to every day, wondering what would trigger his mind enough into motivating him to translate the world's visions to his perceived visions in chalk on the busy sidewalks which, more often than not, got a mere superficial glance by most of the pedestrians.

Today, however, he was morose, even though he could see a beautiful black duck paddling in a nearby pond that he knew, just knew, would look very appealing in chalk. It was one of his weary days - he brooded over his life and then he tortured himself by telling his brain not to call it a life - it was mere existence, where loneliness abounded and old age brought him nearer and nearer to death everyday. Death would be no new adventure since there would be no one in this big wide world who'd even notice that he's gone.

As he started drawing the black duck, it came out of the water and sat near the edge of the pond, apparently soaking up the meek sun. The old man continued to make chalk strokes from memory as another part of his brain contemplated ending his pointless existence for once and all.

"We go through the motions of our existence mechanically. What's in it for us in the end? It's better to bring things to a close sooner than later."

Seattle is not the world's best place to be a sidewalk chalk artist in. Just then, the grey skies gave way to rain. The old man stood near his chalk portrait, seeing it wash away. He just stood there, dripping in the rain. He then squatted down on the sidewalk and was in the same position, looking at the vestiges of his portrait, even when the rain had stopped and the sun was out again. His wiped-out work seemed like a sign of futility of his existence all over again. It seemed that the Gods were mocking him. He lamented at the realization that he'd never leave a mark in this world.

His distressed musings were interrupted by a voice, "Oh, will you do it again later?"

The old man turned his head and saw a small boy trying to make his dog stay put on the leash. He looked at the boy straight in the eye for so long that the boy squirmed in discomfort and then walked on.

Just then, the duck quacked. The old man turned to look at the pond. The duck was dry by now and it waddled over to the edge of the pond and then, suddenly, leapt inside. With some amusement, the old man shook his head at the duck's stupidity - what was the point in drying itself if it had to go back in again?

Yet another mechanical motion, he mused? Then, he stood transfixed as the answer hit him - it was the mere pleasure in the simple things life had to offer that kept one going. Life as a whole may not seem to have a meaning but if one learns to derive pleasure from the little, everyday things in life, it would be more like a gift one is grateful for rather than something imposed on us by the Creator. We're not puppets on a chain - we go through what we perceive as the rut simply because deep down, we really enjoy being in it. Why don't we accept this and learn to recognize our love for the "ruts" we're in?

"Hey, boy," the old man called in sudden cheer to the boy with the dog.

The boy turned with some surprise. He then smiled as he heard the old man say, "I will do it again, young man, I will do it again."

A Final Solution

2011-02-24T06:02:00.000-06:00

The night view from her office window on the twentieth floor was breathtaking - it reaffirmed the fact that the world is beautiful. The colorful lights on the skyline of the city beckoned to her - "come out into the night and play", they seemed to say. The headlights of the cars whizzing by on the freeway made everything seem ethereal - no one actually on the freeway would concur but to those observing the scene from a hundred meters above the ground, there was a weird tranquility that made itself conspicuous because of the very hypnotizing motion of the cars. Even the cacophony that wafted up till the twentieth floor - including the sound of a raucous siren of an emergency vehicle - seemed liked a pleasant enough score. If she positioned her hand on the window's glass rightly, she felt that she had the entire city in her hands.

It irritated her that even in her current depressed mood, she could imagine being cheered up by the mere view.

She wanted to position her hand on the window's glass in such a way that she blocked out the mesmerizing view. She didn't want to be cheered up yet again - not again, never again.

She knew that dying was a solution to all her problems - and to those of some other people as well. She was an inefficient employee, she hadn't been a good daughter, she was a poor wife, she was a vicious daughter-in-law and she had no bundles of joy in her life, despite her many efforts to have them. Her boss scorned her, her husband was indifferent to her, her mother-in-law hated her and her own mother was probably the luckiest of them all - she was free from her, safe somewhere where God deemed her to be. She had no one who needed her and those that she needed, considered her a heavy burden.

So, she carefully opened the window, stepped onto the ledge, took a deep breath and jumped.

It was as though time had slowed down and acceleration due to gravity had fallen from its normal value of 9.8 m/s^2 - she could see everything around her in minute detail. The leaves of the tall trees near her building brushed her very lightly against her cheeks as she made her descent and she felt a moment of panic - she would never be able to feel - either a sweet and hesitant or a bold and sure touch - again. The lights on the horizon seemed to twinkle and she realized that now she would never ever be able to opt for being cheered up at seeing them or not. She could feel her skirt billowing around her legs as she fell - yet another feeling she would never have. She could feel her eyes watering as the air hit them and she understood that there would be no more tears too. That made it almost worth it.

She looked down, expecting the descent to come to an end any moment now - she was ready for the final solution.

Her heart skipped a beat (another sensation she would never have) when she saw her husband walking with a woman on the pavement. There was a small child perched on his shoulders and he looked the exact picture of a dad whose son considers him a hero above all the others. It had been ages since she'd seen him look so happy and she sadly acknowledged that he'd probably find happiness without her easily enough.

The woman next to her husband was laughing at something the child said and as the woman threw her head back while her husband looked on indulgently, she was startled to realize that the woman was she herself - a happier she. As her heart struggled to recover from the jolt, the woman turned up suddenly, looked directly into her eyes and said in a voice that seemed to reverberate into eternity - "Your solution is a permanent solution to problems that were probably temporary. You ought to have given life a chance. It's too late now - too late now."

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PS: This is probably the most morbid thing I've ever written - and probably the one with the most unsatisfactory and may be meaningless ending. I decided to pen this down simply because I wanted to share this weird feeling - this dejection, puzzlement, a sense of bafflement coupled with the sensation of loss - with you all - everything I've written down here was a dream of mine and it ended in precisely the same way, totally freaking me out. If you didn't feel anything remotely close to the way I've described feeling, you're so much better off than I am! :)

Grow

2011-02-04T00:47:00.001-06:00

I was cranky, I was mad, I was ill.

I was all those things a small girl of four hated to be during the tail-end of the wonderful, glorious and much-anticipated winter holidays.

I sat behind the glazed glass of my bedroom window, "safe" from the biting cold, ensconced in the fluffy pink blanket my mother insisted on covering me with. Things that pleased me when I wasn't sick only succeeded in irritating me now - the hot mushroom soup seemed like cod liver oil, the Barbie looked supremely artificial, the snow falling against the dark sky of the evening looked like a particularly vicious case of dandruff. I'd always liked to lick the snowflakes as they fell but now, the very idea made me nauseous.

I was restless, I was irritated, I wanted to go out, no matter what the consequences were.

I looked at the flames dancing in the fireplace - I couldn't see any monsters in it now. Didn't that mean I was alright again, that I could go out again?

I needed to go out - it was stifling in my room.

I jerked my blanket off and ran down the stairs. There was no grown-up around to reprimand me. The first breath of cold air that went into my lungs made me feel alive, the second one made me shiver in pleasure. Feeling the familiar happiness coming onto me, I knew all would soon be right with my world.

"I thought you were supposed to stay in your room, child," a gravelly voice said.

I skidded as I stopped running abruptly. Our gardener was on his haunches behind the thicket near the kitchen garden. To me, he seemed ancient, someone who'd be better off kept in a museum. He seemed frail but he could work in the gardens tirelessly. He never failed to intimidate me - I feared him even more than I feared the bogeyman. I had a nagging suspicion that the bogeyman was a figment of some sadist's imagination but our gardener was very much real.

I tossed my head like the bad-tempered girl I was and though I wanted to sulk since I would surely be sent inside now, I replied rudely, "What's that to you?"

"Nothing, little miss", the gardener said seriously. "But I figured - since you're already outside, you might as well make the most of it and have some fun."

I stared at him, not believing my ears. No grown-up had ever told me to "have fun" - rather, their standard line was "try to keep out of trouble". The gardener just extended his gnarled and scarred hand and after a moment of hesitation, I put my little one in his.

"Want to see some squirrels playing around the garden? They're really active in the late winter."
Surprised and very pleased, I smiled. My pigtails went up and down as I nodded vigorously.

The slow smile that he sent me then was one of the nicest and warmest ones anyone had ever given me and my young heart trembled into love instantly. He answered my endless questions and never once told me that I talked too much. I held his hand tighter and hung on to his every word as he pointed out the squirrels and their stash of nuts to me.

"Why are you putting that in the ground?" I asked him as he dug a hole and put a shrunken seed into it.

"Little missy, this might look ugly and shrunken to you but when covered with mud and cherished, it will soon grow and give us fine and handsome seeds that are healthier and nicer. Isn't nature beautiful? And spring is one of the most beautiful months."

Winter moved on and our gardens bloomed in spring. Everyday after school, I spent a lot of time with our gardener, chattering away like a happy, chirpy magpie. He always had a flower ready for me when I came back from school and I always had my day's adventures to narrate to him. I'd found a true friend and so, he said, had he.

One morning, my mother came into my room, looking sombre.

"Wear your black dress, daughter. We're going to the funeral."

Of course I knew what a funeral was, even if I had never been to one - I knew that only the dead got it. I didn't ask who got to be dead. I felt that it was an impolite thing to ask so I just put on my black dress and sat silently next to my mother in the car.

I didn't cry as I saw my friend, our gardener, being lowered into the ground - because I saw him being covered with mud. I knew he would come again - a nicer, handsome and healthier him.

I go to his grave everyday, taking a flower for him, narrating my day's adventures, cherishing him - like everything was still the same - and I wait, oh wait, for when he'd come up.

Meeting Point

2011-01-21T01:32:00.001-06:00

In a crowded and busy corridor, his gait was the slowest. Had there been silence in the room, the tap-tapping of his cane on the shiny gray floor would have been audible - a monotonous and somewhat pitiable sound, broken only when his old legs needed a rest. The corridor was air-conditioned but the perspiration on his furrowed brow was testimony to the fact that walking, shuffling really, drained a great deal of his energy. To any one who cared to observe him, he looked the picture of a lonely old man, unhappy with himself and the world.

He stopped suddenly, not quite trusting his ears when they told him that someone was calling him by his first name. Really, there weren't many people left who could do that. Some, like his beloved wife, had succumbed to illnesses plaguing the human body in its old age; some were bedridden and under the care of their children or a nursing home; yet others, like his only son and daughter-in-law, had died in the deadly earthquake that had shattered their town some years back.

He turned slowly, willing to entertain his hallucination. When he saw one of his cronies, looking ruddy and fit even though he was the same age, his face split into a surprised yet ecstatic grin. Any observer could now catch a fleeting glimpse of the happy and young man he once was.

"I can't believe that you look almost the same as you did when we played golf!" the old man exclaimed while they shook hands and then exchanged a hug.

The ruddy man laughed, "Oh, I feel better, I feel better! Life's been good to me and my son and his wife look after me well."

A shadow crossed the old man's face but he collected himself.
"Yes, that must be a boon. He loves you a lot, huh?"

"Oh yes, almost too much. He insisted today that I come to this hospital to get my regular check-up done. I didn't really need to come - nothing wrong with me - but my son - he worries like a Mother Hen. He wants me to be fit and fine."

"Yes, that's good. I remember he adored you when he was a kid. You're lucky, friend. One of the few ones who are."

"That I am! So, what's going on in your life?"

Before the old man could formulate a reply that would sound better than the lonely reality was, the ruddy man's phone rang shrilly. The ruddy man hurriedly slid his hand into his trouser pocket and as he did so, the phone got caught in the lining and fell down on the floor.

"Oh dear," he exclaimed as he bent down to retrieve it.

"Missed an important call?" the old man asked.

"Oh, it's my son. He must be worrying where I wandered off. I better call him."

The old man suppressed a wave of disappointment. It was the longest conversation he'd had in many days and he'd wanted to sit with his old buddy and reminisce about the good old times.
"Oh yes. Do call him."

As the ruddy man started to call his son, they heard a shout behind them.
"So, there you are!"

The ruddy man paled and the old man looked at the young man who, after a single disdainful glance for him, had eyes only for his father and looked irritated and displeased. His buddy, now looking strained, old and shriveled, stammered, "Meet my s-."

"Don't you know that I don't have time for this nonsense? I need to go back to work and you wander off, talking to people like yourself. This is a hospital, not a meeting point. God knows why the doctor thought you needed to come to the hospital for your treatment. As if anything could make you live longer. You're living on borrowed time as it is."

The old man was staring with dismay at his buddy, who had a look of embarrassment and a resigned sort of despair in his eyes. As his buddy meekly allowed his still-angry and muttering son to steer him away, the old man thought that his ears heard his buddy whisper, "You're the lucky one, mate. You're the lucky one."

Litmus Paper

2010-12-13T04:06:00.000-06:00

I'm big on signs. I look for them everywhere - on the roads, in airports, on the doors of an office building, near swimming pools, on the grass in parks. Admirable things, aren't they? They guide you in the best possible way.

I believe that life gives us similar signs - either most of us are too obtuse to pick up on them (like I am when I wander in Walmart without my spectacles on and hence can't spot the "Breads" section) or they are too abstruse for the most of us (like they were for me when I was in Andhra Pradesh - all the department stores boards are in Telugu - a language completely "Dutch" to me).

However, I also believe that if something that will have far-reaching consequences is imminent or we have to make a choice we'll have to live with for a long long time, life's signals will be very conspicuous. In fact, they'd be so loud that they'd all but slap us in the face.

I'd borrow HW Longfellow's lines here - most of the people we meet in our life and most of the situations we survive - they're all like ships that pass in the night. There is one thing that spurs us on through all this rigmarole - our very own restlessness. Even the most placid of us have an innate restlessness to move onto better things. It's a happy human indeed that loses this restlessness - for this means that he can now be contented without reservations.

You aren't aware of being in the clutches of this restlessness unless you're free from it. It's like losing excessive weight - when you lose it, then you realize that you indeed feel nicer; when you don't lose it, you are in denial - "you don't need to lose it anyway".

And this, my friends, is the litmus paper that gives perfect blue/pink results for our lives - the sign, the indicator, the omen, the portent or the harbinger for something/someone we wouldn't feel contented without. If it is a place, you know that this is where you are meant to be, even if you'd thoroughly enjoyed the journey that brought you here. If it is a thing, you know that this is what you want. If it is a vocation, you know that this is what you want to pore over at breakfast when your eyes are still blurry from sleep. If it is a person, you know that this is whom you want to spend your days, even the bad-haired ones (actually, especially the bad-haired ones), with.

If you haven't been restless in a long period of time, you know you've got it. Life's signaling - did you miss it?

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P.S.: For the few of you who read my blog regularly (or rather, as "regularly" as I post stuff), I know that I have mentioned somewhat similar ideas in "Moving On...". It just seems as though I can never escape thoughts that often emerge from brutal introspection.

"Mittyesque"

2010-11-21T04:50:00.003-06:00

There was one memorable occasion when I'd managed to convince Marcus Brutus not to betray Julius Caesar, even if he wasn't quite convinced of Caesar not having ambitious intentions.

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Walter Mitty's way of coping with the world - namely escaping from it - is one of those things I admire without any reservations. Those of us who don't take pleasure in pondering over the "what-ifs" and the possibility of improbabilities are, sadly, restricting the domains of their life to only the physical one - only the things that they can see and feel are real for them. What about the things that can't be felt by you, let alone seen? Do they cease to exist?

Well, they might not exist in your world but that doesn't mean that they don't exist in someone else's. Think about it this way - kangaroos don't exist in any of the continents I've been on (pur-leeeez, don't even think about saying that zoos are pretty well-stocked these days) but that doesn't mean I will deny to admit the fact that kangaroos jumping yonder on the land down under is in fact , just that - a fact .

Similarly, if certain situations don't exist in your world, all you have to do is dream them up. Play with them, star in them, be a victim in them but the most important thing is - live in them in a way you know you have a slim chance of living in your restricted little physical world.

For my part, conversations with people in likely and sometimes unlikely circumstances in my unrestricted world stimulate me. I have had exceedingly interesting interactions with a wide variety of characters - who can lay claim to the same? Apart from helping me relax, such interactions help me through some of the mindless and unavoidable routines of life.

There was one memorable occasion when I'd managed to convince Marcus Brutus not to betray Julius Caesar, even if he wasn't quite convinced of Caesar not having ambitious intentions.

Wow. I knew this, though convoluted, was the road to change history - Mark Antony would then stay on with Caesar as his trusted confidant and right-hand man. He'd never meet Cleopatra and the world would never have one sad story of love and passion. I wanted the story to be erased from the fabric of this earth. Too sad for my tastes.

However, as soon as Brutus had agreed to spare Caesar, Zaphod Beeblebrox had to turn up - like the bad penny he was - in his Heart of Gold spaceship, muttering about the Infinite Probability Drive without really knowing why. Just as he was debating over which button to press while we looked on with bated breath, the Nutri-Matic produced a "plastic cup with a liquid that was almost, but not quite, entirely unlike tea". This plastic cup was promptly picked up by Hercule Poirot, whose exclamation of disgust after taking one sip had taken Zaphod by surprise - so much so that he inadvertently pressed the yellow button instead of the pink one. As the world whizzed around all of us, we could hear Poirot's words, " Ah mon ami , your English tea...".

When the spinning ceased, I saw that I was alone in a dark place. However, just then the bat signal imprinted on the sky and in its light, I saw Bruce Wayne in his black attire hurrying along the streets of Gotham City. A menacing black cloud half-covered the bat signal. Frightened, I started hurrying across the dark alley myself, orienting myself by keeping a hand on the rotten wooden fence that ran along the side of the alley.

An angry voice stopped me - "You haven't finished whitewashing the fence yet!" I gasped in surprise as I saw Aunt Polly coming at me with a brush and a huge pail of white paint. The paint sloshed dangerously in the pail and I picked up the brush to apply a coat of it on the rotten wooden fence.

"She'll be back", the Terminator called out as he flexed his hand. "Trust me".

"I don't believe this!" I gasp.

"Why not? Sometimes I've believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast!" Lewis Carroll called out. Beside him, Noddy lived up to his name and kept on nodding compulsively.

I thought wildly that only magic could get me out of here when Houdini swept upon me and took me away. En route, in response to the question in my mind regarding the number of ways out of my current state, I knew I heard Alan Turing say that this particular non-deterministic automata was especially nasty.

I landed near a hole in the ground. At the sound of nibbling and the words "What's up, Doc?", I looked up to see Bugs Bunny grinning and at the same time, busy with his ubiquitous carrot.

"I'd rather ask what's down there in that hole," I said.

"Who else but Mark Antony?" said Sherlock Holmes. "Elementary, my dear... oh, you're not Watson."

I knew I'd changed history then - merely by traveling across various seemingly unrelated dimensions. If Mark Antony was down there, he wouldn't be able to meet Cleopatra. The world was safe from one sad story of passion and love. I felt a glow of achievement.

As I happily got up from my seat in the bus to get off at my stop, little did I know that the rabbit hole was actually a worm hole to Tarsus, where Antony would meet Cleopatra and give the world the story I so dread, in addition to a huge horde of children.

Knight on a White Charger

2010-11-11T23:11:00.000-06:00

He was my knight on a white charger and I'd grown too dependent on him for my own good.

He was the music to my soul, he was the reason why I could laugh at the end of a harrowing day. He made the mundane special, he gave simple intimacy without suffocating me. The soft warmth and simple weight of his head and limbs on me conveyed an unquestioning affection and support I'd grown dependent on, even desperate for. He never wanted from me what I couldn't give, he never made me feel less than I was. He didn't say much - what male does?; his heavy silences and sighs never made me yearn for things that were beyond my reach - simply because I felt that I had everything I could possibly want.

We roughhoused when the mood caught us, we lounged on the porch when the night seemed heavy and world an illusion. We shared our food and fooled around with a bright red frisbee on the dewy winter grass under a light blue sky spotted indolently with bright white clouds.

He made me feel safe, he made me feel strong. With him, I was my own woman and more, oh so more.
I doubt that anyone ever could have a better companion.

Too good to last, wasn't it?

We had to part, he had to go away to a world which seems even more of an illusion to me than the present one. He went and left behind a void in my existence.

Now, when I come back home, my eyes involuntarily search for that golden blur coming towards me, my ears strain to hear the quick click-clacking of paws on the drive-way tiles, my legs yearn to feel the glorious golden-brown tail which used to hit them repeatedly while wagging vigorously to convey joy at my return. As I crouch to put down my bag, I expect a pair of very intelligent brown eyes with incredibly long lashes to look deep into my eyes with simple but overwhelming love and joy.

And I weep because there is nothing here any more.
Nothing here... any more.

Homecoming

2010-10-20T02:37:00.004-05:00

He floated on a cloud of anticipation ever since he knew that his passage home for a long visit was assured. Oh, there was no time to be homesick actively in his temporary abode but there was always a part of him that made all of him feel like a misfit - as though life could be whole again only if he could re-connect with his roots - roots that were so deeply entrenched that even he hadn't been aware of their existence. Roots that were like the air - something you took for granted simply because you hadn't been without it ever.

He began to jot down what would be the things on his to-do list when he arrived home. Gorging on food? Lots of R and R? Get-togethers with family and friends? Shopping?

The list seemed endless. Also, it seemed location-invariant. He could do the exact same things at his new abode too. Also, something was conspicuous by its absence. For the life of him, he couldn't figure out what. So he did what he did best - make-do while something better struck him.

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ * _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

With his bags collected from the conveyor belt and securely placed on the trolley, he made his way to the airport's exit, feeling none of the joy he'd expected to feel on being finally back on the soil he called his own. He was vaguely disappointed and a lot discomfited. What made him whole really if it wasn't the contact with his roots again?

He walked towards the people who'd come to receive him. He was ready with a smile and a cheery greeting. However, he never managed to get the words out or the wave done.

He was ensconced in a hug from the grey-haired man who was visibly struggling not to cry. Then he was swept into the loving, generous, soft and welcoming arms of the grey-haired woman who emanated love from every pore. Even her tears were soothing and warm. He hugged them back with a fervor which children, regrettably, so seldom show towards their parents.

His woman - he realized the use of the possessive pronoun - was smiling through her tears. As she opened her arms wide, he simply buried his face into her hair and crushed her to himself. Her shaky laugh brought on the dawn of realization.

Homecoming is all about being encircled in love and warmth. Here were the people whose touch he needed at his brow after a day's hard work, here were the people whose unconditional love made them the only constant thing in his life, here were the people whose soft hands and conch-bangles made him think of unbounded love and willing sacrifices, here were the people whose strength made him strong, here were the people with whom he never had to make-do, here were these people...

He was home, he was home at last.
________________________________________________________________________

PS: So will I be, so will I be. Chickens always go to roost but they never forget their abode.

US - A New Place...

2010-08-08T21:03:00.001-05:00

A new place – the “developed” nature is the one thing that surprises me the least of all – probably because I expected it and I knew that the roads would look thus, the cars would look thus, the houses would look thus, the hotel, motels and inns would look thus and the greenery would look thus, thanks to Hollywood. Lack of surprise isn’t akin to lack of appreciation though.

On the other hand, people are, very surprisingly, exactly like the movies too. Either Hollywood makes Honest-to-God movies or my eyes are deliberately seeking similarities. There’s this hefty African-American woman in her security personnel uniform, who pushes people in queues along by the mere use of language. There’s that very eye-catching young guy who’s got tattoos all over his back and hands and is moving around with a girl who has piercings on interesting parts of her body. There’s this incredibly jovial, funny and helpful African-American who initiates talks with you as if you were the one thing he was waiting for the entire day and when departing, thanks you for entertaining him with chatter while brushing aside your own thanks for guiding you to the location where the train to Terminal 1, Gate C21 could be caught. There’s this obese man sitting morosely alone, eating a huge burger while texting forlornly on his iPhone and constantly using the delete key to take care of that extra character that his fat fingers hit accidentally. There’s this attractive woman who is swinging her flat sandals by the toe while she’s talking sotto voce on her phone. There’s this family of two very harried-looking parents and their three children, two of which are mercilessly teasing the third one still in his perambulator, who’s then crying the place down because of which the others are shooting dagger glances or pitying glances at the ever-so-more flustered parents.

If Hollywood is an art, does life here follow it or does it follow life?

There are, of course, Indians everywhere. I have finally managed to put my belief to test that Indians are more Indian when they’re out of India. They believe in “help your countrymen” and carry suitcases for you, they give you their place in the Customs line if you are late for a connecting flight, they exchange gossip in the same way it would be exchanged at any Indian gathering – with a not-so-subtle attempt at trying to learn about your “background”, they invite you over for Indian food – quite forgetting that you’re yet not tired of American grub as yet since you haven’t had any, they offer free (but in this case, very welcome) advice and they even smile when they make eye-contact! (Yeah, I know. The last one is certainly not an Indian characteristic!).

Some, let’s call them stereotypically disgusting “pseudo” Indians are of course, also here, who start US vs India comparisons. If this topic starts and goes in the very predictable direction of establishing US supremacy and oft use of the words “hamare yahan…” and “tumhaare yahan…”, just use your hands to eat the food, wipe them on the table cloth, get up and leave. And if the conversation goes in a pleasant and realistic way, you know you’ve found your doppelgänger.

Shilpi Goel

Seriously?

2010-04-16T12:30:00.000-05:00

You know the feeling when half the people half the time don't take you seriously?
If you don't, then I seriously envy you.

If you do, however, then I can commiserate with you.
Long and sometimes, painful experience has taught me that the reason why some people don't take you seriously is because you take YOURSELF too seriously.

And what the heck, if you can't stop taking yourself too seriously, then remember the other half of the people who take you seriously - for half the time and if you're lucky - even more!

White to Black

2010-03-29T17:09:00.000-05:00

What would it be like to be a white cloud in the blue sky?

You can see everybody but they won’t pay heed to you the way you want them to. They will probably think about how you might or might not block the harsh sun and bring some rain but they will never really wonder about YOU.

You’re lonely – not because there aren’t others around you. You’re lonely because of others around you. There are so many things you are bubbling with and you want to share them – but there are few to none people to share them with.

The white cloud – with nothing else to do and brimming with unspent energy - will soon accumulate more and more moisture. It will rumble down and growl. It will turn people away – into their homes and for the lucky ones, to their family and friends.

It will become an angry, static-electricity-filled black thundercloud.

Moving On...

2010-02-09T05:21:00.001-06:00

If someone asks me, “What’s the most exciting aspect of moving on?” I’d unhesitatingly reply, “meeting new people”. Of course, coupled with the excitement is an innate fear – fear because you will be missing your dear friends and the time spent with them so bad that it hurts; fear of not being able to belong with the new people as well as you belong in the current company; fear of being alone.

However, this fear lures you – it’s comparable to living on the edge and God knows it’s exciting. Some people need an occasional bumpy stretch of road to invigorate their lives. Everything they do once they are well-established can become routine very soon and routines can threaten to be monotonous. I can think of nothing else that kills as painfully as monotony does.

I think the exact analogy would be venturing into the unknown – it is supremely exhilarating, partly because it is scary. Another one is watching horror movies with your eyes closed and hands clenched – you still enjoy it.

This certainly doesn’t mean that if not on “bumpy stretches”, life isn’t enjoyable. Of course it is. In fact, it’s rad because that’s the period when you strike up ever-lasting relationships and “connections” that will see you through your life. You LIVE in those periods.

It’s like being a restless traveler – when on the road, yearn for the inn and when in the inn, yearn for the road. In other words, defy satisfaction because satisfaction leads to complacency, which leads to stagnation. Restlessness gives you the drive – it makes you tick.

My point of view was challenged recently – a friend pointed out that if someone is anticipating moving on with such fervor, it means that he/she doesn’t respect his/her current company and is eager to leave them. An admirable point and something I had to seriously ponder over. However, I soon realized that I don’t concede to the above. Again, I’d use another analogy as a crutch to make my point.

Suppose you have friends over at your home and they get really boisterous while playing. Your mother never scolds them; she instead sternly tells you to be quiet – in spite of the fact that you were the quietest of them all. Why is this so? This is so because she loves you and knows that you know she loves you. Hence, she knows that she can cross the lines with you without the fear of losing you.

Similarly, when we get friends whom we love, we know that even if we move on, we’ll always have them. We can neglect them, hurt them, shove them away but we are always sure that they’ll be there. They are a comfort to have and they give you happy memories while on the road. They make you feel loved, wanted and more importantly, liked.

Hence, fervor for moving on is not disrespecting your friends – it is, in fact, a token of trust in the relationship.

However, I agree that moving on is petty when we think about escaping from unpleasant situations or the people whom we dislike but are stuck with. But what’s life without some decadence? I guess whoever said that a known devil is better than the unknown was wrong – an unknown devil is so much more alluring just because he’s new. Plus you can really look forward to the process of figuring out who’s the devil and who’s the angel.

I subscribe to the restlessness theory – true, it does give us the drive in life but also, once you are in a place and haven’t felt restless for a long time in it, you know, “This is it for me”.

Restlessness is your litmus paper.

Dedicated to all those whom I Love (with a capital L)...

2009-12-16T06:56:00.000-06:00

... and now I came to the conclusion that I HATE you... so damn much...

The reason being - you people have loved me so damn much and been there for me always when I needed you that everyone else I now meet, everyone else I now talk to seems bad, rude, uncaring, irritating, disloyal, etc etc...

Whatever they do is always less in comparison to what you people did and do and now because of you people, I don't like anyone at all - the whole human race, except you guys...

huh...

Live with this...
It should be on your conscience if I turn out to be a people-hater - a sociopath...

And remember, after having said all -

I love you,
Shilpi

HAPPINESS!!!

2009-11-08T09:10:00.001-06:00

Heya Guys,

Guess what's weird about this poem titled "HAPPINESS"?
The FIRST person to tell me bags a prize! (We'll work that out later!)

Happiness
Comes
In-More
Ways-Than-One
And-So-Does-Elusive-Fun
When-Everything-Seems-Bad-and-You-Are-Undone
One-Unexpected-Person-Will-Hold-Your-Hand-and-Stay-Till-Doom's-Day-Come

EQUITY IS MORALITY

2009-11-08T09:07:00.000-06:00

We need to examine two scenarios here:

1.When equity is derived from morality (m --> e)
2.When morality is derived from equity (e --> m)

These will enunciate the relationship that equity (e) is equal to morality (m). (e <=> m)

SCENARIO 1:
AUSTERITY DRIVE, EQUITY AND MORALITY:

The politicians in India have always been regarded as being way above the aam aadmi. However, recently, what else is all the hype of the “austerity drive” about but for the establishment of equality among one and all – be it the netas or the aam aadmi? The netas need to understand and follow equity to establish equality. The austerity drive has been taken up by the netas with much ardour so that the aad aadmi can identify with them and also, of course, empathetic votes never hurt.

The source of this desire for equality - via the practise of equity - is none other than a intutive sense of morality that everyone has. Being very pragmatic and honest, we must admit that India is essentially a poor nation. A majority of the people live under the poverty line. It has become the norm in India that wealth – if possessed by anyone – should be kept hidden since it can offend the dignity of the masses. This is an instance of how equity is derived from morality.

However, in this case, the approach is skewed. Our morality stems from the fact that poverty should be eradicated. To achieve greater results, it should stem from a desire of wealth creation. Hence, equity should not be practiced by portraying the netas to be as “austere” as the masses living in poverty but by bringing those poor people up to the level of our netas.

SCENARIO 2:
HOSTILE TAKEOVERS

The law sometimes matters less than the judgment of the public. Even if a company follows the strict letter of the law, it will run into trouble if it violates the moral intuition of its customers, shareholders and employees. Saying "what I did was legal" is not always a good defense since the customers lose confidence in the integrity of the company.

For e.g., if a company X wants to takeover Company Y without its knowledge, then it bids for the shares of Y under the aliases Company A, B and so on. Then, it also bids for the shares of Y under its own name X in the open market. This way, the controlling authority of Y goes to X. This practice is called a hostile takeover. The people feel that the company X will go to any lengths to gobble up other companies solely for the sake of capital and hence, X will lose face in the business world.

In India, currently, there is no law against hostile takeovers. A hostile takeover is hence legal yet it leaves a very bad taste in the mouth and is considered as a bad business practice. Hence, moral standards dictate that even though the law doesn't send people to jail for this practice, it should be shunned so as to lend a moral meaning to equity established by the law. This is the situation where morality springs from equity.

Historically, India has witnessed only a handful of hostile takeover attempts. Foremost amongst these is the highly contentious and unsuccessful attempt by Swraj Paul to take over Escorts Industries. Thereafter, corporate India witnessed the only successful hostile takeover of Raasi Cements by Indian Cements in 1998. And more recently, Harish Bhasin (the stockbroker) led a series of bids to acquire DCM Shriram Industries Limited and his attempts earned him the dubious reputation of being the ‘corporate raider’.

Ruminations of an OTM (One-Track-Mind)...

2009-07-09T02:35:00.000-05:00

Tunnels don’t really scare me – it’s not that I have claustrophobia. It is just that the glimmering light at the other end of the tunnel is so appealing that I wish to scurry through it as fast as I can. At least, that’s what I do when I cross the Dehradun-Mohund Tunnel. This time round, however, I cast a cursory look at the walls of the tunnel and I was fascinated. Of course I knew that the tunnel was old but I never knew that its age could hold such an appealing beauty. There were huge indelible stains of trickling water and dark patches of black algae on the walls – but all this seemed inexplicably wonderful to me. I had a feeling that I’d missed something that I could have enjoyed all these times I crossed the tunnel – and it’s not only with the experience of the Dehradun-Mohund tunnel that I get this feeling. Now it has become quite a déjà vu. The beam of a searchlight has some semblance with my life – I can see only those things at which I am focussing; the rest of the world is in darkness.

It’s very ironic that we humans have been credited with the supreme ability of learning from past experiences and hence, are placed at the highest position in the spectrum of “intelligent beings”. Yet I wonder if we actually as intelligent as we claim to be because there are just a handful of people who learn from other people’s mistakes. For example, many-a-times have we heard of the individual who scaled the ladder to success, only to find himself alone there. Yet, in our own lives, we make the same mistake. Why? Is it the sense of denial in us that refuses to accept that anything like that can happen to us? I wonder...

Secondary Meaning - "romance"...

2009-06-13T15:26:00.000-05:00

The word “romance” always brings the “love” connotation to the fore. Somewhere, in the pages of Silhouette Romances, the word “romance” as stands for “something mysterious and remote from the mundane” has been lost or at the very least, relegated to the back of the mind.

Romantic people (ahem, NOT in the lovey-dovey sense) can be cynical too and this, on deeper thought, is to be expected. Perhaps romance precedes cynicism in the sense that it causes it. When you live in the mysterious, romantic world of your own, you tend to disbelieve the events that break the monotony of the routine.

There’s nothing as incredible as having your innermost world come true.

Synonym Furore - "lust"...

2009-06-13T15:23:00.000-05:00

This has been established in the Adam-Eve era itself – forbidden fruit is always more appealing. Similarly, anything that is disapproved of by the people at large also holds a hypnotizing fascination.

In our society, lust is something which is omnipresent and yet a target of disapprobation.

I’ve had the occasion to study quite a sizeable chunk of the approved English vocabulary, thanks to my GRE preparation. It simply couldn’t have escaped my notice that there are so many words in the must-learn GRE lists for anything related to “lust”. Guess humans are still driven by their primitive urges… What’s new? Sigmund Freud had already established this.

Just for form’s sake: some words are:

Lascivious, libidinous, salacious, lubricious, bawdy, ribald, prurient, dissolute, libertine, rake, debauch, promiscuity, roué, rake, licentious…

I pleased everybody...

2009-05-18T14:56:00.000-05:00

Of course I’d always been with people – I wasn’t starved for their attention.

Well, not really.

I was this “best-pal-guy”. Oh come on, you know the kind – the ones to whom all the gal-pals come and confess that they are in “love” with his friend who’s got that amazing torso; the one who get invitations to shop for clothes along with his gal-pals; the one to whom all the guy-pals come and say that they like his gal-pal and ask if he can fix up things for them; the one to who could always be relied upon to smoothen the awkward moments; the one who – oh well, you get the picture, don’t you?

So I had huge friend circles (yeah, the plural use is intentional) and they weren’t overlapping. Managing friends made me appreciate the skills of any juggler or playboy. It sure is hard work to manage people the same way you manage balls, and ladies, for that matter.

I was never alone and I knew that I had friends – if I wanted to behave eccentrically, I had one set I could rely on; if I wanted sympathy, I had another and if I wanted guy-talk, I had yet another.

And if I wanted to be myself, I had no one.

I was always lonely and it really rankled that I was the “Jack-of-all-trades” friend to everyone, each of whom was only a “master-of-one” friend of mine, if you know what I mean.

All in all, people were starting to wear me down. I needed a break from them and from myself too. I didn’t know what I’d become – I’d worn so many capes for so long that I had forgotten what my birthday suit was actually like.

So I decided to move out of the hostel.

I made sure that my flat was not in the vicinity of anyone whom I already knew. I needed a drastic change of scene – a clean new slate where I could re-invent and re-establish myself. I didn’t want people of my generation around me so I chose a locality where well-established families lived cozily together.

In the beginning, it seemed like a big mistake.

Returning from the college was a painful thing – I was all alone and others had their family with them. What else could be more heart-wrenching?

Gradually, this began to bother me less and less and as time flew past, I realized that the new life suited me.

I discovered that I really liked to be alone when I was supposed to be alone. At college, I couldn’t do without people and at my flat, I swore off people.

What was new? I was still a mass of contradictions.

I decided that the only way to decipher myself would be through my friends. So if with my set A of friends I acted the way I acted with my set B, their reactions would be a revelation to me.

The scheme was an utter flop.

When I took a hangdog expression to what I call my ‘vivacious’ set of friends, I was blatantly ridiculed. I felt so bad – did that mean that all were my fair-weather friends?

“Let sleeping dogs lie” was the one good adage I decided to follow. So I carried on in my college life in pretty much the same manner without any uncomfortable introspection.

My friends loved me, I loved myself and life was generally good. Everyone was pleased with me, including myself.

College ended. We all went our different ways and I got an awesome job.

Then I became famous - so much so that one of the paparazzi wanted to “do a piece” on me for the Sunday newspaper. I agreed – the price was nice.

I now realize that I needn’t have worried about introspection during my college life. When the reporter interviewed my college friends – all the sets, my “character” was brought out.

The title of the article was: “His Life was a Lie...”

In retrospect (yeah, I know), I realize that whoever said that you can’t please everyone was wrong. It is incredibly easy to please everyone but try getting all those people to talk and agree on your niceties.

You’ll never stop trying.

_______________________________________________

NOTE:

I've taken the liberty to borrow some aspects of the protagonist's character from a lot of friends of mine. Since people have no sense of self-awareness, I am pretty sure that they won't recognize themselves in this post. Too bad then!

Pack Your Rucksacks, Guys...

2009-03-26T13:08:00.000-05:00

KABIR’S NARRATIVE:

I think I should do my own jobs myself. Sonia is too overworked. She will appreciate me all the more for this.

SONIA’S NARRATIVE:

The woman’s handbag is off-limits but nobody said anything about the man’s rucksack, did they? After all, men are creatures of few needs and wants. What can they possibly have that they want to hide from the world? Their life is an open book – nah, not even a book, but an open pamphlet...

However, I have noticed that more and more men are becoming secretive of their possessions. They pack their knapsacks themselves and believe me, unpack them without help too (okay, husbands excluded!). I am somewhat ambivalent about this new development – on one hand, I am glad that the men are doing their baser jobs themselves. This ascertains that women are free from this really tiresome responsibility. However, on the other hand, I don’t like this – no, I don’t. For two simple reasons: One, mothering comes as a second nature to me. If my man does his work himself, he is not dependent on me and I thrive on people being dependent on me. True, I do nag and true, I do scold but then, I work too and this gives me pleasure. Two, if I don’t pack or unpack my man’s bag, then I lose the opportunity of checking the contents – from where else will I be able to spy on a surprise gift he bought for me or how will I detect a tell-tale lipstick smear or lingering perfume smell?

My boyfriend Kabir has been bitten by “I-can-do-my-own-job-dear” bug. While it was gratifying initially, it has now become downright irritating. He turns down offers of help and when I sneak away to do some chores without asking him, I find them already done. My feathers are all ruffled. I can’t help feeling suspicious. What’s he hiding from me?

KABIR’S NARRATIVE:

I am alarmed. Sonia doesn’t seem happy with me. On the contrary, she seems... almost livid. Have I done something wrong? She’s very sensitive – may be the way I told her to leave me to my own devices hurt her and made her think that I don’t want her anymore. God, I should apologize.

SONIA’S NARRATIVE:

Oh, the damn nerve of the man! He apologized to me and told me very sweetly (as though he was doing ME a favour) that from now on, he’s under my wing again. “Could you please do my laundry again?”

Well, of course I declined. He’s a grown man – he should do his jobs himself.

KABIR’S NARRATIVE:

It looks as though I am stuck with doing my laundry and packing my bags all my life. Dang! What DID I do to antagonize Sonia? Guess I’ll never know... Complex creatures, these women!

A Note from Me:

A friend, who had just returned from a solo overseas trip, described the contents of his rucksack to me – two identical pairs of blue jeans (one of them grimy because of his football fetish and yeah, the grimy one mixed up with the “clean” one), three T-Shirts (“I can’t remember whether I’d washed them since I’d bought them. They SMELLED alright – well, almost.”), toothbrush and paste (“Guess I brought the hotel’s tooth brush and left mine there.”), deodorants (yeah, plural and yeah, all the same brand and fragrance), a comb, shaving kit, two paperbacks - one without the cover and some nitty-gritties, whose state I refused to hear. God, guys really need mothering. This blog post is dedicated to him. J

Apples, Oranges, Kings and Queens...

2009-02-28T04:27:00.000-06:00

I wonder why it is not called “Live Life, Queen Size” - may be because of an implicit understanding that a “Queen” sized-life is nothing to revel for.

Women do lead a tougher life and somewhere deep down, men do acknowledge this. Don’t believe me? Ask any guy - no, ask especially the guy who insists that women don’t lead a tougher life – whether he would like to exchange his life for that of a woman at a standing equivalent to his...

There, you’ve got your answer. If he shirks away from this very notion because he doesn’t want added complications in his life, he does believe that a woman has to face more challenges than he does and if he winces at this very idea because he believes that women are in some way inferior to him, then there it is – you have the reason why women lead a tougher life.

Alright, I won’t talk about how women are expected to work as well as look after their family single-handedly. No – the reason is that this is simply becoming obsolete. Men and women, after returning from work, look after their homes together. They tend to the children – are good daddies and mummies, and look after the household issues. The issue of who has a tougher life comes alive when we are talking about the professional front.

It’s an established fact that we’ve always lived in a male-dominated society – people give the pre-historic times as a reason when men hunted and women kept the home fires burning. Another piece of evidence is that “his” is the default gender when it comes to proverbs and sayings. So, women do accept the fact that men have a head-start out here. With all the catching up that women have to do, it’s inevitable that they face a tougher time.

I’m pretty sure that you have heard the term “Glass Ceiling”. It’s a very intriguing and “oh-how-true” term – so said a male friend of mine. Consider the scenario of a professional woman at a position X and that of a professional man at the same position X, working for a renowned enterprise. Each deserves a promotion. As an outsider, it’ll appear to you that both have an equal chance of being promoted, but then you need to look again – and from an insider’s perspective. There’s a ceiling for the woman who wants to take what is rightly hers – and it’s made of glass because no one else but she sees it. She doesn’t get the promotion – the reason – she’s a she. Men somehow don’t trust women with power because they feel women misuse power. Well, who’s got the power problems now? Hence, women have to be decisive when they do hold a position of power - few clichés are true but this one surely is – “well-behaved women rarely make history”.

May be, women, to establish their standing in the society, have been working too hard and they are facing opposition because men resent it. There’s this concept that we studied in our Group Dynamics class in Behavioural Science – if one person is a high achiever in a group and the rest are average or below average achievers, the possibility that the rest try to pull down the high-flyer is more than the possibility that they strive to come to the same level. It’s but natural. The latter requires more effort and some painful introspection whereas the former is easier as well as satisfying.

Why is it that to prove themselves, women have to work twice as hard as men? Working women do say, “We have to work twice as hard to earn half as much pay as men”. Why is this? There is the “guilty-until-prove-innocent” concept here – women are thought to be incapable until they prove themselves otherwise whereas the men are taken as being capable till he proves himself to be otherwise.

So many sexist comments have been making the rounds and why not? Sexism sells – just like controversy does, but we are not buying it. To achieve a true egalitarian society, we need empowerment and by we, I don’t mean women alone. I mean men and women alike. Both need to accept their differences and yet, maintain their equality. Apples and Oranges are different, yet they are both fruits, aren’t they?

Just a passing thought...

2008-11-20T15:30:00.000-06:00

The world is a global village only to those who can afford the costly transportation all the time.

To people like us, it is still a vast global expanse!

What an irony!

Be rich and live in a village!

No one to moan and cry after I die... :(

2008-10-28T00:01:00.001-05:00

Hey friends,

I "typed in" and "thought up" this poem during a chat session with one of my friends. I label it as a babble since I don't usually have such a morbid side to me. Anyhow, the "poem" comes up in my blog! Happy um... Reading..!

No one to moan and cry after I die

I consider this and then I sigh

Don't I even deserve a nice crowded burial?

It would convince me that death isn't surreal

I'd leave many legacies after me

Love, Pain, Joy, Hate, Indifference and Memory

All I ask for is someone standing at my grave

Longing for me already and trying to be brave

Missing me enough but not a lot

As though I was one of the best friends they'd got

It is but a fact that you aren't appreciated in life

People tend to forget this in their own strife

Only in death are you ever missed

As though you are the only one for whom they've wished

Call it selfish, call it mean, call it shallow

And even though it is certainly a bit callow

You are being pined for – that's gratifying to know

And you die, believing you left a mark that'll show.

One Sided Love...with a difference...

2008-08-09T15:21:00.001-05:00

Some people call it “Love”. Some people call it “Magnetism”.
I didn’t call it anything – I just whimpered.
*

All through my life, I have been forced to do things that I never wanted to do. Situations forced me. OK, I admit I could have been stronger, but then, I wasn’t. How can you expect a girl to be strong after a traumatic childhood? I never knew my father. I had been separated from my mother and my three siblings at a very early age. I had to scourge the savage streets for food at an age where others, luckier than me, are pampered, spoilt and loved.

It’s not that I have really bad criminal tendencies – I am not a schizophrenic, not am I a psycho, nor do I get a kick out of torturing people. I just have to live and whenever I try to steal food, I get caught and end up here in a damn cage.

Of course, I always manage to escape, only to get caught again. You’d be surprised at how adept I have become at escaping AFTER I am caught! Wish I could manage it BEFORE getting caught!
I really hate it when the so-called guards rattle their baton against the cage. It puts my teeth on edge and keeps sleep at bay. As it is, my acute hearing prevents me from slipping into a deep slumber. All these sleepless nights have taken a toll on me. Though guys tell me I still look as pretty as I did a year ago (I was breathtakingly pretty then), I don’t believe them. I think I have circles under my eyes.

Nights are predictably harder than the days. The day is full of the bustling activity of the guards – we eye the new arrivals and sympathize with them, even though we put up a cold and hard front. The nights hold terrible nightmares for us.

You’d never imagine how much pain the inmates are in to be caged like animals. I can, literally, hear howls of pain, abandonment and loneliness emanate from the cages near mine. I can’t figure out how many times I myself have joined in.

It was in the wee hours of the morning of 27th of January when I was plotting yet another escape that I saw him.

I’d never seen him before. He came in with one of the guards, his majestic face confident and stance arrogant. The way he moved reminded me of a ballet dancer. His body was strong and supple and his muscles rippled as the faint light of the overhead bulb caught them.

I caught my breath.

He snorted once, evidently thinking that all inmates were beneath him. I could clearly see that he saw us all with a withering scorn that should have dashed all my hopes, yet who can dictate such matters to the heart? Just because he was on the other side of the cage didn’t mean that he was unattainable.

I knew with a deadly calm that he was the one. The ONE.

Some people call it “Love”. Some people call it “Magnetism”.
I didn’t call it anything – I just whimpered.

He looked up at me. The disdainful expression on his face didn’t change. With that amazing grace, he moved closer to my cage.

Then, blithely, he raised his leg against my cage, snorted again and walked away, his tail jauntily up in the air...

After all, he was a guard dog in the dog pound and I was a criminal stray bitch. A gap that could never be bridged...

A gap that could never ever be bridged...

My Brand Of Poetry

2008-07-29T00:10:00.000-05:00

My brand of poetry – huh, I believe in pure rhyming. I believe in poetic licence and I believe in nonsensical poems, which at least draw a smile, however slight, on your face.

What’s the use of a poem that you first have to decipher to understand and then too, you are not too sure that you really appreciated the deep, deep meaning?

Lewis Carroll surely appreciated this fact, I bet. Look at “Father William” and “The Walrus and the Carpenter”, for instance.

And also Fatty, of Five Find-Outers-And-Dog Fame (Enid Blyton) gave this very important piece of advice to Ern:

“Oh every time
You want a rhyme
You let your tongue go loose.
Don't hold it tight,
Or try to bite,
That won't be any use!
Just let it go
And words will flow
From off your eager tongue.
And rhymes and all
Will lightly fall
To make a little song!”

There’s one more Ern-Fatty poem I am really fond of. Here it is:

“A pore old gardener said, "Ah me!
My days is almost done.
I've got rheumatics in me knee,
And now it's hard to run.
I've got a measle in my foot,
And chilblains on my nose,
And bless me if I haven't got,
Pneumonia in my toes.
All my hair has fallen out,
My teeth have fallen in,
I'm really getting rather stout,
Although I'm much too thin.
My nose is deaf, my ears are dumb,
My tongue is tied in knots,
And now my barrow and my spade,
Have all come out in spots.
My watering can is feeling washed out

And the spade has come out in spots..."

Did you at least smile while reading this? I sure did...

Courtesy: http://www.enidblyton.net/mystery-series/erns-portry.html

Kanta Bai...!!!

2008-07-25T00:55:00.000-05:00

Don’t blank looks put people off?

I always thought so.

My belief has been repeatedly blown into smithereens during these holidays - by a person none other than our maid.

I pride myself on being an expert at reading expressions on faces – well, on expressive faces, at any rate. I can differentiate between a quizzical look and a blank look – the former I associate with a hunger to know more and the latter, with disinterest. I am sure it is a very logical conclusion any day, any time.

I never reckoned with that innate human desire to teach, preach and tell.

I grasped, quite late in the sequence of events, that my maid (let’s call her the universal name – Kanta Bai – though I feel that she won’t ever read my blog, I can never be too sure. She’s a kind of enlightened person, you know) equated my blank looks with incomprehension. Now, when I perform a post-mortem, I agree that is also a possible conclusion any one might draw but hey, this never occurred to me. Possibly because I am very vocal when I do not comprehend – actually I kick up a great deal of fuss.

So Kanta Bai thought that I needed more information when I gave her a blank look when she was narrating about how Mrs. Sharma, who lives on the other side of the wall, fought with her mother-in-law in the street in front of the poor “thela-waala” selling vegetables.

Clearly wanting to oblige me, she put down her mop, which had dripped a considerable amount of water on the floor while she was talking, and sat cross-legged on the floor, facing me. I observed, with a sense of foreboding that oh boy, she did mean to talk. She had hitched up her sari to her knees and made herself comfortable on the floor. I tried to show her how busy I was by pounding on my keyboard, but Kanta Bai was unfazed. She’s not for subtle hints, is our Kanta Bai, even when the subtle hints make the very audible sound of keys being pounded at...

I have never mastered the art of conveying to people that I don’t want to talk. Sure, I have been known to be blunt, bordering on being rude, many times but that works with real close friends only. Sometimes, finesse works with other sensitive people. What was I supposed to say to Kanta Bai? She sure doesn’t recognize finesse and I couldn’t bear to tell her to get on with her work – after all, she’s older than me and I have been brought up to respect all elders, despite their idiosyncrasies.

My non-committal grunts and nods seem to satisfy her, thank God. She is still happily perched on the floor, talking nineteen to a dozen. And I am apparently granting her a wonderful audience. I am making eye-contact every two minutes and saying things like, “Aur nahin toh kya! Aisa thodi karna chahiye?” and “Ajeeb log hote hai duniya mein!”

Poor thing, she is unaware that I am typing this while I am granting half-an-ear to her. I am simply not interested in why Mrs. Sharma threw a rolled-up bed sheet at her mother-in-law, who in turn, promptly threw a pillow at her. Gawd!

Uh, I am now aware of a lull in her monologue. Kanta Bai is looking at me with a curious expression on her face. I am feeling pretty uncomfortable. Has she guessed something amiss?

“What story are you typing now?” she asks me. “Tell the story to me, beta.”

Damn! No brilliant story comes to my mind. My own pathetic creations had sarcasm as a thick vein running through them and that’s another thing Kanta Bai doesn’t recognize. She’s a simple soul. Kanta Bai is still looking at me with that expectant look on her face.

I throw caution to the winds and decide to settle with half the truth. In novels I’ve read that for people who have secrets to hide, this is a very successful approach. Let’s see whether it actually works.

“Actually, Kanta Bai,” I clear my throat, “I am writing about Mrs. Sharma and her mother-in-law. I have obviously changed names but I found the incident very... interesting.”

Ending # 1:

Kanta Bai’s eyes are twinkling with a simple pleasure. She says, very simply, “Please read it out to me. I want to know how you can weave a story out of something like this.”

I want to crawl into a hole.

Ending#2:

Kanta Bai’s eyes have widened. “Really!” she squeaks. “Then maybe you will like to hear the story of Mr. Agarwal too. You know what he did?”

I slowly shake my head and reflect that I’d soon find out. I open a new blank document and turn to Kanta Bai with a dazzling but resigned smile. “What did he do?”

“Arrey, he drank a lot yesterday and he drove his car directly into Mr. Karmarkar’s wall. And you know what Mr. Karmarkar said? He said..........”

I am still pounding at the keyboard and the mop is all dried up now. But Kanta Bai’s throat doesn’t seem to dry up.

Ending#3:

Kanta Bai beams at me in simple pleasure. She said, “Oh, that’s nice. Did you include the part when Mrs. Sharma threw a bedsheet at her mother-in-law?”

I nod.

“What about the part when she slapped Mr. Sharma for bringing his mother home?”

I feel a warning prick at the back of my mind, but I ignore it.

“Yes.”

“And what about the part when the mother-in-law threw Mrs. Sharma’s suitcase out of the window? And what about Mrs. Sharma’s departure forever to her maika?”

I don’t think I managed to conceal my shock very well. If Mrs. Sharma was indeed going away forever, I was really disappointed. She makes lovely jalebis and she always remembered me when she made some.

I manage to stammer a “yes” again to Kanta Bai.

Kanta Bai got up, brushed her sari and said, “That’s fine then, beta”. She picked her mop and turned away, scrubbing the floor. I breathe a sigh of relief. It’s finally over.

“Beta,” she said over her shoulder, “next time you don’t want to listen, just tell me. I won’t talk. Do you really think that a person who makes lovely jalebis can slap her husband and be thrown out of her house by her own mother-in-law?”

I had no answer.

I told you, Kanta Bai is an enlightened soul.

__________________________________________________________________________________

Well, the actual ending is #2. I face this nearly every morning of my holidays.

Malsi Deer Park

2008-07-15T03:30:00.000-05:00

Though I had visited Malsi Deer Park when I was a kid (say 5 years old), the experience this time was absolutely awesome. Needless to say that I hardly remember anything from my previous visit, except the fact that I was real hungry and couldn't possibly see why the grown ups preferred watching caged animals rather than have food.

Now I know why...

The animals, though safely tucked away in wire-mesh cages, are provided with their most natural habitat to make them feel at home.

That's the speciality of Malsi...

I never knew that I would like ducks, drakes and swans so much. But trust me, I did...

The Puja Store...

2008-07-13T09:50:00.000-05:00

My dad had slipped into a restaurant to get our lunch packed and I had gone to a CD rental shop to bring a nice movie that we could watch over our lunch. Our car was parked in the direct, brutal sunlight that is very often seen for a short time between heavy rains. My mom couldn’t switch on the AC of the car as dad had yet again taken the car keys with him. Hot and bothered, she got out of the boiling hot car to seek refuge in the nearest shop.

I chose a nice, light, cute and silly movie (read: a teenage love story I’m sure my mom would be exasperated with and dad sceptical of) and made my way back to the car. Just as I was about to panic due to my mom’s absence, she called out to me from the small shop. Relieved, I hurried over to her.

The shop was indeed small. Every inch of the floor and walls was made of white marble. It was dark yet oddly welcoming. There were no wares displayed outside the shop, as is the case with ninety percent of the shops in Dehradun. I glanced up to read the billboard identifying the shop. It was a puja store. No wonder its atmosphere was comforting.

I saw at once that my mom had slipped into an easy conversation with the keeper. This surprised me – my mom is a very reticent person when it comes to talking with strangers. The keeper was an elderly man with orange henna-dyed hair and moustache, an orange tilak, wearing an orange kurta with a white chudidaar. He had red paan-stained teeth which still managed to shine in the left-over white places.

“Aur yeh hai meri chhoti beti, Shilpi”, my mom introduced me. I mumbled a hello as I glanced around. There were idols and photos of Ganeshji, Shivji, Lakshmiji, Saraswatiji, Balaji and every God of the Hindu religion in that small shop. He beamed right at me and asked a question which people normally don’t ask as soon as they’ve said hello.

“Toh beta, aap kya roz puja karti hain?”

I looked with apprehension at my mom and I recognized the twinkle in her eye. Ah, she wants me to take over the talking, I thought. I right away understood that he was the kind of man who just kept on talking, no matter how much you discourage him and you just couldn’t be rude to an elderly guy who owns a puja store where you’d taken refuge from the harsh sun. I spiked my guns and decided to get into a full-blown conversation.

“No, uncle, I am not a very religious person. However, I am a spiritual person. ”

“Hmm,” he said, “so you don’t pray?”

“Nahi uncle, I didn’t say that.” I replied quickly. “Of course I pray. It is just that I don’t pray before a murti. I believe that God is within our conscience. That’s all.”

He smiled. “Tum jaise aur log ho na beta, toh meri dukaan hi band ho jaye.”

I didn’t know what to reply, so I smiled back uncertainly.

“Waise,” he continued, oblivious to our reluctance to make further conversation, “what do you think about my shop? Tell me the truth please, I won’t mind.”

“Uh,” I said, taken somewhat by surprise. “It’s a very nice shop. It has an atmosphere, you know. Very comforting. And there are all the Gods and Goddesses here as well as all the puja samagri. It’s heaven for a truly religious person.”

He guffawed, to my surprise. I thought that my answer would please him but it seemed to have tickled his funny bone. I looked at him uncomfortably.

Then, even as he wiped the tears of laughter from his eyes, his voice grew serious.

“I have my wife to support, you know. She is quite ill. But I don’t think that will be possible anymore.”

He paused. My mom asked the obvious question, “Why not?”

“Arrey! Tumhe pata hai committee waalo ne meri dukaan band karwana ka notice diya hai.”

“Kyun?” I asked, this time genuinely willing to hear his answer.

He turned away and popped a paan in his mouth before he turned back to me, once again guffawing. But this time, his laugh carried a tinge of hysteria.

“Beta, log kehte hai ki meri dukaan thik nahi. Main ko bhagwaan ko bhi bech deta hu! Ha ha! Main toh bhagwaan ko bhi bech deta hu!”

Zeitgeist, Chick-lit and Roads Not Taken...

2008-07-02T14:13:00.000-05:00

There are just two sorts of occasions. Some occasions demand us to go with the crowd and the times. Some don’t. It’s as simple as that.

The former occasion is called Zeitgeist. The latter – plain Rebellion...

I think zeitgeist is tougher than going against the crowd. If you know that you have to go against somebody, it is just a simple matter of opposing whatever they do. However, if you are one among the crowd, you never know what you yourself will do next. Mass psychology differs so much from the individual one.

Most of the things that are being done today are just because of zeitgeist. Well, I stand corrected.

Most of the things that have been done, are being done and will be done are because of zeitgeist.

There’s one example that springs to my mind immediately. That is concerning the field of chick-lit.

Think – how many chick-lit movies have you seen recently? How many chick-lit books have you read recently? I’ll help you - Bridget Jones, Devil Wears Prada, PS I Love You, The Nanny Diaries, The Confessions of a Shopaholic, How Opal Mehta got Kissed, got Wild, got a Life etc.

All have the same vein running through them – young women and their emotions in various situations– running from love to career to gender bias to betrayal to god-knows-what-else! The thing is – women always appeal to everybody. They are such a surprising and interesting subject to read, to see and to be with. Men are with women for obvious reasons and women are with women to learn something new from them.

Again, there’s a tinge of zeitgeist in books about mythical creatures too – read novels by JK Rowling - Harry Potter Series and Stephenie Meyers – Twilight Series.

I am tired of reading the same type of novels. I need something new. Whenever I think this, I don’t know why I pick up an Agatha Christie and all is right again with my Book-World. I am all set and raring to have a go at any author I find.

When we have too many things of a kind, the ground is prepared once by a daring pioneer and once a new idea lodges itself into the people’s brain and is on the path to universal acceptance, it is easy for others to follow. Zeitgeist may help to keep us mingling with other people without being “out-of-touch”, but it sure as hell is boring. It reminds me of the poem by Robert Frost – “The Road Not Taken...”

Shampoo and Soap...

2008-07-01T07:29:00.001-05:00

Hey, I did warn you this blog was all about BABBLING... but, to the practiced and sharp eye, useful baubles often come up in babbling...

Well, did any one of you notice what happens when you shampoo your beautiful hair with Head & Shoulders and simultaneously use Lux Body Wash to lather all over?

I did. Actually, it was hard not to.

The pungent, ammonia-like smell is really unpleasant. At the point where the shampoo and soap lather mix, the lather becomes hard and real smelly!

Urgh!

I guess there can be no partnership between Lux and Head & Shoulders! They'd Stink!

For this trip, More is Less...

2008-06-30T12:55:00.000-05:00

There’s something to be said for the car-ride from NOIDA to Dehradun. Though, to many – like my dad –it is a very monotonous journey as far as the view is concerned, to me this journey has a lot of emotional significance – it symbolizes home-coming...

After the brown, dusty landscape of NOIDA, my eyes are more sensitive than ever to the wonderful colour of nature – Green. Almost all the pictures that you see accompanying this post abound in green, leafy vegetation. See what I mean by repetitive? However, this is what I truly love, whether repetitive or not...

The road-life, as I like to call it, always fascinates me. The cars whizzing by, the trucks groaning with the ultra-heavy loads, the tractors rumbling jauntily along, the bullock-carts trying to hog the fast-lane, the haggling and squabbling at the railway crossings to cross the barrier first and reckless bikers taunting the cars drivers to race against them – I see them all with utter fascination. Don’t ask me what fascinates me – it simply does. I try to keep my mind perfectly blank. It is amazing how many insignificant and significant details you can recall later that way...

Ruskin Bond is so right. There’s a sort of ethereal magnetism in the roadway to Dehradun, even though the sights and sounds are so much the same as those seen in the rest of the country.

We are a family who simply can’t have enough of car-rides. We love to make each and every journey by car. My dad loves to have the steering at his hands and the rest of us love to sit in our car, so we complement each other perfectly. Two years ago, we even went from Dehradun to Manipal by car! It took us the most part of five days. We stopped at motels (discovered serendipitously by us) at night and we drove during the day, often stopping if we met anything interesting on the way. I just love to travel like this, unburdened by the tight schedules of trains and planes. Moving at your own pace and whim is like an answer to a prayer.

Though the distance between NOIDA and Dehradun is petty compared to what we really term a long journey, we most definitely make one stoppage. Cheetal Grand.

This is one place that will always appeal to me, not because the food is great or the service is good (mostly because the manager knows us very well now and even comes and sits with us to chat when business is slow), or the gardens are awesome or the loos are welcome after an interlude in the car, though it is all of these things too. Yes, again an emotional attachment. I seem to have so many of them. It was in this place where I tasted my first burger and lost my heart to French fries. It was in this place where my sister and I could finally manage to squabble physically after being a bit cramped for space in the car. It was in this place that when we travelled with our dog, Bonzo, I finally let him run free after he was confined for so long in the car and was hence restless. It was in this place where we all caught up with the rest of the group if four or five car-load of our family people were travelling together. It’s so much fun to wait at a place that is not your destination for someone whom you hold in some affection.

For me, for this trip, more is certainly less. May there be many more such trips to come...A healthy dose of nostalgia does me a world of good...

A Fairy Tale to Begin With...

2008-06-30T01:59:00.000-05:00

THE RISE AND FALL OF THE ROYAL FROGS

Once upon a time, a long, long time ago (yes even before the age of blogging), Kings, Queens, Princes and Princesses lived in huge majestic castles whose very towers kissed the ethereal clouds in the sky. The castles were surrounded by strong impenetrable walls, which were again surrounded by a wide and deep moat, along the periphery of which the royal guards rode their stately horses and kept their King’s abode safe. Large, regal gardens spanned within these walls and these gardens had their multitude of gurgling fountains and tranquil ponds.

It was in these ponds that the best friends of the Princes lived.

Oh, did you never really know? You must have known, sub-consciously, at least. The best friends of the Princes were the Frogs.

You shouldn’t be really all that surprised, you know. After all, a real best friend is that who lives up to the adage – “a friend in need is a friend indeed”. Of course, princes couldn’t even dream of sailing breezily by their youth without the aid of Frogs.

There’s nothing that appeals to a young lady more than a man with an element of mystery. What’s more mysterious than a prince who turned into a Frog, only to be restored back by a kiss from a beautiful and kind princess? And how many times have princesses bent down at the periphery of a pond to kiss a Frog, only to have him turned into a prince? And let’s face it – she always managed to find that prince handsome. Who wouldn’t, compared to the frog she thought he previously was!

Once the Prince got his Princess, he would sever all relationships with his old best friends – the Frogs – and make more normal human friends as he progressed to Kinghood. The Frogs, meanwhile, got other Princes as friends then.

However, this fairy tale is different. This one’s about a prince with a huge mole on his cheek. He was called Prince Freako. His father, King Gross, ruled over the Kingdom of Pervert-shire with an unmatched fervour. So much so, that he had no time for the only Prince. Prince Freako became helplessly lonely, since he had lost his mother during his own birth and he had no siblings.

His bond with the Frogs was therefore deeper than it should have been otherwise.

When Prince Freako came to the age when he wanted to woo a certain visiting princess, Princess Gru (short for Gruesome), Frog Hoppity helped Prince Freako do the age-old conjuring trick। Frog Hoppity watched the happy Prince win his Princess and breathed a sigh of relief. At last, Prince Freako would get the much-needed company in his wife.

However, things didn’t turn out that way. Prince Freako certainly got married to Princess Gru but he still made visits to Frog Hoppity every day even after his marriage. Frog Hoppity was troubled – such sort of a thing had never happened before. No one, however, had the heart to discourage Prince Freako, since his feelings of amity for the frogs were too deep.

Time passed, and with it, the reins of Pervert-shire passed from father to son. King Freako was now stark bald and had a brown wig that slipped often to remind everyone of its owner’s baldness. Two brown springy hairs sprang up from his mole like toadstools from the ground. He had two sons and one daughter and Queen Gru was a fat, happy and contented lady.

Alas! The same could not be said for King Freako. His responsibilities as a King kept him away from Frog Hoppity for long periods of time. He didn’t enjoy his Kinghood anymore. He summoned his Prime Minister, Mr. Monster, and explained to him that he planned to take an indefinite sabbatical from his Throne.

The King went to Frog Hoppity and said, “O dear Hoppity! I am tired of my life. What fun it must be to live in the pond and help the princes woo their girls! Not to mention being kissed by beautiful princesses! Use your magic, dear Hoppity and transform me into a Frog for some time!”

Frog Hoppity was essentially of a kind nature and couldn’t say no to his old friend.

“Khachchhack – Pachchak – Hooom – Tada – Tara – Rara!” bellowed Frog Hoppity and lo behold! King Freako turned into a frog!

The next day, King Freako’s son Prince Dumbo approached Frog Hoppity to help him woo Princess Ugly. Frog Hoppity winked at Freako and said, “O Prince Dumbo! I’ll ask my friend here to help you instead, as I am busy.”

Prince Dumbo agreed and a plan to woo Princess Ugly was chalked.

When Princess Ugly approached the pond the next day, King Freako, umm.. Frog Freako, was so excited at the prospect of helping his own son win his Princess as well as being kissed by the beautiful young lady, that he made an exceedingly high jump on the lotus leaf and fell headlong into the water. When he managed to climb back onto the leaf, it was only to be stared at by the Princess for a full second before she screamed in fear and ran away.

Frog Freako soon realized that his dripping brown wig perched on his ear rather than his head and his springy hair on the mole didn’t make him a pretty picture as a Frog-soon-to-be-turned-into-a-handsome-prince.

Frog Hoppity was very angry – such a failure was a first. Moreover, Prince Dumbo had come and scolded him for something which was actually his own father’s fault. He transformed the King back into a human and forbade him to come near the pond again.

Meanwhile, all the princes lost faith in the ability of Frogs to help them any longer. Princes refused to make any tie with the Frogs then.

From the time of Frog Freako’s failure, Frogs and Princes have been at loggerheads ever since. That is why Princes of the later day made friends with horses but they never looked back at the frogs again. Frogs soon lost their royal status and left the majestic castle grounds to live in dark swamps, where they became associated with witches and dark magic.