The Third person

Just for the effect, Antaheen’s soundtrack played somewhere in the background. She deliberately placed her Ipod docking station in the bath, to hear a faint trace of ‘Pherari mon’ . Her organic Tulsi Cha was hot and ready in her favourite white pot and the Facebook window on her laptop was closed.

She opens the draft. Looks dreamily out of the window and stares at the trees. The leaves she noticed were slowly turning a sad autumn orange. Why did she have to look at it sadly? That was her. Vague. Repressive of upbeat emotions. Getting back to what she had set out to do, she returns her glassy stare from the window to her laptop screen. She minimizes the doc. A brilliant blue, orange and white image of Ladakh stares into her face. A picture from Flickr. She returned her gaze back to the window and this time saw a little drizzle. She instinctively drew the sides of her sweater, closer and poured some tea into a cup. She wondered where the Tulsi had come from. Made a mental note to plant one in the empty pot lying in the garage, over the weekend.  She moved the curser to maximize the Word file. She saw a lot of words, inverted commas and exclamations. But could read nothing. She kept gazing at the screen….

 

Ok, tell me, does talking in third person glamorize my image? :D :D :D

So darned bored, I can’t tell you fellas. Besides, Mrs Melancholy is home. Hope her visit is brief. Atithi, tum kab jaoge?

(And you thought this was a pati patni aur woh type of post eh, rascals!)

I Love You, Daddy

 

 

(Oh yaaay, oh yaaay!!)

Because I was always the one standing in front,
between your arms,
holding on to the handle of your blue Bajaj scooter.

Because you always picked the bones
from my piece of fish.

Because you always bit a piece of the guava
before giving it to me.                                              
Ensuring I got the sweetest one, much like Shabari .

Because you came just for me,
to save me from the dreaded bus ride,
in that black and yellow taxi.

Because you waited anxiously, yet patiently,
when I got home late.

Because you sat behind my Scooty
and shouted into my ears- i’ll get you that loan, don’t worry.

Because you cried like a baby,
when your lil girl went away to be someone else's.

Because you fumed and raged
when you saw me wronged.

Because you came home with goodies every evening
when I was expecting my mini-me.

Because you held her, just the way you might have held me
when I was born.

Because you love her, the way you loved me,
only more.

Because I know when you hold her,
you see me in her.

And because you are MY Daddy,
the best one can ever be.

Happy birthday Dad.

Bedtime stories part 3/conversations

Papa: ………….so the robbers reached the bank and stole all the money. They were a real bad bunch of robbers. The police didn’t know how to catch them. They were thinking of ideas..

Mish: I’ll tell you papa. We can pretend to be girls and then go kiss them. But we won’t. We will actually beat them up.

Papa: oh. *eyes wide*

(Ma interrupts): Mish where did you get that idea from?!

Mish: it came from my head,  Ma.

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

Mish: …but girls always kiss boys

ma: and..

Mish: then they run away, when the clock strikes one and two.

Ma: hmmmm. We need some dinosaur and crocodile stories tonight.

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

At the school.

Mishmash: I have been telling dad that I want a baby brother. But dad doesn’t listen to me at all.

Teacher: Your daughter here tells us that she has been asking you for a baby brother. * sly smile*

Dad: *Turns beetroot red* Why baby, lets first go home, fetch mamma and then go to the supermarket and buy you one?

Mishmash : *happy and does her trademark butterfly flutter*

At the supermarket: papa, i want Ice ceeeeaaaaaaaaaam. Pink one.

 

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

I don’t want to be a super woman

No I don’t.
I don’t want that title, neither the accolades that come with it.
Aren’t a lot of us  doing it already? Busy being super women?
Can I just be a woman?
And still be admired for who I am, and what I do?

Where the hell am I?

Today morning was dedicated to try and decide on - what I really want to do in my life. Not that I haven’t had this conversation with self before. Just that today it seemed imperative. I had to do or die. Desperately I scribbled, googled, doodled and finished 2 pots of Darjeeling. I know being desperate takes you no where. But I wasn’t going to again write to unknown consultants begging them to please gimme 10 minutes of their day so I could prove to them what a kickass marketer I can be to their clients. I wasn’t going to waste my week thinking about that book that I can still write (which obviously I am not, because I simply can’t) or that passion I can still pursue. I just wanted to make a decision and do whatever the hell it takes to do it. And guess what? I still haven’t figured. I’ve been vacillating between a million things and I’m left with basically nothing.

Oh God, please.

This is not me.

Edited to add: AND THEN I READ THIS-

“When I stand before God at the end of my life, I would hope that I would not have a single bit of talent left, and could say, "I used everything you gave me.” ~ Erma Bombeck

when you are sorry

Everyone does stuff to hurt people knowingly or unknowingly at some point in their lives. But when someone is hurt, little does it matter if it was done knowingly or otherwise. There are two parties to this. The one who hurts and the one who is hurt. And both suffer at the end of it. Trust me on that one. I have been on both sides and I know being on the side that hurts the other, suffers more. Sometimes it remains the biggest regret. More so when its done  unknowingly. Its so dire that you can’t even undo it. It kills you. The word ‘sorry’ seems hollow, futile, insincere. And nothing can appease you. You just have to live with it.

Like one of those heart-breaking childhood memories that still remains with you, haunts you. You have no escape.

Live, regret, repent. Like a curse, I’m reminded, may you never make peace with yourself.

To shoot or not to shoot

Have you seen the number of pictures people upload on social networking sites? And if you’ve cared to notice, of those pictures they upload, the number of pictures dedicated to random shots of the sea, birds, flowers- anything but group pictures, have gone up? Not just that, the cameras they use are also pretty high-end. A photographer friend of my remarked rather scornfully, ‘everybody wants to be a photographer today’.

Now that statement cheesed me off.

Well, I belong to this new photography crazy crowd. However, if you ask me, I have a completely different opinion about us ‘wannabe photographers’. In my case, I was genuinely interested in shooting images and taking a professional course to help me do that better. But for some they just want to do it for the want of a hobby. I think our generation of youngsters have come to feel the lack of doing something substantial, that goes beyond their professional realm. They want to stop going to malls (or so I think) and take up a hobby that’s not too complicated to be taken up at the ripe age of 30. While you might want to sit on your favourite armchair and philosophize that you are never too old to have a hobby. To you, I suggest try doing it first.  Photography, blogging, sports, cooking, painting- suddenly I see people making an effort to wake up on a Saturday and pursue the good life. And then, they want to share with the world, their wonderful Saturday exploits. :) hence, Monday mornings have newsfeeds packed with new photo-uploads on Facebook.

So, what’s wrong with that? Why must professional photographers feel threatened :)? OK maybe not threatened, but why feel bitter? Aren’t you happy this world has fewer lazy people? Sure, you feel bitter that you still are filling that piggy bank to buy that high end DSLR, while your friend Jaggi, who knows nothing about the manual mode, shutter speeds, exposure, blah, bleu,bleh-  is strutting about a D300s with the auto mode on and clicking pictures of every flower and butterfly his viewfinder can find.  Of course, he is using flash in broad daylight, but again, what the hell is wrong with that? This friend Jaggi wants to do something apart from sleeping until 12 noon, and he has the money to buy a high end camera and it makes him very very happy. That’s why, on a Saturday morning he hits Brindavan gardens and shoots like crazy- every leaf, petal and fountain in sight. He is a happy man, and you are sulking in that corner yearning for some expensive lens. And what is worse, you’ve cursed, bitched, mocked and done everything negative possible and whiled your day away. And then there are people who shoot awfully cool pictures without knowing any technicalities of a camera. You have an issue with that too?

Just let people be, ya. Shoot and let people shoot (as log as they are cameras :D). This world will be such a wunnerful place then, you’ll see. Being good or bad, average or superlative, all leads to nothing but STRESS. As long as you enjoy doing something, do it. The minute you peep into your neighbour’s to see if their dinner is better than yours, the colour green will blind you.

Mind it!

(I know some of you might want to object to this theory of being ok with being average - like Ayn Rand would have said. But you know what? Today I'd rather be more inclusive than scornful. That way I'll sleep better. Aren’t we spending too much time critiquing? You’ve passed that literature paper writing a critical analysis of Paradise Lost, long back. Move on, dude).

What's in my backpack?

I went through my entire blog today. Each and every post. I cringed quite a few times, at the immaturity of my thoughts just a couple of years back. But this post is not about how wise or otherwise I have grown up to be.

As I browsed, I realised, with each post, there was so much I did not write. And that's where that familiar feeling of regret came all over me. Regret over the fact that I didn't start blogging anonymously. Regret that what I write is weighed and based on how a certain section of people I know, who read this blog, might react. I write, but never the entire story. And the worst of all, I don't write stuff that deeply saddens me. This is quite unlike me. I have always been the outspoken one, who didn't give a rat's ass about what the world thought of me. Or, wait, was I really that carefree? Maybe not. But my friends might want to think otherwise.

Regardless, I am now the typical Indian daughter, daughter-in-law, wife, sister, mother, friend, neighbour, relative- who talks, walks and writes with extreme caution. Suddenly it matters what 'they' would think or say to me. When the hell did that happen? Is that why I feel so weighed down? Or in Clooney's words, is that what's in my backpack?

So, I am beginning to ideate on ways of going back to being my good old (nasty?)self. Won't be an easy task, given that I have changed way too much (even for my liking).

But there's one thing I most certainly want to do - ask George Clooney, 'will you marry me'?

Julie and KG

Saw Julie and Julia last night. And last night was perhaps the first night where I dreamt of chocolate recipes the entire night. Needless to say, I woke up really hungry. More about the film- what a splendid film! The reason I loved this film so much was probably because I saw so many shades of Julie in me. Mostly the bad shades. Or lets just say the i-wish-i-could-change-these ones. Julie’s inability to finish just about anything she undertakes, her lack of accomplishments- despite her talents, the way she sets to blog, damn, even the way she whips- actually I am almost Julie’s mirror image. But for her petite figure. Oh, and the way she loves cooking. How it settles her- that’s so me.

The film, really inspired me. And predictably it stopped there. Doesn’t inspiration make people do things – but me, it only makes me dream some more. Or maybe, it me and not Ms. Inspiration’s imperfections at play. I am going severely wrong somewhere. But where?

However I think if one answers the question that Julia’s husband asks in the film,  life should indeed get less complicated-

what is it that you really love doing? 

Julia in the movie said, eat.

I don’t know my answer yet. I love too many things, to decide on one. That’s probably why I am so stuck-in-a-rut. Nothing seems to move. May be I ain’t pushing it hard enough. Whatever, it may be, I am not in the best state of mind.

(Didn’t I somewhere just write the words- I AM INSPIRED? I hate being a Gemini)