4th Dec 09 , 242pm
Was just jotting down, in my typical hurried manner the to-do-list for today….
Scribbled ten things in quick succession, wanting to rush to do the hundred things for the day..
Suddenly my pen stopped to scribble… and I flipped and flapped at it and felt irritated as to why it was not working..
Got this funny feeling then.. When was the last time I wrote with a pen till the last traces of ink in it refused to come out ...?
Almost smiled to remember that it was only back in school…
The pleasures of writing with a pencil till the last wood in it has been sharpened away, the chewed end of it, not allowing you to use it any further…
I keep changing or losing pens and pencils ever so often now, don’t know if any of them really belong to me anymore….
Friday, December 4, 2009
Saturday, October 3, 2009
Losing myself...
3rd Oct..5 35 Pm, on the steps at landscape pinto park... waiting for friends to arrive...as I am locked out.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I lead multiple lives…
All those lives, important for me, in their own ways
What you see is of me is not always what you get..
Somewhere I feign more than I mean,
‘cos what I see matters..
somewhere I pine for more and yet not tell,
‘cos what I am seen as, matters…
With some others, I am there, much of myself often times,
On some moments, even with them , I am just pretending..
I sometimes lose myself in these lives,
But they’re so precious.. the loss seems worthwhile..
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I lead multiple lives…
All those lives, important for me, in their own ways
What you see is of me is not always what you get..
Somewhere I feign more than I mean,
‘cos what I see matters..
somewhere I pine for more and yet not tell,
‘cos what I am seen as, matters…
With some others, I am there, much of myself often times,
On some moments, even with them , I am just pretending..
I sometimes lose myself in these lives,
But they’re so precious.. the loss seems worthwhile..
Friday, October 2, 2009
Old man and the sea...
2nd Oct 2009, 12 34 PM
There’s this top up shop just below my apartment and for some reason that seems to be the only shop within 5 km of my house on either side here in Goa.The shop owner is an elderly man, probably in his late sixties. I see him there every day, clad in his checked cotton shirt ( it is always checks!) and bermudas, his grey hair neatly set just about two inches above his forehead. Bespectacled, with a broad nose and small eyes, he brings a smile to my face everytime I see him.
Looks like the shop has been there for ages now .It’s as if the people in my society have learnt to live with the basics like bread, jam, milk and soap and the other limited provisions that the shop provides... for I don’t see how and why the shop uncle would have changed one bit in the many years that he’s been selling.
I see him every day opening the small shop at 6 30 am in the morning, with tentative hands, with the stray dog galloping and barking excitedly next to him and jumping at every stranger who passes by. And in the evenings I see the shop uncle again, sitting on that chair with the dog next to him on the floor, in a small room just inside the shop.
I have started greeting him these days as I leave for my bus stop early in the morning. When I go to him to ask for my weekly coffee packet and bread, he would slowly and carefully take out tiny carry bags and most meticulously pack each of the items and make sure that he ties up the bags like he were giving me the most precious jewels. Often times when I am in a hurry and want him to just hand it over to me, he would look at me almost admonishingly and I decide to show some semblance of patience till he finishes his job with perfection.
I get a little worried when I do not see the shop open a couple of times in the morning while taking my usual route to the bus stop, but there he is in the evening, every evening, on the same chair, looking into nothingness ahead, with the dog sitting next to him on the floor. He waits patiently for his customers day after day. With so many boys sitting outside his shop, smoking and drinking the occasional chai from his place, it amazes me how he just sits there with a content look on his face and looks right through them, at the sea right across the road…
Life need not be as rushed and demanding all the time. I am trying hard but that kind of peace with oneself is hard to get. I wonder what it takes …
The shop uncle on that chair in the shop, with the dog sitting next to him, looking across the road into the sea… the picture always tells me something…
There’s this top up shop just below my apartment and for some reason that seems to be the only shop within 5 km of my house on either side here in Goa.The shop owner is an elderly man, probably in his late sixties. I see him there every day, clad in his checked cotton shirt ( it is always checks!) and bermudas, his grey hair neatly set just about two inches above his forehead. Bespectacled, with a broad nose and small eyes, he brings a smile to my face everytime I see him.
Looks like the shop has been there for ages now .It’s as if the people in my society have learnt to live with the basics like bread, jam, milk and soap and the other limited provisions that the shop provides... for I don’t see how and why the shop uncle would have changed one bit in the many years that he’s been selling.
I see him every day opening the small shop at 6 30 am in the morning, with tentative hands, with the stray dog galloping and barking excitedly next to him and jumping at every stranger who passes by. And in the evenings I see the shop uncle again, sitting on that chair with the dog next to him on the floor, in a small room just inside the shop.
I have started greeting him these days as I leave for my bus stop early in the morning. When I go to him to ask for my weekly coffee packet and bread, he would slowly and carefully take out tiny carry bags and most meticulously pack each of the items and make sure that he ties up the bags like he were giving me the most precious jewels. Often times when I am in a hurry and want him to just hand it over to me, he would look at me almost admonishingly and I decide to show some semblance of patience till he finishes his job with perfection.
I get a little worried when I do not see the shop open a couple of times in the morning while taking my usual route to the bus stop, but there he is in the evening, every evening, on the same chair, looking into nothingness ahead, with the dog sitting next to him on the floor. He waits patiently for his customers day after day. With so many boys sitting outside his shop, smoking and drinking the occasional chai from his place, it amazes me how he just sits there with a content look on his face and looks right through them, at the sea right across the road…
Life need not be as rushed and demanding all the time. I am trying hard but that kind of peace with oneself is hard to get. I wonder what it takes …
The shop uncle on that chair in the shop, with the dog sitting next to him, looking across the road into the sea… the picture always tells me something…
Thursday, October 1, 2009
Under my foot step..
2nd Oct, 2009. 8 34 am
The flower that I picked up on the pavement that evening,
White and so delicate...
And yet its smell rousing many a sensation in me…
I could have crushed it under my feet,
Walking on the pavement that evening..
And yet, all the way home, I protected it…
Nestling it away from shoves of the shoulders,
The ashtray that held it in water as I dined….
Seems weird..it could have withered last week,
And it still lies fresh in that water bowl I set away for it…
The fragrance still alive in it..
The course of life that takes another turn altogether,
Just because someone stops to hold you…
At the right time..at the wrong place…
The flower that I picked up on the pavement that evening,
White and so delicate...
And yet its smell rousing many a sensation in me…
I could have crushed it under my feet,
Walking on the pavement that evening..
And yet, all the way home, I protected it…
Nestling it away from shoves of the shoulders,
The ashtray that held it in water as I dined….
Seems weird..it could have withered last week,
And it still lies fresh in that water bowl I set away for it…
The fragrance still alive in it..
The course of life that takes another turn altogether,
Just because someone stops to hold you…
At the right time..at the wrong place…
Wednesday, September 30, 2009
Saturday, August 15, 2009
A Lonely Tear...
Written in 2002...
She stands at the threshold,
The rains blurring the horizons beyond,
Making a sweet shattering noise on
The asbestos roof.
Amidst the mellifluous drip drop,
That slender figure stands…
Her locks darker than night,
Willing to enstrange the day of its brightness.
Emotionless emotions on the face,
Her eyelids bent…
Looking into the endless water patterns
On the cemented roughness.
Just then she looks up!
I see them…
The colour, just like the brown earth,
Quenching its thrist…
They would engulf you into the deepest fathoms.
Someone had said, “they are expressive eyes”.
Where is the expression gone?
There is just a queer silence..
The silence holds a thought at the
Edge of her eyelid.
Lo! Perhaps it’s a dew drop.
Held there due to the stillness of her mind and body…
Suddenly, someone calls her from
Behind somewhere…
Somewhere, back into this world I guess...
She shudders!!
Eternity shattered….
She turns, and there it falls….
The sole tear, down the softness of her cheek,
Meandering away to her lips…
Lower and further down…
She’s gone… and so has the tear drop.
I look down for it,
Frantically searching, to where exactly it fell…
But all I see, are the water patterns,
Due to the rain, below….
She stands at the threshold,
The rains blurring the horizons beyond,
Making a sweet shattering noise on
The asbestos roof.
Amidst the mellifluous drip drop,
That slender figure stands…
Her locks darker than night,
Willing to enstrange the day of its brightness.
Emotionless emotions on the face,
Her eyelids bent…
Looking into the endless water patterns
On the cemented roughness.
Just then she looks up!
I see them…
The colour, just like the brown earth,
Quenching its thrist…
They would engulf you into the deepest fathoms.
Someone had said, “they are expressive eyes”.
Where is the expression gone?
There is just a queer silence..
The silence holds a thought at the
Edge of her eyelid.
Lo! Perhaps it’s a dew drop.
Held there due to the stillness of her mind and body…
Suddenly, someone calls her from
Behind somewhere…
Somewhere, back into this world I guess...
She shudders!!
Eternity shattered….
She turns, and there it falls….
The sole tear, down the softness of her cheek,
Meandering away to her lips…
Lower and further down…
She’s gone… and so has the tear drop.
I look down for it,
Frantically searching, to where exactly it fell…
But all I see, are the water patterns,
Due to the rain, below….
Sunday, July 19, 2009
Maula mere, maula mere...
Sunday, the 19th July 09, 4 00 pm
It was 5 30am this Sunday and we wanted to be in Haji Ali at the break of dawn.
We parked ourselves in the car, FM playing the remix of certain soothing numbers..
Outside it was still dark, when we took to the Bandra Worli Sea link..
We hit Haji Ali just a little after break of dawn..
Often times while passing Tardeo, I had seen that distant Dargah situated in the sea. The beautiful white marble building shimmering under the sunlight with
many hundreds of people in the silhouette streaming into it.
I don’t know why it’s so famous. I don’t even know what specifically is its religious significance. Does the strategic location make it that way? Or it is something else? The legend has it that it was built on the islet where the coffin of a famous peer Haji Ali Bukhari finally rested.
Whatever it was, here we were at Haji Ali, just as the sun was coming up.
We waded through the narrow gullies towards the bridge, the aroma of mutton curry wafting strongly in the air.
From closer quarters, Haji Ali looked like any other Dargah that I had seen. A white building, not so well maintained , one could have missed it for an ordinary mosque ,had it not been for its location in the middle of the sea . However, the coloured pieces of clothes hanging from the dome, with Urdu inscriptions on it, lent it the sacred feel.
I was just a little discomforted to see the ‘women only section’ as I am not a strong advocate of any kind of discrimination or isolation and I told them I will be out in exactly five minutes and that they meet me outside.
I went in to see the Dargah. The priest standing along side, who would touch the offerings and flowers to the sacred bed and give it to the worshippers. It was quiet and relatively less crowded and I did not miss the opportunity to observe the followers. The man wearing the kufie (religious cap), who raised his arms in prayer and touched the bed with a practiced ease like I know how to automatically join my hands when I see a temple. The lady who had her hands open and raised towards the sky, mumbling to herself ‘pareshaani door kardo’, largely oblivious to the fact that anyone else could overhear of her troubles as well. Looking at her I could not help but think that faith, above question, doubt and cynicism is the only common element across religions, which makes any of the sacred places what they are.
I most automatically clasped my hands to pay my respects to that power above us.
Lo! Why would I do that?! I opened my hands slowly and raised them pointing upwards like I had seen the lady do. Isn’t that the best way to pray? With your arms open, in respect to and in connection with, that all encompassing power up there. Why should I close my self to his/ her glory. I smiled softly to myself, received the blessings from the priest and retreated.
For whatever religion and faith does to others, I distinctly know what it does to me. I smile more and my heart feels more at rest and this happens each time I visit any religious place. The last I remembered was the Dukh Nivaran Guru Dwara at Chandigarh. You cannot miss the unquestioning faith of people reverberate through every nook.
As ever, I was happy and chirpy on the way back, taking pictures of people and the sea, as the waves lashed at us and drenched us completely and our lips tasted salty.
An early morning sumptuous breakfast of bread, eggs, sausages and a piping hot cup of coffee at my favorite joint Café Mondegar followed by a walk to the Gateway of India in wet clothes, made the Sunday special for me. I slept cosily in the back seat of the car entirely through the way back. It was 9 am then. I knew that even if the rest of the day goes haywire, my Sunday was made!
Or, may be, I just wouldn’t bother planning for the rest!:)
It was 5 30am this Sunday and we wanted to be in Haji Ali at the break of dawn.
We parked ourselves in the car, FM playing the remix of certain soothing numbers..
Outside it was still dark, when we took to the Bandra Worli Sea link..
We hit Haji Ali just a little after break of dawn..
Often times while passing Tardeo, I had seen that distant Dargah situated in the sea. The beautiful white marble building shimmering under the sunlight with
many hundreds of people in the silhouette streaming into it.
I don’t know why it’s so famous. I don’t even know what specifically is its religious significance. Does the strategic location make it that way? Or it is something else? The legend has it that it was built on the islet where the coffin of a famous peer Haji Ali Bukhari finally rested.
Whatever it was, here we were at Haji Ali, just as the sun was coming up.
We waded through the narrow gullies towards the bridge, the aroma of mutton curry wafting strongly in the air.
From closer quarters, Haji Ali looked like any other Dargah that I had seen. A white building, not so well maintained , one could have missed it for an ordinary mosque ,had it not been for its location in the middle of the sea . However, the coloured pieces of clothes hanging from the dome, with Urdu inscriptions on it, lent it the sacred feel.
I was just a little discomforted to see the ‘women only section’ as I am not a strong advocate of any kind of discrimination or isolation and I told them I will be out in exactly five minutes and that they meet me outside.
I went in to see the Dargah. The priest standing along side, who would touch the offerings and flowers to the sacred bed and give it to the worshippers. It was quiet and relatively less crowded and I did not miss the opportunity to observe the followers. The man wearing the kufie (religious cap), who raised his arms in prayer and touched the bed with a practiced ease like I know how to automatically join my hands when I see a temple. The lady who had her hands open and raised towards the sky, mumbling to herself ‘pareshaani door kardo’, largely oblivious to the fact that anyone else could overhear of her troubles as well. Looking at her I could not help but think that faith, above question, doubt and cynicism is the only common element across religions, which makes any of the sacred places what they are.
I most automatically clasped my hands to pay my respects to that power above us.
Lo! Why would I do that?! I opened my hands slowly and raised them pointing upwards like I had seen the lady do. Isn’t that the best way to pray? With your arms open, in respect to and in connection with, that all encompassing power up there. Why should I close my self to his/ her glory. I smiled softly to myself, received the blessings from the priest and retreated.
For whatever religion and faith does to others, I distinctly know what it does to me. I smile more and my heart feels more at rest and this happens each time I visit any religious place. The last I remembered was the Dukh Nivaran Guru Dwara at Chandigarh. You cannot miss the unquestioning faith of people reverberate through every nook.
As ever, I was happy and chirpy on the way back, taking pictures of people and the sea, as the waves lashed at us and drenched us completely and our lips tasted salty.
An early morning sumptuous breakfast of bread, eggs, sausages and a piping hot cup of coffee at my favorite joint Café Mondegar followed by a walk to the Gateway of India in wet clothes, made the Sunday special for me. I slept cosily in the back seat of the car entirely through the way back. It was 9 am then. I knew that even if the rest of the day goes haywire, my Sunday was made!
Or, may be, I just wouldn’t bother planning for the rest!:)
Sunday, July 12, 2009
On a rushed saturday..
- 11th July , 9 30 am.
I want to catch the sun come up..
I want to be able to know there is nothing to do that I don’t want to…
I want to be able to make my early morning cuppa at my pace…
And I want to sit out there in my small balcony, looking out, into no where,
my spell, broken, only by the chirp of that little bird on the tree
or by the whistle of the pressure cooker making breakfast next door…
I want to catch the sun come up..
I want to be able to know there is nothing to do that I don’t want to…
I want to be able to make my early morning cuppa at my pace…
And I want to sit out there in my small balcony, looking out, into no where,
my spell, broken, only by the chirp of that little bird on the tree
or by the whistle of the pressure cooker making breakfast next door…
Scars
10th July '09, 7 32 PM
I see those scars on some houses in Mumbai.. the marked, random, erratic streaks of lines across the dimensions of the apartments..
They are all new houses… Someone has designed it like that..
I wonder if the apartments have been scarred forever so that no one ever looks fondly at them.. no one ever casts an evil eye?
I see those scars on some houses in Mumbai.. the marked, random, erratic streaks of lines across the dimensions of the apartments..
They are all new houses… Someone has designed it like that..
I wonder if the apartments have been scarred forever so that no one ever looks fondly at them.. no one ever casts an evil eye?
Sunday, July 5, 2009
Let me be..
I have been craving for some time alone, all to myself.
The more I want it, the more it evades me.
This has also led me to think how alien the concept of snapping out is to most of us.
Why is it such an ill understood concept? Most people do not understand that just because you want to spend time with yourself doesn’t mean you want to cut away from them or that you do not like their company. Unfortunately, there is some sense of insecurity or a feeling of rejection associated with those who you want to get away from.
What needs to be understood better is the desire to be alone and spend time all by oneself has less to do with getting away from your close ones and more to do with going towards yourself.
When the days and weeks have been rushed and the personal and professional demands start taking a toll, it’s as if you are divided into a hundred thousand shreds scattered in all directions. Each shred having a life, an emotion, a context of its own.
That’s the time when one needs to snap out, look in and sit still. And all those hundred thousand shreds of you travel back slowly and stick to your core. It’s like rewinding the scene of an underwater explosion.
Let me be.
The more I want it, the more it evades me.
This has also led me to think how alien the concept of snapping out is to most of us.
Why is it such an ill understood concept? Most people do not understand that just because you want to spend time with yourself doesn’t mean you want to cut away from them or that you do not like their company. Unfortunately, there is some sense of insecurity or a feeling of rejection associated with those who you want to get away from.
What needs to be understood better is the desire to be alone and spend time all by oneself has less to do with getting away from your close ones and more to do with going towards yourself.
When the days and weeks have been rushed and the personal and professional demands start taking a toll, it’s as if you are divided into a hundred thousand shreds scattered in all directions. Each shred having a life, an emotion, a context of its own.
That’s the time when one needs to snap out, look in and sit still. And all those hundred thousand shreds of you travel back slowly and stick to your core. It’s like rewinding the scene of an underwater explosion.
Let me be.
Perfectionism sucks!
It’s a pity! Think I have become a stickler for cleanliness or something. To my sheer disbelief, found myself cleaning up the mess that my little sister had created at 1 30 am at night on my birth day!
I cannot help but feel bad for perfectionists. Imagine the kind of stress it causes you when you see a pencil that’s fallen out of the stand or that crease that you spot on the bed sheet when it’s not supposed to be there…
Freak! There was a time, not very long time back, when I would take pride in sleeping amidst a mound of clothes. The ideal single’s life. Alone, independent, dirty house that I would clean once in two weeks, clothes that could remain unwashed till I exhausted all of them once and there was nothing fresh left to wear and utensils that remained in the sink at the mercy of my mood to wash them.
Yuck?! I know. But the objective to tell all this is not to highlight how disgustingly unkempt I was but to recall how happy I was. How much at ease I was with myself and the world around me!!
And now!! Just see what has become of me. I tend to get acidic at the thought of entering a house which has not been cleaned. Once upon a time I could never understand why women freaked out if there maids did not come on time. Today, my mind whirrs at the speed of lightning, a million heart attacks a moment, biting my nails in anticipation every morning whether my maid will ring the bell at 6 am this morning!
To this day, my only sense of solace remains that my perfectionism has only remained restricted to cleanliness at home and has some how not trickled down to my professional life!
Thank God for small mercies! :)
I cannot help but feel bad for perfectionists. Imagine the kind of stress it causes you when you see a pencil that’s fallen out of the stand or that crease that you spot on the bed sheet when it’s not supposed to be there…
Freak! There was a time, not very long time back, when I would take pride in sleeping amidst a mound of clothes. The ideal single’s life. Alone, independent, dirty house that I would clean once in two weeks, clothes that could remain unwashed till I exhausted all of them once and there was nothing fresh left to wear and utensils that remained in the sink at the mercy of my mood to wash them.
Yuck?! I know. But the objective to tell all this is not to highlight how disgustingly unkempt I was but to recall how happy I was. How much at ease I was with myself and the world around me!!
And now!! Just see what has become of me. I tend to get acidic at the thought of entering a house which has not been cleaned. Once upon a time I could never understand why women freaked out if there maids did not come on time. Today, my mind whirrs at the speed of lightning, a million heart attacks a moment, biting my nails in anticipation every morning whether my maid will ring the bell at 6 am this morning!
To this day, my only sense of solace remains that my perfectionism has only remained restricted to cleanliness at home and has some how not trickled down to my professional life!
Thank God for small mercies! :)
Thursday, June 25, 2009
To Do list
To learn Salsa..to live in Europe.. to sky dive.. to learn odissi … to go to Leh on a bike… to do theatre and act in at least one play… to learn the guitar…
To travel alone for 10 days to some place…. To participate in Kalyan’s photography expedition…to read the Gita..to do something for Animal welfare ...
To travel alone for 10 days to some place…. To participate in Kalyan’s photography expedition…to read the Gita..to do something for Animal welfare ...
My dreams are limited by reason.:)
Still trying to break my mental barriers... I will learn to dream soon.
Antithesis
Good thoughts that don’t remain etched in memory if I don’t write them..
Moments that got obliterated when I didn’t have a camera to capture them…
There was a thought that I wanted to forget and it kept coming back to haunt me..
And the images I wanted to wipe out like chalk dust from the slate, but in vain.
Laughable.
Moments that got obliterated when I didn’t have a camera to capture them…
There was a thought that I wanted to forget and it kept coming back to haunt me..
And the images I wanted to wipe out like chalk dust from the slate, but in vain.
Laughable.
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
Identity Crisis... 21st June 09, 10.00 am
I was traveling to Vadodara for the first time yesterday and there’s this teenage girl who I spotted sitting on my seat. Dressed in yellow shirt, loose jeans, short cropped hair, slight signs of mustache above her lips and spectacles a tad bit too large for her little face.
Just as I told her that she was sitting on my seat, I realized I had committed a blunder! Her face shrunk, she grabbed her bag, fumbled inside to look for her ticket and realized that she had made a mistake. She had the most crucifying look on her face, got up from her seat and sat at the aisle seat.
She had an awkward smile on her face for the next twenty minutes and largely had her head buried into her news paper for the rest of the travel. To me it was a small unnoticeable mistake...to her it was probably an error she would think of for the next few hours, if not more. I smile to myself. I was reminded of my own times as a gawky little teenager, always wanting to be treated as an adult when I was not. It’s a perpetual identity crisis! And I hated it when the older, beautiful women would not notice me and I wasn’t in ‘that’ league.
When I look back at those times, I never want to go back to them. Not that those times were not good. They were; the dolls ( Though I did not play with dolls too much!),friends at school, dance, cycling in the evenings; it had its own charm. But they were turbulent times.
Remember all that? The hairy hands that cannot be waxed, crushes that you do not understand, small tiffs with friends which will mentally push you to the bottom of the pit?
It is not that the same situations do not arise or exist today. They do. Rather some of them have gotten more complicated. Hair needs to be painfully waxed, crushes become complex relationships and tiffs at times become serious misunderstandings!
However, as we grow up, I think there are a few things that make us equipped to deal with situations better.
One of them is the simple awareness that what is happening is normal and that every one encounters these situations in life. The knowledge that you are no special makes you feel at ease and deal with things a lot better. So while the kid thinks that the situation is unique and why did such a thing have to happen, you know it’s just one of those.
Another tool is our gradually evolved comfort with who we are. The clothes we were, the language we speak, our choice of songs, what we want to do, the realization that you may not want to top in studies even though you have been told that’s the best thing ever! You develop your own comfort levels and style with time.
But the biggest realization which makes adults deal better with situations than the kids is that everything… everything that we go through is transitory. Bad moods, back aches, good friends, the girl you hated in school, hubby squabbles, this good moment, PMSing(!), everything will pass if you let it.
In India, the tendency to treat teenagers as kids is far more pronounced. It is not too surprising when even the thirty five year olds are instructed on how to spend their money and stuffed with food by mommies who ‘know’ what’s best for their bacchas! Looking back I think teenagers would like it better if parents/ elders around treated them more as adults than as kids. That would mean more of reasoning than instructions. It would sometimes also mean sometimes just letting them be! Encourage them to try and explore everything but tell them the pros and cons of it.
They would fumble, flounder but would emerge far stronger and independent headed than they were before. This is in no way to undermine the positive influence the parents and other elders have on their teenagers. All that is imperative to instill the right values in them but sometimes, it is important to just let go.
Not fuss over like the air hostess on the plain was doing with the girl next to me, asking her several times if she was traveling alone and that if she needed anything. I felt like saying “Will you let her alone, she would tell you if she needed anything!”
As I looked at her, the girl still had her head deeply buried into the same page of the news paper. Her desire to look and behave like an adult, somewhere betraying her need to be one.
I smiled to myself ( It was almost a mean feeling of being in a better situation) and looked out of the window.
Just as I told her that she was sitting on my seat, I realized I had committed a blunder! Her face shrunk, she grabbed her bag, fumbled inside to look for her ticket and realized that she had made a mistake. She had the most crucifying look on her face, got up from her seat and sat at the aisle seat.
She had an awkward smile on her face for the next twenty minutes and largely had her head buried into her news paper for the rest of the travel. To me it was a small unnoticeable mistake...to her it was probably an error she would think of for the next few hours, if not more. I smile to myself. I was reminded of my own times as a gawky little teenager, always wanting to be treated as an adult when I was not. It’s a perpetual identity crisis! And I hated it when the older, beautiful women would not notice me and I wasn’t in ‘that’ league.
When I look back at those times, I never want to go back to them. Not that those times were not good. They were; the dolls ( Though I did not play with dolls too much!),friends at school, dance, cycling in the evenings; it had its own charm. But they were turbulent times.
Remember all that? The hairy hands that cannot be waxed, crushes that you do not understand, small tiffs with friends which will mentally push you to the bottom of the pit?
It is not that the same situations do not arise or exist today. They do. Rather some of them have gotten more complicated. Hair needs to be painfully waxed, crushes become complex relationships and tiffs at times become serious misunderstandings!
However, as we grow up, I think there are a few things that make us equipped to deal with situations better.
One of them is the simple awareness that what is happening is normal and that every one encounters these situations in life. The knowledge that you are no special makes you feel at ease and deal with things a lot better. So while the kid thinks that the situation is unique and why did such a thing have to happen, you know it’s just one of those.
Another tool is our gradually evolved comfort with who we are. The clothes we were, the language we speak, our choice of songs, what we want to do, the realization that you may not want to top in studies even though you have been told that’s the best thing ever! You develop your own comfort levels and style with time.
But the biggest realization which makes adults deal better with situations than the kids is that everything… everything that we go through is transitory. Bad moods, back aches, good friends, the girl you hated in school, hubby squabbles, this good moment, PMSing(!), everything will pass if you let it.
In India, the tendency to treat teenagers as kids is far more pronounced. It is not too surprising when even the thirty five year olds are instructed on how to spend their money and stuffed with food by mommies who ‘know’ what’s best for their bacchas! Looking back I think teenagers would like it better if parents/ elders around treated them more as adults than as kids. That would mean more of reasoning than instructions. It would sometimes also mean sometimes just letting them be! Encourage them to try and explore everything but tell them the pros and cons of it.
They would fumble, flounder but would emerge far stronger and independent headed than they were before. This is in no way to undermine the positive influence the parents and other elders have on their teenagers. All that is imperative to instill the right values in them but sometimes, it is important to just let go.
Not fuss over like the air hostess on the plain was doing with the girl next to me, asking her several times if she was traveling alone and that if she needed anything. I felt like saying “Will you let her alone, she would tell you if she needed anything!”
As I looked at her, the girl still had her head deeply buried into the same page of the news paper. Her desire to look and behave like an adult, somewhere betraying her need to be one.
I smiled to myself ( It was almost a mean feeling of being in a better situation) and looked out of the window.
The Bhopali Vs the Mumbaikar , 20th June 6 PM
Off late I have been in the skies very often and I like those times as they are completely mine. I sit back, relax and enjoy the good times. My thoughts meandering, creating a hundred images all at the same time…
It was no different that day as I let my thoughts flow while I was landing at the Indore airport and my reverie broke as I spotted the cube like houses and the checker board fields and my mind went … ‘ Aaaaaaaa!!! What a gross wastage of space! Just imagine how many apartments could have come up here to accommodate millions!’
That was the moment I realized I had become a true Mumbaikar. Having lived in small cities till five years back I was in love with the wide fields, big houses and spaces around. Brought up in Bhopal, known as the city of lakes, I remember getting nauseated in the pit of my stomach as I was thrown out of the local train with the tide of people who got down at Sion station. That was my first landing at Mumbai and I hated it!
Forward it five years hence from then, and here I was at the Indore airport, impatient and uncomfortable with the slowness of life that existed around me. I spent my time, checking out the guards, studying them as seriously as they were studying my boarding pass. Asking each person to remove the laptops from the bags, frisking for minutes with a purposeful look… I wondered what would happen if the guards at Mumbai Airport started taking so much time with each person?!
‘ Work expands to fill up time’ , I mentally ridiculed not knowing how seriously I had started liking everything that was fast paced and deriding everything that was not.!
The next thing I remember is my travel back from Indore to Mumbai. Needless to say I had to undergo the same slow motion check up all over again.
Just I settled my self comfortably at the window seat, glad that I was back in the flight again and headed towards amchi Mumbai, I heard a lot of huffing and puffing right next to my seat. I turned to find this large lady, in her mid forties , dressed in white, holding a huge bulky jute bag ( The kinds you get in the Kirana stores), trying to push herself between the handles of the seat. I offered to help to keep her bag up but she declined and held it as if she didn’t want to part with it. Another man, a complete stranger, also in his mid forties took the aisle seat. Both had boarded from Indore and were complete strangers to each other.
When the food was served, this lady asked the man and me if she could keep the food which was being served inside her bag and have it later. I answered her but maintained a restrained expression as if she were doing something outrageous and that my paying any more attention to her would somehow make me a party to it!
The man however told her very coolly that she could keep the food inside and eat later. From there on, there conversations started. The drift that I got suggested that they spoke of Ayurveda, Vedanta, naturopathy, books and yoga. I was amazed to hear the lady say ‘ Aap kabhi us side aayein toh mere ghar zaroor aayiega ( if ever you come to that side of the city, do drop in)’!! I could not help smiling. All the while that I was putting up my fast-paced-high-handed-city-face, these two people had found friends in each other!
I wondered if these things ever happened in big cities. If people in big cities like Mumbai ever had the time to indulge in such conversations on trains and busses and find others who share so many common interests? And even of they have the time, do they consider it too LS to show concern and empathy. I write this at the cost of sounding harsh but the incidence of such incidents is higher in places like Bhopal than in Mumbai.
As my thoughts were playing pendulum with Mumbai and Bhopal I saw Mumbai from the clouds. Brightly lit in the night, I thought only the milky way can look like thisJ
the python like queens neck lace, the sprawling high rises, accommodating millions by the day, cars lined up and following each other like ant trails on the marine drive… life on the fast track…
I rationalized, that in this city, people may not have the time to make friends on the way but if you ask them the way, they will leave their jobs to show you the way… that’s all that matters isn’t it..
Besides I had grown so used to the crowded roads, the jostling on the trains, the hours on the road where the traffic cops consider it blasphemous if your car is not bumper-to-bumper with the car ahead(!), all that I could see from up there..
Going back to the ‘life at its own pace’ was more than a little difficult.
As the airplane hit the tarmac at the Mumbai airport, I knew I had arrived home…
It was no different that day as I let my thoughts flow while I was landing at the Indore airport and my reverie broke as I spotted the cube like houses and the checker board fields and my mind went … ‘ Aaaaaaaa!!! What a gross wastage of space! Just imagine how many apartments could have come up here to accommodate millions!’
That was the moment I realized I had become a true Mumbaikar. Having lived in small cities till five years back I was in love with the wide fields, big houses and spaces around. Brought up in Bhopal, known as the city of lakes, I remember getting nauseated in the pit of my stomach as I was thrown out of the local train with the tide of people who got down at Sion station. That was my first landing at Mumbai and I hated it!
Forward it five years hence from then, and here I was at the Indore airport, impatient and uncomfortable with the slowness of life that existed around me. I spent my time, checking out the guards, studying them as seriously as they were studying my boarding pass. Asking each person to remove the laptops from the bags, frisking for minutes with a purposeful look… I wondered what would happen if the guards at Mumbai Airport started taking so much time with each person?!
‘ Work expands to fill up time’ , I mentally ridiculed not knowing how seriously I had started liking everything that was fast paced and deriding everything that was not.!
The next thing I remember is my travel back from Indore to Mumbai. Needless to say I had to undergo the same slow motion check up all over again.
Just I settled my self comfortably at the window seat, glad that I was back in the flight again and headed towards amchi Mumbai, I heard a lot of huffing and puffing right next to my seat. I turned to find this large lady, in her mid forties , dressed in white, holding a huge bulky jute bag ( The kinds you get in the Kirana stores), trying to push herself between the handles of the seat. I offered to help to keep her bag up but she declined and held it as if she didn’t want to part with it. Another man, a complete stranger, also in his mid forties took the aisle seat. Both had boarded from Indore and were complete strangers to each other.
When the food was served, this lady asked the man and me if she could keep the food which was being served inside her bag and have it later. I answered her but maintained a restrained expression as if she were doing something outrageous and that my paying any more attention to her would somehow make me a party to it!
The man however told her very coolly that she could keep the food inside and eat later. From there on, there conversations started. The drift that I got suggested that they spoke of Ayurveda, Vedanta, naturopathy, books and yoga. I was amazed to hear the lady say ‘ Aap kabhi us side aayein toh mere ghar zaroor aayiega ( if ever you come to that side of the city, do drop in)’!! I could not help smiling. All the while that I was putting up my fast-paced-high-handed-city-face, these two people had found friends in each other!
I wondered if these things ever happened in big cities. If people in big cities like Mumbai ever had the time to indulge in such conversations on trains and busses and find others who share so many common interests? And even of they have the time, do they consider it too LS to show concern and empathy. I write this at the cost of sounding harsh but the incidence of such incidents is higher in places like Bhopal than in Mumbai.
As my thoughts were playing pendulum with Mumbai and Bhopal I saw Mumbai from the clouds. Brightly lit in the night, I thought only the milky way can look like thisJ
the python like queens neck lace, the sprawling high rises, accommodating millions by the day, cars lined up and following each other like ant trails on the marine drive… life on the fast track…
I rationalized, that in this city, people may not have the time to make friends on the way but if you ask them the way, they will leave their jobs to show you the way… that’s all that matters isn’t it..
Besides I had grown so used to the crowded roads, the jostling on the trains, the hours on the road where the traffic cops consider it blasphemous if your car is not bumper-to-bumper with the car ahead(!), all that I could see from up there..
Going back to the ‘life at its own pace’ was more than a little difficult.
As the airplane hit the tarmac at the Mumbai airport, I knew I had arrived home…
Trying to keep my sanity in insane times.. 23rd June 2009, 1 pm
What is detachment?
Is it the ability to accept the unacceptable when you know things are not within your control, when you can do nothing to alter the situation?
Or is it the ability to know that you could have helped the situation if you really wanted to.. but hey ! u know what..??! You have a better idea…! You don’t want to do anything about the situation. You want to let yourself stand there calmly.. between the emotions and your soul.. You want to see every emotion pass through you like the spirits that you saw in the ghost movies..
Feel sad, depressed, pained, puckish, bliss, joy, cleansed… all as it comes…
And feel cathartic at the end of it all… Knowing well that you have the ability to feel all and yet rise beyond those emotions…
Why are tough times so tough when we pass through them and why do they always look easy in retrospect.. making us look stupid and small about the way we behaved when we were going through it…?
Is it the ability to accept the unacceptable when you know things are not within your control, when you can do nothing to alter the situation?
Or is it the ability to know that you could have helped the situation if you really wanted to.. but hey ! u know what..??! You have a better idea…! You don’t want to do anything about the situation. You want to let yourself stand there calmly.. between the emotions and your soul.. You want to see every emotion pass through you like the spirits that you saw in the ghost movies..
Feel sad, depressed, pained, puckish, bliss, joy, cleansed… all as it comes…
And feel cathartic at the end of it all… Knowing well that you have the ability to feel all and yet rise beyond those emotions…
Why are tough times so tough when we pass through them and why do they always look easy in retrospect.. making us look stupid and small about the way we behaved when we were going through it…?
Bliss ... 18th June 2009, 6 am
Sitting all by yourself, at the airport CCD ,on an early Friday morning, sipping a piping hot cup of coffee; with Barack Obama’s Audacity of hope in hand…
Knowing that the flight is delayed by two hours and that not working is legitimate …:)
Knowing that the flight is delayed by two hours and that not working is legitimate …:)
Wednesday, June 17, 2009
Something intertial about it...
Someone close had once told me that the only thing that prevents us from realising our true potential is that sense of inertia which sets in every now and then. Back then those words did not seem anything beyond being profound words which I did not bother to delve into .
These days, surprisingly, everywhere I go , in most of whatever i see and do, the feeling sets in stronger than ever.
One realises that in most of what we do everyday, a sub optimal performance brings optimal or sometimes supra optimal results. You could take any example for it. Think about the presentation that you have tomorrow, the night out that you do for it. Not that you will not cover all the requisite points or that you will you will not deliver a fantastic presentation. But what I am talking about is the gap.. the gap between what eventually turned out and what could have turned out had you mulled over it a lilttle bit more.
Many a time , I have felt as if this intertia in me has a clock sense in it, It knows exactly how much time I would need to be able to make a sub optimal presentation and yet be able to make an impression!
Most of the people who I see around me are intelligent ( at least above average) , can apply themselves well and respond well to situations. Why then do we not excell at everything that we do? Why do we end up with sub optimal results?
Then there are also people who I see bring that special touch to whatever they do . Mind you, it's not about doing well what you like. The challenge is to bring that special bit to your daily rigmarole. How many of us do it or even want to do it?
I believe it is the ability of people to rise above this inertia that makes all the difference. The need to not just do justice but to give it reasonable energy and thought , that does it.
One realises that tasks start looking more meaningful if one stops to think of why one is doing what he/she is doing. How will that add any value ( sounds terribly cliched!) to anyone or anywhere. Not always will one find significant reasons/ answers for it, but chances are that you will find tasks more meaningful.
Many of us may not be able to live significant lives, where we do earth shattering work, or add value to millions of lives. But if we start excelling in most small things we do, chances are that we would lead a more contented life... a more happy life.
Another aspect of inertia that I wanted to talk about is the inertia of our lifestyles. My mum says that she loves her life the way it is. Revolving around her three daughters and till sometime back her two dogs( both of who just passed away). Sometimes I think that She, being the great woman that she is was capable of a lot more. May be she rues the fact that she did not do anything else or may be she really means what she says. I would give her the benefit of doubt, but the point being - are we really happy with our lives doing just what we are doing - work, family- a bit of travel- dance- exercise- wotever else?? Or have we just found enough ways to rationalize that we are OK/ happy with it because anything else seems too disruptive/unnecesarry?
I don't have answers to these. Just asking myself some questions.However, two things that I clearly see in what i wrote above -
Intertia to prolong till you do a sub optimal- yet -manageable job
Intertia in life to live it with no chage.
If we try and look into these forms and try and rise above that inevitable feeling that sets in, we will find our lives more meaningful.
These days, surprisingly, everywhere I go , in most of whatever i see and do, the feeling sets in stronger than ever.
One realises that in most of what we do everyday, a sub optimal performance brings optimal or sometimes supra optimal results. You could take any example for it. Think about the presentation that you have tomorrow, the night out that you do for it. Not that you will not cover all the requisite points or that you will you will not deliver a fantastic presentation. But what I am talking about is the gap.. the gap between what eventually turned out and what could have turned out had you mulled over it a lilttle bit more.
Many a time , I have felt as if this intertia in me has a clock sense in it, It knows exactly how much time I would need to be able to make a sub optimal presentation and yet be able to make an impression!
Most of the people who I see around me are intelligent ( at least above average) , can apply themselves well and respond well to situations. Why then do we not excell at everything that we do? Why do we end up with sub optimal results?
Then there are also people who I see bring that special touch to whatever they do . Mind you, it's not about doing well what you like. The challenge is to bring that special bit to your daily rigmarole. How many of us do it or even want to do it?
I believe it is the ability of people to rise above this inertia that makes all the difference. The need to not just do justice but to give it reasonable energy and thought , that does it.
One realises that tasks start looking more meaningful if one stops to think of why one is doing what he/she is doing. How will that add any value ( sounds terribly cliched!) to anyone or anywhere. Not always will one find significant reasons/ answers for it, but chances are that you will find tasks more meaningful.
Many of us may not be able to live significant lives, where we do earth shattering work, or add value to millions of lives. But if we start excelling in most small things we do, chances are that we would lead a more contented life... a more happy life.
Another aspect of inertia that I wanted to talk about is the inertia of our lifestyles. My mum says that she loves her life the way it is. Revolving around her three daughters and till sometime back her two dogs( both of who just passed away). Sometimes I think that She, being the great woman that she is was capable of a lot more. May be she rues the fact that she did not do anything else or may be she really means what she says. I would give her the benefit of doubt, but the point being - are we really happy with our lives doing just what we are doing - work, family- a bit of travel- dance- exercise- wotever else?? Or have we just found enough ways to rationalize that we are OK/ happy with it because anything else seems too disruptive/unnecesarry?
I don't have answers to these. Just asking myself some questions.However, two things that I clearly see in what i wrote above -
Intertia to prolong till you do a sub optimal- yet -manageable job
Intertia in life to live it with no chage.
If we try and look into these forms and try and rise above that inevitable feeling that sets in, we will find our lives more meaningful.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
