Bucket List Unfinished

For the brief moment I spoke to one of my good friends, I realized that it is easier to look back – say the last ten years or lesser, say five years – and count at the things you had dreamt about doing and not done. Everyone has their bucket list but I think with increasing age and changing priorities the list is like life – never constant. So why fret about the things you haven’t done and list the things that you actually never thought would have entered “the-things-to-do-in-life-in-ten-years” and point out some that you have. I hope whoever is reading this can name at least 5! :-) Mine are as follows and by the way it is more difficult than you think. Why? Cause you have raised the bar high for yourself by doing great things :) pat yourself for that and cheers to many more…

1. I went to London to study – I never thought I could convince my mom, who was quite adamant that Indian education is much better
2. Paris/Egypt – Went to some of my dream destinations
3. Fell in love, fell out of it, got my heart broken, broke a heart and did one all over again
4. Business Journalism – of all the things the one thing I NEVER dreamed of is to become a part of the financial sector. And I love it!
5. Poetry – I was always in love with words. I tried my hand at prose. Theory is not my cup cake! Then all of a sudden there she was… My muse. And then to make life better, brighter and sun shiny I stumbled upon Emily Dickinson!

Change

Most of us love change in its simplest form. A change in seasons, a change in clothes, and a change of jobs – we except, and sometimes even enjoy. Recently, my friend lost access to her blog, which she had created and come to love. However, it was not her first blog but her second. She was debating as to moving into her old blog or starting one afresh. I haven’t followed up with her regarding her decision, but that debate spun off a thought in my head.

Late last year, I created a new blog for a new beginning, a new direction a new me! I have written stuff that I like, I don’t like, I will miss, tell and never kiss, but it lacks the “real sense of me” -- an idealistic dreamer and a story teller -- who in an impulsive spree opened her own book, opened a book as an ode to her life. It was real, honest and even brutal sometimes. Well, most of the times. But the people I spoke about, tarnished or plain pointed fingers at understood why I wrote them. It was personal but it wasn’t me taking things personally. Every time I feel like writing a heart rendering post I run back to my old one. The new one is a pretty dress. The old one is me, sitting in front of a mirror finishing up a long day’s work, mascara running down my cheek along with tears, after a performance worthy of a standing ovation.

Acceptance and the Cut

What if the same friends who pledged to listen to you turn deaf to your words?

The most important friends, or the friends whom I consider my best friends have no clue about the trip I just had. What happened, where I went, how the weather there was, did I have a good time? Nothing.

It infuriates me that they don't care enough to want to know. But then may be these things bore them. They don't want to know what I did. What would they get out of it? And that too when they don't consider it interesting or what I did there.

I also think that I have shut down. A lot!!! I like myself this way... Upsetting to know that I love "aloneness"!!! :) my word.... I don't care to elaborate to people who don't want to listen. I spoke about myself to a total stranger on the trip because she wanted to listen. To me, to what I did, what I like, how I prepare for a vacation... Study about the civilization, to know before going and visiting the place.

Now, I am stuck. Between loving my loneliness and getting irritated with the callousness. I am unable to tell them that I need to put an end to this. Which does mean amicably part as friends who were... And there I am put in a pickle -- my inner voice of fear -- I am scared of pity. I cannot explain that feeling. Pity.

I know why some men and women move away from their friends when they find love. You want to spend every waking moment with the one you love. I found love, my passion. It is isolating, cause its within me. Words! Mine, to myself, to the world, to love, to life and to the soul.

And then I think maybe I don't want to accept that I am not that important in my friends' lives. Its not because they shut me out but it is just because life takes you in different paths. You can never know everything about each other any more. I know where I belong but the strings are of various lengths... I should'nt be complaining either. I am more detached than I thought and my promises of being for the other .. I have not been able to keep up!

I think I need a change. Serious change. There is a certain negative aura... Reasons are just that.. reasons! Not solutions...

Bday

I have been, for 23 years, excited about my birthday. Every year. Without fail. I have never thought about getting old as a bad thing. At each stage in your life, you get to do something you have always wanted to do. Obviously you cannot wish for something which has already passed you by. And if any point you have then you havent lived your life completely. Sad but accept it and give the coming years a real good chance.

This year, I am working on my birthday! I have never done that in my life!!! What a waste! I know it but I cannot think of having gifts, meeting friends who are there and not there. At this juncture, I really wish that I had a huge family. Well, I cannot get over being the only child in my home, aint giving that up easily, but I would have wanted a larger than life lunch or dinner with my huge loud, gregarious family this year.

Anyway... I really wish for a quiet, forgettable birthday (May be, after one like this I will be sure that I never waste away another birthday in vain!!! :D)

News for Harry Potter fans, And something abt an xtraordinary day

News: From the Guardian
Oh and by the way please do check out MS Corley’s blog - - his interpretation of the Harry Potter series. Classic

Separately...

I am finding it hard to live with everyday life after experiencing an extraordinary one.

Extraordinary day = on a daily basis = heart attack (too much adrenalin)

Daily ordinary day = exists only to make the extraordinary one = alive

I crib about both to write a stupid post like this

The Phelps Drama

Michael Phelps was caught on a candid photo which showed him inhaling from a marijuana pipe. People all over the world lapped up this information about their swimming champ. The number of critics that raised their voice is astounding. The sports clubs, fan presidents, etc etc were out to disown him due to the act committed by the once highly decorated sports person. And this felicitation was not too far long back.

I know and understand that smoking any kind of drugs is not good due to its addictive nature, ya da ya da ya da!! We all know the drill but what comes out of this incident is that I think it’s about time that people stopped idolizing certain celebrities and realise that they are also human. They want and they have the right to make a mistake. They need not have to apologise to the whole freaking world to save their sponsorship. It’s a different deal if it was a repetitive behaviour which gets people concerned about his health and the sponsors about their money. We tend to exert pressure on these “sports idols” to be the perfect role model for us.

Make him apologise for regrettable behaviour and bad judgement. Force him into acting because you dream of him in a particular way. It is a price to pay for fame. But still!

No one recognises the amount of unwavering devotion he must have given to his swimming practices. I understand he is an inspiration for many young aspiring athletes but why should we be afraid of all these youngsters only taking the photo into consideration? Would you wish to live your life under constant scrutiny, criticisms? How many of you want to do pot, get caught on camera for the kicks and not see that picture on the front page of sports news?

Not me!

Travel

I look back at last year and I realised that planning a travel program in India, with my friends, is harder than it was in London. Dates for leaves, suggestions for places, money and mode of transport -- all tend to rear their ugly head into our lovely dreams of meeting up in exotic places. From a week in Singapore to two days in the sultry Chennai heat, lots of plans have been blotched. Nevertheless, I have managed to travel a lot last year. With my friends and family.
(Mumbai-Mahabeleshwar, Chennai -- by default, Goa, Bellikeri [I am sure its called something else, ask Frank], Mysore, Mekedatu)

The thought that occured to me was obviously not a novel thought and hence I am refraining myself from giving it a dramatic entre. I suddenly wondered why I did not have a or start a travel blog. It will not aim to flaunt the places I have been to (or will in the future) but for the selfish pleasure of trying to manage another blog (or mabbe continue in one which is redundant at the moment) and to do something new in the new year! (Honeymoon period for a new year is only till Jan end).

P.S: The minute I write something in the "travel" blog of mine, I will end up not travelling... sigh :) Rules and 'happenings' need to be broken :)

Master

Mine is a silent obsession. It doesn’t consume, doesn’t demand and I do not fear it. It does not take over my life’s decisions. But then it does. In subtle ways, when I do not expect it.

I have, over the years, heard many songs, instrumental music. I have figured certain things out and these findings have been quite consistent.
-- The sound of piano can evoke a feeling of romance or put me to sleep
-- The sound of drums never found a place in my heart. No emotions - of anger, sadness, excitement
-- The flute, I always associate with superficiality, snobbery and detachment.
-- Saxaphone, with a jazz twist, a complete picture to jive with. Happiness.

As always, not adhering to the inverted pyramid style of writing that is drilled into all journalists, I have kept the best for the last.

-- The strings of a guitar.

Today, I learned that the sound of a guitar can make me an infidel. Or, let me put it in other words, I heard a certain sound from a guitar, which is exactly how I would describe infidelity. I believe (at least for now) the emotions you pass through being infidel is the height of emotions (before and after the act. I wouldn’t consider acts as thoughts come into play and then decisions. Whole new post!!!)

I love the sound of the guitar. I have tried mastering it. I use the word master because I never managed to do that. The obsession doesn’t dictate people to help me out. It sticks and seduces and it is everything that I want.

Shades

I don’t see colours
I view all in black and white,
Many in shades of grey
They tell me snow is white
But for me so is the sky I say
I hear the dog bark,
I hear the cat mew,
And see the crow just like you
I exist in a time,
Before the Eastman blush
Where the gory of blood,
Is without a human touch
We marry in my two paints
Live in one that's yours
But see the crow just like you

Compromise on the hush of a library

I had a hundred arguments running through my head the minute I finished reading Lyn Brown’s article about how libraries with strict rules need to be replaced by upgrading them to a culturally rich centre to avoid being shut down.

Do I believe that a "long overdue revolution" would save these libraries? I think it eventually might but I am really not up for that change.

I don’t think that I fall within the brackets of “the ageing band of traditionalists who shrink in horror at change.” Although what I do believe is that the concept of “culturally enhancing the libraries” with a dash of jazz in the evenings every Friday night or even having coffee whilst being engrossed in Shakespearean Sonnets will disrupt the peace each person enjoys in that limited space.

Imagine a group of people loudly discussing about the evolution of the universe while you are reading economics or someone slurping (not in a manner less fashion but merely distracted by the book in hand) their coffee which rudely steals you away from your walk with Robert Frost. A whisper into the phone can distract, the swirling whiffs of freshly ground coffee beans can distract. You are effectively ripped away from your book.

I love reading a book with loud music but I wouldn’t want to disturb or encroach into another person’s space, way of reading the same way I wouldn’t want someone to poke into mine. In my opinion, the lessening readership in libraries are partly due to e-books, and also the dying culture, of loading books every week from a library or sitting in silence where each mind is processing knowledge, which my parents taught me to and which I have always loved. More than buying them or reading them from a screen! But I do hate to admit I haven’t been a regular visitor to one. May be from now onwards I will.

The years have given a hourglass figure

I just saw and realised that my blog has an hour glass figure!

Ok well... at least one section of it :) Please See: Pages of His (her) tory

I think thats pretty cool :)

Walk away!

Walk away!

Her determined steps meant nothing to her intellect at the moment. She was walking not into the sunset and definitely there had'nt been any sunrise in her opinion, for long. For longingness was taking her to place she did not want to go, want to be, want to see. Yet she surged forward. Her calculated steps swayed her from side to side, an inflammation sprouting from her unsure, indecisive mind.

She was not dying though every waking minute her life flashed in front of her. She had not accomplished anything.A meager peasant girl in a land not worth conquering. No one came, no one saw, no one left. No one was ever hers and she never was someone elses.

She walked further, her feet sinking into the abyssmal wet earth. If she concentrated enough she thought she could hear the grass grow. Slowly. Painfully slow. Just as her inches neared her track. The speeding train on its tracks slapped her hair across her tough face. Hated it, she hated anything in her face. Hair. Grime. People.

Not another step. She was not going to take another step leading her to doom. Apocalypse is not hers. Not yet. She will go on. For however long it takes. For now! Now is forever!