C'est La Vie....

Expectation was rife. Exaltation expected. Ebullience anticipated. The night was contained in the magnanimity of space.

As I browse through some pictures on the Internet, thoughts whirr in and out of my mind. The mountains in the pics, the brown-earthed valley dotted with green; coupled with the lazy afternoon sun peeping in, yet playing peek-a-boo with my chocolate coloured curtains, do more than just calm my not-so-calm mind. The kaleidoscope of rich tones only sets alight a blaze of yet more thoughts.

Dreams are not ones to recede quietly into the background; they emerge and re-emerge every time the mand goes off on a short adventure. They are like those little peaks that exist but you never knew they existed till you climbed one and saw eternity almost vanishing into itself.

Sometimes I wish I were not sitting here saddled by technology and I wish it was just the guzzling waters of a river tucked far away in some fruit orchard that trickled life into me, like the dream that whir past on lazy afternoons. Sometimes I wish it was just the cacophony of grasshoppers and frogs singing soulfully to the first rains on a heavy night. And as they soak in it, that would be music to my ears. Sometimes I wish it was the tinkle in the laughter of the children that signified the time of the day as I sat in a corner brewing coffee and listening to the womenfolk share their tales. Sometimes, I wish I could walk through my dreamscapes and hold the slow flowing bubbles of reality in my hand as they bobbed up and down, collided with each other, and tottered around like a bunch of fairies on their first outing.

Sometimes I wish I owned a palatial, ancestral home tucked far inside the greens of the Kerala countryside. I would sit on a wicker chair in the verandah, overlooking the trees and the river flowing through the orchard, sipping hot tea. Mornings would be just a haze of sights, smells, and sounds....the freshly-watered rusty earth, the jasmine being strung together by toothy old women sitting in the courtyard laughing and sharing stories about the antics of their grandchildren, the steaming idlis permeating the air with a warmth that can be both felt and tasted. And as the afternoon sun would peep into the warm, mahogany-laden dining room I would traverse miles and miles, all the while lying cosily under pristine, white sheets, letting the coconut trees sweep coolness into my room, and finally awaking with a song on my lips. As the day would draw to a close, I would find comfort in the honey dripping off the branches of the immodestly green mango trees laden with plump yellow fruits. I would count the bursting jackfruits, sucking mindlessly on tamarind strewn around carelessly by the wind. And when the inky blue skies would descend, I would return to a night of sloth and Jim Reevs singing in sync with the croaking frogs and the barking wild dogs.

Sometimes I wish it was a tiny, cozy cottage tucked far away in an obscure hill-station that I could call home. I would own a little shop next door selling knick-knacks, home-made chocolate, and bread. The red door of the shop with its bronze bell and chimes sould sing a mellow song every time someone would walk in through it. Children would be running through this door to buy candy and big yellow lollipops that I had made and kept in big, glass jars on a high shelf behind the counter. Women would walk in, eyeing this city-girl humming Norah Jones. I would welcome them with a warm cup of coffee every time they walked in bringing with them a cold gust of wind to this little shop warmed by a baked brick firepace. I would listen to their woes and the occasional snippets they would allow me with soem trepidation while serving them freshly soft bread everyday. Their husbands would eye me with suspicion yet wonder what a girl like me was doing in a town like this. My golden comma of a cat would purr with sloth every time I would cuddle it in my arms. And after the children would have had their day's share of peppermint flavored candy and the women would have bought the spices lying in sacks at a corner in the shop, I would pull down the blinds and make my way to the sweet, incense-filled cottage of mine for a night of knitting and some reading. And when the local doctor would come knocking at the door to ask me out for a cup of coffee, I would bat my eyelids and say, "I brew my own."

And when reality tiptoes to the doors of my mind and knocks surreptitiously, I pull the door wide open, embrace it with warmth and quote Pico Iyer - "The best trips, like the best love affairs, never really end."

We live in such a mechanical world nowadays that sometimes it becomes necessary to just stop, take a break, and appreciate the smaller things in life....

Today morning (meaning the morning of the day when I wrote this post in my cell drafts), I was all ready for another gruelling day at office, waiting for my cab (which had been delayed due to the city's pitiable traffic situation) and I happened to come across various genres of movies playing on different channels...and I was amazed to realize the human mind's capacity to feels so many emotions that soemtimes even words cannot convey the EXACT feeling that we may be experiencing....

Think of it...you can be MADDENINGLY happy....like when you crack the college of your dreams! Or get your dream job...or you can be just plain normal happy that you have had a good day at school/college/work

You can be devastated if God forbid, a close one is no more...sad that you didn't get that promotion you had been hoping for

Furious that a trusted one lied to you....angry over a stupid fight with a friend

Irritated with the guy behind you in the traffic jam who's constantly honking...pissed when someone is overtly obstinate

Scared to death when your dad catches you doing something you shouldn't be doing

Proud when you see your work being appreciated

Disgusted when someone spits on the road

Curious when you know a friend has some juicy gossip for you

Excited when you are taking your first trip with friends

Lonesome when you are missing someone badly

Compassionate when you see someone dealing with the hardships of life bravely

Thankful when you realise that you are lucky to have the life that you do

Jealous when someone beats you at what you thought you were the best

Nervous before giving your first interview

Relaxed after it goes surprisinglt well

Embarrassed after you have just managed to drop a mannequin in a huge departmental store

Ashamed when you realise you have hurt someone

Regret when you realise what you did was not only stupid but wrong

Tired with dealing with life and its unending problems

Amazed at how a two year old can be addicted to smoking

Surprised on how much you can write on a nonsense topic :D :D

I saw Aisha. Finally. And it made me think. Yeah, a movie as inane as Aisha made me think. Now if you are over it, let's discuss the subject matter of my thoughts.

So this movie, like all stooopid chick-lit movies basically tries to tells you how incomplete, how lonesome, and how sad a woman is without the presence of a guy in her life.

True, with single hood come many insecurities, fears, and a fair amount of longingness on seeing happy couples around you...but that's all there is to it really.

With single hood, comes a lot of time for yourself, your interests, and your near and dear ones. I think it's the best times for girls who perennially find themselves in one relationship or the other to rediscover themselves.

Why is it that it is thought that a woman NEEDS a man in her life? Why can't a guy just be another character in the play that's her life? Someone, who if there, makes life a tad more fun but someone, if not there, will just be a happ/crappy (as applicable) memory.

Single women don't wake upe very morning wishing they had some guy to share their life with. Maybe women with no friends whatsoever do. But not the modern woman I know. Today's woman is capable of living her life alone. And mind youshe can not just live it but live it UP. Hell, we women don't even need you men to make babies now. Ha!

Here's to all the women I know. Single or not. Cheers! :)

P.S. Written on my cell on my way back from home, all the time stuck in heavy traffic. Feelings: to get out of the cab and get drenched in the rain dancing to the music playing on my cell. ALONE.

As I dream my way through
The white sands of happiness,
The shinig star of friendship,
The nectar of true love,
The filling of my inner vacuum,
The puzzle of myriad choices,
The sweet sense of security,
The discovery of goodness,
The joy of solitude,
The robustness of eccentricites,
The absurdities of manner,

I never want to wake up,
For reality is a myth,
And I'm living (loving?) my dream

It seems ages since I last wrote any poetry or fiction....not too great..but for some strange reason, I am inspired (as well as a little demotivated! strange I know) today, so thought of posting this....

Dusk - that time of the day when light surrenders to the darkness around. When it's neither day nor night, quite like the much-talked about "grey".

The time when a husband, after a day's hard work, drives back home with the hopes of seeing his wife soon and enveloping her in his embrace.

The time when a wife frees herself from the household chores to get ready for her husband and lays out the dinner for him in anticipation of a great evening.

This is the time when I travel in my cab, (on some few lucky days) reminiscing about the day's events. Some bitter moments, some sweet, and some insanely irritating.

This is the time when random songs playing on the stereo make you go through a gamut of emotions.

Some make you smile despite yourself...and the cab driver looks up i the rear-view mirror wondering what's wrong with you.

Some make you lean your head against the car window and stare outside at the thousands of twinkling headlights. You see the traffic around you, but what you are looking at are random scenes from your life playing in front of your eyes.

And those of us who are lucky enough to have found their someone special inadvertently imagine their rosy future with them.

This is the time when you observe people around you - a group of young girls in an auto, all dressed up for a party; office people stuffed in a cab, glad to be on their way back home; the guy in the swanky car at the red light eyeing the light-eyed beauty in the bus and what not.

This is the time when I sit in my cab and switch off my cell to write this inane post.

Audrey's dead.
Don't try to wake her up.
She's still crying
The songs of tomorrow,
Which when she was alive
She used to sing out aloud,
But now she sings in silence.
I want to live,
She cried in my ears,
The echo still fills my mind.
I want to love,
She pleaded through her eyes,
I can still see them burning.
But my heart's burning too.
She used to be my light,
I used to be her shadow.
We used to walk together,
In the valleys of pain and tears.
She could not take it any longer.
Me neither.
Audreys' dead.
I am dead.

As I'm writing this post on the very last day of 2009, trying to analyse whether this has been a good or bad year, all I can say is that it has been a tough year. Fulfulling in some ways and not so fulfilling in many more ways. Humans are not an easy species to be satisfied you see.

"The past three years have been a blur. For all I know the time spent at college was but a rapturous moment filled with euphoria that was too good to last..." With these closing words of the farewell speech by a final year student, the hall exploded into applause. There were smiles and there were tears, of joy I hope!

For I would definitely have shed tears at these oft-repeated words by every outgoing batch. Forget the emotional moment and you can actually laugh out loud at these cliches that have percolated through years of public disapproval of the moment of separation from the college.


Consider this: "Words cannot express the hollow feeling that is plaguing my heart right now." Can't they? Then how do you intend to deliver the rest of your speech? Through a mime, maybe!


"It seems that it was only yesterday that I was seated amongst the audience, listening to the inspiring Orientation Speech by the Director."


There! The genius has just demonstrated the hitherto unproved theories of Time-Contraction and Time-wrapping. Take that Einstein!


"Thank you, dear teachers, for having guided us throughout the our management education. It was under your able guidance that we hatchlings developed our wings and are now ready to take flight into a world of endless possibilities." Bravo! Nothing wrong with that except for the fact that you can actually notice the unbelieving smirk on the speaker's face for having pulled off saying something that incredulous.


Imagine a flock of chirping birds escaping from a cage, year after year, celebrating freedom after two years. Add to that the immense possibility of their spraying droppings on those left behind. The above platitudes don't seem quite so believable, do they?


Come to think of it, it is not only at farewell speeches that we come across such repetitions. Placement interviews, for one, are another cliche heaven.


Preparation for interviews heavily involves mugging up smart and impressive (and now decaying!) answers that have been doled out innumerable job - seekers for years. Needless to say, these answers have become the contents of a placement formula. Notice the subtle humour attached with renditions of these cliches in the interview room-

Question: So, tell me something about yourself.
Smart Answer: (after a formal introduction stating name and place of living) I am an ambitious, hard-working person. Quick grasping power accentuates my cognitive skills. I am a good team worker and believe in developing innovative solutions. Besides, I can assimilate myself comfortably into any work environment and can work amicably with fellow workers.


Spare a thought for the poor interviewer who has now interviewed the thousandth person exhibiting the same set of 'cognitive skills', 'team spirit' and 'hard-working' capabilities. This truly is an "Attack of the Clones".



Question: Why do want to join this particular company?
The same stinking answer (The plastic smile still intact): The company has an unparalleled market reputation. It provides ample growth opportunities to individuals. I, as a persevering professional, found the work ethics of the company quite alluring.
Money, to me, is but a reward for doing good work and nothing more. A decent salary obviously gives you a high.

Washing your hands off the "filthy lucre", eh? Wait till you see this intellectually motivated professional brag about the anticipated fat pay-packet in front of his drunken cronies. Well, at least he was honest about money giving you a 'high'!


Question: Who is your idol in life?
The answer to this much anticipated question: My mother/father.

Aha! Now the candidate can almost clearly hear his management coaching teacher hollering away, "Choose your father or mother. They can't screw you dimwits with questions pertaining to those two people at least!"

But can you blame these individuals for resorting to such a blatant show of this lack of creativity? Hell! Our day to day life involves cliches of the worst degree.

How many times have we heard friends sympathising with you, "Chuck it man! No point crying over spilt milk."

For God's sake, leave the poor milk alone. Wonder who that jobless man was who dedicated all his cunning to create this proverb about this mundane event of spilling milk!

Ever reached the class late? Panting and puffing (literally) when you reach the class at last, you are sure to be greeted with these famous words, "You are too early for the next class!" Apart from the murderous feeling that arises in your heart at that instant, you rue this lame attempt by the teacher to show off his smartness (at something at least!) If the gurus themselves cannot come up with a new catch line for something as simple as throwing an unpunctual brat out of the class, how can the students be expected to break with such cliched conversational routines?

All said and done, we can finally conclude that cliches are an inseparable but indistinguishable part of our lives. They claim their position in any dialogue with panache. To say that we need a language revolution would be too far-fetched an idea. But guys, is using a little bit of creativity that difficult?

Armed with her CV - the most potent weapon she possessed - she entered the room which promised her a world of opportunities. Looking into the eyes of the interviewer's eyes, she tackled all the questions brilliantly. And then it happened.

"So what did you gain from your summer internship?"

"A lot of weight."

Ooooooooooooooopssssssssss!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

MORAL: Think before you speak.

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Yeah I know this 55F kinda sucks, but I hadn't written anything for quite sometime. So when I finally did (in a bore to death seminar), I decided to put it up here. Sharmana mat, bindaas besti karna. :P :D
As for the title, well, actually this was a dream (nightmare) that I had. :D :D The Placement season in my college begins this monday, pray that I don't do any such goof-ups in any of my interviews. :)

( A dark, dingy room. The curtains are drawn. She sits on the desk in one corner, pen in hand. There is a certain repose in her motion, in her language. Paper strewn all over the floor. The bin in the other corner is overflowing. She begins to write.)

I took up the pen. I wanted to write something on this lank white sheet. No questions, no answers, and no topics to chain me. Just free thought and pure imagination, no reason, just illusion, no falsifying materialism.

I searched my thoughts to find an instance but all I could find were vicious circles.

I rummaged through my emotions; I could only find chaos and disorder.
I asked my words to grant me speech but even they seemed mute.
I questioned the leaves outside my window, glistening with the radiance of the summer sun. They could tell me but eluded.
I asked my eyes to give me a story. In reply they wept a tear in my cheek, a tear of fading colors.
I asked the ink, but it was too dark,
I asked the air, but it was too fast.
I asked water to give me thirst,
But it had to satisfy a desert first.
So I went to the woods to get myself a break,
Ashes were all that I could take.
I hunted for the earth to dig up something new,
But in it lay at rest some beloved one I knew.
I asked the thorns to give me some pain,
I asked light to show me a lane.
I sought for fire for me to myself burn,
I spoke to the road in search of an elusive turn.
I went to God to ask for a line,
He refused, He said that he has no time.

Here I stood, that was me, without word, without utterance, with no address, no enunciation and no expression.

But hark! Who is this looking at me? “Leave me alone”, I said. He was not listening. How stubborn! I changed my view. But he did not move. He wanted to say something. I moved near, deep into his dry eyes. I saw fables floating around in vast darkness. I am telling you the truth as I saw it. Perhaps a spell was cast on me. As if I was a visitor to some cosmic dance. And moments, still moments floated around me. It was ephemeral, yet never-ending. I was standing at the vertex of space and there were pulses of time moving all around me. I outstretched my finger to catch one, that intangible form. I received a shock and a flash blinded my eyes.

I began to witness life as if being played out on a sheet of clear water with nothing beyond it – abstract, imperceptible, incorporeal yet scintillating!

At first I saw a girl, big eyes, not more than 8 years old. She was returning from school. She saw an ice-cream vendor and her friends relishing a candy. She looked at the ice-cream and kept looking. She had no money to ask for one. All that she could do was to savour it from a distance. She kept on looking while life passed around her.

I drifted to another moment….

I saw a body covered with a white cloth and lifeless air blowing over it. I saw a woman sitting next to him with tears in her eyes….still as a stone, with lifeless breath…but no words.

I could not understand what was going on. The sequel continued as I grazed for another feeling.

I saw a deserted platform with nobody around except a few workers. A train comes, waits and whistles. But just then I saw an old man sitting on a bench. I could read the wait in his eyes. H e has spent years on the same platform, on the same bench, day after day, at the same time waiting for his son who has not returned from the war. The train whistles again, moves, and departs filling his eyes with the smoke of stillness. He kept on sitting there with no emotions, no words, no soul.

It continued….

I was in a hospital. I could see some tension, people buzzing all around. I saw a man with folded hands in want of something. But just then I saw a nurse accosting him with something wrapped in white cloth. He was a father now! I saw the cheer in his eyes, the spirit of rapture dancing on his lips which were again silent.

Another drama followed.

This was a scene of war. There was smoke all around, roaring guns subduing the sounds of cries. A soldier was entering the enemy camp secretly. He was brave and it was his first war. He crept in slowly, as carefully as possible. But just then he heard a tap, a rustle of leaves. He turned around, only to find his forehead at gunpoint. Death was standing in front of him, sharp and dumb.

The play proceeded into a dry field with a farmer looking at the burning sky with barren eyes, with dread crops, with no strength to articulate a prayer.

Many more cyclones followed through my frail body…moments that were captured in a glass-pane. I saw them…that was all that I could do.

That emptiness resumed form and I found myself in that same stretch of life and death. There was one last window that appeared, more brilliant than the others. That was the last one I had to touch in that vast span of still time. I could see light waiting eagerly to touch me. Everything paused….the whole universe, time, space an all else….still.

The next moment I found myself on my chair strangely looking towards my blank paper. I felt as if it was laughing at me. I knew it now. This was my present. I recalled everything, that expanse of emptiness and form, that cosmic dance, that eternal swirl, that moment of indulgence, that ephemeral time, those stories and that stillness.

There was one thing common to all these stories that reflected equally in all those magical fables, in all those odysseys.

It was the silence of a moment, the fulfillment of emptiness, the completeness of voids, the speech of mutes, the sound of silence.

None of them spoke for a moment – the girl, the woman, the old man, the father, the soldier, the farmer…none uttered a word. Deprived of words, unknown to speech. Everything was still.

And I, a silly writer kept asking for words from everything? How foolish of me! That blank sheet told me all. What emptiness is. What is it to say nothing. The paper told me the essence of being silent, of being white, not spotted, of being unmarked, of being nothing.

I now realize how vital it is to write nothing, just leaving things blank. Bare, empty, unsaid, unadorned, inscrutable, emotionless, impassive, unresponsive, vacuous and lifeless.
So today you are reading something derived from pure silence, dead. Something which has nothing, yet everything.

It is in emptiness that the world takes form, its stillness all over and in God’s voice, you can hear His silence. Try to be empty someday. And you will enjoy the joy, the ecstasy, the mirth, and the fulfillment.

Did you ever sit alone on the sea shore? You could always hear it shout, you could hear waves breaking on its vast body. But did you ever hear the silence beneath?
Did you see the silence of a bird taking flight?
Did you see the butterfly flitting from flower to flower?
Did you hear the silence of mountains?
Did you hear the silence of a forest dimly lit with glowworms?
Did you hear a glass before it breaks?
Did you hear the notes when the night sets in and the morning wakes?
Did you hear the sigh when the raindrop breaks?
Or when you drop sand from your fist?
Did you hear the silence when you look into the wet eyes of your mother who just scolded you?
Or the waiting lips, when your beloved just proposed to you?
Did you hear the silence of the last breath?
Did you ever hear them?
Did you?

I wish I could paint your life in every bright hue,
I wish I could wash away your agonies in the morning dew,
But I don't know what to promise, I don't know what to say...
Everyday I'll just want to tell you my love, that whatever..It's just your day.

I wish I could bring a smile to your face even after the saddest days of life,
I wish if ever you missed your soul in the darkness, I could be your guiding light.
But I don't know what to promise, I don't know what to say...
Everyday I'll just want to tell you my love, that whatever..There's always a way.

I wish I could remove the thorns from every rose you wanted to touch,
I wish I could fill your life with love, every bit, very much
But I don't know what to promise, I don't know what to say...
Everyday I'll just want to tell you my love, that whatever..I'll always ask for your happiness, my entire life forever pray

And...I just wish I could hold your hand and touch your happiness with my smile,
I just wish I could walk by your side, no matter how many a mile...
But I don't know why I didn't promise, why I couldn't say...
But I'll always wish for love to be yours, with
My whole heart,
My every day,
My every way,
Forever I'll pray...

Happiness. One word. Million interpretations.

Money. Love. Shelter. Good grades. Security. Freedom. Friendship. A square meal perhaps ?
Whatever the case be, they are all branches belonging to the same tree - HAPPINESS.

Hey, wait a minute !!! I don't have a lotta money (I'm a student after all and God only knows how I survive on my pocket money!), don't have my own house, have much less freedom than I'd like, there's absolutely no sign of love in my life and don't even get me started on my grades !
Hell !!! I should be miserable !!

But surprisingly, I'm not! I'd like to believe that it's the small things in life which make me happy. Yeah yeah I can almost see that eyebrow go up.

Seriously folks, I feel really happy when the book I'm reading has a happy ending.

When I take out my winter blazer at the beginning of the season and find a five rupee coin in it, I'm over-joyed.

When a friend who hasn't been in touch for a long time, calls up out of the blue, my heart takes a joyous leap.

When I really like a shirt/skirt in the display window o a shop but find that it's outta my budget and save all week to buy it & when I go back 'n' it's still there, I feel ecstatic.

When I'm really skeptical about doing something which eventually turns out to be in my favour, I feel on top of the world.

When I'm feeling down & out and all of a sudden my absolute favourite song plays on the radio station, I feel absolutely happy.

But then, I'm a simple girl with simple needs. :)

Do you know that according to the American Constitution, every citizen there has a constitutional RIGHT to be happy ? I'm sure that there are loadsa people there who have just about enough money, with little or no security &/or shelter and who haven't met their soul mates(yet!) but manage to be happy nevertheless.Perhaps, they like me, find happiness in the small things in life. :)