To dream...

Would I rather dream and fail at it or not dream at all? Would I stay hungry and foolish or be the street smart kid who doesn't take risks? Would I be cloaked in my clothes as I walk out each day or stay naked at the heart? Would I look at you and clamp the door shut or would I stand on the door waiting for you to come inside, knowing fully well you may just walk past and away? Would I hold alight the dying candle and risk the dark forever or snuff it out and save it for a later day and time? Would I walk out in the woods on a cold dark night in search of the light of answers or stay back inside wondering but staying put and safe? Would I choose living a little or just a little living? Would I give my heart and soul or keep them? I wonder...

Goodbyes again

My parents are shifting to Bangalore. For good. For the fact that I have been living away from home for more than 10 years... shifting houses still feels alien. The first 18 were spent in Raebareli... a small obscure town in the state of Uttar Pradesh, made famous by politicians and R P Singh. Then a lil time in Delhi, then Lucknow and then Pune and then Mumbai. Of all these places that matter are Raebareli and Mumbai. Raebareli got to see the child, the girl... Mumbai has seen the woman... and I have not missed the family much here because they were just a Volvo and 4 hours away.

I am not sure how its gonna pan out now... that I will be seeing them once in a few months etc... bringing the visits down to some depressing statistic of 3-4 a year. Traditionally, the laws of growing up demand that I should rather be missing them lesser and lesser but our relationships have undergone some really torrid times and things now are taken far less for granted. We value our time together... we talk and laugh. We have so much fun together, it'll give any fun party with friends serious competition.

The person that I am, I don't have an army of friends here and some new gig to go to every now and then. So I am a lil worried about weekends and time by myself. In Chapter 18 of the novel The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) it is written; "The only horrible thing in the world is ennui, Dorian. That is the one sin for which there is no forgiveness."... and I run the risk of committing this sin over and over again. I dislike the whole emotional experience of boredom. Its exhausting and risky.

Enrolling for weekend belle dancing classes was an attempt to give myself something to do over these scary spans of time. Sometimes I just wanna be like those people who have a gazzilion friends and really like to talk to people rather than put all my eggs in one basket with a fervent hope that it'll turn out just fine. Its really fervent this time.

Sis now being in NZ makes this whole feeling of being scattered and not together rather stark. Today I just wanna go back to that time so many years ago, when she was this small thing following me around everywhere and wanting to do everything like I did, eat only what I eat... and come to me for all confessions of childhood sins... seeking protection.

I might not miss Pune so much. The house there has many many memoeries, but last night Sis and I agreed that it'll never evoke feelings the one in Raebareli still might. She had got an opportunity to go back before she left for NZ. I knew exactly what she meant when she told me that she just stood there on the road staring at that one story house we'd seen built brick by brick... and cried and cried. I know I am going to have the same reaction if I ever go back. If. It'll take a long time before I can grow that kind of roots anywhere else.

Hmmm. Seems I am nostalgic. And looks like the mood is here to stay. I will be helping Mom n Dad shift... but they will be all packed up and ready to move by the time I get there. It hurts to know that many things like how the drawing room looked in the afternoon with sunlight streaming through the drapes... the chirping of the birds at sunset... Sis's room... the view from the window... the balcony and us standing there staring at the clouds is all only in the memory now. It'll all be naked and empty when I get there... without the paintings and splashes of color. I think I could do with a warm hug right now.

Amidst all the chatter...

I read posts and things people are writing and all I see is something or the other that they predict is going to go wrong with the world. Elections, greedy politicians (everyone is writing about this one, almost like we hate them now for winning)... the economy going to the dogs blah blah blah!

Please people just write about something nice. Write about something happy. There are too many people gunning for that impending doom. A lil effort on the side of sunshine would sure be of help. I don't feel like talking when all around me are so glum and gloomy (which some might say is a good thing now!)

Anyway, I shall therefore proceed ahead and tell you about something nice that happened today. A friend who recently got married sent across a compliment. You see, she being a chaste hindu brahmin was marrying a christian and as expected none of her family could bring themselves to attend the wedding (except her sister). We were invited and go we did... I broke my last record of money spent in a single day on clothes. Managed an ivory dress with a long flowing skirt made with some 6000 metres of cloth. Anyway, it seems I have managed a strong fan following at the party including the hubby dear of my friend. I danced some good old salsa with him and he really liked it! I have always wanted to date christian men and looks like we are finally getting there!

This also reminds me of the sermon that sweet old pastor gave during the mass... he was emphasising the importance of God and how his presence is there to keep us all together in the hard times. So he goes...
'You are like the wick and the candle and god the light... you two, my dears are like the seed and the plant with God being the fertile earth... like the two sides of lips of a zip, and God being the head of the zip in between....'
"How apt!" whispered my partner and I frankly have no recollection of what happened next coz we were shaking with laughter... and it took some stern glances from people around for my friend to curb the wild wild interpretation of how God would just love to be a zipper in between having a 'hard' time getting all the head he can! So gross and so God damned memorable!

This week has otherwise been good. Among other good things that happened were that my boss was on leave for a good part of it, which might be a large contributor to the general bonhomie. My sister earned a B in a test and did not lose it. I have a phone bill of 7 K this month and all for an A- she got on a paper last time. I have read 10+ cheap romantic novels this month. I have demonstrated positively obnoxious behavior with my room mate and her friends and gotten away with my way! I made some new and very nerdy friends. Finally realised that basically deep down I just hate banter! And discovered a fab gynaecologist in the city. Now what more can you ask for... hmmm?

So... Intelligence is normally distributed after all!!!

Well... The concept of normal curve says that for any phenomenon present in a large population, it is safe to assume that its distribution if plotted on a curve will take the shape of an inverted bell... also called the Normal curve or the Guassian distribution with love. It means that most people will lie close to the mean or average, and a few being exceptionally above or below it. Makes intuitive sense rt?

Now, intelligence too therefore can be assumed to be normally distributed. So what's the point?

You see, for the last hour and a half my dearest roomie has been going on and on about her martial arts camp at Goa the past week. The high point of the whole affair seems to be a rendezvous with a snake 'on the beach'... She gets into details of course (with no prodding needed). This snake on the beach happens to be less than a couple of feet long, Yellow in colour and a 'Cobra'!! She then went on to say how everyone was holding it and playing with the cobra on the beach when one of the black belt instructors took pity on it, picked it up by the tail and took it back home into the sea water!!!

Now, you need to go to any five year old, give them this story and ask them what they think of you?

As for me, I am pretty disappointed with the cobra and his absolutely blasphemous un-clanly behavior! So I am going to put him in the 'exceptionally below' the average in my books.

As for my roommate... well! I sure do live with some truly exceptional people! There is no way in hell I can find a category for her now can I?

My personality type

After taking those gazillion inane 'who, what, why and just about when' tests on facebook (pl don't think less of me for this!), I finally remembered some of my own HR gyaan and logged on to a site that gives one a taste of MBTI or the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator test. The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) assessment is a psychometric questionnaire designed to measure psychological preferences in how people perceive the world and make decisions. To know more about the theoretical aspects pl visit wikipedia. Anyway, to translate it all into simple English, Jung basically said that people can be rational (thinking and feeling) or irrational (sensing and intuition). To add to this, he said that these types can be expressed either in an extroverted or introverted fashion. Add to this you could either be Judging or Perceiving and you have the 4 pairs or by simple permutation and combination, 16 personality types. So essentially I lost you here rt? Fine! Lets make it simpler

4 pairs:
Extraversion - Introversion (how does one gather energy: within or without)
Sensing - iNtuition (How does one gather information?)
Thinking - Feeling (How does one process this information?)
Judging - Perceiving (What is your decision making style?)

and you will have more of each pair on all the 4 dimensions. So you will either be:

- an extrovert (deriving energy from doing things and meeting people) or introvert (deriving energy from thinking),
- sensing (Being able to see and articulate the reality, gather information from the 5 senses, data driven) or intuitive (driven by an inner logic, insights of the subconscious that can be excruciatingly difficult to explain to the sensing type)
- thinking (take decisions from a detached standpoint, look for rationality) or feeling (decide by empathising with the situation and people involved, looking at things 'from the inside')
- Judging (people who prefer to have matters settled) or Perceiving (those who would like to keep decisions open)

So guess what am I? Guess guess...
Well... I am an I(Introvert), N(Intuitive), F(Feeling) and J(Judging) person. To understand me better (talk about narcissism) I am attaching a few interesting descriptions I found on some other sites... This one calls my type a Counselor Idealist:

Counselors have an exceptionally strong desire to contribute to the welfare of others, and find great personal fulfillment interacting with people, nurturing their personal development, guiding them to realize their human potential. Although they are happy working at jobs (such as writing) that require solitude and close attention, Counselors do quite well with individuals or groups of people, provided that the personal interactions are not superficial, and that they find some quiet, private time every now and then to recharge their batteries. Counselors are both kind and positive in their handling of others; they are great listeners and seem naturally interested in helping people with their personal problems. They are the constant 'givers'. Not usually visible leaders, Counselors prefer to work intensely with those close to them, especially on a one-to-one basis, quietly exerting their influence behind the scenes.
Counselors are scarce, little more than one percent of the population, and can be hard to get to know, since they tend not to share their innermost thoughts or their powerful emotional reactions except with their loved ones. They are highly private people, with an unusually rich, complicated inner life. Friends or colleagues who have known them for years may find sides emerging which come as a surprise. Not that Counselors are flighty or scattered; they value their integrity a great deal, but they have mysterious, intricately woven personalities which sometimes puzzle even them.
Counselors tend to work effectively in organizations. They value staff harmony and make every effort to help an organization run smoothly and pleasantly. They understand and use human systems creatively, and are good at consulting and cooperating with others. As employees or employers, Counselors are concerned with people's feelings and are able to act as a barometer of the feelings within the organization.
Blessed with vivid imaginations, Counselors are often seen as the most poetical of all the types, and in fact they use a lot of poetic imagery in their everyday language. Their great talent for language-both written and spoken-is usually directed toward communicating with people in a personalized way. Counselors are highly intuitive and can recognize another's emotions or intentions - good or evil - even before that person is aware of them. Counselors themselves can seldom tell how they came to read others' feelings so keenly. This extreme sensitivity to others could very well be the basis of the Counselor's remarkable ability to experience a whole array of psychic phenomena.

So why am I doing all this? Just because I feel less of a freak now. I know that my type is rare ... just 1% of the human population. I know that I am an introvert so I don't have to get confounded by the 'feeling' aspect of my personality, which makes me wanna talk to people. I understand why I feel panicky when I get invited to parties!! I'll feel okay now when I am unable to explain the logic of my decisions to people... they just harass me and make me look like a fool and then in the end when I am proven right... beyond all 'logic' I'd like to add... I just cannot make them look bad by saying... I told you so! Also that though I am a decisive person I just dither most because I have some human considerations at heart!! So there.... I got me figured. Some atleast.

Scotch Bright!!!

I have a secret to confess. I love washing utensils. Infact the dirtier the lot the better. I love washing bathrooms too. And I love toothbrushes not just because I use them inside my mouth! So if you have been paying attention at all... I love to clean with toothbrushes.
Well... I told someone I befriended last year that the year before that I got bit by the cleaning bug so hard, I scrubbed away at everything with a toothbrush till I got a back problem. He laughed much at me. My sister has a picture of me... down on my knees scrubbing the back of the pipe under my wash basin with my ass looking all perked up for a smack! She is holding on to it for revenge if I release any of hers to someone of any importance anywhere ever. The only thing she wanted to know was... "Di... I get the cleaning and all but who will ever look "there?" Who even cares?". So I guess I am a certfied freak now.
Last weekend I took all of the utensils in the kichen and gave them a taste for some real FR brand soul-of-the-silver shine! After 2 hours, an environment-unfriendly amount of soap and detergent and 2 toothbrushes later... I was a happy soul. And every now and then when I catch a gleam from the kitchen rack, I sure return it with a toothy one of mine.
So if any of you ever get invited to my place for dinner, rest assured its never the bacteria that will kill you.

Reading for the week

I love classics. And Jane Austen rocks! I have just finished reading Persuasion and its been a fab read. The characters are brilliant and the simplicity with which Austen finely sketches the follies of human character, her astuteness and subtlety in bringing forth the silliness of our very many egomaniacal concerns, the narcissism that people with wealth and education offer suffer with, is just exceptionally endearing.

I have been impatient while reading a book and its happened after a long time... I was unable to take my mind off the plot... I was just as interested in what all other characters were doing as were the main leads. The fact that I'd know people very much like those characters in my life today is a trifle astonishing and I exclaimed several times 'What's new!' through the pages of a book written almost 200 years ago!

The same prejudices of race, birth, money are all just as alive today as they were then. It is just as often that the real merit of character slips from our fingers in an attempt to hold on to all that glitters!

If you do read the book, please pay special attention to the character of Mary. She is Anne's younger sister and it is through her that Austen has been able to so succulently bring about that nuantic perceptiveness of human foibles she is most famous for.

I am proud to say that with this one, I now own a collection of and have read all of Austen's work. The next focus point is 'Jane Eyre' by Charlotte Brontë, which I have been meaning to read after the seductive BBC book adaptation series that ran it on Zee Studio a few months ago. I truly liked the whole series so much I wished they'd never stop.

To change the flavour in between, I am also managing to be thoroughly engrossed by the management book called 'Hard Facts, Dangerous half-truths and Total nonsense: profiting by evidence-based management' by Pfeffer and Sutton. Pfeffer is God is all that I'll say, when it comes to management wisdom. I know of people who have his videos on their facebook profiles! Now you see!

This is one management book that has managed to make me laugh while I was reading it and think deeply (I'll acknowledge that this is a challenge for me most times... ) too. A very good read for anyone who wants to gain brownie points by talking sense in the next department meeting, specially if they involve discussions on hiring consultants or process improvement initiatives! Most other books in this field have not managed to hold my attention beyond 3.5 chapters... that'd explain the grades in B-School too now, that I think of it.

Anyway, I'll try and get some work done too this week to deserve the salary they are paying me. I hope you all have a good week ahead too!

Grazzie Mille

I have a stupid lil something called a counter at the bottom of my blog and it touched 1000 today. So as the title says in italian... a thousand thanks... to all who have come and shared this journey with me.

I am reading this book called 'eat pray love' by Elizabeth Gilbert. This is the book that inspired that small paragraph in a post a couple of posts ago. The story is about a woman who goes through a messy divorce, relationship shit etc etc to embark on a journey for a year. She decides she will go to Italy for four months and learn Italian. Then she will go to India and spend 4 months in an Ashram of her spiritual guru. The last 4 months of her journey will be spent in Bali, with a 9th generation medicine man... who'd once read her palm and told her she will come back to Bali. This explains the sequence of the words in the title of book as well...

So I am in Italy rt now now... and learning Italian with her. Till now my fav word as well as hers is Attraverisiamo... meaning Lets cross over. Its very symbolic for where I am rt now... this year, so few months old tho, has already brought in changes I never thought I'll see.

Other favourites are:
Perfetto: Perfect
Caro mio: My dear
Vaffunculo: Go fuck yourself!!! I have been saying this under my breath so many times in the day... its just the most delicious way of saying go fuck yourself!
Figolo Di Mignotta: Sun of a bitch
Stronzo: Shithead
Cafone: Asshole!

Some other interesting phareses are che bordello and che casino... which essentially means 'what a friggin' mess!!'. Hmmm... that rings a bell too now doesn't it? :)

I think its pretty okay that to celebrate my blog hitting the mille mark, I have tought you some cuss words in italian... A man once told me that was the best way to start learning a language. Shall keep you updated if I find any more jewels in the pages ahead, caro mios.

The showdown

Somewhere late last night I finally had the showdown that had been coming for some time... with my mind:

Me: I need to know why is it that you dredge out the worst of the memories for me at the most opportune moments? It really bothers me.
The M: Well... that's just me. I am a sick bastard.
Me: Well... I'd like to tell you that its not helping. At all.
The M: I do what I do.
Me: I'd like you to stop.
The M: I get bored. What do I do then?
Me: Stay quiet, for a change.
The M: That's boring.
Me: And 'boring' would be an insult to your existence rt?
The M: Yes
Me: Well I am bored too. Of your antics. Of the same repeated shows of failure, desolation and fear etc etc etc... that you keep playing for me. I am fine. I am doing fine. Absolutely. I don't know why you are always trying to convince me that my world is all wrong and that everything will seem like a teen slasher flick, bloodier and ghorier by the miniute! I don't understand why I have to believe that everyone hates me or will eventually end up hating me, someday.
The M: I give it to you because you want it.
Me: So I am telling you I am done!
... I don't remember much of what was said on both sides later, I was drifting in and out of sleep and shutting out very many distraction too... the Mr Mind here does a good job of deviating from the topic, when put in a tight spot. But I do remember sensing exhaustion on the other side. Not surprising, given that my head is a super duper production house of all kinds of drama items.

For whatever it was worth I slept well and am feeling much better today. I have smiled much and cracked a few good jokes since morning. Its the middle of the week and I'd like to keep this going. Mr Mind and I have just now planned a celebration too, if we reach the end of the week without a serious incident. Hope you have a good day and week too.

Rehabilitation

Okay... It is really tough right now. I am taking one hour at a time. Planning things to do every hour, so I do not have to think about 'those we shall not speak of'.
Its gut wrenching. I feel real physical pain where the heart is. It hurts like mad. I emotionally double up with pain.
The good news is I am doing it. I have managed it for the 6 + hours that I have been awake since morning. Its some time points in the day that I am particularly scared of. 9:30 AM, 2:00 PM and 6:30 PM. I am terrified of 6:30 PM. Its that point of the day, when I know that I am going to be on my own for the evening and lonliness is at its best dressed for the party ahead. Oh man! the games the mind can play... the excuses it can come up with to make just one call. It can come up with the most creative reasons for that one phone call. If nothing works... then the emotional red card of... "I just want to hear his voice... just one time"... Its like telling yourself that you will have just one more injection of the most potent mood uplifting drug you have ever had in life... just one and thats it.
The truth is it doen not work. You can't ever stop at just one.
So I have till this time, stayed with my mind. The poor thing needs help. I have been telling it that its the thoughts that control our emotions and emotions control us... like this deep need I can feel within rt now.
I have been telling it that love never means having to hold on to. It does not say anywhere that because I chose to love you, you have to love me back. It does not say that you have to do X, Y and Z in order to make me happy, because you love me rt? I can't hold a gun to anyone's head to ensure my happiness.
Someone wise has said: 'Do not fall apart again and again. It becomes a habit. Practice being put together instead.'

Okay. One step at a time. Just one step.

I think my colour is purple rt now

I have broken up. And its really hard. This is not going to be a post which makes one go awww. I hope it will make you see the way I do though.
I am not bitter, angry or bitter... to drive the point home. I have invested several years in this thing. And in the end I have decided that I will not be a victim of my own love.
The truth is that there is unbearable pain sometimes. There is amazing frustration of not having someone around who completely gets you. I feel like I stand here at the end of 27 years... not having anyone with a complete understanding of an unabridged version of FR. I feel lonely. Yes I do.
But everytime there is a voice within that tells me... hey guess what I know. I know everything and I will love you reckless till the end of times. It makes me grateful for the fact that there are two people, slowly growing old and mellow at home who wait for me. I want them to know they will always have me.
I think it was for this love that I will actually walk this path alone and be ok with it. There is a difference in being alone and being lonely. I choose to be alone.
The need within to show my pain and see that understanding in someone's eyes is very strong. I don't need pity. I just would like to tell me story and know that another soul can make sense of the language I speak in. Till then, I'd be happy to go look in the mirror every time I feel this. I read this in a book lately, that has come to mean a lot to me:

.... somewhere from within me rises a now familiar voice, offering me all the certainities I always wished another person would offer me when I was troubled:
" I'm here. I love you. I don't care if you need to stay up crying all night long. I will stay with you. If you need the medication again, go ahead and take it - I will love you through that, as well. If you don't need medication I will love you, too. There is nothing you can ever do to lose my love. I will protect you until you die, and after your death I will still protect you. I am stronger than depression and I am braver than lonliness and nothing will ever exhaust me.

So its begun. Wish me luck. I am hoping to do well. Through the black nights and stubborn cynicism, the cold I feel within and sometimes this whole feeling that I can't feel a thing. I would like to stop scribbling I'm cynical in my notebook. I'd like to be able to trust again. I'd like this voice in my head to stop predicting exactly how everything's gonna go wrong. I'd like to start feeling again. I'd like to feel enthusiasm. I'd like to go back to being the person who brought energy in the room she entered. I'd like to smile often. So here it is... the list of things I'd like rather than the ones I hate rt now.

Did I say wish me luck?

Blue has many shades

Life's been busy. The room in my head, where I live has seen some changes. Some additions... some deletions. A lot's happened, if you wanna know that is :). I got a new job. I am happy about the fact that I am not in the old one anymore... Being happy about the new one is an awaited possibility. Lets hope for the best.
I have been struggling against writing. Every day for the past some weeks I have lived sentences which I have not come put down here because I have not been sure. I started this blog with a purpose and that goal dissolved in time somewhere. And suddenly I was not sure of what I should write about. The fog's lifted and the answer is simple. I am just as confused but that does not mean that I don't write. So we move on... the blog lives.
The recent happenings have made life seem like its all whizzed past besides me. Sister's left for NZ for studies... Ma and Pa have learnt to video chat on skype. Ma has turned out to be the undiscovered internet genius in our family. Dad's not far behind. We all were running for the 'who cries the most"after" sis leaves' trophy and not surprisingly Dad won. Fathers do have a soft corner for their daughters, specially younger ones with a great sense of humour.
My bit of the story in all this is that I love her. I am crazy about this woman God gave me as my younger sister and hence put in special effort to fish out all her snaps from childhood out today. Mom and I have picked out some brilliant ones from there (funny hair, gawky posture, bushy eye brows, retarded smile) and I shall be posting them on a social networking site soon.
The new job's fine rt now... I am two inches apart still from hitting crazy. I was wondering why is it that I got this fantastic share of drama in my life... in the last organisation people were dying because the lazy humongous ass of my boss wouldn't work. And this guy I am with now wants a Nobel prize for initiatives in HR, if they ever have any for this notorious function. So work I shall have to.
Another slightly irritating aspect is the passion flowing in people for the company. I have really seen people with eyes brimming etc when they talk about the company. So no surprise I am extremely uncomfortable. I even checked the watercooler to see if some drug was being passed on to them here... Its a pharma company this time around.
The last organisation had no culture. This one's got too much and you've to join the madness or you are out! I am doing fine generally ... its just that everytime someone says 'our values here are such that....' I just wanna reach out over the table and slap them and say fuck you! Lets hope we can get by without an incident like that for some time.
Hope all is well elsewhere on blogosphere.

ps: ever wonder why all the words like fuck, suck, schmuck, muck, yuck, chuck, duck (in cricket .. and like in a sitting duck) etc rhyme with luck..? eh? :)

Across the centuries

I have been in conversation with Mr Nathaniel Hawthorne for some time now over 'The Scarlet Letter'. The writer has just introduced the setting of the story with a cheerful sketching of characters including his own around him for the benefit of the reader. It is quite lively indeed for I already feel that I know some of them or rather some people very like those characters at the Custom House in the old port city of Salem in America. This city is also nicknamed 'The Witch City' after the famous trials for witchcraft held in Salem and neighboring areas between February 1692 and May 1693. But I digress...

So as I said I have been in conversation with Mr Hawthorne and I am amazed with how 'on the same page' feeling I have with whatever he's had to say till now. The story is in its early stages with a lot still forming but here's a guy I am talking to beyond words and I like that. He's been expressing his frustration at not being able to weave a tale around a certain letter he's found in his new offices at the Custom House... something akin to a writer's block.


He says... 'it is anything but agreeable to be haunted by a suspicion that one's intellect is dwindling away, or exhaling, without your consciousness, like ether out of a phial: so that, at every glance, you find a smaller and less volatile residuum...' He then goes on to say something that was the clincher of the day for me. He expresses with lament as to how his offices at Custom House have given him a strong arm of the republic to lean on, but in bargain the strength of his own true character has left him and now he can at best be a good surveyor at the custom house and ceases to be a tolerable writer of poor tales and essays.


He points out astutely that many in his situation have had this enervating magic work on them and have lost this capability of self-support and held on to the struggle in a struggling world just about long enough for their own ruin. Once the spirit has been sucked out of them they are left to totter alone on life's difficult footpath in a vain hope that they may sometime be restored to its erstwhile glory.



What he has to say rings a bell and close too, for that is all I see happening in the world around me. One gets entrenched in the system, soon to find that all that was dear and close to you as a person once is lost somewhere in the struggle each day... and that you hold onto the struggle just about long enough to realize that the spirit has been vaporizing away and now there may be nothing left of it.


I have been living these feelings for the past some months now. I think it has been this valiantly desperate attempt of not losing my soul that made me quit the hellish job and glamor of being a consultant and to go on and be somebody in a smaller house rather than a 'personality' in so many others, none of which are mine.



I was not being able to get to Neverland for quite some time now and honestly it scared me a lil. So in an attempt to resuscitate the whole thing I have been watching 'Finding Neverland' with an almost religious fervor... this might sound crazy but I can watch that movie any number of times. I am in awe of James the playwright. A little in love with him too.



On another note I have laughed at Mr Hawthorne too because he feels so much burden and difficulty with a job that expects him to be at his offices for 3 and a half hours a day! I mean you've got to be kidding me dude! You are stressed with those hours? But I must not judge too soon... for all he may be saying, he's still managed to write this book and is a name to be counted in, in American Literature. His work is also known to have deep psychological complexity, which Wikipedia and I shall vouch for. And he is a good looking bloke as you can see in this picture here. He happens to be 36 years old in it. Cute isn't he?



So we shall continue to discuss the story and its characters, hopefully soon. Till then... a thought to leave you guys with. Have you ever wondered why a person who writes plays is called a playwright and not a playwrite? That's because the word wright is an archaic English term for a craftsman or builder (as in a wheelwright or cartwright). Hence the prefix and the suffix combine to indicate someone who crafts plays. The fact that its a homophone with write is purely coincidental!

I shall leave you to your reflections now and would take your leave!

And yes! A very happy new year!

Blood of Dreams

So I met her again today. She says she's got a new part in this TV thing. She was happy too and smiled much as she talked. Then slowly the conversation shifted to some other things... some subtle drops of her gaze as she went on gave me a feeling. I quite could not catch what it was. I don't think I caught on to anything at all for some passage of time. It was as if a feeling bubble had burst open somewhere within me... something that till then had been steadily growing but had been too transparent for me to see... what an irony! It only became apparent when it could not be contained any longer and burst open on to my conscious from the sub-conscious.
And then, I saw it. I saw it for a moment but it could not be mistaken... like the way lightning illuminates everything in a black dark night... and then you are blind again. But you know what you saw. I saw her soul.
It was empty. It was heavy. It had makeup on it. To hide the real thing... from the mirror every morning I guess. I asked her how she was... and she laughed at me saying silly you already asked me that. She looked at me laughing and stopped dead. She looked at me and said... 'What?'. I said... 'How are you... really?'. She knew. I knew. And for some seconds we went numb. Almost like her soul could just have been lying besides the napkin and coffee cups on the table. Just another thing to look at.
Then, survival took over. I could taste the restlessness and the misery around her. I could touch the mad rush of thoughts in her mind... telling her to take control. To stop it. Not go any further... how its never of any use to go down this path. We've all sold our souls and what we've got back in bargain is too important to let go of.
So I told her about my job change and the moment passed. I chose not to speak of the loneliness. Or she of how meaningless it all is at the end of all and everything. Beneath the spoken words were layers of sentiment of paralysis. Of this reckless inaction. Morbid darkness of our very human existence usurped by this pretence of civilisation. Clones of patterns of approval everywhere.
May be then... I should be happy about the fact that I find it so hard to fit in. That for days I cannot relate to nothing or nobody around me. Makes it all a little less violent for some time.

Get back on my feet... I do.

So its been a long hiatus from my dear blog spot. And I think he doesn't mind. I always did get a lot of space from this guy here. :)
So its been some thinking, some reading and some vegetating happening here all this awhile. So have discovered some new aspects to me... seen to it that I get to know the person I spend the most time with (me!) better. Seen to it that I like her and feel for her and ensure that her well being is priority with us.
So for all of this its been an interesting ride and I am glad for it. I feel this sense of peace within that is not so common to feel late on a Sunday evening. The battles and demons of the week to come quite often than not manage to poison this part of the week for me.
I see that the reason for it is hope. It is this idea within that the coming week is when I may just be putting in my papers and be ready to leave and move on. I am ready to move on, to take on something new and this time around I want to ensure nurturing for me in the process. I want to take a chance at finding inspiration and feeling my heart soar. Oh what a feeling that is!
I was speaking to Mom today and told her how I'd felt like this race car without head lights for some time now. I'd felt like I was going somewhere but not really sure if I was getting anywhere. I told her that good it happened so because now I know where I'd like to get to and the risks I am willing to take to get it.
I know that I cannot work or exist without inspiration. I need a higher ideal to move towards, to have meaning in whatever I do. Call me a control freak, but I need to know where its going and why. Call me an idealist, but I need people around me to inspire me with their own excellence. I am not ashamed of this dependence either now. I think in these past few months I have understood how deeply I cherish such people around me. I have come to fully recognise their power over me. You give me something striving towards excellence and you've got me hooked. You don't have spend an extra second motivating me... I'll fail that is for sure but I will rise up again and again and again... There is nothing else that makes me so happy.
A small digression. I was watching those CSI kinda stuff on AXN today and then the 'So you think you can dance' stuff. I was thinking why is it that I love to watch some of those movies again and again... why I like to watch these serials? I realised that no one in these stories is in a job they don't like. They are always at the top of their game and come up aces against odds always. Its the consistent excellence and the portrayed brilliance of what they do that I love. It is this touch of divinity that we all aspire for, isn't it? The search is to find that one thing within us that will take us closer to this goal. I realised that it is only true excellence that validates our existence to us. That in reality, another's opinion does not really ever matter. It is always our own. We may not be aware of it always though.
It is in this search that our true happiness lies and all that we need to and will care to learn. This is the path of the individual and no one else can walk it for any. The people who then really make a difference to us are the ones who lead us to this path. They are the ones who inspire and make us believe that its possible. They believe it for us before we can. True essence of love. The reason why we find it most in our heart to love in whom we see the greatest potential.
Here's to hoping that the year to come will bring with it ideas and hope, warmth and love and most of all inspiration to all of us. Make all of us get closer to our own divinity. Amen!

Deep dull red

I hate getting into the Bombay conversations these days and dear God as long as I am alive and same I refuse to call this place Mumbai! It sounds alien and so not home. I have been thinking about what home means to me for some time now. The blasts and everything that happened made me realise the emptiness of so much around me. To me home means safety, love, warmth and inspiration. And after all that has happened I don't feel any of these. I feel a dull pain within... like a constant inside. Does not change, does not go away either. Just stays. Its fear and anger and the sense of loss all frozen solid.
I think we can't really make our children wear bullet proof jackets when they go to schools. The idea that I may live in constant fear for my loved ones is to not live at all really. I want to go back to my childhood. It was somewhere a more innocent and safer world to live in then. I don't want to bring my children up in a world where I don't know where we are headed as a race. I see destabilised economies, people losing jobs and livelihoods, rabid people killing each other, greed and power the motivation and no real feeling... whatever there is is somehow just not strong enough rt now.
I feel upset to look at our contry and how vulnerable we are. The so lil confidence we as a nation have in our decision making... how we will never be regarded as tough coz we are always the soft nation to the world. My friends went on a tour of south east asia and came back determined they will not go anywhere looking for a job. They felt the backlash was too strong against Indians. I feel rightly so. We have chosen the leaders who run this country. And our nation's true character is reflected when the true colors of these people are exposed as soon as they get the invincibility of temp power. The lengths people go to to keep it is a chronicle of our debacle as a nation of epic proportions. And so much for the values we stand for.
We are like a diploma technician from a lower middle class income group, trying to make it too soon too big coz his diploma happened to be in Computers and its a skill in demand. We have risen too high by our own complacent standards... behaving almost like we never expected to achieve this greatness or to be known around at all. And too happy for it... all bursting at the seams trying not to show it.
My worry is if somewhere we have accepted that we were never meant to do a proper engineering in computer science and that we may becapable of more... the cutting edge work has been left for others. That somewhere we behave like 'koopmanduks' (frog in the well) and are too happy to see things have improved 2% over 200 years (exaggerated example). We sing the song of our own 'oh so unexpected' success so much that we have missed out on the real standards of excellence. We have reached a stage where just being able to think about change and improvement is good enough and justifies the greatness we feel. Like an autistic child learning to write. We talk too much as a country. We are so 'new money'.
We don't have any standards we follow. Our benchmarks are stupid and shallow. We don't do worldclass coz we don't believe we can. So cricket is the only sport that reall matters to us as a country. We have been world champions in chess for forever now but will never put this guy on a pedestral like Dhoni.
You see we are so typically Indian! We just can't appreciate any good we do... we always focus on what we din't do... the lack of confidence eating in to us making us a country of short cuts, corruption and bribes. This very lack of faith in our own ability as a nation, contributed to greatly by our leaders, utterly despicable standards of higher education, makes us want too much too soon coz happiness is so scarce in life here.
I was speaking to a friend today and realised that I have never before felt such a sense of hopelessness. I have always been a prennial optimist and thought that things will all turn out ok in the end. This feeling has been very important coz it defines me as a person and comes from a deep safe place within from where inspiration springs for me.
I have lost this place somewhere. I am feling truly cynical about this world and its people and the future of our race... Its a very strong feeling within and is a dark place to be coz I can't find hope. I have not felt something like this before.
And so I feel that the only thing I can control is my own life and happiness. I want to be as close to my family as possible. I love them and I want to focus on them so I can build as many happy memories as possible. I want to get inspired and inspire them to achieve more in life before it all ends. On a day like today, when I come back home and miss them terribly... with a nagging thought somewhere saying...who knows? this may be the last week I'll live... does not let me rest in peace.

There is blood on the streets tonight

I am sitting here infront of the TV. Taj is burning. Oberoi is burning. People are held hostage inside both these places. More than 60 people have died. 200 injured. Hospitals are making an appeal for blood. Attacks in 25 places. And its just going on... every minute a new blast... or some firing.
I am crying. I can't tell in words how this makes me feel... what this does to me. I feel like they are in my house, burning things I love and I feel so helpless. I have a stupid wish rt now. I want a Bruce Willis for my city. I want someone to come and kill all these people or just somehow lock them up somewhere. A friend's father has not come home and I am so numb inside I don't know what to do. Or say.
They are throwing grenades from Taj. They have attacked a hospital.
For the life of me will someone please tell me when did terrorism solve anything? Will someone tell me one example of it working? Will someone tell me how does one kill? Will someone tell me how does it make sense to kill someone who dint do you any harm.... never meant it.... someone who is just going home to kids. What do you need to be to take a hand grenade in hand and hurl it at women and children? Will someone please tell me how does one take a gun at hand and open fire?
I can;t sleep. I want to sleep and I can't. I want to scream really.... I want to fall on my knees and pray. I just want to do anything to make this stop because dear God I can't understand this. I feel so sad because they may have just killed the spirit I love in this city I call home and proudly so. I feel sad because its going to be a long time I am going to feel safe in my own home again. Long itme before I walk out of the door not dreading something bad. I have lost my freedom.... my ability to walk the roads of this place at night... trying to find me in its spirit. I want to go ask the Thackereys if the attackers asked who was a north indian or maharashtrian before killing them. It dint matter when they entered Leopold and opened fire.... How will I ever go there and not remember this? They killed people at Metro... I have memories there... I have outside Taj and looked at it with a smile... proud. I don't know if its still gonna be there tom. There is a car bomb explosion near vile parle flyover... There is firing at JW Marriott in Juhu... I used to live close by... Firing at Borivali. I can't take it any more.

The river's waiting for rains

Its been some time that I wrote and the break has made me realise how much I love writing... I missed being able to write so very often.

I battle fear of failure, yet another bout but this one's kinda solid that it refuses to melt away now for some good time. I have been trying hard to rise up in the conscious realm and ask myself where the fuck does this come from again and again. There are days when it seems to be the single driving force in life and then days when it paralyses me out of any action possible. It gets very exhausting to live life like a yo-yo... I feel like a pendulum wanting to just stay and swinging in one direction to other... being able to feel that peace of being centered for a small time before realising oh no... I am swinging again!

I just decided to write about it because I am not being able to talk about it to any person living. I am not being able to tell someone I am so afraid inside its wrecking havoc and I don't really know why I am scared. I'd want to be able to say it to someone who will listen to me and just be there... let me be afraid and be ok with it. And not send across that vibes of being impatient with the whole thing but just be there. I guess that person will have to be me.

'It ain't brave if you're not afraid'... so we'll see where it all ends. Ideas are forming and some vague answers pouring in from different levels inside me as I talk to you here... let me go mull over some and hopefully get a good night's sleep.

Dreams unlimited

So as I said its been a phase when there's been a lot of thinking happening. Its always happening with me but now there seems to be a renewed effort to take it in the brighter direction. And there is tremendous scope for improvement... but as someone said... you won't get to the big victory unless you celebrate the small ones on the way.

As I get to these elusive goals of life, I have had some small victories, some beautiful moments with me that I will like to celebrate with you here. Mid last week, the work stress was getting to me and I went for a stroll around the building. Nothing busts that uneasy feeling for me like a walk or sleep. I sat down on the ledge under one of the trees and for some time thoughts were like the shadows of the leaves above... shimmering, blurring in front ... no finite shape... undefined.

And then from somewhere an idea came... for some reason I was taken back to all the major instances of my career with this organisation for the last year.... I looked back at all the challenges and hurdles, client and colleague situations... and I realised I had found a solution to every single one of them. Later at times than what might be expected, but I had nevertheless. An even stronger realisation was how little help I had received from certain quarters it was expected from. And even though some problems still remain unsolved, I am onto a solution now. So I know I will get there. I don't know how right now but I will get there. I still get worried but I will get there.

I looked at things from purely my perspective, and I was happy. In this moment I chose to overlook what these people mirrors had been reflecting all this while. I chose to look within rather than outside in search for answers. I am happy I found them. In an instance a few other thoughts flashed past and I felt I was looking at the whole situation with a new perspective. I was placing a lot of importance on my own feedback and how I felt and what I wanted. I gave myself credit for all the hard work in the last year. I was not feeling guilty, for once... I hate introspections because mostly they are instigated by some feeling of guilt. I was happy that I was experiencing a 'happy introspection' for a change, right after a stressful moment.

I was full of hope, looked at the challenges in front, for which I know I will not get much support, but for once the thought did not make me nervous. It made me think... have managed it till now so will now on as well. For once I felt faith within, coming from my own feedback. Absolutely independent of what any one else thought. And it felt great!

The second victory came in a relationship with a colleague. I acted out of instinct, contrary to what every one else had been telling me. I had a conflict situation at hand and everyone I spoke to about it supported my cause and said how it was all so unfair. They were being good friends. I however did not take any advice I got. I took responsibility for making things better and went back and worked on the relationship. I listened before being listened to. I understood before being understood. I did on my own that no one had asked me to do. I sat dwn and took out time to list all the good things this person had and genuinely communicated my regard. We had to say something about everyone else at a team dinner and I took the opportunity. I listed down all of these and my colleague did not say a thing but her surprise was genuine. Its been getting better since. Not all mails are marked to boss. There is much less defensiveness.

And everyone else has been coming back saying I am doing a good job! I smile at them... the same people were giving me some totally diff advice some time back. But that's how things are... :)

Some failure is inevitable in life. This week I took out time to look at success. We indians are so conditioned to be failure focused we miss out on the lil joys of celebrating our success. So as I celebrate I an getting this feeling of coming full circle somehow!

To change the flavour, we are hunting for acco for sis in NZ. And my parents are absolutely ok with the idea of her sharing a flat with two guys! My jaw dropped and I was gaping at them like a retard... till my sister pinched me. Mon and Dad dint realise this ofcourse... they had already moved on to the next topic of conversation. I looked at my sis and she smiled back. Things have changed back here people... they really have! 6 years ago they would have disowned me and then shot me in the eye for having so much as thought about such a thing! Look at them now! In this part of the universe evolution is moving with the speed of light! And I am glad.

Live from Firangi Paani

Hi everyone...

I have been dancing like mad on the floor... just came back to take a breather and thought of this crazy idea of writing a blog entry from here!

I am getting a lot of crazy looks... like 'how could she open that damned damned thing within these holy walls'... but then! I will now be thinking about this and smiling to myself for some time to come so hell with everyone!

And this is going to be short post... but there's more to come soon.. I have been in one those phases.. you know those... the ones I keep slipping into every now and then... but then that's a story for another time!!

Till then... I'll go burn some on the floor!

Love!

Little dots on my map-o-life

We are losing H to marriage and hence decided to offer our condolences at Firangi Paani. I love that place by the way... Its such an 'oxygen'ating change after cramped I-can't-breathe-here-no-more shacks and Totos of the world. It also has the longest bar in Bombay. And there is so much space around tables you could actually play 'catch me or my balls if you can' around them.

So me decided to break the rules... to hell with the fact that it was an outing with office junta... and had mostly women in it... me decided to wear silk flow-on-and-hug-me upper, teamed with a denim mini... strappy bronze sandals and reckless spray painting of my fav Bvlgari perfume.

End result: H comes up to me and says.... "Hii... I am H****... have we met before?" I wink back and say... "Was that addressed to me or my legs?" He laughingly makes the eyes rolling I-can't-believe-you-just-said-what-you-did face and raises his hands in defeat... not that I mind.

And then what happens is very very nice. I had fun... after I decided to shun some people from my radar. I chose yesterday to spend my time with people who are simple. They might not be categorised as the most intelligent ones around... honestly very intelligent people psyche me in relationships. I chose to shamelessly dance in the aisles with this set of women and found the experience very satisfying. I chose to ask them questions about them and was so happy to receive simple answers not putting too much pressure on my processor. I was so happy I was welcome to spend my time with them without having an entry or exit barrier.

Also floating around is an idea of a ladies' day out ... the master mind of the plan wishes to hang out, drink...lech at men... even pick em up... generally perpetrate in every sense of the word and make it a memorable evening to say the least. Lets see if anyone has the guts to go through this one. Impress me please!

It was late by the time it all got over... and I was open heartedly offered a room in P's house, in case I was uncomfortable going back home. And the genuineness of it all was exhilarating considering we aren't the thickest of friends. Somehow I would rather be around this set of people than the ones who base their lives on the rational model... only that 'just rational' becomes very boring after a point.

I also saw a movie yesterday ... it was a lil syrupy... I wasn't over the moon with it but it had a strong message. The lady in the movie is dying and has 3 weeks to go. And the rest is about how she goes about reclaiming her life before she reaches the pearly gates. So she says the things she wants to, cusses, misbehaves, quits her job and blows every penny she has on living life king size. And manages to get everything an international socialite would call success... And the role's been played by Queen Latifa... She is black and about 100% overweight... wherein lies the true message of the movie I guess.

Today was spent in reading a book. Its momentous coz I have finally finished a book I started, in a long time. I read it for straight 8 hours till I was done with it. So its been a great weekend... full with the party scene and reading... TV and maggi... along with waking up only after afternoons. I am content and have not thought about work. Its so peaceful, I want to stay awake the whole night just to keep feeling like this.

Lights and shadows

I am clothes rich. And got cool laptop speakers. And this is not the high point of my Diwali at home this time.

It was a perfect day... in every way. I managed to get up in time (like 5 in the morn) for the bus at 6:30. Reached home much before 10 (approx 3 hours from Bombay to my home!). Had yum crispy bread pakoras for with mom's very own zing-your-brain-like-a-guitar-spicy green chutni! The skin on my fingers burns... my eyes water... I can't talk for sometime but I love that chutni man!

Anyway so... the plan for the day was that Mom and Dad were to compete. Now where do you think that might be happening hmmm? In the kitchen of course! Each was to cook a sweet dish and we the daughters were to be the judges. So Mom made gulaab jamuns and Dad made lauki khoye ki mewe waali barfi!!!! The amount of almonds on that thing is undescribable!

And while they exchanged notes and fought with each other and then laughed and then fought (you get the drift!!) they also managed to make some awesome chicken curry with desi ghi ki roti. And Dad's patent salad! And then we all sat down and watched Lagaan for 2 billionth time on TV. The movie is FUN!... made so much more so with Dad's wise cracks... sister's retorts... and Mom's uncanny ability to summarise the whole situation in a line or two which is so funny it kills me sometimes.

Sister was under some duress... she ambles to the kitchen and says... there is so much to do Maaaaaaa..... I am thirsty.... I need to peee... I want to eat that heavenly smelling chicken you are making and the damn movie is just passing me by!... what to do... what to do....

Dad had a solution but for the sake of the family's honor it shall not be revealed.

So Dad won. He cheated of course. Not that his dish was bad... frankly it was very tough to decide and he won coz he bribed us. Well. :) People at office were almost equally divided on which did they like better!

We had the Pooja in the evening. Nothing elaborate... very simple but with lots of lamps and flowers, just as I like it. Lighting those small clay lamps is my favorite part of this festival... Sis and I take it to perfection... with those lil lamps lining the walls in precise symmetry and distance. Then we run down the stairs and look at our house and go awwww.... that one's so cute... awwwww this one's so bright!

I came back the very next morning... but its a day that's warming my soul till today, and will for some days to come. I started laughing the moment I landed and dint stop the whole day... we just lazed on Mom's bed and discussed everything from Obama to our stock markets to office gossip (their's and mine). I slept well.... Mom managed to find time for our champi routine. Dad joked on the state of my equity holdings account... and then on a solemn note said that he is just waiting for the damn index to go down to 6K and then he too will invest again!

I am still somewhat jealous of the way my sis can just get up from her bed and go and snuggle with him under his blanket. The way they play with each other... their jokes, which sometimes no one around them gets. And the way he refills her box of eclairs every time without reminding him. The way he tells her that he is going to be so clueless when she leaves. I just wanna add that every one will be.

Prolly the reason I waited two days to write about that day is that I knew I will be sad. It was so perfect. It was so everything I ever wanted home to be... and its there now and she will leave.

I will miss her. Very much. And maybe I am blessed too to love someone so much that I'll miss them like life.

I turn 50

...posts old today. :)

In two and a half months.

Do I qualify as 'bloggative'? Do I? Hmmm...?

?

I read J K Rowling's commencement address at Harvard Alumni Association 2008. She talks about some beautiful themes therein. One of them is that there is an expiry date on blaming your parents for steering your life in the wrong direction. The moment you are old enough to take the wheel the responsibility lies with you.

I feel I have taken the steering wheel.. am sitting in the car of my life and am just wondering where to drive out to. Ironically most of us pine for this moment when they will take the wheel coz they are just frustrated with someone else driving them around. Now that I have been in that moment for quite some time... I just don't know where to go. In a way I am missing the awareness that the responsibility lies with someone else... It was easy to just sit at the back and blame them for everything that din't happen as per expectations...

The full import of the word responsibility is coming home. I am responsible for my own life. I bear the consequences of decisions I make. Its amazing the number of people I see going back home then... not physically but emotionally and intellectually. Take H or M at office... H keeps saying... Its enough now I just wanna go home. Every single one wants to be closer home... No one in this so called high flying consulting firm talks about leaving India. And people wanna flock towards the base location... be it Delhi or Lucknow.

So I feel lost as I sense these lives whizzing past me on the race track of life... And I wonder where are all these people going? This gives me that nasty feeling of sitting on some kind of a time bomb... this uneasy feeling that time's just flying by with each passing day and what do I have to show for it?

Ok... So I have a job that pays the rent, for books and movies and phone calls. And how this is where I had dreamed of reaching just some time ago... And today I feel these standards are so damn external. It seems there is some internal standard... a voice that keeps coming back to you like an echo... doing rounds within. Something which says... Hey! but is this what I wanted to begin with? I thought so... but after reaching here it feels so different! It feels empty now. So maybe I need to come full circle and revisit the whole thing. Its a difficult voice to listen to coz mostly it tells me how cowardly or pathetic I am. Its brutally honest. It tells me where I have not lived up to my highest right. Its also tells me my strengths and leaves the decision of doing something basis this information to me. Everyone has this voice within. Some just manage to drown it in the cacophony of the worlds they build around them. I am hoping this voice within will never drown out and guide me. This will take me to where I need to go.

I am hoping I have solved a bit of the puzzle. For now at least! Still no clue on long term visions and directions etc... but like Martin Luther King said... you don't have to be able to see the whole staircase to be able to take your steps.

Exposed at night

Last night! Yes I did... and before you go onto an overdrive of expectations from the post let me put it as last night was a night of revelations. We had an office party yesterday. Phoenix Mills it was...and four lanes of the bowling alley were booked. But before we get onto the real story I have a few revelations myself! I have never bowled or played pool before.... and can you please change that expression on your face right now? That does not make me a social retard! Rt?

Ok... I hope you still like me!

I had been hanging around (more on the edge of the party scene) when someone came up to me and said he dint think I could bowl. Astounded I ask him Wow! ESP? He says not really... its easy to guess when you see people in a bowling alley not bowling. So he proceeds to teach me and too much pressure I mess up. He gives up on me and goes and hangs himself on the bar. And I hate him in that moment. So the culture illiterate (that wd be me with both hands up) gets into the arena and bowls!! bowls with a vengeance... I gave all those amateurs and semi-amateurs a run for their money! I am good at it and that makes up for the pain in the upper right arm rt now. damn some of those balls were big! Err... I mean heavy! best was Mr. I-did-you-a-favour-tonight's team lost! along with their tempers. I wanted to hand one of them balls to him and say.... 'You need one?'

Then we get bored of big balls and get onto the pool table, nice shiny small balls!... you have people here who are playing the game like art! Like all those angles and making a ball jump over the enemy one without touching! Strokes so smooth and perfect. Precision....! Here you had people sharing life histories of playing on the pool table and how this particular kinda stroke is the only thing someone's picked up from their ex and how the endless nights at college were spent bent over it... sliding up and down.

And then it so happened I was assigned to a team on the table and we were to compete! I attribute this event to a state of drunkenness... both for people who proposed and me who accepted. I'd been semi lolling around the table and someone assumed I could be of use.
Reality dawns... never held that stick in life... never really touched a pool table... compete? Honestly... I was having slight difficulty looking... (Vodka maybe) at others... but also because I was so preempting the impending disaster! There is nothing worse than having a moron on to your team... specially when you are competing with the other line of business. Its not just a game then dude! You are playing for pride!! I cursed my self and my bouncy demeanor and flappy state of mind!

Well... the revelation happened again. Guess what!!! I played well people. I potted on an average 3 balls per game and wasn't so bad on the fouls either!! So got a pat on the back from Mr H ... our team leader! I mean... 3 balls in a row and we ended with the blacky cornered and potted! S.W.E.E.T!!! And I am so hooked to it I wanna play all the time now. Its screwing with my focus with work, that bad hooked!

H was so vehement on how he just never wanted to get married and just live around a pool table with a glass of whisky all his life! I agree somewhere I guess... but I'd like Margaritas, Screwdrivers, Capriojkas... variety on my table!

ps: the night dint end there! we then went on for dinner and danced the night away! I belley danced and showed off my cool new jazz moves... and me and S burned the dance floor with some real good show of the dirty dancing variety. She beats me to it tho! She is such a bad girl! :) And I love her for it! I mean it takes something to scandalise me... and before this turns into a post written in ps... I'll stop! overall a great night out. Over and out!

A T-shirt that says 'No'

Well... The story in the last post ended. Well. I met the client today and it all went ok the minute his huge ego was satisfied. Seeing three women lug it down to Thane from Santacruz (Distance: Equator to the North Pole) was a satisfying experience... He will have an orgasm thinking about this for days to come. His life must be really boring for him to resort to such cheap thrills. But anyway...Best thing was I took this opportunity to open a dialogue with my Boss. And we spoke for a good hour and it seemed like a decent enough chat... considering it happened for the first time in the whole past year!

So the amazing experience which may just be life changing happened last evening. I met someone. E.R.U.D.I.T.E does not begin to say it. He had finished reading all the Puranas before he reached V std. All Upnishads, Vedas by VIII. So he is obviously on a different plane of evolution. And he reminded me of some simple fundamental truths of life.

Our chat drifted towards me and I told him about my inability to face conflicts. I told him how I was a wimp when it comes to confrontations coz I just can not engage in one. I just can not say, 'No, please don't do this. Its bugging me!' He asked me if I don't do anything at all... And why? I say that I am uncomfortable with anger. My mind is conditioned towards not expressing anger because it has learnt for it to cause pain. I hence feel guilt after expressing anger. I also tell him that now I have improved and have started reacting 2 out of 10 times. I tell him I believe in an 'adult-adult' interaction devoid of too many emotions to solve an issue... mostly by the time I cool down the whole thing has lost its fizz and I don't see much point raking the dust then.

He laughed. Very hard. I was awkward coz here I had told this guy a thing so deep about me most of my good pals don't know... and he is laughing. He finally stopped and said all this was brilliant rationa'lie'sation... this facade of 'jaane do', compassion... forgiveness. He said that an ant can not forgive an elephant. I responded saying it bloody well can! How does size matter? He again said that a lamb can not forgive a tiger! And I looked at him and said.. . ok Help me. I am lost!

And then he explained that a lamb can forgive a tiger only if it can kill the tiger too. Since it can not kill the tiger there is no scope of forgiveness. Forgiveness is a choice. You make the choice for yourself and yourself alone. But you need to be able to kill first... to be able to decide not to kill. You need to be capable of hurting before letting go and forgiving.

He said that the one and only obligation you have is to protect your own interests. Its truly the only thing under your area of control. So react. Not necessarily with anger... but react. Tell him /her what is it that you dint like. Say it and then if they choose to fight, use it as an opportunity to resolve the issue. Say it and then if they choose to leave, let them. They would have left anyway in some time.

I told him his approach sounded selfish. He smiled... looked at me and smiled deep. It felt like coming from his soul and wrapping around mine. He said... 'If you do not tell that person what they are doing wrong to you... you are taking away the opportunity of them changing for the better forever.' You are taking an equal revenge. He/ she upsets you. And you never let them know. They stay as they are and maybe you become weaker too. The entropy of the whole system goes for a toss.What's the big point?

Since then I have about this to two other good friends of mine and have called them 'you cowards' and then reiterated that 4 fingers are still pointing towards me! :)

And I guess I should have published this post yesterday rather than falling asleep on a laptop... drooling in my sleep! May be then Mr Anonymous here would not have taken my case (pl refer to the comment in the previous post!). Ha!

What do you think!?!


ps: I really have a T-Shirt that says "NO!"... for last three years now. I like it much and wear it on one of those days when you have one of those feelings!

The bitter pill...

Hmmm. So I have a professional situation and I am quite jacked, euphemistically speaking. A client has gone and bitched about me to my boss and well... to make matters interesting she happens to be the relationship manager.
You see the background is, I was trying to be the good person. I took a decision which was more emotional than cold calculated rational and went out of my way to help the client. Now 11.59 min situations... data crunching happening... no real time for quality checks coz his people from the region were breathing down his neck and he wanted the information. So I gave it to him... took shortcuts and bypassed the process and gave it to him where he needed it.
So what's happened? A few data points do not match the norms of conventional wisdom. He has come back with a ruckus on unprofessional job done, quality of service.... all nicely worded and sent to my boss in a letter.
So I have this big meeting tom where I will be questioned on why I did not choose to follow the process. I will be told exactly what I did wrong... and how have I jeopardised the relationship. I will also talk about the frantic calls I had made to the senior and my boss... which had gone unanswered... but then its my job to offer solutions and not situations. Oh... I was also on leave by the way!! After a year prolly...
My friend here had the most interesting thing to say... He listened to me patiently and said well... If your boss says tom that you went out of your way to help a guy and in the end have achieved a letter of commendable unprofessionalism and have not safeguarded the interests of your organisation as well.... she just might be right!
Lesson 1: Save your ass! Keep things you say to people in writing over mails... that is the only reason why God made emails. They will U-turn on what they said over the phone... always. Your colleagues will do it. Everyone who needs to find a scape goat will!
Lesson 2: Assert! Clients or colleagues... tell them what you can and can not do. Stop bending over your back to get someone else data in time so that he/she does not get screwed. Ensuring his happiness is not why you were born... really! Now say it 10000000000000000000 times till you believe it.
Lesson 3: No body dies. In consulting no one will die if something does not get done when they say they need it. Specially if it is a delay they caused... so relax! Go home on time. Do what you can do peacefully. Do not miss dance classes! Ever!
Lesson 4: Loop your boss. Always ensure you keep your boss in loop. Don't worry about unnecessarily flooding her inbox. Do not be considerate when you 'know' that as a boss she might never stand with or for you in a client situation. Be prepared! For a situation where you can rely on lack of feedback, support, guidance... necessary inputs... anything that dint come to you in time and that could have avoided the fuck up. LEARN TO SHARE ACCOUNTABILITY!!!!! Instead of being the 'Hey-dont-you-worry-I-am-there-for-you' IDIOT!!! (Gawwwddd I can't believe it myself now.... I mean how dumb am I!!)
Lesson 5: Pick up the art of beautifully scripting emails which can fuck people later if they do not keep their word. That is why God put you in consulting. There's got to be a reason why co'nsulting' and i'nsulting' have so much in common rt? You can not blame others for being a retard and not picking up the cues when all this was staring you in the face all the time.
Lesson 6: People are different. Vindictive. Vengeful. Destructive. Just because you can not pick up the phone and scream at someone... just because you always let people have an exit route in a confrontational conversation... just because you can never ever fuck someone's happiness by saying something nasty, mean and bad to them... just because you are always ready to give people the benefit of doubt, please don't assume they will return the favour. Its as stupid as assuming the lion will not eat you coz you happen to be vegetarian!

And maybe... just maybe tom, I will open my mouth and say what I need to say to her. I will open my mouth and tell her the 'situation' and the 'volition' and defend my turf. I am hoping I will not sulk and go dumb on her... but stay in the talk and 'talk back' like a consultant. And may be I will have a better story to tell tom.

Which movie are we watching today?

The books which have had an enormous impact on me in the recent past are 'Man's search for meaning' - Victor Frankl and 'Illusions' - Richard Bach. Frankl talks about having a vision in life... about having a goal that you'd wanna get to. He says that man is a forward looking being and always needs something to move towards. Bach talks about how to go get wiser with the world. He says that all of us live in movies of our own making. He talks about being able to look beyond the movie... the appearance... goes ahead to say that be aware... know which movie you are watching and which is the one you'd rather see. Actually for a good long time I have had Bach's ideas resonate within. They make hell lot of intuitive sense to me... but to live them has been a tad difficult. Like all wise things. :)

I believe that all one needs to be happy in life is a vision you believe in and some wisdom and you're done. They both seem to ellude me rt now. For wisdom... I know I will find all that I need to learn in the search of my own happiness. For vision... I am still looking. Yeah I know what you might say... She doesn't know what to do with life! And honestly I feel slightly guilty about it too... You know all those people who know where they are headed... know exactly what they want... I am not a part of any of these groups. I am too amorphous... malleable.

Most of my wisdom has come from love. I like to experiment with relationships and people... And I really like the character of Krishna... I have read some about him and he seems to be the only person closest to unconditional love. I would like to experience unconditional love and recieve it too. I'd like it if some one could love me like that. I still struggle to define it. But the concept always manages to give me enough food for thought. When I succeed at it partially and whenI fail at it miserably. Its been an area where success and failure have taught me equally well.

One day... some day I'd like to tell you guys about my vision too... when I can see it crystal clear... when I am done making it. I enjoy being driven. I like to feel passion... get crazy in the head. It so has to be the 'truly madly deeply' variety.

Till then... I will amuse me with the movies I make. I'll add travel and books and more books and more people to it. And may be we'll have something that can be put between the coverpages of a book!

So be it

Early morning here... not yet two. I am up and hoping to get started on work coz I have this important meeting tom at 9... Happens to be a Saturday too. But today I shall not crib about how I am working oh so hard. I am going to stop being a baby about all of this. Everyone goes through working to near death at least ones a year and so be it. My time's come.

Been a few days though that I can't listen to music. It hurts... very difficult to explain this... but I don't think I'll listen to 'Summer moved on' for a good long time to come. May be never. I can't.

My body is kicking me to get back into my exercise routine. I am looking forward to the dance class on Sunday. Dint go last time around and am still upset with myself for that.

I am just vegetating infront of the laptop most of the times and guess that's the reason why everytime I close my eyes visions flash... its like the mind comes up with innovative ways to scare me into opening my eyes shocked wide. Everytime I close my eyes I see some scary thing... its like I am playing a game in my head where I start with a nice visual... like a quiet lake with full moon at night and suddenly have snakes all over my boat... so I try change that to watching the moon from the shore and there I feel a shadow lurking behing me ... uneasy rustling sound... so I fight it and say its a friend come to sit by my side... and when I turn to look at him with a smile its an evil dead. This phase does not let me relax... can't sleep and get tired coz I need to keep my mind busy. Or it will get into the visual playing let-scare-her routine again.

So lets change the topic. Its Dad's birthday this month. Wondering what to get for him. Its a special birthday this time. The first after his surgery.

Time is flying and very soon sis will be off to NZ for studies... I am sitting here thinking how the hell am I gonna let her go. I really love her and she is one of the few people I miss really. I am so fiercely protective about her that will go and drop her off to NZ coz I wanna ensure she settles down ok there... against every body's advice.

Time passes. People come and go. Love comes and goes and in the end its just me here. If that's how its gotta be then so be it. For the time being, I'll send across the motherfucker of ze excel sheet I am working on to the visualization department inside my head! And see if they have anything scarier to get back at me. Screw them really!

Time to be you... Time to be me... Time for us together you see...

My Blog turns two months old today. :)

I love my blog. I love all people who come to it.

I catch a lot of my thoughts and put it down here. I like to think I will probably come back to this page ten years hence and smile. That I will read some of my own words and think how I have or have not changed over time... may be I'd have gone un-anonymous by then!!

:) We'll see.

Love.