The Colour of Magic

Ness Sess

2006-07-14T13:30:00.000-07:00

Ness ses I'm to be writing 6 weird things about me - then I have to tag people it seems. I tag Shalo and Diloo and Chatti and Shanswam (although I don't think there's a point to this)

1. I love Bollywood bakwas pictures. I love Govinda songs inspite of myself.

2. I have to pick my nose at least 5 times a day. I can even do it in public.

3. If my shoe laces are tied too tight, I feel like I can't breathe.

4. I call people by three different names (which aren't their own) before by some accidental neuronal spiking I get their name right.
I haven't been disowned yet.

5. When I get stub a toe or get wounded I whimper and make all the sounds made by an injured dog.

6. Sometimes when I have an itch on my forearm, I'll gnaw at it with my front teeth the way doggies do.

Now I've really blown my chances of finding a boy-friend!!
Grr...

Sahi hai ...

2006-06-04T04:33:00.000-07:00

We (He and I) called an old friend up the other day and she said, “Wow it’s amazing!! Your accents haven't changed one bit!!”

I managed a faint smile at my friend sitting opposite me. He grinned.
(Marvellous no? This speaker phone contraption).

We talked a little longer – about this, that and the other and hung up swearing to think about each other each time we did something wonderfully symbolic of our friendship, like hear a Backstreet Boys' song.
(You know, one of those standard things adolescents do to swear their undying love for each other?)

I looked across at him … He stared back at me wide-eyed. Wondering where I was headed on my newest “philosophical trip” (a term of his own devising I assure you).

“She thinks we talk the same," I said.
“Haan tho? Theek hi tho hai. Tereko accent bilkool nahi hai, mereko bhi nahi hai.” he said.
“Woh maloom hai re, lekin accent aane ke liye angrezi mein baat karta kaun hai?”
“Sahi hai … yeh baat bhi sahi hai.”
"Kya na, humlog bombay mein bhi itna hindi mein baat nahi karte the na?"
“Haan re. Apna mummy-bapu apna lingo sunega tho unka dimaag hatega nahi?”
“Maa kasam! Fight ho jayega. Woh log bolega - tereko mein Stanford, MIT iske liye bheja kya!!”

*laughter

“Aur Xavier’s jayega tho log terko dekh ke bolega – kidhar se aaya atrangi?”
“Baat sun, udhar jayegi na – professor log ko hi hello bol ke somdi me vat lena- kissi ko maloom bhi nahi padega.”

*silence

"Tereko yaad hai kya, mast english mein baat kaisa karne ka?"
"Haan, sort of. I mean, I haven't completely forgotten the language or anything. Matlab I can still baat karofy in english, its just that hindi comes more fataak se."
“Tu jaldi upar jayega beta”

*more laughter

No, my dearest, I don’t have an accent – however, there might be other things about my verbal communication skills that you need to be concerned about.

I do think about you although I rarely listen to BSB.

23

2006-01-21T21:45:00.000-08:00

Simple Minds

2006-01-03T02:14:00.000-08:00

I am not saying I am right. I am saying this is what I believe.

Reality to you is what you accept to be the truth isn't it?
The best way.
The easiest route.
Tailor made for you.
By you.

So more people agree with you than I have people agreeing with me.

Why do you break down my beliefs?

On days when everything seems hopeless they're all I have.

Shalom

2005-12-26T01:43:00.000-08:00

But Muttu you put the chocolate in my stocking!!

Err… Yes…

Why?

Well…

There’s no real Santa is there?

I’m not sure.

*tears…

Baby I don’t know if there is a Santa or not. And you have no way of knowing either. But your stocking is full isn’t it? Do you know what that means?

It means someone loves you enough to fill it. Your very own personal Santa. Someone cared. Someone made the effort. Isn’t that more than your stocking can hold?

YES!! Thank you… which one should we eat first?

Fruit and nut… I have a particular fondness for those …

Merry Christmas.

[Dorothy this was for you…(notice the title fit so well no?) one of my favouritest memories of my grandfather. Had we been together I would have loved to fill your stocking up, so lets just say my blog is your stocking… since you come here looking for my random stream of “consciousness writing”]

For Dorothy... (for her motion sickness...)

2005-09-29T15:53:00.000-07:00

But isn't this what it means to grow up together? ...

I know it’s unpleasant to see innocence and starry eyes be replaced by one of the less sweet character traits … like practicality… (I’m really not the biggest fan of practicality).

And I do think its more romantic when you say... the sum of all forces add up to ONE... unity is always a nice number... (zero's are kinda empty like... unless they have ONE in front of them, and besides I really doubt these physicists know what they are talking about so if I were you I wouldn't take that law at face value)
Anyway...Lets just be romantic shall we?

You are home to me... and you are my innocence and starry eyes ... It's with you for safe keeping... coz I now find myself in a world where it might not be the best thing to wear on my sleeve...

I'll just do what I need to do and come to you when I need to be me or when you should need me...

So please don't forget that you are loved just as much as always...

Also, please don't forget the vitamins...

I love you
the older (...and hopelessly lost) sister.

Dear world and Everyone...

2005-08-16T13:40:00.000-07:00

Everyone insists I write what I felt. Everyone insists I express what the flood did to me. Everyone is concerned because it is unnatural to watch your home be destroyed and see all that suffering and death and be as calm as I am.

So I am writing this to Everyone.

I

I felt helpless when I stood at that first floor window and saw people getting swept away.
I felt helpless when I saw people on the top of buses far away from me who spent the whole night shivering in the rain.
I felt helpless when I saw people breaking into shops and stealing.
I also felt helpless being stranded in a building that was an island.

The only way I could have left the building was if I had a boat. A boat that would float on, unfettered by the many whirling vortexes of water that surrounded the building.

I am not about to run myself into the ground over misplaced guilt. I did all that I could. And if I could have done more, I would have done it. I know this; else I would never have been able to live with myself.

II

I do not hate the rain. Nor do I hate Bombay.
And while the word that came to your mind when you saw the rain was ‘Fury’, I felt a strange sense of calm.
It felt like the city was tired and it just needed to break down and cry.
Wail…weep… moan…whimper.
All of us need to do it sometimes. It makes us feel ever so much better.

III

But at what cost you say? And you spoke of loss… and you said there were so many lives lost in the storms wake… and so much grain… and destruction…

How about we discuss shoot outs then? The underworld? How about if we discuss girls who have acid thrown on them by angry lovers? Or a woman being raped in the train with people watching? Or two girls sightseeing being slain by a guy in a bad mood? Or a bomb that blows up a bus or a train or a building? Or little children eating glue that will give them a high that will forget their hunger… forget that they have no where to belong to and no one who loves them…? Or animals being ill-treated? Street dogs being poisoned by people who can’t sleep at night because of their own conscience and instead blame a dog?

You want to talk about that too? While we’re at it… Lets…

The city has a heart.
A heart that was born into being from the tempo of a million other heartbeats.
A heart that we who live here created… some of us forged, some of us nurtured.
You must’ve noticed it… the heart that warms up to you and makes you feel at home when you get here...
The heart that makes you say, “I’m from Bombay”… that makes you smile when you hear a mention of it somewhere.

And like all other hearts… when it sees pain… it bleeds…

IV.

You also spoke of ‘Nature’s Revenge.’

Now you’re making me laugh.
Tell me… really…
Isn’t Nature way beyond revenge? Nature is constant, we’re the transient ones.
Nature doesn’t destroy without a purpose. That’s man’s forte really.

We really ought to accept our limited understanding of things and shut up when we don’t know better.

We always tend to perceive things within the limitations of who we are … maybe that’s why we are talking about ‘revenge’.

Well, I don’t know much myself. But I do know that Nature doesn’t take revenge. She balances… she does what is needed to best sustain life… she has the foresight… because she created life… and that is what she nurtures…

I know I am not wrong about this. I could be wrong about everything else. But I am not wrong about this.
And I do know to her all are equal.

V.

‘But aren’t you unhappy…?’

Why should I be unhappy? No really… I don’t understand this question.
I am tired. And I am dazed. But that’s because I was given 15 minutes to grow up and I had to do it real fast. 15 minutes when water gushed and flooded and I had to decide what it was from my home that I needed to save. 15 minutes when I would decide my moral fiber for myself, I didn’t have time to think about what the world would say, I didn’t care then, and I don’t care now…

… like those POP quizzes where they would ask you, “if your house was burning what are the five things you would save?” Well, I always answered… My certificates, money, some photographs, some clothes and jewelry, you know, things that would get me help me get started with my life again and I would still have some of my old life in the photographs.

Lol… Well in real life, I only saved the certificates from this list… and just to cheer you up, coz I think I’ve made quite a task of myself, let me show you some of the other things that came through dry… (more or less...)

Name: Honey a.k.a Hun-munch.
Age: 9 years
Sex: F
Eats: Anything with MSG.
Most peculiar habit: Hides her children in strategic places around the house and then forgets where she has hidden them. Proceeds to complain very loudly to everyone in the household. “Who has been moving my babies around again?? I demand an explanation right now…”
Known for: Ability to wake instantly from REM sleep on the sound of a packet of Lays being opened.

Name: BIG TABBY or Tadee Maadu (which I think is tamil for fat bovine) now more popularly called Storm Babu after his 10 second experience underwater.
Age: 1 year and 6 months.
Sex: M
Eats: Everything…No really, I’m not saying he is not a fussy eater, I’m saying he eats everything.
Most peculiar habit: Can’t swim. Loves beer.
Known for: Being able to preen himself at any given point of the day.

Name: Butter boy (Suffered from some seizure disorder when he was a kitten because of which he now has a very peculiar ‘melting’ gait, like he is going to dissolve into the ground).
Age: 1 year
Sex: M
Eats: Chicken patties... and everything else.
Most peculiar habit: Sleeps most peacefully on ‘Lehninger Principles of Biochemistry, Nelson D.L and Cox M.M; 3rd edition, 2000. Macmillan Worth Publications. 2003 reprint.’
Known for: Questioning eyes. “Are you going to feed me?”, “Are you going to feed me NOW?”

Name: Anisha, the cat a.k.a. The girl cat. (The mothers explanation: Because she is as obnoxious as the real Anisha)
Age: 1 year
Sex: F
Eats: Rarely… fish and rice.
Most peculiar habit: Doesn’t walk from one place to another. Only prowls.
Known for: Distrusting everyone instantly.

And then there are the storm babies... COMING SOON... Also, the mother's 'flood humor'

Okay... so I wasn't dropped on the head... BUT!...

2005-08-15T12:36:00.000-07:00

This is a letter I managed to retrieve ... I need to type it in before it becomes completely illegible... its worth a million laughs... its also proof of why I am such a ehm... "disturbed child".

Don't forget to pay careful attention to the bold letters.

Don't forget to laugh. :)

Bombay

May 1st, 1990

Darling daughter,

Happy to receive a letter from you. But your handwriting is bad. You should try and be neat when you write something. Okay?

Do you remember the bird that lives on our kitchen window? She's layed eggs. Now she has three baby sparrows who make lots of noise all day long - just like you.

Enjoy your stay in Kerala, but don't trouble anyone. Don't throw tantrums or misbehave. Eat whatever people give you and don't waste your food. If you overhear someone saying something nasty about someone else, don't interfere. It is not the business of little children to listen to these things.

We are happy to know that you are happy, but we miss you very much. Both of us miss our baby doll. Teddy is very quiet without you. We watch your video everyday.

Rashmi phoned today. She got 2nd rank. You got 7th rank. Though we are very sad, we are not angry with you. But next year you must study well.

Take care.
love,
Mama.

The other letters unfortunately aren't legible... but you love her already...don't you? :)))

Warmed chestnuts: courtesy, the Purist Me.

2005-07-25T11:13:00.000-07:00

(Big grin!)

Have you noticed… the most clichéd thing to say these days is…
“Now of course I say this at the risk of sounding clichéd…”
or
“I know I’m capitalizing on the cliché but don’t you think…”

What’s wrong with clichés anyway? They’re good man… they’ve stood the test of time… (said with a deep reverberating voice and nose in the air, for the sake of the clichés of course … since they don’t have noses of their own…)

… So a lot of people agree about a lot of things and end up saying the same things in the same way and often about the same thing at the same time…(now that’s an original sentence!!)

(Grammar?… who grammar?)

As if by saying “I don’t mean to sound clichéd…” they somehow make what they are saying more unique and ORIGINAL.

Originality also I think comes highly overrated… simply because if you shut up and listen, you will realize that most people (including those who seem to vehemently disagree with each other) for a good part of their life are trying to tell you the exact same thing…

Yup! So do that… go listen to those people…

……………and stop looking at me like you expect me to start making sense.

‘hic! :D

The Dragon and the Phoenix

2005-07-25T10:20:00.000-07:00

The Dragon.

The world is so full of false prophets and mystics.
Mind-readers, spiritulists, "but-i'm-your-friends".
They’re all there to help you.
“Come and ease the pain”

Its good fun really.
They will trivialize it for you.
Make it much easier to breathe.
It’ll all end in a sigh… or a sob… or smoke…(depends on how long you take to adjust)

The Phoenix.

Kid yourself sometimes… it’s the only way to get by…

Hey I didn’t promise unscathed… I just guaranteed escape…

Then again when you have the balls…

Crash and burn…remember the phoenix.
You are no less.

Feeble

2005-07-25T05:55:00.000-07:00

Sometimes it’s easier to talk when no one listens.
Especially yourself.
You might think it a futile exercise when you start.
You need to keep at it.

You know those voices that you constantly try to ignore?
They don’t go away.
Not unless they’ve had their say.
I should know.

But you can cheat them… the voices I mean…

Talk when no one is listening.

Ma.

2005-07-25T05:45:00.000-07:00

My mother is by far, the funniest person I've come across... she is also one of the wisest, kindest and all sorts of other nice things...
But other stuff apart... my mum is definitely the funniest...

This is me immortalising some of the stuff she says... lest I forget... and I don't EVER want to... I want to have more 'mama stories' about my mother than my mother has 'baby stories' about me!

I.
Me: “Amma are you gonna have dinner?”
Ma: (from bathroom where she has three taps running) “What baby? I can’t hear you…”
Me: “ARE YOU GONNA HAVE DINNER?”
Ma: (happily splashing around) “What love?”
Me: “DINNER! DINNER! ARE YOU GONNA HAVE DINNER?”
Ma: (humming to herself as she soaps) “What did you say baby?”
Me: “I’m going to Spain tomorrow.” (Sarcasm influenced by tattered vocal chords)
Ma: “Yeah I’d like some dinner.”

II.
(Phone call during class hours! Daughter fully anxiety-fied! Must be urgent, crouches under desk evading wary eyed lecturer)

Daughter: “What happened Ma? Are you okay?”
Ma: (sing song voice) “Hi Baby!”
Daughter: “Why did you call ma?”
Ma: (in her Oracle voice) “I was thinking…”
Daughter: “What?”
Ma: “Sometimes I think God is great…”
Daughter: “…and at other times?”
Ma: “At other times I think God is great anyway… Chal voh bhi kya yaad karega!”

All tooned in :)

2005-07-25T05:02:00.000-07:00

This particular friend of mine who shares my obsessive fixation with comic strips and cartoons and animated films in general asked me which cartoon character I realted to the most. She also asked me to give 5 reasons I thought this way...

Well Sue, here are 6 reasons why I think I am a living breathing Broom Hilda!

(I'm putting it up here coz this is bloody brilliant... do look up Broom Hilda by Russel Meyers).

:) :) :)

Soul vacation

2005-07-25T04:14:00.000-07:00

Most conversations have talkers and listeners.

Between you and me, I think the real conversations happen when both people listen, neither talk. I’ve never known this to happen with anyone, but I think it can happen. At least within oneself if not between two distinct people.

Then again there are people who can talk to things others consider inanimate. I know this person who shares a very special connection with her ceiling. She calls him ‘Frank’ (Sinatra fan she insists!). She and Frank have spent many hours contemplating the meaning of life, discussing pain, recollecting the day’s events, setting reminders… she lying on her bed and he always watching over her.

And then again there are people who can talk into space with the conviction that they are being heard… they trust someone is listening to them…someone, anyone. When I was first introduced to chat rooms on the internet that’s what I thought about… so many people talking into space… believing someone is listening…

I don’t think anyone is wrong really… in fact I think everyone is right…

But this isn’t about categorizing conversations…
…..this is about connections… and memories… which get stirred, mixed and glorified by dialogue…

So I don’t want to talk.
I just want you to listen.

I don’t know what this is about.

But maybe…
this is about sitting sleepless at 4 am staring at a pristine white screen. Where letters appear just as easily as they disappear…
this is about not knowing what I want to say and what I want said to me.
this is about uncertainty that I know shrouds the life of even those I want should console me.
this is about me wanting to be told that I am loved but still being too tired to say it back to someone.
this is about me blowing small things out of proportion and trivializing things that should matter.

That’s what I am doing…
Running around in circles… looking for misplaced dreams…
…trying to find that little part of the soul that churns out the new ones…
Forgetting halfway what it was I was looking for…

........ ..... .... ... ......... .. ........ what was I going to say?

Wake up! Get up … enough already…

Stirring the soul out of its vacation.... definitely NOT easy...

*sigh :)

Yeh hai Bambai, meri jaan...

2005-07-24T12:25:00.000-07:00

These are everyday in Bombay
… somewhere or the other
Whether or not anyone is around to watch ... whether or not people watching notice…

This isn’t meant to be writing.
This is meant to be pictures. Real live pictures.
The accompaniment music… is the sound of a heart beat…

5:03 am: Airport Runway
(Location: Santacruz)
Black.
It is always darkest before dawn.
The runway lights shine on steadily… symmetrically…
The city wakes… watches over you…

5:30 am. The first visitor, the first 'note to self'.
(Location: Somewhere on the way to being awake)
“Didi doodh” says little boy wearing your old t-shirt, shorts and a smile.
“thank you… umm…” say you... eyes half shut… must remember to buy him slippers.
“Welcome didi.” He runs on…
… you go turn on the radio…

6:00 am. Consciousness and coffee.
(Location: kitchen floor)
White cup, with cartoon dog on it. All milk no water coffee.
Strong... Bitter... Sickeningly Sweet.
Serpentine steam...
Smell… Still more smiles…

6:01 am: The Grey-yellow sunrise.
(Location: Every where)
Alarm clocks going off in the neighbours homes.
The little man washing the car trips the car alarm again.
Someone swears… rolls over and sleeps…
Someone else laughs… morning person…

7:00 am: THE Local train.
Ear splitting hoot that you don’t react to anymore.
Hurriedly folding up newspapers.

7:45 am: Cautionary Road Signs
(Location: Haji Ali)
A bad patch of road.
Someone put an old rubber tyre around it.
Another adds the frond off a palm tree.
A few rocks. A bunch of sticks. Doggie strutting by pees.

Its good... everyone understands...

8:30 am: Construction work
(Location:Grant Road)
Three little kids in uniforms and bright umbrellas.
Building a house for a mother and her three little babies.
Clumsy effort… lots of licks… empty yellow biscuit wrapper, the bone of contempt between the three puppies…

12:00 pm. Musical Matinee.
(Location: Fort)
The service at an Udipi resteraunt.
15 workers, coffee and cream uniforms, 250 sq.ft of space.
They move… in perfect harmony.

...the little boy with the wash cloth cleans up.

And we talked all night about the rest of our lives...

2005-06-29T12:02:00.000-07:00

I.

Last night my life found itself in a room with my childhood.

It was a beautiful room. Packed full with laughter, music, tears and food… Lots of food and a rabble-appetite that seemed satisfied although the food went untouched! There were bottles of alcohol too. They stood dully on a table with the quiet demeanor of those who know they aren’t wanted at a party… who knew they weren’t needed at this party. Characteristically of booze bottles or not I don’t know… but they didn’t seem to mind.

I don’t know why I sit down to write this because it seems so unnecessary. I know that all I have to do should I ever want to relive that evening is get ‘em ol’ girls from school back together. It doesn’t matter where, it doesn’t matter when, it doesn’t matter who else will come or what we’ll have for dinner.

But yet I sit and write this, because quite honestly I sometimes get scared that someday I just might grow up too much… too fast. So much and so fast that I will even forget to remember.

II.

It was all a haze really… we were laughing so hard I couldn’t see what was happening through watery eyes. Ears reverberating with the shrieks of one and guffaws of the other. Sides hurt… cheeks getting ever more sore… I couldn’t breathe!

I loved it.

There were oodles of blah music that transpired from a makeshift music system, comprising by and large of two computer speakers and a barely working(?), highly strung disc-man. As fate would have it, I was the only one who could operate that thing.

They made cracks at me… “So you finally get it going with some sort of a MAN!” Bitches!… how hard they made me laugh! They of course paid dearly coz they didn’t get any music until I was done. They (characteristically of them, I know)… didn’t mind.

The evening wore on… we didn’t. We only seemed to get stronger and fuller of energy.
P asked S: “Aren’t you tired? You came straight from work.”
S said: “I don’t understand.”
The conversation went on. But it has already said what matters.

III.

Sometime around midnight the stomachs got their way. Vegetable Biriyani… cold, oily… I’m talking major dyspepsia material here… what do I say… it was delicious!

IV.

The contentment that followed dinner manifested itself as a conversation. Everyone talked… everyone listened… quite often all at the same time.

V.

Then there were narratives of loves lost and found…there were tears, anxiety and there was hope.

I (silly as I am) wasn’t paying attention. I looked. Realizing that we weren’t in our dull grey pinafores with our pigtails… that our problems were seemingly graver than bad marks, how conversations about crushes had now moved on to marriage plans… I watched them comfort and rejoice… smiling in spite of themselves…

It was like taking stock… of your whole life… right there with each other. Talking and coming to terms with what the years had molded you into. Thinking about how we all started at the same place and how we worked differently… sometimes making the decisions for ourselves and sometimes life making the decisions for us…

VI.

I don’t know when I fell asleep… but I remember waking up just before I did.

Pebble of wisdom:
Growing up is easy to cope with once you realize you never have to.

Tagging Linking shminking poo! (grumble...grumble...)

2005-06-21T23:34:00.000-07:00

Alright... now how was I supposed to know that I had to link everyone I tagged??

I am about to start now... my feeble attempts and all... (good heavens)

WARNING: these might not work!
Another WARNING: the link and the author might not match.
Yet another WARNING: if you thinking of slugging me in case I misdirect people on the way to reading your blog, I HAVE A MEAN BITE!!!

hee hee... its all allowed...

Deepti
Shankar
Ashwin "Player" Menon (tee hee hee!)
Satya or alternatively Satya
Uncle Slimes

Phew...!!!
wow...

technophobically yours,
me

Sitting on the park bench... like bookends?

2005-06-21T02:50:00.000-07:00

I have been tagged by Shalome to fill in the following and I in turn tag all of you who come this way.
Especially you Dips (Veena I think will enjoy doing this too.)

The Worst Book Award:
Err… Can I change this to the book I have despised the most?
I have already now and there’s no going back.
I despised ‘Written on the Body’ by Jeanette Winterson. She writes beautifully this woman does. Beautifully!
But there is so much melancholy, misery and out right down in the dumpiness although in superbly crafted sentences, I don’t like the book. Ugh!

The Grossest Character Award:
This would have to be the Queen of Hearts from Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carrol. Allegory or not that woman epitomizes fear for me as much when I was four as she does today. Shudder!

The Largest Collection of Books belongs to:
How I wish it were me! Sigh… but well of all the people I know, it’s this certain bachelor friend-uncle I know (Alan). He has books all over his house and in his car and I presume whatever other piece of land or ledge he owns. They’re stacked on all the shelves and even on one part of the kitchen counter. On top of the fridge (obviously!) and he has now confirmed his bachelorhood by stacking them on that side of the bed one would usually attribute to the significant other.
The comics (Marvel) along with a few really old and tattered porn magazines are confined to this ingenious shelf in the loo! Real nice.

Five Lifechanging Books are: (in no specific order or importance)
A) The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath: Because I read it when I was going through the same kind of turmoil as Plath. Because when I was done reading it, I swore never to do myself an injustice again
Sigh~ … that too is a work in progress

B) The BFG by Roald Dahl: Because it’s so full of love and goodness and just the right amount of macabre. And most importantly it’s about a little girl and a wrinkly old man. Like me and me gramps!

C) The Solitaire Mystery by Jostein Gaarner: Because this book knows no boundaries, your imagination goes into overdrive. You can’t stop. Its brilliant.

D) Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery: She had an astonishing influence on my mind. This was the second “real book WITHOUT pictures” I read. I think it’s her optimism that rubbed on to me; really, sometimes I am more than convinced that I managed to trap quite a bit of Anne in me! (this also happens to be one of the first books I intend buying for my children)

F) Illusions by Richard Bach: Because all that may be written in that book could be wrong. ;)

The Hyped Beyond Belief Award:
‘Sophie’s World’ by Jostein Gaarder! Pft!

What Am I Reading Now?
‘The Ringmasters Daughter’ by Jostein Gaarder

The One Book You Couldn't Finish Reading:
Atlas Shrugged. It was too bulky to carry to read while traveling.

Roots.

2005-06-20T08:27:00.000-07:00

Kerala. Kerala and this casual remark my mum made while on the airplane. “God is a pretty creative chap na Anchi?”
“Hmm…” It was one of those ‘hmms’ I give people that makes them think I am listening when I am really in a world of my own (Ooops! … apologetic snigger).

But then the thought was immediately yanked back into the deeper layers of my consciousness. Apparently the cerebral cortex saw potential in it… the rest of the brain complied willingly.
As you must have realized I, personally, was left with little choice.

And yes, the ‘hmm’ changed its tenor… it went “Hmmm?” Some part of me obviously wanted to understand that more … ‘fully’? Or is the correct phrase ‘blow it out of proportion’. But then can anything that concerns beauty or creativity or God be talked about enough? The question of blowing out of proportion doesn’t really come up now does it?

Hmm… I was being silly and lazy. I decided to work with the ol’ head on this one. There has to be a point to this.

Before I tell you about the trip my brain and I went on (my heart, the poor over-excitable little wretch that she is, skipped along happily taking delight in the silliest things!) I need to tell you what Kerala was like.

Well, it was beautiful. And green. I’ve probably read way too much poetry and am very tempted like them poets to call the green a shade of emerald or jade or … err… I forget.

BUT NO! I am the inspired radical and shunner of all established doctrine! (Or so I like to kid myself, and you kind reader, will laugh and nod gently PLEASE??)

Therefore if you have suffered your way till here, you may want to suffer your way through my stubbornly original, attempted of what Kerala was like.

Like I said, it was beautiful.

It was mostly about life.

I don’t know which of these two would be the consequence of the other.

There wasn’t a patch of earth where something didn’t grow! Not a spot of soil that didn’t support life.

Once, my brain very critically observed that a patch that seemed particularly rocky had nothing growing on it. My heart knew better though. She quietly whispered to me that, that bit of land had her own share of secrets, her own little treasures buried there. I asked her how she knew. She answered like she always does, “I just do!”
Over time I have learned that this is the one and only true answer she could possibly give. Over time I have also learnt that no other answer would convince me.

We (the heart, brain and I) also spent some time thinking about the whole tourism department's marketing strategy. “Kerala: God’s own country”. A unanimous vote decided that this was ridiculous! Which country isn’t God’s own?!
But a second unanimous vote also decided that if God did have a “Favourite Place List” Kerala would definitely be on it.

Oh yes, the green in Kerala. The Green is constant. The Green is the blood that throbs through the veins of the land. The Green is the life and the Green is the beauty. At least that’s how it seemed to me. All of me.

Towards the end of the week the brain elatedly reported an all time high on its release of endorphins and similar neurotransmitters of the “feel good” genre. The heart smiled at the brain lovingly. I would love to tell you that I was terribly hungry during this momentous exchange, but you would call me trivial and unfocused! Therefore like any self respecting individual who knows when to keep her mouth shut, I shall refrain.

Pebble of wisdom:
Stupidity, like sunrises and sunsets is expected and beautiful. Thou shall not snub it. Merely laugh at it. The louder… the better.

Then there was the deal with the frogs and the crickets and the colour in my cheek. The first were mostly greenish-yellow, the second I never really saw and the third was a deep shade of happy pink.

Its strange how when you splash water on your face and lazily let it dry your cheeks respond with colour. What do they mean “I recognize the water”?

And the butterflies come and flutter by you like they know you... like you're always been there... like you belong to them...as much as the flowers they eventually settle down on... and the dragon flies! Them little show-off devils!

And the froggies… complain all night in loud disgruntled voices about how it’s been a mean summer and how the insecticide gets to the flies before they do... and you try to stay awake and listen but you fall asleep trying. They start again the next night... they don’t mind you falling asleep the gentle dears that they are. They often tell you the same story again… but its all okay, you know?

And the crickets... they are another talkative bunch. But so many of them talk at the same time I never know what they are trying to say. They are adorable though… each one of them. Like little children all too eager to tell you what they did at the fair! You laugh. And you listen. You don’t really understand, but you listen.

Its strange how your heart, brain and intellect respond to a place. Maybe the DNA knows… maybe its those evolutionary artifacts, junk DNA??? I think not. It’s that part of me that understands this is home to some part of me. And therefore we are happy. Therefore we are pink. Therefore we understand the tongues of those who are made of the same mud albeit a different species.

The Green runs in our veins.

Desiderata

2005-06-10T21:58:00.000-07:00

I was taught as a little girl... ever since I have recollection of being able to understand things, that everything must be started with a prayer...

This is the one prayer I leave home with and come home to.
This one is... me.

Desiderata

Go placidly amid the noise and haste,

and remember what peace there may be in silence.

As far as possible without surrenderbe on good terms with all persons.

Speak your truth quietly and clearly;and listen to others,

even the dull and the ignorant;

they too have their story.

Avoid loud and aggressive persons,

they are vexations to the spirit.

If you compare yourself with others,you may become vain and bitter;

for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.

Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans.
Keep interested in your own career, however humble;

it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time.

Exercise caution in your business affairs;for the world is full of trickery.

But let this not blind you to what virtue there is;many persons strive for high ideals;

and everywhere life is full of heroism.

Be yourself.

Especially, do not feign affection.

Neither be cynical about love;

for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment

it is as perennial as the grass.

Take kindly the counsel of the years,

gracefully surrendering the things of youth.

Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune.

But do not distress yourself with dark imaginings.

Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness.

Beyond a wholesome discipline,be gentle with yourself.

You are a child of the universe,

no less than the trees and the stars;

you have a right to be here.

And whether or not it is clear to you,

no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.

Therefore be at peace with God,

whatever you conceive Him to be,

and whatever your labors and aspirations,

in the noisy confusion of life keep peace with your soul.

With all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams,it is still a beautiful world.

Be cheerful.

Strive to be happy.

(Found in Old St. Paul's Church in Baltimore; dated 1692)