Any dream will do

The Resurrection of Driftwood

noreply@blogspirit.com () — Sun, 13 Jul 2008 18:50:00 +0530

I want to come back to my Driftwood days,

I want to come back to my wordly ways,

For somewhere in the last year or two,

I've been feeling a whole lot of blue.

I don't know if I'll ever find those words again,

Or if all I write here will bring me pain,

But I do know that I miss my Driftwood days,

And want to come back to my wordly ways.

If it brings you pain, you're sure to know

That those are the words you'd rather show

Is what they say to me all the time.

I'll now have you know, it's truth sublime.

For words that don't reach in and make you feel

Are not words, just bunkum and reel,

So I'm throwing salaried class jargon away

And coming back to my wordly ways.

Will you come over, will you read me,

I know not, but my words need to be.

Or it'll be another every day

With no words that matter anyway.

The last year or two are gone, anyhow

And it's time to take a step forward now

And get in touch with my wordly ways

And make my tomorrows all Driftwood days.

Welcome home, Driftwood.

Tonight, I write my thoughts as they flow

noreply@blogspirit.com () — Sun, 11 Mar 2007 22:55:51 +0530

So much to say, I don't even know where to begin. Summer's here and everything's the same. I look down on the road below and nothing's like it was a year ago. This 31st summer is not like the summer that was 10 years back, and funnily enough, I don't even remember what that summer was like. I can't believe it's March. It can't be March, it was just January yesterday. And July the day before that. Where are all the days going? I wish there was some way I could record every moment, every day somewhere. If not, at least those moments that make a difference. And the thing is, there are too many of them, but not quite enough. Somehow, not quite enough.

We're quite the sad species. We want company when we don't want it. And when we do have the company we yearned for just a day ago, which seems like months ago, we can't wait to get away from it. And yet we claim to be the most evolved of species. Like Tom Petty said, we're too alone to be proud. And yet, oxy-morons that we are, we're too proud to be alone. Somehow, that didn't make sense so much as I thought it did a moment ago. Maybe it did. Maybe it does. No, it doesn't. Of course it does.

How we outgrow relationhips. How we look for ways to escape what we wanted just last night, a lifetime ago. How we look for ways and people and things to change our perception of tomorrow, and yet, when the change is just round the bend, are too scared to grab it. How we make excuses for those who let us down. How we're quick to judge our loved ones and fob it off as love, which gives us the right to judge them. In a way, it's admitting our own lack of judgement, if you will. How we pretend we don't need anyone and yet, know, somewhere in our minds, if not in our hearts, that maybe we really don't. Nothing changes, nothing changes at all, yet people do. How is that possible, we wonder. And we keep on wondering, never quite finding an answer, but always hoping that we will, somehow, someday.

How we lean on pillars and yet pretend that our spine will do quite well, thank you very much. And how we ignore the pillars once we've left them behind. How we try to bribe those we love with thoughtless gestures that would have meant needless expenditure yesterday to us, even if it was just a few rupees. All because we're guilty of somehow betraying them, but not wanting to own up to it. How we live with those we love and yet look for someone else to love. How we live with those that love us and yet wait for someone else to. How we're as susceptible to human frailties as everyone else, yet trivialise them when it's someone else's frail moment.

How we always say that nobody has all the answers in a way that suggests that "I know more than you do AT THIS PRECISE MOMENT, YOU BRAIN-DEAD BASTARD FAGGOT." How we look for validation from those who've hurt us and our own, all because we just don't think it's enough that we love and are loved. How we want our yesterdays so desperately, so badly that it completely takes away our thoughts of tomorrow from focus. And yet, we fumble and stammer when we do get a chance to revisit the good old days. Time is just not on our side, and when we do figure it out, if we ever will, it's always, all-the-freaking-time too late.

There is so much to say to you today, and all of a sudden, I don't even know what to say to you anymore.

It's been a year already!

noreply@blogspirit.com () — Sun, 25 Feb 2007 19:45:00 +0530

And I didn't realise it at all!

Happy first birthday, Any Dream Will Do, dear blog mine!!!!

My Funny Valentines

noreply@blogspirit.com () — Tue, 20 Feb 2007 22:30:00 +0530

Do you remember the time when doodling hearts in your notebook gave you a sense of selfish delight that was yours and yours alone? I don't. Because I still doodle little pink or red hearts in some book every chance that I get :P. And it's usually to thoughts of past Valentines. The nice ones.

N was one of them - my college crush. I had a boyfriend, but that's another day, another story. (He never did become my Valentine.) Cut to the chase - I remember college board elections in my final year was when I developed this huge crush on N. N was a junior, N had a gorgeous gaunt face with pronounced cheekbones and oceanic eyes. I say oceanic because I don’t remember if his eyes were blue or green or grey or brown – just that they were limpid. Yes, because I don’t often get those kind of compliments about my own eyes, I use the adjective to describe a boy’s :P.

Note to self:

Usage of word ‘limpid’ in connection with me in this lifetime – check.

Valentine's Day, 1997

Anyway, coming back to N, he was running for college president. He happened to be in my secondary group of friends at college – the music and fine arts group. There were a couple of friends from my primary gang mentioned in my previous post, but it was an eclectic mix of people from various classes and departments. Back then, I was riding on an Atlas Shrugged high, and was looking for a Galtesque face to colour my dreams – the face that knew no pain, fear or guilt. N fit the bill to a T. And I harboured a crush on him from June through next Feb, which is when I decided to do something about it.

I even remember the day – I had my Chemistry practical exams in the morning (freedom in a couple of months!) and the afternoon was dedicated to time with the lovebirds in Group B. Everyone was busy thinking of what to get their Valentines and what they could expect in return from them. I was busy preparing for the proposal of my life. Back then, pocket money did not exceed 50 rupees a week (and I had to earn it by washing Dad’s clothes and ironing them) and even then, it was a lot. (How times change. 50 rupees isn't even tuppence today.) I hadn’t allowed myself any masala dosa sessions in the college canteen all week because I needed to buy a gift for him. What did I buy? A long stemmed red rose, a super mushy Valentine’s card and a couple of BIG chocolate bars. N is one of the very few men in my life who've got chocolates from me. I walked up to him just as he came out of the canteen eating something and went down on my knees with the rose clenched between my teeth and the card and chocolates in my hand and asked him if he would be my Valentine. (An act such as this would be considered butch nowadays - chalk one more up for my generation!) He stopped mid-bite and stared at me for a full minute before he accepted my gifts of love. Which is when I told him that it was merely a confession and not a proposal :-). He and I would have never worked and we both knew it. But that is one of the best memories of my college days.

Ten years ago, on my birthday, N made a pendant of a gaunt face with pronounced cheekbones and deep-set eyes from clay and M-seal for me. I still wear it sometimes.

Valentine's Day, 2007

My Valentine for the last three years has been my one true love. He never ceases to make me feel like I’m the most beautiful woman in the world. All because I gave him a bar of Diary Milk the first time we met. And as with every Valentine’s Day since then, there was something waiting for me this year, too. Among the many tokens of love that he sent my way was this little white teddy bear that holds a red heart in its hands with “I love you” inscribed on it in gold and silver :P.

It has its pride of place on my desk at work :-).

Morals of the story:

Only men who deserve it get chocolates from me.

Those who get chocolates leave lasting impressions.

Funny Valentines make the best Valentines.

Because they're funny Valentines, I will love them all my life.

xoxox

Minu and Koopi

noreply@blogspirit.com () — Mon, 22 Jan 2007 22:00:00 +0530

Minu and Koopi are sisters. Minu is the older one, by two years. Minu is the saanvli saloni, while Koopi is the gaaon ki gori innocent bacchi. Minu, by virtue of her being the oldest of the two, likes calling the shots. Koopi is one pretty thing, with this really sweet smile. Koopi is the younger one, by two years, in case anyone out there is really, really bad at math. Minu and Koopi were losers at college romances. So was I. How do I know them? We were thick as thieves during college. We are thick even now, of a different kind. Minu and Koopi are Punjabis, and God help me if they’re not. That’s what I remember them to be, anyway. Their dad is an army man and their mom is a homemaker who makes awesome nariyal ki barfi and poori chhole and their bhaiyya is the oldest one of the children, who is, in plain language, bhaiyya to them – a quiet authority, who by virtue of being the oldest amongst all of them, commanded respect and demanded affection and got both in equal measure. That’s how I remember him. He was bhaiyya to me, too. Minu and Koopi have an older sister, I don’t remember what she looks like. Minu and Koopi have a younger sister, too – Pinky if I remember correctly. They were my favourite family amongst all my friends’ families in college.

Minu taught me a lot of things. Because she is older than me too, she would tell me aise karna chahiye aur vaise nahin karna chahiye and I would listen. Minu also taught me that draping one’s head with a dupatta while frying poories would make the poories absorb less oil and hence, there would be that much less fat that settled around one’s posterior. Apart from almost singeing my scalp and burning the skin off my ass, I have nothing to show for it, or should I say, too much to show for it, so there goes that theory out of the window. Minu would make tea for 16-17 people and after adding the teapowder to the boiling water, would come and enquire if anyone wanted strong tea. If anyone said yes, she would add ¼ spoon more. Minu also made awesome, awesome gobhi ke pakode. Minu in the final year lost her heart to someone much shorter than her (and took it back too). This was during that phase of our lives when we thought that if we did not snag someone in our group before we parted to become independent adults, we would probably never get any action. This was because our dear genetics professor, bless his heart, had told us all, and I mean all, in class, that we should get married as early as possible and not wait until we were 25, because sex was more fun when we were younger. Remind me to sue him if I ever meet him again, for misleading information and hence emotional distress, but like I was saying, most guys in our group of 16-17 people were taken, mostly by the girls in the group. I was the quintessential bridge between every possible permutation and combination of two in our group of 16-17. So anyway, coming back to Minu, I remember that she came to college once in her younger sister’s knee-length frock and she hadn’t waxed her legs, dumbass. Yes, back then, it was the age of the naïves and the don’t-cares who co-existed peacefully with one another.

Koopi is this fragile, tender-hearted thing. I remember being instrumental in her first hook-up, or so she says. He was D-bhai, my rakhi brother in college. I was mighty, mighty, mighty fond of him because during our zoology trip, he told me I looked gorgeous as I came out of my room with a towel draped around my head (I had long hair then). Something now tells me he told me that because he wanted to get closer to Koopi, because I was close to her, but anyway. Their romance was the stuff you get to read in books and watch in movies and always wish for and never have in your real life. DDLJ time it was, I remember. It went on for a year or so and gradually fizzled out because he had tremendous pressure at home to end it, and frankly, what do twenty-year-olds know about life, anyway? He broke her heart, that bastard, and I’m still fond of him. Because the romance ended on a sour note, he stopped being friends with me, too and the world has the nerve to label women drama queens. Really. Koopi's favourite song of all time is Ravindra Jain's 'Ankhiyon ke jharonkon se' sung by Hemalata. Koopi darling would belt it out like crazy after breaking up with D at every opportunity she got. She also wrote down the lyrics of the song for me and I swear I still have it somewhere. According to Koopi, if you wanted attention from a man who wasn't giving it to you, you had to sing mediocre songs such as this and nonsense rhymes of dil, mohabbat and pyar written by Sameer, composed by Nadeem Shravan and sung by Alka Yagnik loud enough for them to hear and voila! They would be at your beck and call. Unfortunately, this was another theory that flew out of the window. And I'm telling you from experience.

Yesterday, I met Minu after five years. Yesterday, I talked to Minu, really talked to her, after ten years. Minu has married a guy much younger than her, which gives me endless hope regarding my own chances of snagging someone before I hit menopause. Really, what is with her and shorter/younger men? Minu hasn’t changed one single bit, and I choose to ignore her burgeoning waist. Minu hasn’t changed one single bit. She stays twenty minutes away from where I stay and I came to know this three years later than I should have. She has an adorable three-year-old bundle of joy who demanded that I come for her birthday party next week. Koopi also is in Bangalore and is married and though she was reed-thin during college, has apparently ballooned now. Hahahaha, divine justice! I spoke to Koopi on the phone and after the standard saali kutti kameeni gaalies that I gave her, to which she replied ‘Tu kabhi sudhregi nahin’, we’ve decided that we’re doing a gupshup cum adrak waali chai cum gobhi ke pakode session soon. Thick and thick as thieves time.

Last year was a year of reunions. It looks like the trend’s spilled over to this year as well. I ask you all, who loves me, baby?

Where the streets have only two names

noreply@blogspirit.com () — Tue, 09 Jan 2007 22:05:00 +0530

Radhe. And Krishna.

I've recently returned from the best trip of my life so far. I still haven't come down from the high. And verbose and dry and prosaic as my posts are, and perhaps have always been, you just can't hear the music that plays when I write or read them :-). Whoever said that real life has no background music needs a bottle of Waxonil or a hearing aid.

For example, I can tell you of having eaten only dinner for four days and cramming in some biscuits and bananas through the day to curb the hunger that gnawed at my stomach, but you won't be able to hear the lilting voices all around calling out the Lord's name that drowned out the alimentary rumbling. I can tell you of the noiseless din in the dining hall during dinner where nobody spoke, yet everyone communicated, but you won't hear the speaker right outside the ashram that reverberated joyously in one voice the beat of a thousand hearts. I can tell you of our tireless barefoot journey in cold, cold December, on the very land that He roamed many, many years ago, but you won't hear all our teeth chattering in unison to a rhythmic chant of the Maha mantra. I can tell you how I did not know anything but Him for a precious few moments, far too precious and far, far too few, and how I did not want to know anything but Him for a long time after, but you won't hear the silent prayer that my heart knew but didn't say. I can tell you of the man with the kindest eyes I ever saw, ladling food into little bowls made from dried leaves for those who knew hunger like we never have, but you won't hear the melody that a thousand voices sang along as the hungry ate, voices that did not know dark skin from white. I can tell you of the narrow streets that were wide enough for only one cycle rickshaw to pass through at a time, streets with overflowing gutters on each side, but you won't hear the rickshawallahs call out "Radhe Radhe" to each other in a way that you could hear the smiles in their voices. I can tell you of the Lord's footprint that I touched with my own hands, but you won't hear the parrots sing and the cows moo in the gentle evening breeze.

It's been a week since I've come back, but the buzz is still there. Leaves are falling outside and I can see them flit lazily downward, pausing for effect in the gleam of the streetlight as if to tell me, "Look how light I am. I'm not bothered with all the honking below me like you are. I may not be able to fly, but look at me float. Slow. Enjoying the lightness that I feel. And learn."

Angels fly, because they take themselves lightly, I've heard someone say. Well, what do you know. I've never felt this light in my whole life.

Vrindavan, heaven on earth, take me home.

P.S. I touched HIS footprint!!!!!!!!!!! A very happy 2007, everybody! May this year be everything you want it to be!

Bittersweet

noreply@blogspirit.com () — Wed, 29 Nov 2006 23:00:00 +0530

So tell me, what do you know about goodbyes? I’ll tell you what I know of them. Goodbyes till now have been either voluntary or temporary or just what I knew was around the corner. And I’ve also known a few goodbyes where I didn’t want to say goodbye. But I’ve never known a goodbye like this before. Most goodbyes have been the ones that I knew were inevitable. And while your fair argument might be that I must have known this was coming too, my response would be that along with knowing it was going to happen sooner than later, I was also trying to will it away. I’m a regular crybaby. Like Ruthless said today, these darn tears are just primed and ready to flow at any given time. Sometimes, the damn floodgates don’t even need a reason to burst open.

Mother always used to tell me that if I left everything in the hands of God, he would find a way out for me and get me what I fervently wished for. When I was young, it was mostly true, though I suspect He had less to do with it than mom or dad did. When I crossed over into adolescence, they were still there for me, trying to make every little dream of mine come true the best that they could, but I could notice that while still the majority of my wishes were granted, some were carefully ignored or suitable substitutes were provided or suchlike. Later, as I finished studies and bravely ventured out into the big, bad world, it fell on me to make my dreams come true. Sure, I pray to God and thank him for making my parents mine even now, but you know you’ll have to toughen up as you grow older because chances are you will be heartbroken more often than be beside yourself with joy – a lesson you learn unwillingly. My first hard knock was when Mother passed away when I was 18 – I’d just finished giving my 12^th exams. And I didn’t even say goodbye to her. I didn’t think she would go, but she did. Yes, the idealists will have me know that it was because I didn’t want to let her go and that because I didn’t say goodbye, she is still around. Now I don’t see any reason to refute that, but the point is that that goodbye was inevitable too. Only, I didn’t get to say it.

I’ve cried in my teachers’ arms at school just before I gave my 10th exams – even those that I hated. I’ve cried with friends and enemies at college when we were given our certificates for having made a smooth (??) transition into adulthood – we were declared eligible for higher education/career/reproduction. I’ve even felt bad when I left a few jobs. But nothing in the world has prepared me for the goodbye tomorrow – my goodbye to the most enjoyable job I’ve had, to the best bunch of people I’ve known in one place, to the best year of my life. You don’t find perfection often. But I knew it in some measure - this comes the closest to it.

Goodbyes are hard. But you know what’s harder? Not saying goodbye when you can and letting people know how much they’ve added to your life and made your world a better place.

Goodbye, my friends, dear pretty maids all in a row. I’ve had the time of my life, thanks to you. You bon homies and the bonhomie that we knew will be sorely and surely missed :o).

My, but we learn so slow

And heroes, they come and they go,

And leave us behind

As if we’re supposed to know why

Why do we give up our hearts to the past

And why must we grow up so fast?