The whiny post

It's been a long time since I whined. No, seriously, it has been a while.

The year started with my decision that I'm going to be happy, come what bloody may. However, it's not an easy decision to act upon. I know happiness is a feeling, a state of mind and jargon like that. But well, like most other things, I decided this is the way to be. So, no am not miserable, am just annoyed. Extremely annoyed. Annoyed to the point that I am hurting my keyboard with the force I am using to type this post. This is not good. See the number of times I have used the italics to emphasize on words? I'm slowly losing my marbles.

In case, you're still reading this post, let me first pity you for being so bored that you're clearly willing to read any amount of crap. Now, if that wasn't powerful enough a tool to cheese you off, then here is another warning, I am going to bullet point my whining and attempt at amusing some extremely bored lonely soul by declaring the most ridiculous reasons or worry, as has become my life.

So drumrolls, applause and those loud punjabi cheers that sound like horrible abuses, here goes:

1. I absolutely  hate Delhi. I hate it to the point that it's not even funny anymore. I think I should get out of here soon, lest I stop loving those very few things that I do about the city. The city suffocates me. There is zero inspiration, people have the most inconsequential reasons to worry and everyone judges. It makes me judge too. I judge all those judgmental, narrow minded, hypocritical, uncouth people. I hate this place. 
2. Even though I like my job and my team, sometimes, I want to burn the building down. Its annoying how my work can range from some big awesome responsibilities to running to the ground floor with a pen drive for a senior. Some of them here need a lesson or two on leadership and well management. Turns out an MBA really does not imply managerial skills. I can start another blog on this- it will be called jerks at work. But, once i leave this place or maybe this corporate whore lifestyle altogether. 
3. I want to publish. Yes well, am not saying I haven't started. I recently gave out samples of my free verse poetry, let's see how that turns out. But I want to publish a compilation of short stories and a book- which I've already started. But it's so difficult to sit down and keep writing. It will take me at least a year to get done with this book. I am SO slow. This sucks. 
4. I am most certainly incapable of being in a relationship, or for that matter falling in love. I'm at peace with the fact of course and mostly it's not an issue, but at times theres this strange feeling inside- how detached am I? I fall for them men easily, mostly because of my love for novelty and then I snap out of it just the same, because of well, my dislike for boredom. But ah well, sometimes you make decisions when you decide to be no damsel in distress. 
5. Everything in life seems so pointless lately. Just about everything. 
6. I am nowhere on my five year weight loss plan. 
7. I am sleepy all the time, but I can't sleep. 
8. I really need to stop thinking. I wish I could switch my brain off. 
9. I am cynical, so cynical and as it turns out not even by choice. 

I'm tired of telling everyone life will be okay and jazz like that. So sick of listening to people either breaking up or getting married. I don;t know which is worse actually.

I have now completed, easily the worst post on this blog. Seriously! See what this city is doing to me? I'm worried about inconsequential bullshit. Soon you'll find me cribbing about a chipped nail with a bunch of blonde-brained, snow white skinned, ironed hair sporting factory made barbie dolls. 

It's almost as if my dear Delhi collects people basis their lack of intelligence and more importantly creativity. 

Balle Balle, it most certainly is then!

~

P.S: If I've hurt the sentiments of any Delhi lovers in this post, I am sorry or not  being apologetic at all. If you're a true Delhite, you'll never get the humour, so please feel free to abuse to hell out of this delhi-hater, like you roll down the windows and hurl those shameful abuses at the guy who overtook you (did he not know it is your birthright to speed outrageously!). 

If you're actually laughing, you're a poor soul stuck in this dreadfully uninspiring city, just like me or you're in a state of inebriation. Either way, you're better off than the other guys. 

 

Broken hearts and harem pants

The madness sings its perfect song
And how mad would that be
This madness has a mind of its own
And no method can it ever be.

She's racing ahead and racing strong
But her thoughts, they speed like light
Cloudy thoughts and broken hearts
Seldom feel right.

She runs along anyway,
So scared to ever stop
But her breath, it runs out and how
Just an inch away from the ladder top.

You see broken hearts and wicked brains,
Seldom ever mix
So, a part of her ran far away
While a part of her still awaited the tryst.

The madness crazed her heart and soul
But her mind was in a different fix,
So much to do, such little time
Weary, she was of the old tricks.

Peace was the elusive partner
To her exhausted, cynical soul
But her heart, it had a mind of its own
She tried to suppress its role.

Was it one straight line, she ran along
Or three sixty degrees of craze?
How did it matter, she asked herself,
There was no destination either way!

A part of her made bullet points
Of every hurdle to face
Then the other part splattered paint all over it
Naming it pointless, this mad mad race.

The mind it sang its own sweet song
And how perfect that would be
But her heart, it had a mind of its own
And no method could it ever see.

~

Why grow up

I spent the day playing with clay.

After months, today, my head does not hurt from racing thoughts. Turns out clay never ceases to be fun! Also, i found the remedy to put my brain to rest. Green clay and back-to-back movies.

I don't like facebook.
I don't like gtalk.
I like blogspot, only because I can choose to talk to it without being talked to.

My sister is a nutcase. There really is no better way to describe her.

I have random, interrupted, disassociated thoughts again. It's a great feeling. Welcome back yo! :)

A perfect end to the day will be making prank calls, telling random aunties on the line to go 'catch their refrigerator' when they say 'yes' in response to 'is your refrigerator running?'

When did life become about all this adult (no-pun-intended) stuff anyway. I still like lemon flavoured lollypops and choco-bar!

~

What an idea, I say

How about a little game to test the writing skills?
I am thinking, I should pick an adjective/verb/emotion everyday and weave a story/ snippet/ poetry around it. A piece that would bring out that single word emotion to the best degree possible. Everyday is unrealistically ambitious, but atleast as often as I can.
It will help streamline my own thoughts and the consequence of thoughts too.
I recently woke up in the middle of the night to realize, the only reason I do everything that I do do and the only thing I probably even want to do, is to make those around me think. It's ironic because I can be pretty impulsive myself. But what I mean is, to get them to just pause for a moment, think and question themselves, their beliefs, their ideas, contradict them, argue it out maybe and then well, they can move on. Just that one moment, is all I need, a moment that they use to shake up, loosen up and question everything they are being rigid about. So vague a dream, you say? But it is the highlight of who I am. It is the reason I am contradicting and contradictory all the time, but more on that some other time.
So, if I can manage to convey a single emotion so strongly in one piece, I'd consider it a victory in its own right. You know those little victories you do crazy happy dances about in your head? That kind.

~

Dreams

I hold my dreams so close,
Because I fear I'd lose them all.
I wrap them up in polythene
So they're lifeless, like a doll.

I whisper to them at night though,
With a heartache, not so small
And when I put on those running shoes,
I still hear their call.

But so long as they're a secret
There is at least that ray of hope, tall.
So I'll let my dreams be dreams alone
They never see the light of the day, at all.

~

P.S: We are often so scared of our dreams, we underestimate our power to execute them. Execution is a boring affair and barely as romantic and exciting as dreaming itself, but it's braver, no doubt. Is imagination best left unexplored? Should dreams really be left as dreams alone?

Agony

A million little pieces of me,
Lie scattered here and there
Come, take your pick.
Hold the piece you find dear.

Smile at your little piece
If you love, then do tell her.
Hold it close enough
So you can hear her silent whimper.

~

My childhood nightmare

I will never forget this nightmare. It haunted me for a large part of my childhood and is still stuck in my memory. I   think about it sometimes and I think maybe it had  a message or some strange meaning...

The dream is about me, but quite obviously I do not see my face. I see my house though- the old house I was born in. That house was in exactly the same place I am now, only that it was broken down to build this new one that I don't particularly like, this new one will never be like my old home. So yes, that was a big house with 2 floors and a terrace and it had spiral stairs of sorts. The dream starts with me running into the house from the gate at the back of the house. For some mysterious reason am wearing only my under garments (I was like 4, so it's not so strange). This big, rather muddy monster follows me into our home. Everyone panics and runs away in different directions. I take the stairs and start to climb. Somehow I manage to hide myself in the staircase and the monster follows the children of our tenants who lived in the room on the terrace.

And then it's just me running. And running...

~

Updates and Upwards

So, I realized sometime back, people actually  read this blog. I mean am sure they aren't great in number but the ones that are, follow it and get it, and the ones I know of, do matter. So first up, for once I shall be modest and non-pompous, why I will even go out of the way to be humble and grateful (if I use one more virtuous word in this post, noone will believe i wrote it, so let's stop here) to all those who read.

I've decided to go public now. More public than online. I've been meaning to publish  collection of short stories and poetry for a while now but could never really make up my mind. But, thanks to some people around me, I am sort of convinced to give this whole commercial thing a shot.  I mean being a writer can't always remain a dream can it? So there is nothing substantial in place yet. But, the decision has been made. I shall first show a collection of these poetic scribbles. I've already written the rough draft of the prelude to the collection. Will hopefully get done with all the editing and getting opinion soon and then start the tedious task of publisher meetings. In fact, if you are reading this and you think you can/want to help in anyway, do drop me an email. I'd value your view/opinion on the work as well if you could suggest the way forward. Am new to this world. Clueless as can be.

Can a burning desire  and that strong will and passion to achieve, actually be enough to achieve? Maybe not, but it's always a good start.

Lots been happening. 2011 has been rather eventful. Surprises, novelty, frivolity, discovery, inspiration, euphoria, pain, suffocation. It's only the third month and I already feel so lost. I think it's the uncertainty, the wait, the fact that I am out of control. The fact that I know something good is going to come of this because I have to get my way. But, the wait..oh the wait..

In other news, I am getting a paranoia of sorts with respect to my health. No, really. It's funny because I am usually suspicious of medicines and doctors and believe sleep can cure anything and everything. But, offlate I've addressed myself as  bi polar, schizophrenic, OCPD and well some other things which are actually too embarass to put up here. The funny thing is how I drove certain people nuts about those things, but lets leave out the specifics, as always. Besides, as is life, the specifics important at one point of time, slowly lose relevance over time. See why I never mention names, real incidents or an honest update of my emotions here?  Writing is what I love the most in the world- it is a means of self expression. However, I can never write a diary because that is a scary memory book of people and experiences you might want to  erase out altogether. In my case, the erasing of experiences happens almost as often as new experiences themselves. So yea.

I must end now. Running around in circles never results in a solution.  It results in a freaking headache the size of the giant monster whom I used to dream about in the early years of my childhood. It results in fatigue and that incessant, urgent need to break bloody free.
I should know.

~

City-wise

I've been meaning to put my thoughts together on this one, for really long. But for some reason, morbid poetry always beats the other ideas and ends up seeing th light of the day before others. But anyway, let's not drift again.

I love travelling. Well, technically I hate flights and have road sickness so a journey by rail is usually the preferred medium. But what I actually love is going to new places. I know traditionally, if you are in a new city, you see what it's famous for, eat what it's famous for, click what it's famous for and then go back with happy memories. I don't intend to make myself sound too cool and different for those things. I do them too, yes. But what really sticks with me is the sense of the city. Time passes by and the city becomes a faint memory with a certain background score to it. The people? Yes of course. But people come and people go and they leave you with beautiful memories too, but that's for another post, later sometime. The thing about a city is, it changes the way you feel about yourself and why maybe even someone with you.

I've lived in Madras, Bombay and Dilli. Yes, this is the way i prefer to address the 3 cities and that shall remain. Associated with each of these are hazy memories of people, incidents, experiences with a faint background score. But you know the things I see in my mind when I think of these cities? The roads. It is certainly not intentional and in fact a rather startling discovery. I see those roads with clarity, you know? And then there are colours, like Dilli is always green, Madras is yellow and Bombay just has to be red. Everytime I think of each of these cities, I go back to the way they make me feel or the person I used to be in these cities.

Dilli is home. Its where I was born, brought up and its where I came back, every time. I love and hate the city. I love the citty only little and hate the city beyond measure. But it's home. And nothing can ever take away from the first city that's your home. I love the infrastructure, the pure beauty. I've seen this city change and oh how it has changed. I love the urbanization accompanied by the history associated with it. It's the city where on my way to a monument more than 100 years old, I see spoilt teenagers driving their fathers' cars to impress another daddy's little rich girl. It's the city where women dread getting out at night alone and still the city with the prettiest roads. It's the city of loud people, unrestricted road rage and abuses and then its' the city that you can wake up and go for a long walk in the morning all by yourself. The city is beautiful. The people are a different story altogether. It's a city that spoils you and then it's a city that makes you strong. But it's a city that for all its spacious roads and lavish greenery, suffocates the hell out of me.

Madras. I lived there for 5 years and what beautiful memories that city did give me. It's my yellow. I associate the happiest period of my childhood to Madras. In a way I'm so glad I spent my early years there because it has come a long way in shaping who I am. Everytime I go back there, its only happy. I can't remember specifics ( even though I actually know  my way around in the city!). It is the city with faint memories, the smell of musk and the sound of laughter- innocent, unknowing, shrill laughter. It's the city where I made my first set of "best" friends- the friends I can still write 'letters' to. It's the city of the first crush and all those fancy things bollywood movies associate with childhood. And then, my city of beaches- the city that is responsible for my love for the sea. I used to love going to the beach- and it left behind memories of just me and the water. Its overdone and cliche but for a reason- very few experiences can beat sitting in from of the sea watching the tides rise and subside and then feel the salty water on your toes and just when you being to love that feeling, the water resides only to return back later and leave you thinking, leave you wondering...

And then there is my favourite city so far- Bombay. It's my favourite of ALL the cities I've ever been to, every lived in- in India and abroad. The city is romanticized, talked about, visualized- its called the city of dream, the city that never sleeps. But, all for a good reason. There's something about that city. Even for someone as descriptive as me, I run short of adjectives to describe it perfectly. Its crammed and its crowded. It's busy and it's dirty. But why then is it so free, so liberating? That's the irony I am unable to grasp. Bombay breathes inspiration. Even in the daily tedious routine of life, I would feel so inspired. Everything about that city is worth clicking and being written about. Be it the over done Queen's Necklace or that man I saw walking in the subway- I can't remember what he looked life, but I remember him, the anger in his eyes, the urgency in his walk and the sense of fatigue on his forehead. It's a magnanimous city and crazy one at that. It's a city like no other and it will be the city I move back to eventually.

I need to live in many more cities though- for atleast a year. It's like a volleyball of sorts, but it's worth it.

~

For love or for hate

For love or for hate,
I make your dreams my own.
Then I laugh carelessly,
As you struggle with them alone.

For love or for hate,
I hold you close as you scream
But, I smile at your fear
And of revenge, my eyes gleam.

For love or for hate,
I write you a song.
Then I cry in my sleep,
Because I know you lie all along.

For love or for hate,
I tell you I care.
Then, when you look at me helplessly,
I remind you, life is but, unfair.

For love or for hate,
I watch the world spin on
And when I see what I shouldn't
I call it a mere twist of fate.

~