A Life of Spontaneity and Chaos

It is quite easy to lose yourself in your life...the life you so ambitiously created and have been possessively nurturing for the past years. One fine day you are talking to a new-found friend and in sharing your story you realize that you are not even that person anymore.
And while you may be perfectly happy with where your life is presently at, this realization disturbs you. Let alone wondering about existential questions like who we are and where have we come from, you are left brooding about where have you lost yourself?
A rendezvous with old friends, reading a blog from the past, watching old pictures of yourself...every single thing takes you back to a time when you were so sure what your future will be like. When everything important was yet to happen.
When you could confidently maintain that you will life on your own terms and you will love every minute of it...
But your terms can be pretty boring after a while... You may not even like your own terms once you have lived by them... You may desire for completely new terms every now and then...
Terms that could be life changing yet at the same time will reconnect you with your old self. A life path that is progressive and retrogressive at the same time... A life on terms that allow you to be you but doesn't allow you to lose yourself.
A life of spontaneity and chaos...
A life with no plans and only impulse decisions...
A life that is only meant for the callous and carefree child within you... One who never wants to grow up and be a more responsible version of you.

My dream is Me!

The sand of time is slippery yet leaves a distinctive granular, wounded trail in its wake. Every birthday is a reminder of how much you have achieved and how much you have failed to...A string of birthday party photos of years past, makes you realize the potential in you that continues to be unrealized. Somewhere along your mid 20s, you suddenly get attacked by "maturity" and life's priorities change. 

Staying fit and being comfortable in your own skin doesn't remain on the top of your list... 

Being happy gets crushed under the burden of being responsible... 

Spontaneous adventures give way to planned, risk-free trips...

And you morph into someone who keeps on getting a cryptic comment like "You have changed a lot!" from your old friends and acquaintances. Nobody ever cares to explain the perceived change and even the die-hard optimist in you lands up interpreting the worst possible meaning of this comment.

The years don't show...yet 20s are your physical prime after all...But instead of waiting like Michele Pfiefer for that 'One fine day' when your life will change as if George Clooney has entered it, why not take charge of the present and turn it into a true birthday gift?If there is anything to be learned from the showbizz, it is this - "Its never too late to get HOT!"

The universe doesn't sit around waiting for the Alchemist to realize that it is time to realize his destiny, even though it is the prime conspirator. So why would it wait for you to get on top of your game and become who you really want to be.People go to great lengths to realize their one true dream. And if you haven't realized what your dream is yet, why not make yourself the ultimate dream?

It takes patience. 

It needs effort. 

It requires dedication. 

It demands sacrifice. 

But the final prize is worth every moment that you spent in front of your mental 'Mirror of Erised'. The haunting desire of your heart shown in the mirror will one day become your reality. And that day, the sandy trail of time won't seem as corrosive as it does today. The lines of maturity will fade, the sparkle of spontaneity will return to your eyes and the flab of responsibility will ripple like toned muscles of joy!

The Moribund Ambition

The first time you hold a microphone and enthusiastically croon the tunes of ‘oye oye’ from ‘Tridev’ for an avid audience, your central nervous system isn’t even developed enough to retain the memories completely. Then you grow up to qualify for choir singing and soon the nerve to face the crowd alone wanes out of you. However, past adolescence, in the nascent stages of adulthood, you start harboring the dream of becoming a pop star. It doesn’t matter to you that only little girls are fans of ‘Hanna Montana’, you are happy to be in your late teens and yet admire the perky-optimistic lyrics of ‘Best of both worlds’! So this time you don’t sing in a choir, you are up for grabbing a rocking identity on stage.

You struggle, you fall, you rise again yet you crawl… until you hit the wall of limited audience and tiny scope! Soon you realize that your voice is not made for the microphone. The nasal twang in your voice is not appreciated by anyone and you should focus more on management than on music. Alas, when hope is crushed, you don’t see any leftovers, all that remains is emptiness. Miraculously however, then comes the time of ‘Himesh Reshmiya’ and twang is the buzz word in the music biz! So you rise to prominence once again in your own happy-to-laugh-at-parodies lot. But it is too late… that point in time is gone when you could have chosen music as a life path.

Yes, the dialog in ‘Jab we met’ does make you think once again that life is still not over and music can still be a direction for you. But somehow, the comfort of not struggling with a guitar and not subjecting yourself to ridicule in auditions has become the norm for you. The talent fizzles out…

Years pass, you are only a bathroom singer now…at times friends coax you into singing, but that is it. All that remains is a moribund ambition which flares up when you see people auditioning for American Idol or when you see kids still performing on stage with a hope in their eyes which nobody can squelch out… yet. The guitar gathers dust and the tonsils swell up to comfort. You are breathless 10 seconds into the melody and soon, singing will be a forgotten dream. But was it meant to be this way…can you find your sound one day?

Is there a ‘Tara’ to go to…where you can remove yourself from the everyday mundane and tell your singing heart “Tomorrow is another day”?

The Cake Dream

The sight of dark swirling chocolate with whipped creme in front of you and the scent of hot cake wafting from the oven behind. The slow rise of batter visible from outside, every glance stolen. Bubbles on the surface telling you, it's going to be perfect...fluffy, scrumptious, warm and tender... Then the focus shifts back to the icing...it has to be perfect too...the dark, rich brown of coco hiding the pristine white of creme...
Then you shift and wake up!
Damn!!!
It's morning and there is no cake cooking...it was just a dream.
In zombie fashion you walk to the washroom and get fresh. Somehow the residual sleep is magnified after the  trip to the loo. Dragging your feet to the kitchen, you fix yourself a brown bread sandwich with soya spread and nutri. So much for the cake dream!

Sifting through the daily mundane activities, and the oh-so-heavy dose of reality, the cake keeps visiting you from time to time. Sleeping is not required anymore, you can almost sense its taste and richness in your daydreams. The fantasy turns to the haunting! Ingesting some more yellow-food you fantasize about the dark coco color of your imaginary friend...
A friend, yes...The dreary reality makes the fickle dream seem like such a friend. It doesn't apply rules, doesn't expect, doesn't judge your actions or other thoughts...it just lingers...like an emotional support to your battered psyche. You ache and long for the chance to drift back into the dream world when you can actually taste your magical creation of the night before. The idea doesn't occur that the dream may not continue (its not "Tivo" up there, after all!).
By the time its the hour to hit the sack again you are so obsessed with the cake that you can't shut your eyes long enough to fall asleep. Every cell in your body seems to be vibrating, dying to transcend into an alternate reality which can take you that much closer to your cake! 60 minutes of tossing in the bed later, you get up.
Pick up the phone.
Dial a 24 hours service.
Place an order for your dream.
And then the reality hit you again... there is no cash in the wallet.

Damn!!!
You pick the phone again.
Dial the same service.
Cancel the order.
Hit the sack.
This time, sleep doesn't evade...it comes and engulfs you in the scent of your cake once again...

Freedom...j'adore!

Of the changes I keep choosing to experience, the one that has begun this year is the most liberating one! Freedom without independence (yet!) can be quite unnerving and for a change, I understand now how the people of our nation must have felt on 15th Aug, 1947. The idea is not to compare my life to the country but to simply cherish the idea of comprehension which has long since escaped me. I detested history lessons about our freedom struggle with an uncanny passion; not because I am not patriotic but because they were the same for 5 whole academic years!!! And I still couldn't figure out what was all the big fuss about...
So basically my own lack of empathy bothered me beyond expression.
But finally I have caught up.
Freedom is something so dear to revel in that it doesn't matter how often you talk about it, you will not be able to do justice to the feeling in itself. Sleeping without an alarm clock, eating when you want to and not because it's the lunch hour, lounging (read lazying) around with your favorite book and going out when the weather is actually worth enjoying. That's a little piece of heaven...right there...on earth!
You don't need to die to get all that.
You just need to kill the independent chic inside you!
For independence is a different story altogether. It makes you responsible and sneakily build shackles of its own. You start depending on yourself and before you know it, you are proud of yourself. Pride that is based on the shaky grounds of consistently holding a job and sustaining yourself. Pride that helps you hold up your head and walk into a store and use your plastic money to buy some form of happiness and of-course, experience some very expensive retail therapy. Pride that affords you meaningless nights of intoxication just so you can have a hung-over Monday, earning yourself some more independence. Pride that makes you look down upon those who chose the easy life and didn't bother to enter the rat-race. Pride that eventually turns you into someone you hoped you will never be...a slave to your independence.
Been there...done that!
And now that I have opened myself to experience what is so fleeting in it's essence; I don't want to let go. A childhood dream of becoming a pirate one day does come back and appeal horrendously to me. But then again, may be it will take some more life to finally be ready for an adventure of that proportion. For now, I have to satisfy with feeling free to do with my life what I wanted to. Be selfish and not proud. Be free but not independent. Struggle a little against the norm and renounce the "Stepford" routine once and for all.
And while it's possible...live a little. :) :) :)

Fear of fear

Fear.
It is probably the most detested word in the dictionary of mankind. The emotion is as pathetic as it can be and then some. Poets have scorned it, authors have mocked it, bards have condemned it and artists have shunned it in all their creations.
But fear has stayed on...for it did not need anyone's praise or acceptance. It knew when to creep in and corrupt someone's psyche. Fear is more self aware of itself than any other emotion and it gives the possessor an uncanny capability to survive. For without fear, there is no fight.
It's not my favorite vice...I would rather avoid it and if it surfaces, I try to master it and get over it. If someone even implies in some hypothetical situation that I may face fear; I rush on to prove that fear will fear me...I am that brave!
A more accepting mind will admit (to self) that fear is as much a part of one's existence as the need to survive. Bravery to the extent of being daredevil is nothing but denial. It is astonishing, how it takes someone's brave struggle against extreme pathos to make one realize the potential of fear.
We are what we make ourselves and not what life makes of us, but this fire to make something out of our own ashes and rise again like a phoenix comes from nothing but fear.
Without fear of failure, there is no extra effort.
Without fear of loss, there is no reason to protect.
We build ourselves in anticipation of a future which may not always be what we fear but which may be so. The desire to improve and get ahead of oneself doesn't just come from ambition but from fear as well. It maligns the most positive of notions and brings a notoriously bloody flavor to life.
Sometimes it's important to be not brave, to not stand and fight but to fear the nemesis and make an exit strategy. Sometimes the only thing holding you back from giving your 100% is the lack of fear.

It hasn't been easy to accept the potential of fear, but the idea has made its mark.
Still, I fear, admitting that I am anything but fearless will take me a lifetime...

Little life...

A little sweet...a little sour...a little close, not too far...all I need is to be free...


The lines are stolen for sure but the feelings are closer to home than they can ever be.
To an outsider, the other side of grass always seems greener but what if the grass isn't even grass and merely a mirage...
Those who perceive you as the ultimate person are unable to comprehend your lacks and wants. Those who are envious of you can not value their own  blessings. All the philosophies ever written in the world are a writer's attempt to convince self of a greater sense of being and a way to wait for a better purpose in life. Philanthropy for instance is raved about by many, but at the same time scorned for the hypocrisy that propagates it in reality. Now someone missing the trait might glorify it as it is something that may be highly coveted while someone who has 'done that and been there' may be able to tell for a fact how a good deed can go down the drain!
However, truly ingenuous is the persona that makes you want to be like that yet makes you realize the impossibility of it...a life that you want to have but can't have due to the sheer nature of 'you' is what dreams are made of.
Some of us search for these sweet and sour flavors of life in a sheltered and unsurprising life...others, try the unknown to taste freedom! Some of us like the harmony of routine while others like the challenge of chaos! Some of us like to be spectators and some want nothing more than being in the spotlight. Contentment is hard to get by; but then again who has ever told a great story by being content with life?!
It's the dissatisfactions, the restlessness and the unease of being incomplete that drives people towards greatness. (Its sheer abuse of time that drives people towards writing philosophy...NOTE TO SELF - write a story next time!!!)
In the end, life may seem a drag when the hours of the day are ghastly and hard to pass...but it is in essence shorter than the oscillation of an electron and should not be wasted wanting and not getting. It should rather be wasted (Err...Utilized) getting and wanting some more. 
The little life we all get is to live and to be alive...to be or not to be is never an option...its just and illusion of an option!

A voice that soothed and wounded at once...

No, I am not talking about your conscience!!! It either soothes or wounds...possessing both the qualities is rare for even an inner voice...
However, one man wielded such a weapon and used it very well...

Tributing a few words, a blog post or a few minutes of my life to the Legend called Jagjit Singh may be inconsequential to a world left bereft since the legend departed; but I can not NOT write about the era that has ended...
After all, the guy singlehandedly made generations crave for sweet melancholy of love by singing about it...
'koi fariyad' made coveting sounds so absolutely HOT...
'hoshwalo ko khabar kya' made a guy playing with a scarf seem NOT cheesy!
'kal chaudhvi ki raat thi' proved how moon pales when compared to love's glow...
'hotho se chhulo tum' is as intoxicating as a patiala peg...
'woh kagaz ki kashti' has made many of us nostalgic about those childhood moments...
and 'chitthi na koi sandesh' has left many a wet eyes in its wake...

The list is endless....all of us have at least one favorite from his treasure of gazals! For those with some deep set wounds of heart, his music and his words always acted like a balm... The songs never felt unworldly...they were as if they were written for just your situation...
However for those of us, who had no apparent reason for being sad, his songs simply meant a chance to sit on the rocking chair and act all grown up while listening to gazals on the walkman... :P
Or perhaps to some of the crazier creed amongst us, imitating him whilst having fits of shivering just felt too amazing to resist...
Something about this icon of a man and his singing appealed to everyone!

Nevertheless, there has never been a more melodious baritone and there probably never will be...It may not be as sweet a tribute as he deserved, but he will be missed all the same and always remembered for the Titan that he was in the arena of music.

Oscillations

Some heavy duty nostalgia is what it takes to rocket one down the misery-lane. You miss what you once had and didn't cherish enough and you crave to have what time would never allow you to have again....your past!
But its the same nostalgia that can give you that feeling of wholesomeness that describes a full life...
You had friends and you had great fun with them...
You had time and you made the most of it...
You had dreams and you slept some more to build the plot further... :)


Its the swinging between the good and bad of thoughts that makes or breaks one's day. For sure, the thoughts aren't innately holding any character. They are just synaptic pulses shuffling between the idle neurons, there for not much good. Character is given to them by the colorful human mind which doesn't life things to be neutral. One minute you would be staring at a screen full of rows and columns and the next, your mind will be painting an image of a hostel room somewhere, attached to which was the sunlit balcony where you lounged with your friends and had faux-saas-bahu conversations.
Someday you will be watching a movie or show about friends and you will be thinking with a smile, of all the friends you miss and want to be with...
On other days, you would just be miserable thinking about your friends...of why you can't be with them and why the f*** does politics affect your plans!!! (cursing is just the beginning then)


Its not unusual to come across such oscillating-between-realities individuals everyday. It is unusual to stay unaffected after such contact. Their swing can put your mind in motion and send you  in throes of unwanted emotions. The key is to retain your brain for those rows and columns momentarily and save your trip to nostalgia-ville for some time when you can enjoy it more than it can enjoy you.
After all ...there is no better way to spend some time alone lying in your bed, thinking about the good, the bad and the ugly of what made you...you!

Tere Mere Sath Jo Hota Hai...

As a student, its easy to hate chemistry....especially if u have a sensitive nose and a lousy memory...
But as you grow...u learn a new definition of Chemistry; which has nothing to do with acrid smelling H2S leaks or 'ring tests'...[Pun intended]...or may be it does...
How two people react to each other, how they bond, how they don't gel, how something sizzles and something fizzles...its all explained by this 'chemistry'!
Now for an amateur, its difficult to understand how biology gets explained by chemistry! But hey...I din't go to college for nothing!
Its as simple as it seems complex. what two people have, two other people can't have. Its the law of 2...
Edward-Bella is not equal to Bella-Jacob!
Harry-Cho is not equal to Harry Ginny!
Ron-Hermione is not equal to Ron-Anyone else!
Johnny Depp-Palak is definitely not equal to Johnny Depp-Any other fan!!!

The chemistry creeps in because of the 'chemical locha' that goes on in one's mind (Munna bhai nahi dekhi kya bheedu?)

Developing an insight into relationships that we have with so many of our friends, colleagues, family members and that-special-someone is not something most of us bother our minds with. But life is much more easier when we establish our own different shades with different people around us!
Ever wonder why just the sight of some people make you smile and why the mere mention of others makes you cringe?!?
Its not because they are different...(well Duhh...that's a given!); its because you are different towards them!
Howsoever non-judgmental, non-committal and unprejudiced one may be...What electrical and chemical pathways your body is going to choose in response to one person are not going to be the same as those chosen for another.
The sooner one accepts that, the easier it is to digest that while you may be the most adorable and un-explosive friend to your friends; its no guarantee that you would be as amicable a lover...;)

So when a happy-go-LUCKY singer asks 'tere mere sath jo hota hai, wo sb ke sath kyu hota nahi'...ask him to read my blog!!! (& comment too, if i might add :P)

Bloody Heaven

A nice, long break from the mundane eventualities of life is always welcome. Even though once upon a time this mundaneness was a dream; its becoming a reality makes everything else much more meaningful. The world seems to be moving on at a pace at which your footsteps aren't of much consequence.

It rains or the sun shines, people strike or go about their work...festival or regular-old-week-day...life is never at rest, click click click and another number dialed...click click click and yet another mail sent...click click click...voila! reporting the height of mundane!!!

It is inane, how things of significance start seeming like necessity if provided in abundance and how getting deprived of them can send one in bouts of melancholy...

Weeks ago, redundancy was a subject worth pondering...now it is nothing less than a fantasy...

What is still to unravel is... if "we look up" for happiness in the spreadsheet of our life, then how should the search field be defined and... how potent will the formula be if all the different files of our life are open from different sources?!!?

(GEEEEZZZZ!!! This is definitely NOT how I want my first book to read like one day!)

The sweetest of hell is the one that pays you to be part of it... and while everyone of us experience it at one point or the other, it can't be all for all of us.

Sometimes there is an escape route all figured out...sometimes you merely improvise ( like Captain Sparrow, if i might add)!

But hell catches up, all the same...

Money Money Money!

The world sure knows the value of money and yet tries hard to deny it!

It is believed that money can't buy happiness, memories and love. (But money can sure lead the way to all these!)

Even if you don't have money but you have integrity, your life is successful. (But it doesn't hurt to have money and a show of integrity!)

Money can't help you sleep at night...(But it can buy sleeping pills for you! Or better still, can provide you so many options that sleeping becomes redundant...)

If you flaunt money, you are tasteless...a Northerner(read Delhi-ite & Punjabi) in India and a Southerner in US!(But have money, you must.)

Money can't give you inner peace (But it sure can fuel some ambition and keep you young for long! After all, if you have more memories than dreams then you are nothing but old...)

Money surely isn't the best thing in the world (Yet it is gratifying to have as much of it as possible...)

Now, why would an entire specie be so mad about something as mundane as pieces of paper or in the more contemporary sense, digits in your e-bank balance? No other specie on the planet is even interested in barter...let alone finding a convenient medium of transaction. Nature gives and everyone takes graciously, the word 'transaction' is that much to them. But not us enlightened ones! We have to do things uniquely...don't we?!

And thus originated 'Money'...

Personally, I don't fancy money much... ( I can almost imagine the cynical grins of all those who are reading it)...green is really my color only when it comes to couture!

But the fabulous nature of money isn't lost on me either. I adore the idea of owning and purchasing and trading and hence...whatever money facilitates, I adore that. But not money in particular....

I mean, I would love to have the power of money! Never having enough of it have made me covet it quite often. Having some of it occasionally have made me appreciate its significance and being utterly without it at times have revealed to me what 'lack of inner peace is like'!!!

I could be a millionaire if fallen hair were the medium of transactions and not those green notes/shiny coins; sadly it isn't so! So the dream of money stays...

The desire to be rich and limitless is as enticing as ever. With time the (boring) significance of making money the right way does dawn upon most of us...but money still remains that sinful temptation that is not openly appreciated by society yet secretly loved by everyone.

Man-eater

ooo... here she comes...she's a man-eater...

ooo...here she comes...

Yes well, the title implies something more grotesque than the femme-fatale! But so is obviously not the case. In the battle of the sexes, some smart*** has found a perfect way of settlement and named it "Men Are From Mars & Women Are From Venus". Whatever happened to evolution, dude?! An even more incredulous fact about this "settlement" is that it is proposed by a guy!!!

I suppose everyone has a right to humor themselves, but really, human males and females are pretty much a different sub-specie. For one side to write about the other is as fair as chimps writing about orangutans! Again, one is entitled to one's opinion, but that opinion when reduced to such basal statement as to different people being from different planets is a big OUCH!

For one, differences between the sexes are just not to be laughed at. They are there for a reason...they are there because women have evolved to a point where they have started seeming different to men. Let us consider just about any other specie on the planet (preferable mammals, coz many non chordates seem hell bent on exhibiting cannibalism right after fornication!); males and females are pretty much alike. Behaviorally, anatomically and socially...males and females act as the same specie. But not the planet-dominating specie! No-no...we have to be different. And its not just enough that we are different from all the fauna, we have to be different from each and every specimen of our specie as well!

And so we come back to the real topic, the femme fatale a.k.a man-eater :D

Now that females have evolved to perfection, a metaphorical cannibalism is inevitable. Women are shining everywhere. When I was in school, it was the better CBSE pass % of girls... then when I was in college, it was the excellent intellectual finesse of girls over boys... and getting into the statistics of other things is simply mundane! Everyone knows, what a girl can accomplish, a guy can't (what with an incomplete chromosome :P)

The perfection isn't all... there has to be dominance accompanying it. Hence the femme fatale version of the fair folk, I am referring to. Of course, becoming a Black widow is not the way to be but grabbing every opportunity and getting ahead, surely is! Give all the 'Barney(s)' out there, a run for their money!!!

So all the single ladies (and ok, the married ones too) out there...don your fierceness and...

"make a lil love...live a lil life...get down tonight" B-)

Green Grass Blue Sky

The normal, natural course of things is always favored by humans when it comes to the world around. But when the same favor is requested by a human being, it is more often than not, denied!

Oh, it isn't yet another forlorn piece that keeps marveling at the inadequacies of being human. It is a piece that accepts that nature is normally dominant but human will suppresses it so, that every instance new nature keeps emerging...and a new norm is attained.

One may wonder however, what does the greenness of grass and blueness of sky has to do with it? It is with absolute clarity that I can connect these four words with the Vodafone (Hutch) jingle! And I am equally certain that all of us can...What we don't bother to pay attention to is the utter lack of naturality in the advertisement. Given there were grasslands and mountains and ponds and clouds and everything else that nature provides us to feast our eyes upon... but there was a cute, little Pug too in it. It is the most un-natural thing I am referring to! It follows the kid around (ok yeah, dogs do that!)...it brings the kid whatever it wants...without even being instructed to do so ( yeah that happens to, but come on! Was the Pug psychic?!)...it slept on its back, imitating the kid (can you buy that?)... its even out in the damp, rainy time to be 'wherever you are' (I had a dog, he hated damp. You can't fool me!)...

Now the contention is not to deliberate over an excellent advertisement, but to observe how human will, over-rid nature and produced a masterpiece out of it! I believe that it can't be so difficult, therefore, to alter a nature that is inherent to a being.

Its not only philosophy, obviously not! Its a belief deeply rooted in the fact that people do lose weight!

Not the "biggest loser" type only...but 5lbs, 10lbs here and there...people do it all the time! Now why does the need arise in the first place? Because its in the nature of those indulgent people to seek happiness in food. And believe me, its not a disease always! Its not an emotional inadequacy either...its simply nature!

I can't help it if I was born underweight and decided as an infant to make up for it all my life...i DON'T want to help it if my idea of a good time is having chocolates and ice creams to gorge down! ITS MY NATURE!!!

But then its also my will that I won't be beat down by my own nature... I don't want the torment of browsing a fashion magazine all my life! I want the satisfaction of being as hot as the pages that my fingers flip through! But in this clash between WILL and NATURE, I want both to reach a compromise... The passion for food must not be replaced by anorexia and bulimia for the will to win and the nature must not prevail by making a BMI of 27 seem unavoidable!

After all...if a Pug can do it, I sure can :D

Undependable Independance

Freedom is bitter, freedom is sweet.

It feels like raindrops and it feels like heat.

It breezes away the worries of the heart that beats.

Freedom you are mine...

without you I am not human, I am meat!

The sentiment is well understood by all (black, brown and white; alike). Its so well understood that it morphs into any meaning one wants it to have. For we are free to interpret freedom in our own way. In the smallest things we do in life, we want to be free to make the choice. How we live life should be our business not anyone else's. How we cling to the past and how we plan for the future, how we love and how we hate, who we love and who we hate...we must have freedom for all that!

It happens or it doesn't is another story altogether. Most of us don't even want freedom to that level that it is acutely felt... most of us are happy with the notion of freedom at the national level, community level and cultural level... for an individual, freedom doesn't seem to account much. We all have acclimatized to the notion that "man is a social animal" and so independence is not real, its just a matrix pulled over our eyes until the social human nature obligates us to behave in a way that defies freedom.

So you are free to be you until the world wants otherwise. Of course independence is cherished and a quality admired by many. But not without a dash of disdain...

If you are independent, people will hail you for your individuality...but a green monster in them would always want to see you crumble and seek dependence.

If you believe in free thinking and free living, people will appreciate your guts and glorify your nerve...but a conformist in them would want to see you fail and fall back on common knowledge and living with the world.

If you are free enough to wear you heart up your sleeve and put yourself out there, people will pump you up and pour over suggestions...but a cynic in them would always want to tell you one day "there is no such thing as true love".

So as dear as freedom is to all of us and as dearly as we covet independence, its the sublime greyness of human nature that makes it surreal. You can depend on it for as long as you are prepared to be "out-standing", an aberration, an anomaly, an outlier...The moment you decide to be free and yet belong somewhere, you are lost! Individual freedom of thought and action is never conforming to anything that the society thinks is a way of life. Independence is encouraged but actually not expected of anyone...

Everyone must have a role model..or a mentor...or a pillar of strength...

Why that is necessary, nobody waits to brood over it! Eventually, people who keep striving for a free existence (in every sense) are left deliberating the life they made on their own. Their mistakes and their successes are their own but there is always a nagging doubt... was the independence really worth its while?!... Life would have been so much easier had I not been so free...

Tap-some-Bong

Dream -

He had the superpowers he always wished for...he could fly (no kryptonian side-effects), he was super strong (no boy-scout behavior and savior's syndrome), he didn't have to breathe (so water and space were pretty much accessible), he had special sixth sense...he was telekinetic and could shape-shift!

In short, he was THE-Superhero!!!

Reality -

He was just an above-average Joe. He went to school and then college like all other kids of his generation. When he was about to turn 11, he desperately waited for the letter from Hogwarts to arrive...Ofcourse it never did! Then he grew out of it.

When he was 16, on a class field trip to a nuclear reactor plant, he dearly hoped for some freak accident to happen to him...it never did, either...so he grew out of it too!

Dream -

Life had been cruel to him... His parents never appreciated his special abilities. They thought of him as something of a freak-show! He had no friends and whoever he crushed on, always liked someone else... He dreamed of a normal life but was subconsciously reliant on his powers too much to get by with life.

Reality -

His life was normal. So normal that he was eternally bored! He has parents who were always over indulgent in his life and over protective of him. He had very many friends and girls usually found him cute. He dreamed of a superhuman life...a life that was not governed by laws of nature!

Dream -

He fought the anti-social elements without any sense of obligation to a past or a person. He liked being a superhero...somewhat like Metro-man! He had no weaknesses so villains could hardly ever exhort him. And he never wanted a change of scene...he was satisfied being him.

Reality -

Ah life! He wished for it to change somehow...everything was so predictable! He hated being an above-average Joe...he hated being a pushover and he really wished that someday, somehow he will be able to deny his parents whatever they emotionally-blackmailed him into doing, against his wishes!

The Merger -

He waited and waited and finally he decided to take his life in his own hands! Now by day he was his normal boring self and by night, he went by the name of "Tap-some-Bong"...the night crusader, the friendly neighborhood superhero, the alien boy scout...nobody was any match for him. For he was not goodness embodied, he was goodness itself!

He became everything he wanted to be...

He fought aliens, monsters, zombies and mafia clans!

He dressed in spandex outfits that hid his true identity and made him feel cool!

He finally had real friends who were always there for him!

He knew who crushed on him and who missed him the most and who was his fan!

He could share whatever was on his mind and the world paid heed to it!

He developed his own isolated perfect life!

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All thanx to facebook! :D

Redundancy...thou art dear!

Its a given that an artist's inside is reflected on her outside endeavors. I am just the one who believes in keeping subtlety absent,when the obvious is glaring one in the face! Presently, many of my talents are feeling redundant, which in turn is making me feel similarly... NO COMPLAINS though!

What is unnerving is that in the very heat of my 20s, I am not supposed to be so satisfied with being idle. Sure, like many direction-less aspirants of my generation (the no. is fast dwindling!) I can be floundering around in life, doing not even a single thing that I truly want to...but being redundant is something our "Gen-Y" isn't very good at! We have to feel useful. We have to know that our life means something (see, we don't really believe in self discovery at the age of 30!). We have to know we had some dreams and we either lived them or we didn't. There is hardly ever any scope left for "may be(s)" or "someday"...

We want it, we take it(or get ambushed,trying).

And thus my wonder at the fact that I am so at ease with my (short-lived) redundancy. In fact I am quite liking it! Life has absolutely "No Demands" from me for almost a quarter of a year :D!!! Now at the beginning of this long coveted break, I could only imagine the stupendous amount of days I would have to be happily useless... then the time actually begins. Many of the concessions and liberties of being useful have to be given up...but What-the-Hey!, once you taste the utter lack of obligations after going through a (supposedly) highly demanding, professional course; its PURE BLISS!!!

It is understandable that a percentage of that feeling is coming from the fact that once life is going to restart, everything will be in its place (Yeah right, I made it happen!)...the sense of future security can put anyone at ease. But a major portion of this feeling of ecstasy over being redundant is coming from an accumulated need for a break, over the years...

Living in a famous-for-its-population (and mildly competitive) nation, one learns pretty early on that education and career building isn't going to be easy (especially when you are a Jack-Of-All-Trades-Master-Of-None sort of person). So of-course, adolescence is fueled by quotes like -

"beta ye do saal +1,+2 mein mehnat kr lo; fir araam hai"

"bete CAT crack kr lo, fir MBA toh apne aap hojani hai"

"Friends, I(a wannabe cool Prof at a B-school) assure you, with two years of smart work in your MBA, you will reap benefits throughout your life"*

*Conditions in corporate world are nothing like college, dude! I am just messing with you!

So one trudges on in life, putting in a little more of self in the process of becoming someone else. We lose time to chill and be ourselves...we harbor that grudge against ourselves for being all that useful, all our young lives! So when finally, the chance to be "FREEEEEEE" presents itself...it certainly is dear.

CHEERS!!! :P

Hasta la vista

Yes its weird that I always title the blog with some exotic word and what turns up inside is some "Desi" version of my world! It may be the same here, but the feeling isn't desi only...its very much exotic and commonplace at the same time...its very much everywhere...ubiquitous...yet there's nothing divine about it!

Now in any other language, its just plain...no spunk. I can give it a try really...

Phir milenge! (Mushyyyyy!!!)

Adieu! (Mushier!!!)

Dasvidaniya! (More like a tongue twister!!!)

May be my 'language of obsession' these days is dictating my affinity towards the title, but seriously...there is no better way to say it. Literally, "Hasta la vista" means 'until we see again' and its very commonly used as a farewell greeting. The style quotient obviously appeals to me as I feel it represents me.

Weirdly it seems like only yesterday that i said "Hola" to all my new friends...its equally weird that this brevity of time wasn't really felt so acutely while I was living two years of it!!!

But even with the style quo and all, a farewell remains a farewell...the hope of meeting again and the promises of 'staying in touch' are always soothing but they don't veil the transformation that life is about to go through. Dormant under our uber-cool exteriors, is a bubbling feeling of unease about "change"! So what if we all have seen one farewell too many...each one of them rocks us a little.

After all its not easy making friends (what with all the social networking to do)...its not easy to be all set for life's new challenges always ( truest grit is in accepting one's fear and imperfections)... its not easy truly enduring a phase of your life,gritting your teeth, but still wanting it not to end! My friends and I experienced it (with great gusto, if I might add). We cursed the day that put us in the situations we were in, but secretly we were gracious for the chance to get to know some of the most intriguing people ever.

With midnight pasta parties...Punjabi pop-DJ-on laptop-nights...nail paint fest with gal friends... series of knocks on the door when time is short for getting ready for a party... those series of Cntrl C - Cntrl V - Cntrl S, a week before exams...those trips to BIG BAZAAR for everything required for survival...those shopping bags of 1 capsicum,1 onion,1 tomato and 1 chilly (the chilly unceremoniously thrown in the dustbin,along with the polythene)...

Saying Hasta la vista not only brings back those memories but gives you the hope to build some new memories the next time around...It prepares you for the change and preserves what is unchanging about life, inside you...the bonds of friendship :D

Le Magnifique

In a small town quite nearby, lived a little girl. She was as small as the town but dreamed of becoming big and great one day and living in a place worthy of her grandeur. Wanting in many a factors that comprise the secret formula of success, she was unaware of the challenges life were to present. But to lose hope is not her!

Lets call her Maya (shall we?). Now as Maya grew, she became more and more sure of the things she wanted out of life - name, fame, money and love. In short she wanted it all and she wanted everything at her own terms.

Maya was a happy child...a talented one at that...a child who thought crying a waste of time...quite content with her own world of school and pals.

Maya wasn't the popular one, but never was the underdog either! Teachers liked Maya, but she never was the one who could become a teacher's pet!

Maya had few good friends and many ok-ok friends.

Maya thought boys were worthless and girls rock!

Many things about Maya changed with time but these stayed with her...they became permanent part of her nature, beliefs and character.

With time, Maya grew to be a decisive and confident person...fixed many of her character flaws (many still remained)...learnt about herself...her weaknesses she hid, her strengths she polished! Now a strapping young lass of 20, Maya decided to try her luck with guys too (after all how bad can be a sub-specie if it could boast of Johnny Depp as its member?!?!) So with a long long long list of qualities set in her mind, she wore her heart up her sleeve for the first time. But the thing with Maya is that even her sleeve is like her! So the heart never really got the chance of slipping out and falling for the first Prince Charming who walked by. The heart also never got a chance of measuring up every candidate for the quality control list that Maya had so naively prepared. Maya's sleeve did all the required calculation of a matchmaker and Maya landed a striking young lad ( a PERFECT match, if something of the sorts exists!)

So Maya now had one of the things she wanted in life...Love! For a while it felt like everything else was immaterial and Love is all that matters. But this is Maya we are talking about...She can not escape her name after all! So Maya decided to once again strive for having it all. Being Maya, is all about loving moh (Love) and maya (money), so predictably, the next goal in Maya's life became wealth. Now money is not an easy thing to come by if you are only good at things that don't really pay well in real world! Hence, Maya decided to go for "MBA"!!!! (dramatic music for effect)

This is where the story ends my friends...for this is where it gets too tragic to be told! (I don't want to call this piece Les Miserables instead of Le Magnifique!!!)

Obssessive about Possessing

"Possession"...I stumbled across this word by chance when I read about "Firebolt" being one of Harry Potter's most prized possessions in the Goblet of Fire. Back then my vocabulary wasn't even sound enough to understand what "vocabulary" meant! So obviously I would read my favorite book series with a dictionary by my side... Even so, the dictionary's description never revealed the true application of this word. With time however, it became evident that people rarely use it as a noun...its verb and adjective forms are so much more popular...and that too not with objects but regarding subjects!

Developing philosophies about life come at a very late stage, but what every person learns in the first 20 years of life is that you can't change anyone's nature. The less you hope to do that with someone, the less naive you stay and the more at peace are your relations with everyone who matters. So its pretty much around the first time you move out of "home sweet home", that you realize that 'nature' is what governs even one's artificiality!!! And the urge to possess stems from this basic human nature.

This urge soon matures into an obsession for many, when situations presents some forlorn subject of interest! Some people fight against it but most people find it intriguing...the exhibition of jealousy...possessiveness...the need to control... Its seen in mothers, fathers, siblings and friends. We all know how it feels to be on the receiving end of a possessive behavior and we all know how mildly amusing or thoroughly irritating it could be! But what we never marvel upon is that what encourages such behavior?!?

It can't just be the simple need to own...it can't only be the insecurities or lack of trust...it can't just be 'nature'! If everyone exhibits it, then there has to be a reasonable explanation for it...more potent and more satisfying than just 'nature'!

How come people try to possess other people and their emotions? How come it is forgotten that possessing is to do with inanimate objects and not with people,throbbing with life and energy? Personally I am a materialistic individual...possessions mean all the worldly treasures to me, no matter how grand or how inexpensive. But I have always considered human spirit to be boundless...one can't dream to possess it...one can only dream to know it in all its imperfections and one can only hope to achieve exclusivity with some of the pleasures a dedicated spirit can bestow upon one...

What I don't understand is how and why, people still dare to hope that they can possess another's mind and heart and actions and affections! Any feeble attempt to understand this obsession with possessing usually fizzles out even before it can illuminate the nook and cranny of human psyche in which the answer may be hidden...

Still brooding over it does explain one thing...one craves to possess what one desires! It may not be the tendency to control and own but the primal need to be owned and to belong to someone that makes people possessive...that makes people want to have someone feeling possessive for them!