In a week

The futility of the feeling,
The misguided perceptions,
The helplessness.

I feel from the deepest part of my being,
Deceiving superficiality, cheating romance,
A strong tug in my heart.

Emodying my dreams,
exceeding them to make them seem,
but mere attempts -inexperienced paintings.

Its the small gestures,
fresh air is what I did need,
the piercing blue gaze.

Like I've known you forever,
Like we grew up together,
we breath together.

Kindness that almost hurts,
as it will never be felt again,
The sunglasses that I had so much to say about-but didn't.

The thought that you stole from my head,
The sight of the mooon by the tower,
that captured both our lifes for an instant.

You will never know,
I will never know,
What could have been.

It's now encased, a model with tyres that move,
and will lie on my shelf for perpetuity,
reality surpasses dreams.

But you've made your choice,
you didn't know better,
too late now.

Does she know,
destiny has been good to her,
Does she see.

If nothing more,
the dawning of a realization,
that it is reality to inspire imagination.

An ideal,
a higher bar,
perhaps an impossible.

For the next in line.
Can it be done ?
You have spoilt the chances some more.

If never again,
I am glad it was this week.
Somethings come alive.

Thankyou.

Of Powders and Packets

She always goes into a frenzied state of panic about 2 weeks before I leave. Somewhere deep within her, guilt rises up in a flame and prevents her from seeing reason or hearing my protests. She must, she decides, do something to help me get by. I honestly do believe she thinks I eat tomatoes and grass to survive for the 11 months I'm not with her.

Mum's - you try telling them.

So she goes into the kitchen in the morning of the day after this resolution, even before I'm awake, scans her ingredients and of course she doesn't have every thing she needs. Another excuse to go and buy some spices and exotic leaves! I'm unwillingly (sometimes even unwittingly) dragged along on this mission to go shopping.

'Just a little. Not that! Enough! Stop Ma! Oh my God, why do you want that? What do you intend to do with that? and a million other such exclamations later, she scans her conquests (that obviously dad's or my arms are carrying) and says with a satisfied sigh- 'ok enough!'. This is where me and dad drop everything, and do a little celebratory jig of joy around each other!

As the countdown begins, she has it all planned out in her wonderfully clever head - 4 days to dry the coriander (because obviously no other country in the world could possibly have corriander!), 2 for the chillies- maybe 3 if it rains tomorrow, which is likely, right then, 3 for the chillies, and 1 day to get the lentils ground. One day to mix ingredients and cook anything that needs cooking. 1 day to pack, and I know subconsciously, she allocates one evening to fight with me. (She obviously wins. Always. Period)

So she goes about griding, and mixing, complaing about how I don't help her (not mindful of the unrelenting protests on my part in regards to the whole exercise!), and seiving.

Then the eve of departure arrives. I've got my suitcases almost packed, filled with totally unecessary things (in her opinion) such as teddy bears, text books (I told you not to bring them- you never study at home!), reading books (such a waste of money-you should just join a library instead of buying your own...tsk tsk...), a few clothes, a pair of shoes, and sunglasses. Its nearing the 17kg mark, perilously close to 1) my own ability to carry weight and 2) the maximum carry on allowed on my slum class air ticket!

And then it begins. She's in the process of packing her creations. Neatly, cleanly and with lovely little labels on them with useful information like ' 2 tblspns with 1/2 cup yoghurt and 1/2 cup water. Add salt. Boil. Stir the bottom of pan. Add sugar if you want it sweet like the Gujarathis.' Ignoring the inclusion of very obvious information, I think they are adorable. Its amazing how much detail she can fit on two square inches of paper!
But then I see the number of packets lying on the floor all around her- and I flip.

'I told you the day I landed that I didn't want to have this argument. I told you I didn't want any of your powders and packets. I told you didn't I? We had the same fight last year and the year before, and every summer in between, and yet Ma, you just refuse to listen!. I'm not taking anything. Nothing. I can't be carrying 50 kgs across 3 continents! (nevermind that it would in fact be the plane doing that..) I can't. I hate travelling heavy. No way. Not happening. I've been telling you everyday for the past few weeks and still here we are. ARgh...I'm so pissed off. No way! ' I say in my loudest voice fuelled by fury.

She just sits there, scissors and cellotape in hand, looking at me with her puppy dog eyes moistening by the millisecond, with such a hurt expression on her face it could melt the Himalayas. But not me! I've seen it too often. So I stare at her right back. A few seconds later, she gives up playing hurt, and starts getting cross with me.

'You don't eat anything there- always your bread. There is no nutrition in bread. No wonder you lose so much weight before you come here. I feel so guilty sending you so far away to live on your own, working so hard, not eating well, all alone, not eating well, so far. I made all this so that it will be easy for you. So you can come home from work and have dinner in two minutes- something that you like, something nutritious and easy to make. It all only for your good. Its only because I love you. I feel so guilty (here the tears start to appear)- Mummy can't do anything for you anymore.'

Dad now hears the commotion and comes into the room, looks at the packets, looks at both of us, and starts racking his brains to remember what he did last year to diffuse the situation. I put forth my point once again to Dad, and so does mum. I do pity him - he's always caught in the middle when I argue with Mum. He tries to put forth my point to mum and her point to me (not quite coming up with any kind of tangible solution) and yet it seems to do the trick, perhaps not quite with the slant he would have liked I think.

She gets super emotional, tired of arguing, and says I don't have to take any of it. Then I start feeling super guilty (she has spent so long on it) so I say I'll take it all. Seeing my weakness, she pushes me further and plays the game strategically. Now, she almost refuses to give them to me, saying that she'll just use them herself, and that she wouldn't like to force me to take them (what was she trying to do for the past half hour excuse me?). So now we end up fighting over who gets to take them!

A compromise is reached, with me taking most of her Zip locked packets and with her having temporarily appeased her guilt.
I don't know why we bother going through the process- It always ends up this way.

But for all my protests, and arguments, its the days when I come back at 11 at night, aching with tiredness, with an early start looming ahead in the morning, when I put to use one of those hard won packets. And I decide not to argue with her next time- its worth straining that extra muscle in my back carring them across 3 continents, for that one meal I think.

But ssshhh! Don't ever tell her that. She'll never let me hear the end of it. And it will change the dynamic of our departure eve ritual. On some level, I suppose its also easier to say goodbye after having had a bit of an argument.

Tiny drops of sky

A gentle caress of the skin,
A morose sexy scowl,
Grey soft eyes,
A woman, undoubtedly.

But that’s at your best.
Firm, relentless,
Unforgiving you can be.
You know the power you possess,
And you enjoy it.

Unleash your dark side often,
But not without cause.

You bring it all down,
The make up,
Straightened hair,
Pressed clothes,
Five inches of wood under the heel,
Pretentious smiles,
Affected walks,
Thin patience,
True thoughts and intentions.

Our ‘civilization’ isn’t waterproof,
True and durable, hardly.
Our facades are only for fair weather,
But you wash it all away, give a few seconds.

Sometimes, we need to be reminded,
Of what humans really look like.

Of the Atom and the Soul

I was back from college, tired, aching and marginally depressed. Idecided to go for a long hot shower to unwind: a decision I'm always slightly wary to take (not bathing in general (I hear you sigh with relief here), but those extra long - perfume candled- expensive shower gelled baths) as I have many a time been struck by the depth of my own introspective abilities when stimulated by the right environment.

I don't know if the perplexing things that strike me are questions that 'normal' people have pondered over and managed to solve in their pre-teen years, or questions that the buddha might have through of on his way to enlightenment. Not that I claim to have the arrogance to compare my introspections to the Buddha's quest for enlightenment. But I prefer to believe the latter, as it would save me the shame of dealing with a question of maturity.

So, I was there, unwinding, forgetting about accounts and their reporting, forgetting about the troubles that affect me from a land far way, forgetting about my fears and insecurities - just forgetting. I felt the hot water slide down my face, felt the mist in the air, could see the windows fogging up, could feel every muscle relax. I followed the path of a tiny droplet of water as it began its fall from the tip of my nose straight to the bottom of the bath. Then it struck me.

All my life untill that very moment, I always felt I knew the meaning of the 'God is everywhere' line that most people have grown up with.
When I was young, I tried to at first imagine tiny little Ganesh's everywhere I looked, but realised even at that tender age that it could not possibly be.
As I grew older, I grew to belive in the soul and the energy of the universe. I tried to come up with my definition of God and struggled to find a way to make everything fit together- God, science, the soul, the atom.

I don't know when, but I eventually grew to believe that inside every atom, inside every nucleus, inside every quart (here my knowledge of chemistry ends), inside the smallest particle of an atom - is the energy of the Universe or God or whatever you wish to call it.
That would explain it!- God is everywhere. Not quite little images of Ganesh floating in space, but his energy inside everything.

I also believe in the soul- in that everyone has one and that animals,plants and trees have one.
And I thought that the soul was ultimately also God's or the Universal Spirit's energy.

Yet, that water droplet got me thinking. That drop probably had a billion atoms and if what I belived was true, each one of them had a 'soul'- ie that one tiny drop of water was the equivalent ,in Universal Energy terms, to a billion human beings?

Am I just the same as an atom of hydrogen?

That cannot possibly be correct? Not that I am supercilious enough to belive in the absolute superiority of the human form of life, but it just cannot be. If anything, I belive that the 'truth' which the luckier few of us in the world set out to find, will be ultimately and purely logical. Nothing mysterious, nothing magical- but logical. Every part of it will fit together like a globe puzzle and the bigger picture will be revealed.

So I find myself in a predicament- I now have no theory that works, even if only superficially. Am I back then to square one? The thought petrifies me.

Though it scares me that I never though of this serious flaw in my resourceful equation, I refuse to give up.

Another day, another water droplet, and maybe it will undo the damage this drop did to me today.