The Solitary Reaper...

Its 7:22 pm… just 38 more minutes to freedom…
But 8 p.m., my happiest time of the day, during the last few days hasn’t been so joyous.

The fact that my sole flat mate has left for home, leaves me home alone.

So every day at 8, I pack my bags at top speed to reach the auto stand before it gets empty… oh I have learned a useless though intelligent trick… as soon as I am inside the auto I pretend to b calling my mum and say that I’d b home in 10 mins…. Dunno if that even rubs off on telugu speaking autowalas…
So annnyways… I reach home to dark empty echoing rooms… being highly imaginative not to mention darrpok I sneak in switching on all lights and check every nook and corner of the house before settling down in my room, locking it fr good…

But staying alone has its own virtue…
I mean you have the whole bloody place to yourself, for what I know not, but the important thing is that I do…
I get a lot of sympathy and extra attention and extra consideration and extra time from a person far far away yet not so far away…
Also I think I can shed a little bit of that extra fat by having dry Barista’s slimmer’s choice sandwich for dinner… alone… which by the way tastes like rubber glued with mucous and cabbage, but I have to have it anyways as that’s the only thing left by end of the day…
I can absorb myself in reading with zero disturbances… oh how I wish to be disturbed though… (Fountainhead btw is really awesome and Howard Roark is even awesomer… he keeps building structures with integrity till I fall asleep…)
I can put music on loud (though the fact that my lappy’s speakers totally suck don’t make it too enjoyable either)
I can use both the available buckets and the clips and the clothes string and wash my clothes anytime I want (that is a very important understanding you share with your flatmate you know… requires adjustments aaall the time…)
I can have the shared internet connection all to myself… but hell I get soo tired of typing away at the office all day that I’d rather do anything else…

So yeah… I never thought that I’d ever grow up to live alone… but here I am… living all alone in a strange city… wishing these lonely days to be over asap…

Chronicles de desastrado…

If ever there was a Guinness record for clumsiness… I’d surely give the record holder a run for his/her money….

I mean how maladroit can a 23 year old woman be!!!

Butter handed, falling on wet floor, spilling liquids (most of the times unceremoniously on my humble self), wedging myself in the automatic doors, getting shut off in the emergency stairs, type stupid jokes in the wrong person’s chat window (yes I once typed a joke on my manager on his office IM) ….. and this one’s the cherry on top of the icing…. Forgetting to take the change back almost always…. This hurts more than a swollen ankle trust me…

Why and how I establish such venerable feats at this age I have no freaking clue… L

PS: this piece was written post one such accident; do not judge me by this…

Letting go...

So here my heart just let it go…
You did whatever you could do…

Grieve till you must…
But don’t be too long…
It was never really yours…
You could never go along…

A small speck of dust in the divine design…
Does my pain not count… why are my troubles only mine…

But its feeling better already…
I feel the pain bleeding out from me…
I feel the memories fading out from me…
I feel comforted that it was mine… at least for a moment it felt like mine...

Finally I feel I'm letting go...

My Rainbow ~ Rediscovered

Its 12 noon and I’m sitting at The Taj Banjara road junction… I’ve been here the entire morning till now. It is the most unlikely place to be in for so long, for me or for anyone else for that matter. The sun is burning over my head. I look up and am dazzled by its brightness. I look down and see beautiful patterns on the earth. Petrol mixing with water...The rainbow colors… intricate swirls… flowing river… obstructions in between… but the rainbow continues to flow… becoming brighter and deeper… engulfing me into its colors… taking me back to unremarkable yet strong memories… the rainbow as I remember… the rainbow that I spent hours watching… on the bus drive of my school… in the garage of my old house…

when the knowledge of organic chemistry had not wiped away the wonder or leisure of seeing it form… My Rainbow - Rediscovered…

User busy...

So I have a cell phone, and a snazzy laptop. Does that make me an impatient, compulsive, intolerant freak?

I guess it does. Because I hate waiting. I hate it when I call someone and the person does not pick up immediately or forgets to call back. I go livid when I don’t get a reply message. I write ‘WAKE UP!!’ ‘ARE U THERE??’ In bold on gtalk to scream the other person out of their slumber when he or she does not reply in a nano second. Its like the tag line of the new Airtel broadband ad ‘Impatience is the new life’.

But hey, wasn’t there a time when internet connection was used only when it was absolutely necessary? With my mum flashing me warnings if I exceed the allotted 5 minutes on the exorbitantly charged dial-up connection for checking emails. Wasn’t there a time when I did not have a cell phone and messaging was hence out of question. All long land line calls made only when mum and pa had gone out or at least were busy enough not to notice.

Yeah, the time when I was in high school. I used to go to my tuitions on my rickety two-wheeler, with my friend on the pillion, making an ear-splitting noise under our combined weight. When getting off near Shahpura lake for an ice-cream with friends was a real treat. When I used to fight with my sister for my turn on our shared home pc. When listening to music was a family affair and one set of speaker sang to the entire house (oh ya bhajans and hindi film songs, Yeshudas and Backstreet Boys all given their due respect with appropriate timings).

Then came the time when my sister started her college. The Ambanis decided to give away cell phones for a mere Rs.500. Even our sweeper decided to get one then why not us?? So my sister got her first cell phone. And behold I was introduced to this strange concept of privacy (with my sister?). Yes. I may never see her dialed list or her messages. So she would have friends and complications in her life I was to be ignorant about.

Hmm. Okay.

During my second year at college, my sister graduated. She got a job and moved to a new city. After 19 years of living and growing up together we were to get on with our lives separately.

Oh… getting back to the original point of my ramblings… That was when I got my first cell phone.
My sister’s cell phone was passed on to me. Did that change my life radically? Not really, me being me I would just shove it in my college bag and forget about the poor thing. Its battery charged if mummy remembered to. Put on silent mode before lectures, when I was lucky enough to remember to. Basically, just used for forwarding stupid messages among friends and wishing people on their birthdays and festivals.

But it served one very important purpose: it was my mum’s ‘assurance’, that I could call and inform her anytime if I’m in a perilous situation. This by the way never happened. I mean I never found myself in any life threatening situations.

Next I go to Delhi for my MBA. I got my first brand-new phone. In a new city, in a hostel, away from home, I would get at least five calls a day from my mother, just to make sure that I’m alright, have eaten well, had a decent day at college, was safe and generally missed and remembered by her. (By the way I still get these calls from my mum and would be deeply worried if I don’t). But as always my cell phone was hardly ever charged…. If charged left at home…. If carried along, shoved somewhere where I won’t notice the ring or the vibration. So my mum would call my friend and ask her if I’m around so she could talk to me (yeah yeah vai you can smirk…)

Few months into living away I learned to carry and use my cell phone. (Finally!!!)

So I would carry it around, keep it charged, all in all use it well. But my cell phone became my lifeline for a different reason all together. I would spend hours messaging this boy… the love of my life. Waiting impatiently for a reply message with a silly smile stuck on my face all the time, top it up with long phone calls almost 3am into the night. Food …. I’m not hungry…will have it later…. Exams tomorrow… I’ll pass ray… Mummy’s SEVEN missed calls!!!.... Oops m screwed.
But every phase passes. So did this. But I have been educated in the use of cell phones none the less. Right now I’m impatiently waiting for my first salary. Debating whether I should buy an expensive cell phone or settle for something which if lost won’t give me heartburn.

My firm has given me a brand new laptop (ahem…with a web cam). Which, after using 12 hrs daily is a real pain in the eye. Wish we had system of shared laptops in office so you could chill out while u wait for yr turn on it. I have my music which I can listen to whenever I want with my ear phones plugged in. But I don’t have anyone to share that music with.

Sometimes exclusive sucks!!!

The beginning...

Ahem...


To all who may care to listen....


This, is another of those many attempts in my life where I began enthusiastically... promising myself to keep putting that effort to pursue my passion, no matter what...
(many of those attempts did not survive a fortninght, a few hours in some cases)


Well this time I promise myself this:
I'll write....

Write because i want to write... just like I've always wanted to...
Write because,
I want to share without being judged...
I want to write without being edited...
I want to be heard without imposing...


So lets see how long this enthusiasm lasts...


And till it lasts ..... Happy reading!!!