I can see a few rays of light. They are so bright, so blinding that I am afraid I might lose way. Fffuck!

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I am the kind of person who would start writing a long story about that sparrow on the window sill and end up with a short story of my own childhood. And happy with the product. Or not. But still it has to be a short story. I digress way too much for a long story. Like fuck you should care. So much wish wash for a month? Neah.

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A female once told me that I reminded her of Hari from Chetan Bhagat's Five Point Someone. I still don't know what I should be feeling about it. What I know though is that it hasn't made me buy the book. Thank you, my lassitude. Oh, by the way a friend once said I reminded him of some character from some book by Dostoevsky. I haven't read that book, either. Fuck you, my lassitude.

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What do you call a "ILU Shobha" graffiti on the wall of a train compartment?

A guy's orgasm of emotions. Poor Shobha.

# 32

A friend met a friend and asked," Dude, what you doing these days?"
"Hunting"
"Oh?"
"Yeah, job hunting."
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"Enough books for a lifetime, eh?"
"Umm...guess yeah."
Thinking about it, how is one supposed to feel when you think that the books that you own now, at 22, are the books you are going to be talking about, say like when you are 60. Depressing? Not very gorgeous, atleast?
Well, I have like 650 -700 books ( hardbacks, e-books all inclusive ) here in front of me and it's not a very uplifting sight, in a sense.

Of vodka and apple juice...

...and I almost forgot the username.

"...So, whats up?", she asked.
"Oh, an overly glamorous life. A few girlfriends here and there, some one night stands and the such."
I was as pleased at the reply as a child would be after calling someone a name his mom had especially warned him against and especially after he was name called first.
She knew, and I believe pretty much everyone knows, that there is as little a probability of anything mega or atleast something worth telling happening in my life, as something not happening in a hot girl's life.
Hot girls and me. Vodka and pickle juice. Diabolical in a certain way, the species are. So much more the perceived availability, that much more the tangible unavailability. Take for example the case of this girl...umm...I'd call her more classy than hot. Since classy is hot for me, she is hotter than a lit cigarette tip. Percieved available for what now seems to be a genuinely infantile rationale. The rationale being that she agreed for a cup of tea the first time she was asked. That also was the second time we talked. Very big deal no? Pah, no! The story, as a matter of fact ends there. Nice tea, great conversation, thank you sir - hence second time tea? No sir, 'I just had apple juice'.
I am starting to believe in the theory of a single creator. Special designers for the genus and the species. Lack of imagination can be an attribute to these designers for their creations are aall the same. Or atleast perceivably same because we ordinaries are all the same. Not our fault, though. We are just born , not created.

200 killed in a country of a billion and a half. Big deal? I have heard people condemning the rest of the resilient us waking up the next morning, forgetting about the previous day and walking to work. What is wrong in it? I mean, isn’t it wonderful that you are alive and breathing and getting to see what unfolds? Isn’t it wonderful that you are getting to blog and comment and appear smart about the whole thing? Isn’t it wonderful to think that the air you are breathing might as well carry the scent of blood the next moment and that you are privileged to breathe now? What is wrong then in living and sleeping and waking up and going to work when you get to? Can you be sure you are not one of the 200 in the next blast? I can very well imagine 199 of those 200 thanking God and going to work the very next day after the Ghatkopar blasts, after the Gateway of India blasts, after the Mulund blasts, after the ’93 blasts, just like us.

This is precisely called slow poisoning. You kill 200 in a country of a billion and a half and it hardly matters. The agendas are met and not a feather is moved. You see every man worth a dime commenting and appearing smart, every channel theorizing brand new theories till they get enough air-time to fill their pockets and every politician condemning the acts and seizing the opportunity to gain precious political points. This goes on for a week or two and then suddenly everything takes a backseat and everything is forgotten because its elections at so-and-so. So what is wrong if I wake up the very next morning and go on with my life than be a mere hypocrite?

The whole attitude, though, is like thanking heavens for letting you live for just one more day or a minute. Being a reasonable being, one would rather value his life and take control of it than live at the mercy of heavens. But how and when does one begin to value his life if even such incidents don't move as much as a whisker? What is required here is a shock so huge, everyone becomes a victim. So that there's no space left for resilience, no place to go and nothing to do but revolt. Revolt for our own lives and for a change. A 200 people here and a 50 people there, dead or alive, don’t bring about a revolution or even a minor change, quite evidently.

Instead of doing your fireworks here and there, why don’t you nuke us, fellas? Why don’t you, for our sake? Some place where it hurts a little less but which would shock us out of our pants and make us get to the road than to work. All of us.

There are moments in your life which you always want to hold onto. Moments, so special, they seem to define in a single instant all the joy that is there in your life. Times, at which when you look back, they seem to be posters of your favorite classic movie. And a song to associate with them. Memories so beautiful, your heart aches.

Mundane activities gain special meaning just because it was shared by someone close to you. The most ordinary seems extraordinary just because you know someone had felt the same way about it. You feel good to be alive. The air around you seems so fresh, you overbreathe. Life, at times, does seem beautiful even with all its imperfections. Or maybe, the imperfections make it seem more beautiful. Such an irony. You live for the future but the past, your memories, gives your life all its meaning.

Misery has no face
In her sorrows she’s hidden away
The life that teemed a seemly grace
Did bid away her living days
Misery has no choice
In defying joy she dishonors God
And falls from heaven’s lofty perch
To flow in the river of thoughtless indecision.

Weaving, weaving, forever weaving
A tapestry of lost grace.


My Misery. The darling who taught me to live, to survive, to breathe. The angel, my company for four years. And now she is backing away. The end of a bittersweet relationship. The ones where the parties involved invariably get back for a reunion. I'll welcome her, for she taught me to live, to survive, to breathe. For she is my God.

The Great Gig in the Sky

A lady in a white dress floating like a silk ribbon in an infinite silver-white gray-black sky, stretching across its vastness, holding onto nothing. A man in black shades standing in an ashened earth, looking at the sky, at the ribbon, the lady. This is the image I get every time I hear TGGITS. Effigies of anxiousness, of loneliness, of hurt and of all that I set to achieve and I could not, of death keep flashing before me like nasty ogres.
It’s like seeing your own dead self. How would it feel? To see yourselves dying. Lonely, underachieved, holding onto life, which is past you. Chilling. The lady is me. And the man is me too. Right now, I am afraid to face death and so I can’t face life. Explains why he is wearing black shades.

It's not been a long time since I last visited blogger. I visited it yesterday. My blogpage. She was just there, sitting pretty, my black beauty, untouched, still holding her cherry intact except for one small instance of violation at the top. Her stats have changed little over time, except for small changes here and there in her profile. "You can see me, but you can't touch" - that's what she seems to scream with every pore of her black skin. So people come , see her in profile, take a peek, sometimes do a boo and run. Just run!
But to the ones who choose to stay back, to suffer, oh, how different she is. A perfect host. Does the welcome, white smiles all around. Smiles which throw away a whole lot of her, or so it seems. Fastidious to some, dapper to some and ugly to some. She accepts all in her vanity, unawares to what the world thinks. "Stay on", she says, "and you might as well have a good time. But hey, thats no guarantee - you can go deeper, discover me and I know you will not touch me - I suck , and you can leave if you want. Theres a lot of doors there in the right. You can choose any and I hope you had a good stay."
Slut in the mind, chaste otherwise. My da'ling, neglected blog!

A familiar cry of the engine. Road lay down itself for you like a slave, like a whore. Use and They shall abuse. Trees pass by like strokes of a painter’s brush. Faceless beings like specks of dirt on a white canvas. The shadow of you on a thick cloud of exhaust breathed out from your latest pursuit. Forth ho, before you are lost.

A crooked scooter waiting for his master. A murdered [1] truck, his master lost. Many beads of red on its face. Free and happy and dead. Woman riding the pillion. Hip drawn back, chest ahead. Cheek resting on a cushion. Rider resting on a softer one. Cog up, move ahead. What you see is what you don’t get.

A proud dog barks. A prouder one sleeps, in a pool of sauce. Liver out, eyes in. Red, hot bitch. Highway to another (spell-check: a nether) world.


[1]: Murdered by whom, one might ask. Mr. McFate of course, who else?

Your only defence against your own people is sleep. A long, long, long sleep.

I stood at the balcony sipping a cup of coffee , looking at a child playing with her plastic football. The unfinished concrete floor she was trotting on barely seemed to bite her naked feet. Or even if it did, she din't seem to care. Every moment she spent seemed to be moments of unadultered joy, of consummate innocence. One second Time seemed to fly by, another second i looked at her and Time seemed to stop by and join me in the audience , to watch something as pure as that. Maybe the floor was watching too and enjoying the touch of her cushy feet and in the indulgence had forgotten it's prick.
Her grandfather was watering the plants in a small garden surrounding the apartment. The gush of water, from whatever space was left between his thumb and the tip of the pipe, seemed to be as welcome for the plants as for the water escaping the pipe. He seemed to establish some sort of connection with the plants through the water, a smile that would'nt leave his face. A smile which suggested contentment at the way life treated him. At the way all the events leading to his retirement lined up to salute him. The smile of an old man content with life can easily be confused with the smile of one prepared for the eventual, I thought. What could possibly defeat such a man? The smile had to be there.
The water trickled down from the leaves to the concrete floor and formed a neat stream. The sun glistened its edges and it moved lazily, sometimes hither sometimes thither, like a man with no particular deadline to meet. It moved, melanizing the floor along its path. And as it moved further, it broke off into two parallel streams. The streams seemed to look longingly at each other like they never wished to be separated. They never imagined that they could even have a separate existence. They had never bothered to make one out from the other. Even the floor seemed to cry for them and the tears seemed to be the streams themselves.
But then something happened. Maybe it was the wind. Maybe a slight slope. Or maybe, just maybe it was their longing. They were no longer parallel. They meandered towards each other.And as they neared, one stream for once showed a sense of urgency. The other reciprocated and the next second they moved along lazily again, as one. Again as two bodies, one soul. A sweet pang in my chest. The nature seemed to smile at the stream. The Sun shined ever so mildly, not wanting to dry them off and the floor did his best by nudging them through a slope as if sending them for a honeymoon.

The mobile made a merry beep. Sameer scuffled over the bed, scrambling for the damn thing. A rude jerk from the indulgence of an early morning dream. The blanket seemed to pamper him and for an instant he thought there would be no place on earth more comfortable than that. With eyes half open, the eyelids playing a tug-of-war with itself, he pressed some random keys on the mobile. The bright light of the mobile hit him on his eyes and for once he hated himselves for buying a nuisance. 4.40 am shouted the device. Which meant he was 10 minutes behind schedule even before he had woken up. He got up, threw the blanket to the other side and walked towards the window. A bird flew across the horizon. He felt as though the sky was a huge screen and someone was projecting the bird’s image from behind. A silhouette. The morning was still in deep slumber. Nothing seemed to disturb it.

Sameer walked across the room to the basin. There he stood looking at the mirror for a few seconds. He had slept at 3 the same morning .The thought of which made him want to slump back to the bed again. A million other thoughts populated his mind in an instant like the products of a fission reaction. None seemed urgent, none was important. His hands seemed to be a mechanical robot, brushing the teeth for him. By the time he had finished, he was awake. He splashed a handful of water on his face and again and allowed it to work its magic on him, the way it does to flowers. He could instantly feel freshness all around him. He left his face undried , allowing the drops of water to do a face massage while it rolled from the forehead , over the eyes along the nose to the chin and below.
He changed to his tracksuits, slipped in the sneakers and was ready for the morning trot. The mobile beeped again, this time a missed ring from Nayan to inform him that he was ready too. They met below the building, smiled a good morning and set off.

They talked as they jogged. The early morning breeze swept gently across their face, over the forehead and the hairline, in an attempt, they thought, which defined their face from the rest of the body. They moved ahead, sometimes in a silent competition. They kept moving, the legs tired but the mind at its briskest best. A realization of how the mind tires one’s body more than any other part and how the mind propels you to keep moving how much ever any other part is tired. A testimony to the power of man’s will power. A thought of a navy diver from the movie “Men of Honor”. You don’t stop until your mind decides to. One’s mind. One’s god. They looked at each other. They exactly knew when the other wanted to stop. Silent conversation.

You stare at the monitor. You are compelled to write. You are pregnant with ideas. They all seem to be so clear till the moment your fingers touch the keyboard. Everythings gone. All you are left with is some very vague pictures of your originally clear ideas. You have it in your mind, still. You try to translate them into words. You can't find the right words. Every line written seems like an accomplishment. You read back. The lines seem to be just rot. You delete everything. You start over again. Now you are even more compelled to write. Now you cant complete even a line. Every single word has to be thought of. Every sentence has to be painfully strung together to make them sound coherent. You wonder why you are taking all the pain. But you can't go away. You thought you were good at something and you can't even do that. Writer's block phoenix says. But im not even a writer. Im nowhere as good as some others. Atleast you could express. Now you can't do that. You think everyone else is good. You don't think you are bad. But you think everyone else is good. Doesnt help you. In the meanwhile you realise some new ideas are trying to find their way in. Into your head. They seem to grow by the second. You sense them, you feel them, you think over them. You feel liberated. You wanna record these atleast. You run to the computer. You type the first word. The fingers seem reluctant to move. You push them hard. Somehow, one's fingers dont get along very nicely with one's ideas. Your head is pregnant again. You stare at the monitor. Helpless.

Banda n Adi - Episode 1

The people mentioned here is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to anyone living or dead is purely the writer's lack of imagination.

Adityaraj had the makings of a poet. He was sensitive, observant,
philosophical,rational and all that except that he dint write poems. He was considered to be a great listener among his group of friends.The one who could be approached when all one wished to do was whine. He was healthy and well rounded too, as people would euphemise his framework. He had a head to go with his extravagant body. No, he was not a fathead. In the contrary, he was as smart as any guy would like to be. He had an aura ( for some reason, my dictionary defines aura as: " A sensation that precedes the onset of certain disorders such as a migraine attack or epileptic seizure. Well it also has another meaning which is," An indication of radiant light drawn around the head of a saint ". I obviously, meant the latter ) about him that charmed most of the guys he met. It wont be wrong to say that he was conscious of this charm and charisma and was at times nonplussed about himselves. Good enough, for a young chap like him the excitement was quite natural.
All said, like everyone,Adi, as he was fondly called had his share of worries too.Or was it craving? Maybe craving. He craved for a distaff shade in his life. The shade which when absent in a virile makes him seem the most uninteresting and boring. As boring as the straight line. Adi craved for the curves.But,the ascetic personna he was, he never let the craving get the better of him,atleast in public places and wag his tongue and go "woof-woof" when a female figure passed by. Not until he met a certain gentleman called Naveen.
Naveen or Banda as he is popularly known was one tall, dark and handsome (TDH) hunk every girl would drool over, ideally. He believed that too. But then things that are ideal remains that. So by 21, it was no surprise that Banda had developed a tendency to whistle over his shoulder and appear all orgasmic and sometimes moan too when an eve passed by. All too involuntarily. A " 'hey, I'm Naveen' - 'hey, I'm engaged' " convo had become all too common to even become part of a joke when his group met. But, that dint dishearten him. Infact nothing ever disheartened Banda. He was the eternal optimist. The guy who believed that there was a great barn of horses nearby when he was drowned neckdeep in horseshit , the guy who called spade a spade. Such an extraordinary individual was difficult to be missed even in a huge crowd. So it was only a matter of time before Adi met Banda. Both were in the same college and both were extraordinary in their own rights. Now mathematically, a negative and negative makes positive and a positive and positive also makes p. So put either way ,the confluence guaranteed a summation of ideologies and other states of the mind which was sure to,if i may use the word,bother a few. So when Naveen talked about the Tarannums and other bar-girls, when he drooled and whistled and howled and moaned at every passing female, age being not a bar here, Adi merely seconded him. At times they could be heard debating over what the girl who just passed by should have been wearing (looks, dress all considered) for her to look more sultry, among other issues of contemporary importance.
Time passed by thus and both the protagonists were having a ball, in the sense fun, that Banda hollered something which made the ascetic one smile a pleased smile. Whether he kissed Banda on his forehead would remain a mystery. Banda had hollered out a plan. A plan to go to Goa and do some "soul searching" there.

End of episode 1.

p.s: Because the writer expects hostility from the protagonists (yeah yeah they are fictional all right, but you can never say who feels offended) he deems it best to present an episode wise account of the two friends rather than packing everything into a single post and getting mutilated for life. err...mutiliation in capsule format is not something that the writer is new to.