The Renaissance Artist

The irony is that it has been almost a year and a half. There are times when I feel that I have moved on. I KNOW that I have moved on. On the other hand, there are times when I feel like I’m stuck up at the same point in time, one and a half years ago. These moments are typically characterized by a sick feeling in the stomach, like the insides of my body are revolting, like a murderous psychopath is on a rampage inside the heart.. The world swims around in hazy black and white images…The irony is that these moments happen when i least expect them. Saw a picture in a newspaper today, which put me in flash back mode. The issue is that it does not feel like a flash back, instead it feels as real as the present. As if, it happened the same day morning. The pain is real, the guilt is real and the "blacking out" of everything else, is real too.

Like a tornado, that swiftly sweeps across the landscape and leaves as quickly as it came..And the aftermath is as bloody and the ruins are as visible.

But I guess that is part and parcel of the reality, I choose to create. Maybe it is due to the choice I make of wanting to experience pain, almost compulsively, akin to a South Indian tradition of deliberately placing a black dot on the infant’s cheek in order to ward off evil eyes. The concept being that the otherwise blemishless child would attract envious feelings of admiration from onlookers and hence it is considered important to showcase a flaw in an otherwise flawless visage.

I’ve repaid all my monetary dues. I enjoy my work and am respected at the workplace (I assume). I have found a lifelong passion. I have never felt healthier than I do nowadays. I have developed an unbreakable bond with my brother. I have started to connect with my parents like never before.

Overall, I lead a perfect life. Maybe, these moments are the “black spots” I have chosen to create, to prevent me from casting an evil eye on my own life. If so, then I guess, I’m one helluva artist!

Of Memories & Photographs

Memories and photographs.. They are quite similair. Both are frozen in time. Both are unalterable, unless one willingly distorts them. Both are preserved, for various reasons, some happy, some sad, some fearful, some inspiring, but ultimately, the one binding philosophy is that they are worth preserving. Both are a result of humankind’s feeble effort at stopping the relentless march of the merciless/benevolent warrior called TIME. Both fade away, without periodic upkeep. Both are meaningless, at least, not as meaningful, to others. When disclosed or shown to a fellow human being, they can never convey the same significance as it had to the protagonist.

Last Saturday, was like any other day.. Woke up and went for a jog.. Something about watching the sun rise on the beach. The transformation in the sky is striking. While the moon is like a maiden, the sun is quite masculine. The raw power it exudes is incomparable. The shift from day to night is quite feminine, in the sense that the transformation is subtle, gradual and gentle like the rising curtains of a movie.

On the other hand, the shift from night to day is anything but subtle, definitely not gradual and quite explicit. Like a dam-burst. Masculine, all the way.

Post-jog, went to the airport to drop my roomie. He was going to Dubai. (There you go X, your 15 minutes of fame. Now everyone knows that you went abroad … Ok, not everyone, but atleast those lost souls, who by mistake, might land up on this site after mis-spelling an URL)

I’m digressing. Coming back to the topic of memories…On my way back, I happened to go past the premises which hosted my previous organization. On an impulse, I walked in. Met up some people, who had worked with me then. Most of them were new. The office décor had changed. The setting was different. The culture was different, or so I felt. After a few minutes of catching up on the missing pieces of each others lives, I was out of the office.

On my way back, I messaged a couple of my friends-who I knew from those days- about how things had changed and that how I felt alien in my old office. Their responses were on the lines of “yeah, we understand”,”life is like that”, etc. Though, they were well-meaning, these were empty responses to me. Then I thought about my experience that day and concluded:

(a)Disappointment was bound to happen because I had walked in with the expectation that things would be in the same place that I left them a year and half back. That was foolish and deservingly, I was disappointed. Just as how I had moved on a long way in the last 1.5 years, so has the world. Expecting that the past would remain where I left it, like a laboratory sample preserved in vinegar, is naive, if not downright dysfunctional. Instead of expecting things to be the same, I would have been better off, if I had just observed the changes, sans judgment.

(b)My experiences are purely mine and however close I might be to another soul on earth, it is impossible for me to communicate the gravity of my experience to a different person. Consequently, if there is an information gap in my communication, there will obviously be a difference in our reactions. Because the variables are no longer similar.

Hypothetical situation:

Two identical twins, separated at birth, made to grow up in two separate rooms of the same house, never in touch with each other, same upbringing, same conditioning, and same treatment. Basically, all other things being constant, given a same situation, would they both react in the same way?

Lord of the Flies

Listening to Hotel California by the Eagles. The haunting lyrics, "some dance to remember, some dance to forget". Oh! how thankful i am to the lord i cannot say. Have to narrate the events preceding this statement of mine. A lazy monsoony sunday in Mumbai. Woke up pretty late and hit the nearest watering hole. Nothing like a beer and a good book on a sunday afternoon.. I was reading the book " Lord of the Flies".. something abt the book.. by far the most disturbing book i've read.. and i've read a lot of them!.. A simple story of a group of boys washed ashore on to a uninhabited island and their quest to be rescued.. an outstandingly amazingly fantabulously well written book which shatters the myth that children are divine. The book lays bare the myth that adults are the only ones with twisted minds... But the more important revelation to me was that I would not on any given day want to be a child once again. No, No... it has nothing to do with the book. To me Innocence has no value. It has only theatrical value. I would not even begin to curse my worst enemy with the spell of ignorance/innocence.. give me wisdom anyday and take away my innocence, which is just a shell for ignorance..

I distinctly remember each moment of my childhood and it was a pretty normal one at that..no abuses,no upheavals, no parental divorces,no sexual abuse, no poverty, no major cultural changes..all in all, NORMAL.. Nothing to give me regrets.. But what i remember most about the childhood is my consciousness.. I distinctly remember the day i deflated the tyre of who i thought at that time was my enemy number 1, a neighbour of mine.. it was the cold-hearted calculated evil with which i intended to harm to him, in however a childish way, that shudders and sends the shivers down my spine.. Yes, even at that age of 12, i know and remember my intent to cause harm and nothing can convince me that i was childish and hence excusable from the guilt..

When i look back at my childhood, i can never remember a single instant when i considered myself a child.. no where do i remember that the decisions that i took were in any way not conscious.. i did certain actions which might be considered foolish. but those actions, i might still do as a adult..to me the revelation, therefore is not that i was ignorant.. but the revelation is that, at no instant in my life have i been unconscious.. if i go back even further, i can still remember my first year at school,in my lower kindergarden... i distinctly remember my school premises, the strict mathematics teacher,Ms.K.. My fear; my anxiety at being called during the class; my desire to feign illness to skip her class.

Give me awareness anytime.. give me knowledge any time.. Thank god i'm no longer a kid.. I cannot imagine myself going through that phase of ignorance.any more.. the phase when i could not articulate my instincts.. when i had no adequate phrase to explain my actions to myself.. the phase when i had no proper experience to relate to which could have tempered my actions.. thank god, i'm no longer a child!

Knowledge is power and consciousness is divine.

Time, distance & window-shopping

Just read the book "Ordinary Daylight" by Andrew Potok. An interesting one. The author has a disease which makes him gradually lose sight.. The author manages to give a very graphic description of his trauma: A crumbling marriage, A fading career, A tumultous relationship with his kids & Fear of dependency. All of these due to his loss of sight.. Or so he thinks.. That's the catch.. For a long time he finds it convenient to blame all the problems in his life to his fading eyesight, but then gradually comes out his self-pity and starts living a richer life.

Many times while reading, I couldnt help but want to shake up the writer (It was autobiographical) and tell him to just let go of his pain and start afresh.. It was frustrating watching his slow progress & growth.. It was painful to see him take so much time in learning to cope.. Felt that he was being too immature..

Later, I couldn’t help but wonder, is it that easy? It does seem easy when it happens to someone else. Show me any problem and I can clinically analyse it to this reason or the other and come out with a solution.. Am damn good at dispensing advice.. And quite of few of them have proven effective to those who have been foolish enough to try it!

But how often have i been able to be objective when it comes to my own life? Many a time have i let an issue fester inside for long.. Too long.. Oh yes, I seem to allow my problems to have a longer-than-normal shelf life.. I worry.. I bother.. I wallow in self-pity.. I brood.. All the symptoms for preserving the problem in perfect conditions.( As they say in the medicine labels, "store in cool,dry place for longer shelf life"!) I've tried a couple of new age solutions like positive thinking, deep breathing etc... But by far the best solution seems to be TIME & DISTANCE..

A typical desi cure, TIME & DISTANCE.. Wounds apparently heal better if not band-aided. I cannot vouch for the scientific basis of this statement. But one thing i have experienced is that no bitterness, pain, hatred or anger can stand the test of time. Time just washes all of them away like a Tsunami. Distance is again a godsend. "Just travel it off", thats my maxim.. Nothing works better for me than time and distance. Afterall, i'm mobile and i make maximum use of it.. This is not equal to running away from the issue.. Putting distance helps me gain a proper perspective of the issue and voila, i'm back in form..

Went for a long ride yesterday night after finishing the book.. A friend once said, "The true nature of a city is only visible in the night." How true!.. Driving through the streets of the city at night is so energising.. The lack of traffic, noise, pollution.. The hookers, the police, the drug peddlers, the dance bars, the god-knows-what sellers all add to the spice of night..

One of my pastimes when i go for my night rides is to trail the police jeeps.. It is pure fun to watch the police in action.. Yesterday i took to observing a police jeep in Kurla area.. The jeep stopped at each and every shop.. Out went the constable with the inspectorsaab staying back in the safety of the jeep.. The constable would come back in 2 mins from the shop with a bundle wrapped in a kerchief.. This routine repeated itself in front of each and every shop.. I counted 10 in just one street that i followed them.. Multiply it by atleast 5 streets in one beat and multiply that by Rs.250 and you know the money that an inspector makes in one shift.. So much for "to serve & protect".. It is more like a protection racket that is being run..

My friendly neighbourhood bar owner says that even if he does close the bar by 11 ( the official closing time), the police still demand a hafta, so he decided to keep it open till 2.. As a result the police come everyday.. And since the owner has to pay hafta, he decides to keep the bar open for a longer time to recover his costs.. Such is the vicious cycle.

The hookers, practitioners of the oldest profession in the world, are a Dime-a-Dozen. One such madam stood near the junction of Kurla & Kalina roads. Anticipation, Fear, Indifference, all of these emotions flashed by in her face in a matter of seconds as I passed her. I was riding slowly to enjoy the night air. As i drove closer, I could observe her better. She was youngish.. Around 30.. Dusky.. A full bosom and wide hips.. A dark pink transparent saree worn with a tight fitting, low-cut black blouse.. Hair tied in a bun surrounded by a sea of jasmine flowers.. Garish lipstick.. Cheap handbag.. Lovely glass bangles.. As we made eye-contact, she sized me up quickly and gave a smile. Her eyes betrayed the greedy glint a salesman has upon seeing a potential customer about to make a purchase. My indifferent facial features quickly told her that i was not interested in her offer. But as i continued towards her, she grew a bit wary probably thinking i was some kind of psycho out to kill her or do something worse. I could see fear. But as i drove past her, i shot a side glance and realised that her face had a new emotion plastered on it - Indifference. I was just another window-shopper!

A divine orgasm

There have been a spate of events which have generally kept me buoyant and finally led to the state of mind that i find myself in, on this friday evening.

(a) The evening that brought the chills out & kicked the heat out of the city. Last Saturday, to be more specific. The day started off (lazily, since it was a Saturday) with a typically Dilbertesque meeting with my boss and super-boss in which we spent a lot of time going over what we all knew and finally deciding that we will meet yet again after a period to review and take things forward (i.e.,typically call for yet another meeting to review, bitch about the other departments, prepare yet another fancy presentation, take some poor chap's case and talk global gyan). The good thing was, right in the middle of the meeting, my mind wandered and i could picture myself as yet another caricature in the world of Dilbert. The thought was so funny that i could not help but laugh. Thankfully, my boss had just then cracked a joke and hence my laughter fell in sync with the general reaction of the team.

Good food, post meeting. Good food always lifts my spirits and i found myself looking forward to the Sunday.

(b)In this frame of mind, i found myself walking towards my bike, when the gods decided to pitch in with their bit. The erstwhile hot climate suddenly changed. Cool winds from the Arabic Ocean started sweeping through the city. Simultaneously, the sun was setting. The visual metamorphosis in the horizon was striking. The sky turned bright orange with the sun moving towards his evening dwelling. The cool breeze from the ocean was soothing. And then i knew why poets get inspired by nature. It was a delight to the senses. My eyes were feasting on the changing colors of the sky. The skin was embraced by the breeze. The birds were returning to their nests and the attendant chirping was music to the ears. The aroma of the oxygen exuded by the trees was exhilirating...

The whole scenario reminded me of a song from a Tamil movie, "Nizhalgal". I generally avoid translations, as the original beauty is often lost in transit. But i shall venture to do so, in this case. The lyricist draws a comparison. He says that the sky is a beautiful maiden during the day, but she reserves the best of her beauty for the night.. and he says that dusk, being the intervening period between day and night, is when the maiden changes her attire and wears her best clothes. True..Very true..It was truly a voyeuristic experience to watch the heavenly maiden change her clothes!..A divine orgasm, if i may risk claiming.

(c)"Sophie's choice": The book that i'm reading now..Set in England during the 2nd world war..I'm barely 25 pages into it and i know it is going to make my weekend worth remembering..I can barely wait to get my hands back on it.. Ah! the sheer joy of knowing that a virginal book is waiting to be explored..Ready to be interpreted in a thousand different ways..Waiting to paint a million pictures in the mind's eye..A fantastic weekend waiting to be savoured.

To paraphrase Richard Bach, "Life is not to be measured in terms of the number of years one exists, but in terms of moments lived"..Yessireeee.

The Audience Factor

This has been simmering inside for quite a while now.. Time to let it out.. Have been pondering over critical issues like: Why are the damn traffic lights always red when i reach them? Why are the pretty babes always in the next department and not in mine? and Why am i maintaining this blog?..The first two questions are deeper ones and need a lot more introspection.. I was attempting to unravel the mystery of the last question, when i remembered my room-mate's favourite theory, The "Audience factor theory". This theory can be best digested with a basic understanding of the "Matrix" trilogy.

The Audience factor theory(AFT), to put it in a nutshell, says we do a lot of things for the potential claps that we might get from the potential audience who might hear the story. Pop psychologists could equate this with the "need for acceptance/approval"(NFA) syndrome. But the AFT goes on the contrary direction of the NFA. Examples of NFA could be, sporting the clothes in fashion, wanting to be seen in the so-called trendy places, sporting the latest hair-style etc...Basically, "going with the crowd"...

AFT is the other piece in the puzzle...The character "Neo" in the movie, Matrix, is also a part of the program. He is designed specially to cater to the rebel elements in the human race who wish to play out their rebellious streak.. while 99.9% of the human race is content with the illusion of the matrix, there is still a .1% which does not fit into it.. therefore, the character "Neo" is introduced to lure these rebels into an illusion that they are actually outside the matrix.. But the joke is on the rebels, as they too are a part of the matrix..

Anyways, so much for my matrix saga. The point being, even so called non-conformists, who wear their heart on their sleeves about their non-conformism give it all away by falling prey to the "audience factor"...The need to relate to an audience..To tell a fellow human that "i'm rebelling" is also a sign of a need for approval at a different level...

The bottom line is that i am having this feeling that I might be actually choosing to experience this "Audience Factor".. Why else would i mail my friends the URL of this site and actually ask them to visit my site!?...Why else would i have a site-meter installed to check the page hits per day!?.. The attempted funny questions at the start of the post are also designed to draw some claps from the gallery!... Hypocrisy!!! Sheer hypocrisy!!... But i'm not disgusted with myself... I am happy to have discovered this quite early... And in a way, this post is a confession... No, a purgatory..

A Piece Of Advice

This comes from Baz Luhrmann, the maker of the classic, “Moulin Rouge”, starring Nicole Kidman…An amazing song…Outstanding lyrics….Some sensible gyaan..

Baz Luhrmann - Everybody's Free (To Wear Sunscreen)

Ladies and Gentlemen of the class of ’97...

If I could offer you only one tip for the future, sunscreen would be it. The long term benefits of sunscreen have been proved by scientists whereas the rest of my advice has no basis more reliable than my own meandering experience…

I will dispense this advice now.

Enjoy the power and beauty of your youth; oh nevermind; you will not understand the power and beauty of your youth until they have faded. But trust me, in 20 years you’ll look back at photos of yourself and recall in a way you can’t grasp now how much possibility lay before you and how fabulous you really looked….

You’re not as fat as you imagine.

Don’t worry about the future; or worry, but know that worrying is as effective as trying to solve an algebra equation by chewing bubblegum. The real troubles in your life are apt to be things that never crossed your worried mind; the kind that blindside you at 4pm on some idle Tuesday.

Do one thing everyday that scares you

Sing

Don’t be reckless with other people’s hearts, don’t put up with people who are reckless with yours.

Floss

Don’t waste your time on jealousy; sometimes you’re ahead, sometimes you’re behind…the race is long, and in the end, it’s only with yourself.

Remember the compliments you receive, forget the insults; if you succeed in doing this, tell me how.

Keep your old love letters, throw away your old bank statements.

Stretch

Don’t feel guilty if you don’t know what you want to do with your life…the most interesting people I know didn’t know at 22 what they wanted to do with their lives, some of the most interesting 40 year olds I know still don’t.

Get plenty of calcium.

Be kind to your knees, you’ll miss them when they’re gone. Maybe you’ll marry, maybe you won’t, maybe you’ll have children,maybe you won’t, maybe you’ll divorce at 40, maybe you’ll dance the funky chicken on your 75th wedding anniversary…what ever you do, don’t congratulate yourself too much or berate yourself either – your choices are half chance, so are everybody else’s. Enjoy your body, use it every way you can…don’t be afraid of it, or what other people think of it, it’s the greatest instrument you’ll ever own..

Dance…even if you have nowhere to do it but in your own living room.

Read the directions, even if you don’t follow them.

Do NOT read beauty magazines, they will only make you feel ugly.

Get to know your parents, you never know when they’ll be gone for good.

Be nice to your siblings; they are the best link to your past and the people most likely to stick with you in the future.

Understand that friends come and go, but for the precious few you should hold on. Work hard to bridge the gaps in geography and lifestyle because the older you get, the more you need the people you knew when you were young.

Live in New York City once, but leave before it makes you hard;
live in Northern California once, but leave before it makes you soft.

Travel.

Accept certain inalienable truths, prices will rise, politicians will philander, you too will get old, and when you do you’ll fantasize that when you were young prices were reasonable, politicians were noble and children respected their elders.

Respect your elders.

Don’t expect anyone else to support you. Maybe you have a trust fund, maybe you have a wealthy spouse; but you never know when either one might run out.

Don’t mess too much with your hair, or by the time you're 40, it will look 85.

Be careful whose advice you buy, but, be patient with those who
supply it. Advice is a form of nostalgia, dispensing it is a way of
fishing the past from the disposal, wiping it off, painting over the
ugly parts and recycling it for more than
it’s worth.

But trust me on the sunscreen…