Building a Mystery

Sometimes when I sit at my desk on rainy Saturday mornings and see the raindrops lining the bare tree branches I wish they would just stay there forever and everything around me would just come to a standstill. Maybe that's why people take on photography, to capture a moment in time and keep that moment, revisit it to relive that moment, publish it to share that moment and hang it up no walls to surround themselves in moments that were once. But then you slowly start capturing moments and letting go of memories, pushing aside your own lens and letting the machine do all the work. The charm of reminiscing a rush of emotions is slowly slipping away into the hands of applied science which builds us a mystical collage of events. Some days I just wish to walk down a road without carrying anything in my hand except the feeling of blood rushing to my fingertips. Not having to look for a picturesque photograph in every blink and taking with me a trail of every step I took. The feeling of just absorbing and not conceptualizing.

Of all the things that matter

Carefully place the book down, open the first page and feel the warmth of the clean canvas nibble at your fingertips, itching you to take a splash of color and write a story. You slowly edge towards the ink, flashes filter the mind and the eyes desperately move from one end of the room to another trying to find a narrative. But blank pages are complicated like that. They are like starting from the beginning, opening your eyes once again and giving yourself the chance to reconstruct your identity. But beginnings are so cliched.

So you pick it up. The feather threads tickle and you start. Somewhere in the middle, somewhere in between you make the first line. The first letter you pick has no relation to anything but who's looking for one. One letter follows another and soon you realize the blue has infested the white and there's no turning around now. You look for places of refuge to rewrite the script but it seems impossible right now. You take a step back and think. What do I do. What did I do. But introspection too is oh so cliched.

And then the palms sweat but devise a plan. They decide that much has become too much and the page turns. To a new beginning. To a new chance at questions. The feeling is refreshing. The feeling leaves you little hollow in places and complete in others. But who's checking for holes, we're all just looking for new beginnings to happy endings. Leaving that feeling the only non-cliched one in a lifetime.

جنون

To disassociate and to connect.

With doors closing, pages turning, and moments being lived, you unconsciously tend to ask that question of what next. I ask the question, where did I go wrong to end up being so right today. Every morning I awake from dreams of the past and every evening I lay to rest thinking of the future, of what to do tomorrow, of how to live the next. And in between all of that, I take and make the decisions that make my today, that steer me from one to the other. It's like playing bumper cars all day, all day you keep hitting something or the other, you keep maneuvering from perceived dangers to anticipated happiness and eventually, after experiencing all, you're glad where you stopped and appreciate where you are. The past is a baggage, it is that part of your shadow that at any given moment, never leaves your side, but it is also that fortune that happens with the unfortunate. Life is your one gamble at happiness. So what if you have to sit everyday and have to sieve through feelings and disassociate with some and connect others; what matters is that you have the power to do that. The power to separate yourself from you. To take all of you forward but to stop and turn back and look at all of you also. And the feeling that you've made the right moves, taken the correct turns and you are where you are the happiest, and even though the future may be a blur, and there may be a million apprehensions, you are standing strong and ready for every challenge, is by far the best high in life. To be able to say that you are what you are because of what you were and will be what you want tomorrow, is one of the most enduring moments of life and should be lived through everyday.

Zindagi ka kisa..

Tamam khushiyon ke ird gird, apne aap ko samete ve, mein akela khara hua tha, khushiyon se door lekin unke darmiyan..

Ek insan ne mere haathon mein suraj sa roshan ek diya thama diya aur apna haath age barhaya..

Iss roshan se raaste pe chalte hue mujhe yeh andaza na laga ki dhoop ke keenare, apni roshni se haqeequat chupa sakte hain, mita nahi sakte..

Aur phir, ussi insaan ne woh roshaan sa diya mere hi haaton se cheen kar, mujhe phir se uss dorhaye pe khara dar diya jahan na khushiyon ki gunj na suraj ki koi kiran mujh tak ponch sake..

Hum insaan ko mukamal taur pe na samjh sakte hain.. na jaan sakte hain..

It's Our Future

To those that make the view a little less hazy..
To those that make the light a little brighter..
To those that make the impossible a lot more possible!

In My Favor

I got a wonderful gift from a dear friend for my 23rd birthday, 'The Tipping Point' by Malcolm Gladwell (also the author of the brilliant, 'Blink'). It was very different from my usual taste in literature, and so quite naturally, I had certain biases before beginning. But as always, with every book read, I was pleasantly surprised at what I felt post completion. I think what did it for me with this one was the simplicity with which it was written. It had very comprehensible situations, sequential trains of thought and minimalistic ideas. It summed up the "fine balance" of evolution of any given event, being, or idea at any point in time based upon the underlying simplicity of it's existence. But I think the take home message from this one was that any phenomenon is only as complicated or simple as you make them. The phenomenon of a natural disaster, the phenomenon of a scientific breakthrough, or the phenomenon of a fashion trend emerging, all of it has a very clear start and end. But they all reach a tipping point if their path becomes disoriented and detours. That's when the balance tips, one side rises and the other sinks, and sometimes it's disastrous and other times exhilarating. And it all eventually boils down to your range of risk - how much weight you are willing to put on and on which side of the balance. These ideas are very reminiscent of the bottle neck effect of evolutionary behavior. A species emerges, it flourishes but eventually, the complications of habitat and environment bring it the crossroad where it sinks so it can gain back it's simplicity and minimalism. And in context with human emotion, we have the greatest lesson to learn. The more we analyze, the more we tangle the less tangible it becomes, bringing it to a tipping point where we may have to take the risk of loosing it all.

Keep it simple and things will tip over in your favor!

Blueishly Bright

Some days are just bluer than blue. It doesn't need to be a Monday or a Wednesday. They are just blue. The point where you are just about to fall down, your clothes ripped, your eyes tearless, you lips shriveled up and your mind dismantled.. your knees slowly caving into the intensity and just about to give in to the burden.. and then you fall. Flat down, the crusty ground shaving the sides of your cheek, your throat getting more dry with every lifeless breath. Something like a blue day.

On days like this, you cry, you mope, you release everything that has made you upset in that moment to make space for the better. You scream, you hate, you whine to the people that love you and they give you back the power to love again. Love yourself, love every moment that passes, love life.

And then the cherry on the ice-cream is when someone says this to you..
Life is like a wave function, crests and troughs occur. And when we start interacting with others, interference occurs. Some remains constructive, other times may be destructive, changing the function. Entropy may increase as per the law but at the same time, we go through times, through crazy reactions to come to the most stable products, which may be the real ourselves.

All the blue is gone. All the brights are back. It happens. You need to topple over every so often to see a better view from the bottom of the sky up high.

The Happiness that is Life

Sometimes we get so caught up in the race of life that we forget to stop and think whether this marathon we're trying to get first place in is even worth it. We never stop to look up at the clouds or stare out at the endless ocean and see the sun set. We are too busy rushing to get ready to catch the bus that is going to come in the next six minutes to take us to the cubicle where we sit and block out all signs of another day passing by. Often times these questions run through my mind as I run to catch my own bus to another day enclosed by doors and windows but as I run I see a man walking with his fishing rod to the lake. And my emotions get torn by the question, the happiness that is life? Have we just perfected the skill of compromise and adjustment and can tune our minds to be happy in the unhappy? Or are we all just leading this imperfect life in the hope of a bigger perfection somewhere at the end of the tunnel? Why has it become so hard to live for today, for this moment and even if it is just one day in the year, why has it become so hard to take a breather from this rat race and give yourself a break. People talk of vacations but even there, the wrath of the blackberry, the iphone, the laptop do not leave your shadow.

Today I stopped. I breathed. I sit at the pier of Lake Mendota with the 70F sun shinning on my face, the calmness of the water soothing my eyes and the fluff of the clouds making patterns up high and making me smile. And even though I sit with my iphone next to me and my laptop in front of me, my mind has stopped and my heart is breathing. The song, 'Missing Sunday' runs through my headphones and I can't help but think that sometimes, it's good to have a day go missing just so the path becomes a little less hazy and life a little less jaded.

Pick Your Day

There are days. Days when life comes to a standstill and the world keeps moving. Days when flashes of the past start painting the present and blotching the future. Days when you feel like stepping out barefooted in the scorching heat and stare up at the sun. Such are the days when expressions are faint and the silence entertains. On these days the raindrops don't tickle and the moon hides. These are days when dreams seems incomplete and ideas inconceivable.

Those days give way to these days. When the lights shine bright and the heart gloats. When the sweet sounds of the wind match cords with the tapping of the finger. Such are the days that make you believe that life lives for you. Days when stories are narrated with the slight movement of the eyes. These are the days when conversations melt away into tunes and play the melody of love. Days when you feel the need to paint each nail with a different color.

Then there are days that mute you. Days that live on the fence and each side looks as brown as the other or as green.. it doesn't matter. On these days the blues don't make you more glum and the yellow doesn't make your smile stretch any further. Days when it doesn't matter whether there is a tomorrow or you lived through a yesterday. These are the days that a cup of coffee is nothing but a recharge to last another few hours. Days when life is pacing itself with the tick of the clock.

Our lives are a complicated compromise of all of these days. Some days we give more than we take and some days we are given more than we can handle.

The only limit to our realization of
our dreams of tommorrow will be doubts of today.

Live each day like a dream that never ends. Envision each dream like a song that never fades. Sing each song with the beat of your heart.

A Visit With Oneself

We meet a lot of people walking the different paths of life, some stick around to the end, some tag along for the ride, and some just get packed away in the stacks of memories. We get some of our best laughs from them as well as the tartest of moments. For the first time today I felt strange. Strangely connected. The strangeness that comes about when your friend sits across from you and tells you who you are. There is a comforting discomfort in that. Partly because you feel like you're no more standing shoulder to shoulder but now with a mirror in between where you are as much behind as you are in front, hiding nothing. But then you also hear them describing you.. you want to listen.. the words that tell you what you are all about and oddly enough you realize that you can be described in words. Maybe this is why they say your friends are a reflection of you.. and if nothing else, leaving us with the security that even in the toughest of times, these mirrors won't crack! :)

What Dreams are made of

I'll give you a sprinkle of red and let you color the skies with it. Let it run down your dress and trace the lacing. Let it pierce through you and ignite all emotions and feelings. Let it imitate the crimson outline of your lips and seal the words all at once.

I'll give you a dash of cloudy skies and let them pour into your blue soul. Let it dance with your slate colored bangles creating chimes with the falling raindrops.

I'll give you a stash of yellows and let you play games with the sun. Give it a dabble of orange and spray the desert sands with envy. Let you paint the old cafe walls and give them a reason to shy away.

I'll give you a fleck of jade and let you run in it. Let it ribbon itself around you and take vows with the sounds of music. Let you dip your shawl in it and shine like the stone that rings your finger.

I'll give you drizzle of whites and let the rays play tricks with it amidst the sunny winter days. Let you run your nails on the pearls that run around your neck. Let you lose your troubles in mounds of whipped cream that sit on the mocha.

I'll give you all this and a lot more if you dream on.

The Indian Bride

She sat there, sipping the latest brew of the week, the Darjeeling Himalaya, watching the radiance of the full moon fall on crystals that had covered the entire city with the last snowfall. The night was a rich royal blue, cloudless, starless and just the single imperfection in the sky, lighting up the inky alleys with perfection. The snowflakes had aligned themselves along the window panes of the small tea house she came to every evening, and as she traced around them on the foggy insides, while the steam from the tea fogged her own pair of spectacles, the thoughts of what is to come in the next few weeks raced through her mind for the millionth time that day.

Her marital alliance had been fixed with a native from a the small town of Pushkar by her mother's brother who was business partner's with the boy's father and the family had been vouched the most respectable in the entire homeland. Her own family was one of elite standing in city of Chittaurgarh and her grandparents had legacies woven in their blood from generations of royals. She, on the other hand, had taken up the challenge of stepping out of the realms of her heritage and took up a seat two years ago in a University abroad to study Botany. Her whole life she had grown up in desert filled lands yet, plants, beautiful flowers and vegetation had held her interest all along, and that was who defined her - seeker of the the unknown. And maybe that's why she had said yes to this boy who she had never met nor heard but only had a picture of him from his eight standard class. Yet she had faith. Whether it was in the confidence of her mother's voice, the reassurance in her father's words, the giggle of her cousin sisters when describing his debonair features, the letters her uncle had sent her describing the proposal or maybe the sincerity of his smile in the one picture she had of his she did not now, but she had faith. She had always lived life on her on terms, continuing to break all rules and realms that are set for a rajput princess, but only today did she realize the plethora of melodies her heart encompassed. All her life she had made her heart beat to the tunes of her mind but today they conduct yet another tune. Today the beat makes her heart stop at the idea of a better half, today the beat makes her head bow at the thought of her new home, today the beat makes her realize the depth of all the happiness that lay in the horizon. It is an unknown tune, but it is hers. She is only now seeing the rainbow of colors that an Indian woman's veil is made of in order encompass the vast amounts of relationships and responsibilities in her life.

So she sips, and with every sip, pieces of her past travel through her one last time, touching her in many different ways and as she packs away memories from times gone by, she clears the air for more to come. The anxieties of a bride to be play inside her and tickle her as she plans moments ahead. Suddenly she feels a tap on her shoulder and looks up, the familiar face of Harold, the owner of the tea shop, looks down upon her and a small smile cracks through the creases of his aged face as a sign to let her know that it was time to close the shop. And so, she to puts a full stop to the bolting thoughts of her mind, packs her belongings and gets up. She is standing at the door looking into Harold's eyes, probably the only single pair of male eyes she will ever have the courage to look into, and feels a sense of completion. He had the same look in his eyes from the first time she told him of her alliance three months ago. And slowly she realizes that deep down inside somewhere, maybe Harold too had given her the faith to make this decision. And so she hugs him one last time, both of them a little teary eyed but confident that this is where their story ended. A story that is going to give sprout to many more tales and with the sweet thought, she walks out of the doors, hears the bells tinkle as the door closes behind her and takes in a big breath of the subzero chilled air. Her closest cousin sister had made her a recording and sent it with the letter from her uncle of all her favorite wedding songs as she was growing up and teased her that she would only play these at her wedding in a few days.. she smiles, presses play and walks off.

Circular Vision

Once upon a moonlit night we danced,
Bound by the turbulence of beating hearts,
Cast under the spell otherwise known as madness,
With a rush of blood to the head,
We embraced each other like lost souls,
Like there was nothing else worth left to see but each other,
Something like love.

Today is another moonlit night,
There are only tunes now,
Moods of enchantment,
The heart swings alone to its own echoes,
That was then and this is now.

Tomorrow too there will be moonlit nights,
Some with you, some without you,
But always will the beat skip and the sound crash,
Forever more there will be turmoil,
Of what could be and what had been.

Sitaron mein le chalo
Dil jhoom jaye aise.. Huzur aao