helpless

Only when you go through it, you realise why they use adjectives like "shocking" and "gory" and "mindnumbing"; and only when you go through it, you realise why all those adjectives are useless in describing what you have just gone through.

and no, im talking about Cancer.

What  i AM talking about, is domestic violence. Physical domestic violence.

People have a cure for cancer, they help you through it, you are given medicines to kill it. you are allowed to kill the cancerous cells and remove parts of your body that might potentially cause cancer in the future.

What about domestic abuse? You act as if it doesnt exist, you pretend everything to be okay; a ruptured ear drum? a dislocated jaw? internal bleeding?

nothing happened. nothing really.fell down a flight of stairs; wasnt watching where to step; had a minor accident on the two wheeler. really?

really?

how could a flight of stairs rupture a eardrum? How could a jaw get dislocated if one hit the head on the kitchen cabinet? how do you manage to get massive internal bleeding if you dont drive a two wheeler?

no questions asked. questions will never be asked. we all want to pretend it did not happen. how do educated people allow it to happen? what about social standing?

finally, "who doesnt have problems in their marital life" and "all a part and parcel of marriage"

domestic abuse. part and parcel of life. nothing really happened. and I wont listen to what you tell me.

simply because, with a ruptured ear drum, i really cant hear you. 

the realization that the place that you are standing today, isnt where you wanted to be... All that you worked for, your whole life, all that you were, and were not, so that you could be someone at a later date - all that has come to naught, as you are not where you want to be.

That is what she felt as she took stock of her life. She was nearing the big 3-0 figure in a couple of years, and it struck her, that nothing was done. nothing that she had wanted to achieve, was achieved yet. she looked at her life, and it probably was just another life. a below average life, in a below average city with below average expectations.

The stranger (2)

it grew like the weeds and it blossomed like the deadly hyacinth.

it was both illicit and pure at the same time. it stank of betrayal, but had a musky frangrance of love.

They knew not, as to how this had happened. their lives went on endlessly. nothing was out of place. nothing was amiss.

Work, home, travel, friends, everything went on as usual. insurance monies were paid, interests recieved. groceries bought, and old newspapers sold.

A normal middle class life. filled with discussions about prices of gold and fuel, talk about new releases in the the theatres nearby. Of traffic snarls and of bitchy coworkers. of retirement plans and prices of real estate.

They dreamt middle class dreams, of a penthouse, of good education for their offspring, of multiple cars, and frequent flyer miles.

Yet, it grew. weedlike. the addiction. somewhere in that little corner of the being where the mind meets the heart, those few moments of drowsy wakefulness when sleep doesnt know if it has complete control, just as long as a heartbeat - he thought of her, and she, of him.

In the chaos of life, it found root and it grew. unsure of acknowledgement, fearing retribution, in the shelter of the forbidden and inhaling a memory of a kiss, it grew.

It wasnt love said he. it isnt love said she.

He had married his childhood sweetheart, and she had convinced herself that the lack of sorrow is happiness.

It wasnt love and they couldnt name it. they called it - it.

and it grew. the illicit offspring of undeserving parents, the shunned and the unnamed, the banned and the forgotten "it" grew. like the deadly hyacinth.

The stranger

It was unlike anything else. He was married, he had courted his wife before he had gotten married. she was the first love of his life.

The walking home with her, the dropping her books off home, the borrowing things, just so that they could talk again at college, the getting to know her friends, so he could spend time with her, the bribes offered to friends to fake their birthdays and invite her ... he had done all of this. His wife, was his sweetheart. The girl he had fallen in love with, when he was 19. The girl he dreamed to be with, until he was 90. He went home daily to her. He knew her. She knew him. that is what they were.

What was this then? It wasnt the love he had felt when he was 19. She wasnt his wife. What was it then? He thought long and hard about it. There was some chemistry. There was sexual tension. There was the anticipation of doing something out of the ordinary. This wasnt enough to be love though.

They shared the same interests. High pitched Edith Piaf rendering in the car; endless discussions of pre-independent India, political, apolitical discussions. Kannada songs and Hindi dialogues. Mimcry of "namma rajkumaaar ravru"

Deep down, sorrow. Grief unbearable. smiles through unshed tears. what happened that he could say things to this person, things that he wouldnt tell his wife, because she had to be protected? Why could he talk about office politics and bitch about the industry in general, and when he reached home - he had nothing to speak anymore to his wife, except listen to how well her baking classes were going?

Why did he feel guilty when his wife invited this other person into her home? Almost like the collision of two separate worlds would bring about the end of his world?

As he lay at night, thinking about her, he dialed her number without meaning to. She picked up his call. silence.
silence.
silence.
silence.
and then the beep of the phone disconnecting.

She waited for him at the blind turn.(irony). he walked down the steps and another furlong to reach the blind turn.

AC on full blast, it was a cool welcome, against the hot afternoon bangalore sun. they sat in silence. no piaf. no rafi. no vidyabhushan. this time. just silence.
Silence that sang. louder than any song. Silence.


that kiss. brief. unsure. awkward.

another kiss. probing. stronger. a little bit of teeth on her lower lip. breathing in her smell. car freshener and a woody-musky deo. rough facial hair touching the mole on her lower cheek.
Her hand on his cheek, cool fingers touching his warm earlobes. the clink of her watch with his diamond stud.

awkward drawing back of faces. longing mixed with guilt and sorrow. he walked back. the sun felt stronger now. was it the afternoon sun, or the rush of endorphin that heated up his face?

It had now begun.

playlist

some really beautiful songs in this long forgotten playlist. I love this playlist sheerly because of the lyrics and the reality that they portray.

totally love Sunil Dutt, and have always felt that he was one of the very (very) few handsome men in the industry. Even as he is a little chubby in this song,  he is totally handsome. 
The unfortunate man though, was dealt a poor hand when it came to offspring. That though, for another day.
Look just how handsome he looks in this period movie - awww .... no six and eight packs, but gimme Sunil Dutt anyday over any of these plastic newbies :)


And how awesome are the lyrics of this song? One needs to be married to actually appreciate the lyrics of this song... beautiful depiction of the inaneness and the ennui that sets in - you start taking each other for granted, and somewhere, you drift apart - stay together, because - well, you stay together. The love, though, the underlying love doesnt die out so easily, and that probably that is what holds everything together.
Juxtapose it with this song ; the joys of being newly wed, the surprise and the new love that they have for each other, that everything they do, is beautiful in itself ...

Leave you with this one...

wateva!

Love, is single handedly the biggest generator of crime.

All this flowery rosy poetry about love and its grandeur, is all just bull crap. It makes you lie, cheat. It makes you guilty, and feel dirty. even when you are the victim, it makes you feel like the perpetrator.

A friend is in love. for the 4th time. how can that be possible? beyond comprehension. Love is like boobs. even man boobs. it is like a vagina, a penis. once you have it. you have it. how do you get rid of it?

all modern medical practices would say boobs and vaginas and penises can be surgically removed. what else do cosmetic surgeons get paid for? unnatural removal of body parts.

Modernists would tell me to bother about more important stuff in life. Like the politics, or the elections or the poverty or hunger, or marrying film stars ... that is the big stuff. Stuff that the universe is made of. I cant get my head around the small stuff. Nauseatingly sickening small stuff like love and emotions. How am I supposed to make sense of the big stuff?

How does one stop being in love? does it happen like when you get out of a theater  Okay - it was good for the 3 hours it lasted. I am going to think about it now, and forget it by the time I reach the bottom of the escalator? Which movie do I watch next?

I need to know. For I need to fall out of love. I am in love. Far too much out in love. I am at a point where hate, disgust and love - they all meet. Like my own little Narnia or my own sickening version of Far-Far-Away. I need to get away from the looking glass. Alice needs her life back. So, when this friend marries the man she thinks is Mr. Right 4th time lucky, I tear my hair apart, figuring out just how is it possible. I need to know.

I need to get rid of this man living here in my head and heart, at the same time disgusting me, and at the same time evoking all those emotions of supposedly true love. I am stuck with someone whom I cant hate entirely or love completely. So for the sake of the end of the world - how does one get rid of emotions? whom do I pay for a surgery that strips me of my metaphorical man-boobs and penis - for now, it is unnatural to have it.

guilt

this song here  is bittersweet. 

It was 2005 I think, and I was active in the 'Bangalore Music Lovers' group on Yahoo. It was a rare opportunity to see BalaMurali perform Live in Bangalore.

The tickets were on the higher side, as was expected for a BalaMurali concert, but I went ahead and bought 3 tickets. I expected mom, me and gran to go, but when gran refused, I took dad along. we went in our Indica - the car dad had bought in the excitement of wanting to begin a travel business. It was the ultimate pride for him. A car he owed, driven by a chauffeur, with his wife and daughter to watch Balamurali in action, with the tickets his daughter had bought for him with her earnings.

Dad enjoyed the evening to no end. That ad where they say "papa ki chatti ko chattes se chaalis bana deta hain" it actually happened. It did.It truly and totally did.
He did not forget the evening ever. He kept singing that very song over and over again, he must have sang it atleast a thousand times in the short span that he was alive after this incident.

It drives a knife through my heart to listen to this song. It was dad and daughter, sitting next to each other laughing, clapping each other palms to match the Taala of the song.

This song always makes me feel guilty that my first choice was Gran. It taints the happiness of that evening with a huge guilt covered brush.

I make it a point to listen to this song everytime I feel good about myself, because it is important to know that you can never allow yourself to feel too good about yourself, too proud. you need to remember the people who matter the most. you need to make sure you are taking good care of them.you need to love them as unconditionally as possible. because, you never know, when life decides to paint your moments with that ugly color of guilt.

And truth be told. this is the only true and deep rooted guilt I have. Nothing else comes close. nothing else measures up. This is the only true emotion I have. all others pale. even love and hate. they pale. just pale against this one incident.  everything i will ever do in my life, will always pale - there will always be this pain in the pit of the stomach which hits you harder than a punch in the lungs which is so raw and emotional.that nothing can compare against to.