What makes an year

An year is made of

• Change, above and beyond everything else. Seeing it, gritting your teeth against and finally accepting it for the inevitable fact of life it is.
• Decisions, no matter how big. The ones over which you ruminateand spend sleepless nights thinking about, or the ones which happen in the blink of an eye, leaving you with a "holy shit I did it!" kind of feeling. The ones which, no matter what the outcome, are always the right ones. The ones which lead you to now, this moment.
• Love, third but never last on the list. Big love for small children. Affectionate love for the goofy pet. Troubled, oft-tired sibling love. Surprising surges of love for parents, during those moments of realization of how much they do for you. Sweet, constant love for friends. Mad, passionate love for the other half your divided soul. Sweet, comfortable "let's do this for a hell of a long time more" love for the same.
• Friendships, old and new. Surprising discoveries about both.
• Happiness, from simples joys and big achievments.
• Sorrow, from inner realizations or senseless outside violence.
• Anger, at wrongdoings, mostly to others. At helplessness, mostly your own. 
• Family, constant. 
• God, and the untenable link he has over everything we do, unfortunately. Sigh.
• Nature, beautiful, the sea, the beaches, yellow flowers in the garden and blue, blue skies. Sunshine. Waves. Lights over a lake at night.
• Work, hopefull something you like. If you're lucky, something you suddenly discover you like.
• Booze, in high-to-moderate levels.
• Realizations, preferably about yourself, generally not too complimentary, but usually very revealing.
• Art, in any form.
• Books, in every form. From vampires to Jamaican plantation slaves. Never discrimate!
• Food...healthy, unhealthy, the whole lot. 
• People, strange acquaintances, those you never want to see again, hesitant friends, instant dislikes, confusion, struggle, always very interesting.
• And contentment, hopefully, that this year's been OK. 
• And hope, that there will always, always be something to hope for.
• And a quiet sense of achievement, because you've come through 365 days of your life again, unscathed (almost).

Good new year's :)

Making it count

I just stumbled across a blog post by a friend -- a good friend, in fact, someone I haven't had a nice. long jaw with in a long time. She says that she "stumled upon" her life's passion, and goes on to say how nice that is, given that so many search for what they want to do for so long. This kind of reassured me.

Because I logged on because I was feeling decidedly maudlin, the sort of gigantic rain-cloud-suddenly-above-my-head feeling that I don't usually allow to settle on me for too long. Any number of reasons are behind this, I know; new work hours, change, and overall, a general feeling of being chronically unable to make good decisions and get my shit together in a constructive way.

My editor at work has the most interesting desk--she travels extensively and has a miniature totem pole-like thing sitting next to a colurful creamic bowl that looks like something Machu Pichu would have in abundance. Around her desk are little inspirational quotes, printed out neatly and pinned to the spongy fabric of her workstation. One says, "If you think you can, or think you can't, you're right." This has, for some reason, been haunting me over the past few days.

Perhaps the greatest fear we have is that, through our sheer inability to make use of it, our much-touted potential will go waste. Because everybody obviously has greatness, that much you have to believe...we may not all be created "equal" but we surely all have potential...even the child with Down's Syndrome or the torso-only beggar who drags himself through the streets of dirty Colombo. It's always just a case of tapping that potential, which in turn would depend on the tools one has to do so.

Some of us have hardly any tools, but strive and find more. Some have, and make maximum use of. Others, just are. They don't seek, they don't maximize, they "go with the flow" (ye grand excuse) and "hope for the best" (ye second grand excuse) and watch while Life takes them wherever she wills. At the end of the day, these people, who are really cowards in pretty clothes, can always say that things happen for a reason and that if they didn't make up to all they could have been, well that must be Karma, no?


 

A little something on Love

I write a lot on Love :) Most of these rants are induced by some form of heart pain/break, and are usually long and melodramatic affairs consisting of how the right person can harm you beyond all repair. They're very complicated. Sometimes though, in quieter moments, I sit and wonder what life would be without the needle pricks of love -- without the sunsets and the laughter and that inexplicable feeling that poets rave about and 80s rockers keep wailing about. Without love, we'd be fine. We'd be happy, self-strong and confident human beings, sure of our place in the world. Without the doubts and fears Love brings, we'd be good. But we would miss out some of the finest feeling humanity has to offer and the soul can experience.

Never forget, poets and 80s rockers are always right :)

Base Realizations

Base realisations are those where you realise that, despite and in spite of all the various layers of civilization you pile on in life, all the morals and ethics you claim to subscribe to, all the fantastic notions of being better than at least a few other people in the world, you are - at heart - a rather pathetic, base human being. Selfish, self-motivated and convinced that the world and all its inhabitants revolve around you. Determined to see the world from only your point of view and cocksure of always being the wronged, the injured, the victim.

And of course, once you realise that you have all this time been trying to convince yourself of being a bettr person, you feel less human and more worm-like. Like a lowly, earth-living worm, who deserves the monstrous boot that will soon come and crush it underfoot, and grind it satisfyingly in to the wet, clammy, stinking earth, where it belongs.

That day

Forget the raucous rabble

Screaming slogans

Burning bras

Walking naked for

Support.

No one listens;

They only smile

Indulgently, at the little

Women, and their play.

It’s when you look

Straight in the eyes of the

Smirking passer-by,

Mis-direct the bust-aimed

Roving appraisal

And still the glancing

Hand.

It’s when you refuse to bow

To fear and fallacy

And third-party rules

Denying the right to

Your own life-choice.

It’s when you stand when

All would push you down,

Use your voice, your brain,

Ask for books when handed

Pans, reject convention

And grab hold of Change.

It’s on that day when Fear

Turns his ugly leer

Away from the darkened road, the

Lonely alley, the dancing shadows

Preying on your mid.

And it’s when the wrong is

Not “your mistake”, for immodesty,

Immorality, or simply, insolently

Being there, wrong place,

Wrong time.

Then, when your head is held

High above what they deem

Necessary,

That day, the woman walks

Free, among the rest.

Put a little tolerance in yer heart :)

“Every one of us is, in the cosmic perspective, precious. If a human disagrees with you, let him live. In a hundred billion galaxies, you will not find another.”

Carl Sagan

Being you

I've been thinking of writing for a while now...what with new jobs and life changes and adjusting yourself to where it takes you, sometimes writing simple things become a bit of a task. But today, busy Friday that it is, it's just hit me that I have to write about being yourself, and being happy about that.

It seems like every inspirational quote and FB meme begins with some variation of "Be yourself and be happy" etc. etc. etc. and many convoluted, motivational twists on it. But that's not technically what I'm ranting on about. It's about being comfortable with yourself.

As someone who isn't entirely comfortable with myself, but is getting there, I have always envied people who don't need other people -- in the most elemental sense. Theses are people who are so comfortable with their own personalities (and idiosyncrasies) and so devoted to their life purposes that, although they enjoy healthy relationships,they don't seem to depend on them.

Although I firmly believe in the power of harmonious relationships and values relating to family, friends and love, etc., somehow I become increasingly aware of the fact that dependence for happiness, stability and SANITY more than anything else, depends on the self and how the self is prepared to handle Life. And this is not a spin on a feminist "I-don't-need-a-man-to-make-me-happy"ideal, it is stick-up-in-your-face fact. It means that even if you surround yourself with good, kind, loving people, you avoid the latching-on that humans are so prone to. This seems to translate into avoidng expectations, but I think expectations are fair, and human. What IS silly is to always the need the reassurance of another body to feel complete, or happy or safe or important.

This would mean that your're happy with yourself and your rationalisation of life, and that you count on yourself, not because you've lost faith in humanity but because you've come to the understanding that

a. You don't need to justify yourself to anyone
b. There's no one really better than you
c. What better person is there to deal with your mental well-being, than yourself!

Phew! So, like my strong women friends say, take a walk by yourself, enjoy music on your own, do your work well and without constantly needing approval, achieve what you have to because you want to and not because you owe it to someone else and, if you have balls, big ones, do something really crazy, like watching a movie by yourself or heading out to a dinner for one a at your favourite place :) Who knows, in your travails through your Self, you might surprise yourself ;) 

The kiss

Ended too soon
Filtered across fevered
Lips,
And landed on
A quivering heart.

You and Yourself

A song by one of my favourite-st bands on the beauties of solitude and the plus points of, sometimes, not really needing other people or their company. Listen to The Weepies if you haven't :)

People

Contrary to popular belief, there are a few people I don't like! I go through life trying to keep and open mind, but there are a few, treasured human beings who REALLY challenge my attempts to give them a fair chance in life.

However, considering them, I feel bad. Pity may be an overly magnanimous emotion but, you have to feel something for people who don't have people. Because they are out there. They don't have friends, because they can't. Because they can't open up to difference, because they can't embrace the fact that people can be strange, but still good. Because they lack that essential ability to love someone other than yourself.

How much they miss out on.

Because they achieve; great things, even. They "succeed" in life, out-classing, out-running, striving for "perfection" (which to me will always be bloody elusive as hell), improving always, seeking the perfect degree, the perfect job. But they never...bond. Or they bond, with "the agenda", that all-purpose manifesto of requirements that an individual must have to qualify to be part of the circle. '

I have been thinking, on the brink as I am of a Big Step, about people, friends and achievement, the dreaded "What do I do with life?"-type internal monologues.
 Come to a few hazy conclusions, I have; primary among which is that being happy is very, very important. Being positive towards people is important. Not holding grudges helps a lot in life. Looking for the best in people aids in reducing manic anger-related episodes. Hatred should be, well, dropped. And you should do the best for yourself, remembering always that there are people around you for a reason, to live with, to help, to share a joke or a drink or a joint or a kiss or a hug or a smile. It's not about being a peachy, peace-loving hippie, it's about being able to talk to that hippie and be a friend to him.

Because in the end, success is necessary, money is essential and Life is serious, but if you can't find love and friendship among the 7 billion people who share your life-space, you really must question yourself about whether you have lived at all.

The weak roar

Sitting around feeling rather blue today. The only thing that makes things even remotely bearable is knowing that there are close to thousands of people in the country feeling exactly the same today.

Sri Lanka-West Indies, Final, ICC T20 World Cup 2012. Home grounds baby, as it should be, crazy atmosphere. A sea of lion flags wherever you look, The kind of easy camaraderie among strangers that you don't find easily in our country. Was so at the match last night, when we lost.

 Whooooosh. You could almost hear the slow descent of hopes and could clearly the see the flags stop waving, the people stop cheering, the crazy guy with "SL" and "T20" painted on his mohakwed head stop dancing,

People will laugh of course. Silly little islanders, going on about their cricket. Look at them, 30 year civil war behind them, no GDP worth talking about, Stock Exchange handled by goons, rampant Law of the Jungle by administered by the ruling class, no one of note  in the vast minefield of world politics. Look at them, crying over something as trivial as a cricket match for God's sake. It's pathetic, they say, it's only a game.

Thing is,when you have so little, when there's nothing really that you can be proud about, cricket has always come to our rescue. People have no food in some parts of our country. Children are raped, with impunity. Law and order have no place. Wealth is monopolised by the same gaggle of people who could afford to watch the match on their ENORMOUS damn LCD screens yesterday, or pay 20K for a bleachers ticket.

In the same vein, the rational part of one says that surely this is NOT a big deal, because real problems we have aplenty and we can't seem to get past the cricket stuck on our nose to get some perspective. But a win would have been it. It wouldn't have made things OK, or brought about justice, or equality or anything morally good. But it would have given people something positive. It would have made the famous (infamous? notorious?) Sri Lankan Smile glow across every feature-from the hard line businessman to the vegetable vendor and the destitute watching it at a public large screen.

So, yes. The country stands glum. People are back at work, "long faces" as we call them here. The little island will get over it, the blame game has already started, everyone would have played it differently, given the chance.

 But there is a reason collective sports and recreation exist, and even the concept's most vitriolic skeptics  will agree that a win would have lifted the collective spirit of a depressed nation. 

Ask me no questions

And I'll try really hard not to tell you any lies.

I wonder why people think they have the absolute right to know everything about you. Today, I was struck by just how many things people ask you at first meeting, expecting you be willing to divulge without discrimination. This bit of world wisdom struck me today as I met someone new, and in the spirit of cordiality, asked her where she last worked. This unleashed a barrage of questions: How long have I worked, when am I leaving, where am I going, is this my first job, what was my first, blah, blah blah, blah, blah. As I brilliantly diverted her, my mind wandered.

Is it because, now, in the age of "sharing" everything, keeping info to yourself makes you an "introvert", even "a little shy, weird you know", "closed up"? We seem to be expected to tell all-who we  work with, what we do EXACTLY please, how much we make, what we want to do in life, where we WANT TO BE, who we're with, for how long, what the sex is like.We're even expected to rationalize our life choices and beliefs, explain why we go to our churches, give money to beggars, wear our hair this way, decide to not study, not marry, not have a happy brood of kids by the tender age of 22.

Someone called me "closed up" recently. A good friend too, at that. Well, hell, if I don't want to divulge it, you can't do a good damn thing about it :)

But tell me, really, where do you SEE yourself in 10 years? ;)

I love those moments...

When you want to bang your head repetitively against a hard wall. Really.

Or, as a happy alternative, lay your neck gently against the cold steel of a railway track. And then hope that Sri Lankan Railways is not on strike, again.

As a generally non-suicidal individual, these thoughts always fill me with a sense of being in no control whatsoever of my "Destiny" or life. Like today, for God's sake.

Assume you stand at a beginning of a branching in the road you're taking. Yes, very Robert freaking Frost and all that crap. So, then you try to take road A (Also here, it is assumed that you haven't spotted Road B yet), and as you're going all fine and dandy when POW! you trip and fall and fall face-first into...elephant poop. So now you're filthy and pissed and angry with life and yet not surprised because Life has so far been throwing dung in your face for a while now.

So, you trudge back to the road and stand there glumly contemplating, when it starts to rain, drenching you but also revealing...Road B.This reaffirms your faith in life and you happily set off down the road, picking flowers, strewing them at innocent bystanders, petting babies and other little animals and in general making a grand racket about how great Road B is.

Then, one fine day, you stumble across a by-lane, one that leads you straight into Road B. Straight, clear and obstacle free.

The point of this meandering analogy is lost even on me. However, initial sentiments remain firmly fixed in my head. As of now, listening to a Strauss marathon in hopes of reducing them.

On taking a big step

I don't generally like taking big steps; the idea of them are a little threatening to me and they make me feel like they should accompany big, life-changing decisions, of which I'm admittedly not the biggest fan :)
Big steps are all those which-in my head-are taken by people unlike me; you now, risk-takers, bungee jumpers, people who leave home when they turn 18, who go off to the hills with a man on impulse, people who do crazy things like I don't know, get a tattoo, pierce their nipple, have drunken sex on a beach in Hikkaduwa on an unforgettable evening.

Just not me.

Strangely though, what I have come to slowly but surely realize about big steps is that they are often not as daunting as they appear. Sometimes, in mid-step they are aborted, and you can only hope it's for a good reason.
Sometimes, you have to take a number of small, successful steps which will smoothly glide into a big, gliding glide-step thing.
Sometimes of course, as you're walking along alone, amid the aborted big steps and the mundane everyday steps, you find yourself stepping over a puddle, skipping over some rocks and suddenly on the threshold of something that promises to be a very big step indeed. At this point, the smartest thing to do is probably not ruminate over it too much, but to just say wtf let's do this shit and walk on, walk on, walk on because you can'r go back now.

Shame.

of all the various types and colours of shame I imagine a human can feel, the worst, the one which leaves you the worst off, is probably shame about who you are.

 this shame is accompanied by a litany of semi-shames; what you do, what you wear, who you drink with. why you wear what you do, why you speak the way you do.
who you look up to, who you don't. what you bother about, what leaves you with no sleepless nights. what you spend your free time not doing.
how you spend your talents, how you waste them away. what you spend your money, what you don't. what you don't do for anyone else.
what principles you forgo, what easy ways out you take.
which inner voice you listen to; inspirational, defiant, nonchalant or indifferent.

the same shame compounds itself with what you do, or don't,  to alleviate, move away, do better for yourself. 

Waiting

Single mindedly,
Unerringly
Waiting
Unable to move
Or do anything remotely productive
Vibrating inside like a string on an instrument
When the screws are tightened
And the pick, or the bow
Or whatever
Hasn't been place to make sweet music
Yet!
Single knee
Pumping endlessly
Impatiently
Heartbeat galloping steadily
But surely, skipping here and there
Stuttering when the possibility
Of final consummation of expectation
Arrives.

Waiting.
Impatiently! 

Small wonder :)

Highly inclined though I am to write another piece of "My life sucks so much" (only because it does), I want to write about something that made me inexplicably happy, yesterday;

 I felt a baby kick inside a mother's tummy :D :D

As I write this now, I can feel the little bump and the answering bumpity-bump in my heart. I'm not ashamed to say tears came in to my eyes then, as they do now :) My colleague is almost 6 months down the line now, and is rather heavily pregnant. Being the Strange Experience Whore I am, I've been hounding her ever since she said she felt the baby - it's a girl, they found out thanks to a filter-less doc- kick.
So far, the little imp has been evading me, to the point of stopping entirely when mom comes over to our section because there's so much foetal activity.

Aha, but yesterday I caught the little bugger in the act. My friend complained about how our little friend was kicking up a storm, upon which I did a bit of an experimental pregnant-belly-rub. Nothing. Try again, said my friend. So I did. And holy crap, I felt another, as yet unborn, human being kick feistily inside her mom's tummy!

In the midst of everything ugly we see around us, amid all the unhappiness we happily embrace as Karma, God has a sneaky habit of showing his face in sudden, unexpected moments of wonder in its purest, most iridescent form.

Dem Moments

You know those days, those unenviable moments? The ones on which you hear something, or see something that gives you a funny feeling? Like something clicks inside you, or you get a weird clutch inside your stomach. Sometimes it happens because you meet someone who you know will be in your life forever, or will affect your life inexplicably. I suppose Love At First Sight would work like that.

Other times it's because whatever you experience makes you realize how life could have been different if the cosmos - or God, or Karma- had felt a little different about you. A little more benign, a little less benevolent, a little more inclined to help you sort your shit out.

But well, that's life isn't it? Which is possibly the most TRITE thing you can say to make yourself feel better, but I have always maintained that cliches are cliches only because they're actually Universal Truths ;)

Beauty

In one of its many forms :)

All Time Low Behaviours

I imagine everyone has a way they deal with or behave during those (hopefully) rare moments in life when one feels defeated, left out and generally fucked by universal energy.

My least favourite of these behaviours, from what I've observed at least, is the tendency to lash out at others, bang doors, curse violently and inventively and generally become a fat worm up everyone's asses.

Some, I know, listen to hard, thrashing music, hoping to beat out the misery, or at least if God is merciful, block it out for a little.

Some eat. Gorge. Feel sick, gorge some more.

Some bawl. Noses dripping, undignified, ruined tissues all around them, generally a hot mess with no one to see them.

Some update their Facebook status and damn but if that's not good gossip for the rest of us!

And then some of us, put on Adele, take out the tub of ice cream, sit in a corner and scare the cats in the neighbourhood with a heartfelt, from-the-gut, caterwauling version of "Someone like you".

Favourite bit being, " Never mind I'll find someone li-ike youuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuhoooooooo, I wish nothing but the best for youuuuuuuuuuhooooooooooooooooooo...." etc. Really,it's too much for the written word.

Hafoi. Pathetic only.  

Life and her friend Irony

Life is a funny lady as she is, but it's her friends that make her really interesting. Like Irony, for example, always popping up from out of thin air. Full of little surprises that make you want to

a. Bang your head against a wall
b. Laugh uncontrollably, until you fall into hysteria and start crying and then banging your head against the wall
c. Just cry, and then bang your head against the wall for good measure.

I had a lot of things to say yesterday about irony and how damnably ironic life can be at times, especially when set at a tangent with expectations, "should-have"s and other aspect of probability, but today has dawned and I have come more to terms with the fact that Life will always remain BFFs with her girlfriend Irony, who -like Life's other friend Karma- HAS to be a female entity.

Atlas Mode

I love talking to my friends. Everyone has so much perspective to bring to life, to ideas, to stick-in-the-mind opinions. Today, one nudged opened the door of my mind a little bit more.

My strong feminist ideologies have never been a secret, ahem, and I think I like to go through life advocating women's rights and be-moaning a woman's manifold burdens, but also very blissfully ignoring the very real pressures and burdens men have to bear. Like for instance, the Hunter-Gatherer/Caveman/Provider ideal.

Especially in our very South Asian context, the "man of the family" has the Atlas-like burden of "supporting" everyone-the poor unmarried sister, the kids, the distant relative from the South, the painter who used to work for his father, the errant son, the aging mother etc. It is expected of him to perform, provide, put aside all other personal aspirations and internalize this role. Because if you fail, then, aiyo, he didn't do right by the family no. The wife. The mother-in-law.

"It's  a fucking burden" says my friend grimly, just turned 30, graphic designer, 1 year old son, plagued by familial problems.

But, like women have internalized the roles of home and hearth, men have internalized the caveman role. And I can't help but think that not only does this seem  to create a certain balance in the gender role universe but also that it is a facet of South Asian femininity taken for granted by women. Women are expected to run households, slave over them even but not to uphold them. The economic downturn of a family is generally never really pegged on a woman, but rather the man's inability to do his duties.

Seems to me there are all kinds of problems, all kind of  burdens and that the Greek philosopher got it spot on in advice that is very hard to follow :


"Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a harder battle." - Plato 

I am woman, hear me roar weakly.

Women are fascinating creatures, I find the obsession that artists- poets, sculptors, painters, dramatists, cynics, philosophers, psychologists-have with them to be completely understandable. We are a strange lot, especially us "modern and empowered women". Because, sometimes, despite the strongest bloody feminist morals and the most militant feminist ideologies, women end up being just that, women, in every sense of the word in its worst, most stereotyped form.

So I think it would be very safe to say that while I love the vagaries associated with womanhood, and deplore the bullshit (Read as stomach cramps, mood swings, periods, painful childbirth, mood swings, body image issues) associated with being one, the thing I hate most are the basic traits of my type that are sadly unavoidable.

Like pining, and feeling less than special, and being burdened with the expectations of appropriate and inappropriate behaviour and having to cover up for the lack of perception of others. All of that and more.

But what is most insulting to a carefully built up feminist ego is that after years of empowerment, the woman's spirit is still so very much at the mercy of its twin soul's, and still so very easily quashed.

True

Oh Florence you beautiful woman. You're right. You really can't dance with the devil on your back!

Comfort...and other things :)

I started writing about comfort a while back, but had to stop; because there were things to do, and people who "needed me" and important stuff like work, and money to be minted. I wasn't really comfortable, but I think that at that point, I wanted to explore the concept of what it means to be comfortable, with self and others. Because I had recently had, unsurprisingly, a revelation!

Now, there's been rain outside and it's a Sunday, and the only pressing things in life are the cooking baking in the oven and the 8pm appointment for a hair cut, for my sister. I feel comfortable, at ease with myself. Which has increasingly become a very rare occurrence, in the past few months. Sometime I seek these moments SO MUCH that it in itself becomes a damned discomfort, like trying to "find yourself" or "discover you"(epic fails on both counts) :)

However, as I am comfortable now, I'd like to say for the record that to find even a few people with whom one can be completely at ease, is a real gift. Family, yes, always, thank God. Good friends, if you're lucky. Room-mates, I have found, by sheer necessity...and sometimes they even like you for it! Ha. Yourself, whoopie if you find it, I'm still on that quest.

But others, other. One more person. Who you don't feel like pretending with, trying too hard for, being mature for, that now that, comes only if you're rather blessed, I think.

My Alone Theory

Read a brilliant blog post on Riskology, on tips on being alone.

Read http://advancedriskology.com/alone/ when time permits.

As a Confessed Social Butterfly, I have a reputation for being a real PR Person. Everybody loves me, I'm awesome like that :) However, I do like my time alone. I enjoy reading on the balcony in the blistering sun, I enjoy looking at the stars, I like making my own food, I like browsing through old bookstores alone, I like striding across the road alone with my headset on. And I do NOT like people talking to me when I don't want to talk to them, at all.

But I think that I am slightly ashamed of doing things alone, it might be my upbringing, it might be the social conventions I hold on to tightly despite declaring a non-conformist, indifferent perspective of the world. I only go places if there's someone to go with, I generally need a friend to enjoy the theatre or an arty movie showing or an exotic food festival. I hardly go shopping alone. I have a nagging suspicion that I lack faith in meself. Yep.

But the really, really tricky thing with other people is that you can never really depend on them :) They have Lives, Loves and Other Things To Do a lot of time. So I miss out on a lot of things that could possibly enrich my life, I don't know.

There are a few people in my life who I really admire, strange and exotic creatures who regularly do odd things all by themselves, like listen to obscure and brilliant musicians play and watch subtitled foreign films at festivals organized by embassies. These people fascinate me on so may levels; Their comfort with being with themselves is a beauty to me, something I think I will never achieve. Their lack of need for concurrence with another opinion, their pure enjoyment of singular pleasures, their general lack of constant companionship. It's pretty cool.

I think I am a LONG way from being cool enough to go for a concert alone, but I plan to start small. I am already sticking to tips like asking people for less advice when I already know the answer, and also am enjoying the moments of alone I have. I was a little taken aback when I was told that I am only satisfied these days because so many of my friends are down and I have many things to do. This really added to me self-schema, I have to say.

ANYWAY, the plan is to start small and visit a nearby craft village, alone if I must. I will also try to be less dependent on others for pleasure, leisure and other things in life. Being the mostly-extrovert I am (I will never admit that I don't have qualities of introversion) , I will always need some form of company at most times, but I will enjoy my alone time with more ease, hopefully. Maybe, someday, I will reach that point where I can travel the world with just, myself and trusty old I :)

Must see putha. 

CowardiceCowardice

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ibWYROwadYs


Seems like cowardice in its finest form always comes to light through relationships,  of any variety.

Even the bravest man/woman is afraid to love completely and to let go completely.

 To love completely is dangerous-it opens up pores and dust pours through, leaving you prone to infection of the heart and invasion of germs that may one day go away, leaving you curiously empty and hollow, not even half the person you were before.
It make you asks Million Rupee Questions about if you're good enough for a superior human being and if you have anything that sets you apart from humanity's shop of Choice.
It basically, makes you a dart board, facing a being holding darts you handed over to them with stars in your eyes and hopes swallowing your little romantic heart.

That's creepy on a whole new scale.

To let go now, on the other hand, means you have to relinquish rewards, side-benefits, security, known things, familiarity, companionship.It means you have to actually make an effort with beings again. Oh no. What a lot of effort.

So we try and salvage what we have in a desperate effort to maintain normalcy as we know it, while also trying to save ourselves from the abyss of too-close relations which we are oh so prone to.

I realise that this is a rant, but I believe, firmly, that there are times when such are required and accepted as unavoidable.

Wisdom

 "So we keep on waiting, waiting, waiting on the world to change"...John Mayer is crooning in to my ears. He's a wise dude. Been hearing wisdom from some strange corners today.

One says that you must look at where you want to be in another 10 years, and aim from there onward. Sometimes even given up on the vague ambitions of "what I really love to do" to achieve that picket fence, the cheery patter of little feet, the security of home, family and a steady income.

One says that you should always, always make the right connections. Be interested in people, talk to people, and one day, one of them will point you in the direction of where you need to be. That it will always come, no matter what.

So young, these people, and yet so wise. It's fascinating to think of where they have come from, and where they have been in life to come to terms with these (sure, both) truths.

  Everybody is making their own change because the world ain't changing for us.

Content?

Over a long overdue visit, a Wise Teacher told us that she stays happy and content by not expecting anything from anyone. That way, no body disappoints, and no expectations fall so far short that one ends up feeling silly in the first place for expecting.

Mulled this over. It's really a superb plan. Very sensible, and one of the precepts of most wide-spread religious doctrines.

But really, we're only human. Expectation seems to be the in-built feature of the human psyche. One can try not to expect, or have low expectations but invariably you bounce right back to your happy state of what ideally should be. And it's dangerous, and it hurts terribly when things/places/mostly people don;t live up to your expectations.
But really, who are we to complain? What would life be without expectations? It would clearer, yes. It would be less cluttered, fewer of us would suffer from the renowned "I want to bank my head hard against the wall| syndrome, but it would be, unreal. I can't imagine a life without unrealistic expectations.
It seems vaguely unnatural and relevant only for higher states of consciousness. 

The Million Rupee Questions

Sexy Boss said yesterday that she found a new way of relieving stress-writing. Something that I have sworn by since I was a child, but it still warms you up inside when someone discovers the joy of reading or writing.

Her first chapter had been entitled "The Questions we ask ourselves", and what a way to start, I think. Made me think of our Million Rupee Questions.

Am I good enough?

Am I pretty enough?

Do I have what it takes?

Is it worth taking that risk?

Do I really want this?

Will I succeed?

Where the hell will I be in just 5 years from now?

Will my children be proud of me?

Do I have to be patient? Supportive? Understanding?

Can I be everything to everyone, and still have enough left for me?

Do I really the have the potential everyone keeps yapping about?

Will I become the person everyone thinks I can be, or the person I settle for being?

In his commencement address to a group of graduating students, late author David Foster Wallace said that the real value of a Liberal Arts education is to the ability the students gains to think clearly midst the chaos that is the internal working of the human mind. One Social Sciences degree and one year of experience in the famed make 'em or break 'em corporate sector down the line, I wonder how right he was.

Oh sublime!

Thanks to a generous gift from the Love of My Life, encountered first ever full body massage today. And oh, it was sublime!

Pampered in to a willing ball of nothingness at the hands of Olina, a cheerful, very young, Thai masseuse at possibly the swankiest (and ahem, only) spa I have visited, the single thought I had the will power to hold on to was that she could kill me if she wanted to, I wouldn't have been able to budge an inch to prevent it. She pummeled and she pulled, she rubbed and soothed, she pushed and shoved and soothed some more. And all of this mind you, within a dim-lit room of exquisite, simple elegance, soft music and accentuated withe comfortingly hot Sesame oil. Ah...


Stepped out the spa of it with another self-righteous opinion dashed to the ground-I no longer hold in contempt those rich bitches who do this more than occasionally. Of course they do this instead of busting the k on helping orphaned children. If I had the money, I would do this more than occasionally. I would alternate between the 3 choices you get to choose from as the aroma that distills in to your nostrils from under your face. I would choose the Ayurvedic spa one week, the Javanese the next and maybe try the Yoga spa. I would eagerly ask for the post-treatment Tamarind juice and choose Olina as my therapist of choice. I would even shed my clothing with a little less reserve, over time of course!

Of course, I would like to think that I would also spend some time on the orphans. I would be a nice, rich bitch.

But oh, sublime. Simply, sublime :)

Feeling a tad...

Uninspired today, right now. Must be the weather :) It's exhausting-ly capricious and difficult to keep up with.

Visited school today for a fair, met a lot of old friends, caught up some, had fun some. However just came home uninspired. Lots of statuses on Facebook about how they want to go back to school, yay school etc. But I don't feel the enthusiasm. Which is ironic actually because school is probably the only place where I felt completely at ease, in control, and totally belonged.  However, I have no trouble severing ties with parts of my life that end. I always look at it as a part of the great circle that is life, so amid the tears and fears of everyone else, I am calm, unfazed, and ready for Chapter Next.

There's a rom-com streaming though, and a friend coming home for a sleepover. I cling to these to be satiated, if not completely inspired.

Yikes. I say, Yikes.

I am seeking inspiration. I read somewhere-basically some great, writing mind had opined-that if you are writing something, and you face Writer's Block, that shows that what you're writing is not right. Therefore he, I think it was...Ray Bradbury, says that you should just stop. And write something that your mind actually agrees with.
Great advice, when you think of it. But also, very, very idealistic. Because in life you face all these little unpleasant tasks that you simply cannot afford to let go of. Like now, this dastardly Press Release on a vehicle mart. I mean, really. What is a writer to say. I have been labouring happily at 2 paras for the past 2 hours. I tried music, I tried reading inspirational writer advice, but no. Not happening.

So I decided to try Ray's advice. Now my brain, REALLY agrees with what I'm writing :-D

Number 5 on this list is where you should be looking :
http://www.brainpickings.org/index.php/2012/05/18/commencement-speeches-2/

Little Bubbles

My little bubble, let me describe it. Outside it, it's a beautiful world of colour and work and order, but inside my bubble swirls my everything.

The insecurities, the inconsistent feelings, the thoughts that shame me, the un-fulfilled resolutions, the silly things that make me happy, the silly things I don't talk about because they just wouldn't do.

Some bubbles contain the hurt of unrequited love, a thirst slaked outside the bubble with dalliance and one-nighters, careless flirtations.

Some bubbles, I imagine, consist of the wars between what we are and we should be.

Some bubbles are of anger, resentment, helpless fury.

Some are of temptation, of fruits that strive to stay untasted.

I don't know, there must be a lot of such bubbles. It's just so apparent that everyone is living in one, though. We all just seem to float around endlessly, bobbing about on the waves of society, sticking to protocol, doing what's expected. But everyone is in their own little indestructible bubble of everything.

For a special friend

Creepy though that may sound, this is for a special friend who turns an year older today. You know who you are, bitch :)

I decided against a Facebook post because it seems like personal wishes should stay that way, personal. And I have become progressively bad with mailing cards, with age.

I think I have always been blessed when it comes to people. Almost a quarter down my life (holy CRAP) I can safely say that I have met a wide variety of people whom I have loved, liked, avidly disliked and just been plain amused by. This post is dedicated to, however, someone who I consider to be a a bit of a twin soul. I must say we're quite different, and that often the world is viewed in a very different way by the both of us. But, there is something uncanny and yet, comforting in having someone who knows exactly WHAT you mean, without requiring the footnotes. Complete understanding is highly under-rated.

Time has fled and it's been more than an year since we last met, and much has changed. People, places, circumstances once familiar are now basically shelved under "Hey remember when...?". And yet, a sister of the heart remains that, regardless of the time and space that comes between.

A sister of the heart remains a sister of the heart.

So happy birthdays jangi :)

Searching for meaning

When the title for this post struck me just now, it put me off writing it :) It sounds as abstract as it means and ensures the few 100-300 words following to be those of a person who is-at heart, it seems-beautifully, agonizingly, aimless.

The thing with people who have set aims and goals in life; It's difficult to hate them, or even envy them. It seems unfair to hold something against these perfectly settled, destination-oriented, busily tired out individuals because I know how they got there. They had a calling, they felt the need to be someone, they took the difficult, fraught decisions to get on the path to there, and now they're on their way. They may be far from it, they may even be suffering through exams, heartache, insecurity, no income, anything, everything, but they're on their way.

Which make me wonder WHY I feel aimless. There seems to be a set goal in most lives, at least, like, a rough arrow in their minds pointing SOMEwhere. My arrow, whenever it blinks on (It's neon, and switches off when I get distracted by pretty things) points one way..then another. Then it blinks, flickers a little, does a circle, wavers, wavers some more, settles for an easy choice, and then switches off.

As prophesied, this post is naught but, bunkum. 

The Grateful Alive

I wonder if it's general maturity or hearing others' woes that makes one realize what one should be grateful for.
Maybe it's a combination.

I know I'm grateful that I have love in my life, and I don't mean the platonic or filial variety. I mean the angry, biting, desperate, grieving, ecstatic, dizzying type.

I know I'm grateful for having parents who don't hover. Like space ships or mother hens over their chicks, asking if they're done eating, wondering why they're still not home, touching, stroking, placating. GAAAAAAH!!

I'm grateful for having opportunities. To eat, to learn, to read, to blog when the mood strikes :)

I'm grateful for the time I have in life; the time I create without the pressures of whens and when it's dones and once that's overs.

I'm grateful for whatever friends I have made, and will keep, in any realm of life-school, college, work. I' thankful for my lifelines- FB, Skype, mobile.

I'm grateful, I realize, more that anything else, for being able to be grateful for these things. For being able to rejoice in them instead of seeking out all the negative things in life, circling them in Red and marking them "THIS IS WHY MY LIFE SUCKS."

I'm pretty sure that when the next wave of contentment with life strikes, this post will have an extension. Till then, we must all brace ourselves for the inevitable depression. It's life. It imitates any natural cycle.

Eating bad fruit

I think that giving someone you don’t particularly like, a chance, is very difficult to do. It’s an expense of emotional energy the point of which you always doubt because at the back of your mind the questions linger and pop out at your consciousness;

“Would she do the same for me?”

“Is he just using me, like always?”

“Is this just going to be another time when I bang my head and mutter ‘Should have seen that coming, again!’?”

It’s like eating bad fruit; you have to have a certain degree of rare courage to eat a bad fruit, spit it out, and then calmly pick up another one and proceed to peel it. I want to check the fruit, re-check it, poke at it with my knife, hold it up under the harsh glare of the fluorescent light in the kitchen. I don’t want to eat the bad fruit again, and feel that bad taste in my mouth again. I don’t want to feel like a fool who gets had, over and over again. The fool who the not-so-foolish and the hopelessly cynical turn to and gloat at, “I told you not to trust her again”.

But I always think, life is so short and so full of mistakes. I am so full of mistakes. My soul is contaminated as it is with my personal failings and embarrassing little un-Christian habits. Why darken another corner of my soul with a grudge? Because that’s what holding things against someone does. It discolours your heart a little. It taps in to your being’s well of negative energy, and draws forth.

So much easier on the breathing then, to let in. Not trust, maybe, not even get too close to. But to let in. To not just be civil to on a superficial level but find it in your heart to stop clutching at a dislike and to genuinely allow that person in to your space. I won’t be best friends, I won’t even let you be best friends, but I won’t hesitate to talk honestly, to help willingly and to genuinely take joy in the good that comes your way.

I will always doubt but I will not let that doubt get the better of me

. I, in fact, am trying to be better than that.

Escape

People could want to escape from any number of things, I imagine. The nature of life and reality is such that, unless you have reached that higher state of being where you can see The Truth for what it is, you are always faced with people, places, situations, decisions, encounters you want to run away from.

I used to think that taking to the bottle because you're father was an alcoholic was wrong, fundamentally. One must be strong for oneself, one must develop and all that. But what a load of crap. Escape is all we do. We help others , we groom ourselves, we hit the gym, we study harder, we smile brighter, we date the radicals, we drink more, we smoke up a little more, we take up healthy lifestyles, we develop superficially esoteric tastes, we become "better" people. But we're always trying to escape. It's always the escape hatch that we yank open, finding the rusted key somewhere deep in our cowardly, broken souls, bolting through so fast that whatever is behind us pants to catch up.

But it always does. It follows, and it bides its time carefully hiding in our shallow subconscious mind and...POUNCE. 

Then there is, no where at all, to run. 

Strength of a woman

Went to watch the original Mr. Lover Lover last weekend, Shaggy live in concert! Not only was it entertaining but also highly amusing to see Shaggy sidle his slimy way up to the local ladies! That might be the cynic in me talking. Anyway, when he started playing "Strength of a woman", he asked the aaalll independent women in the audience to raise them hannnds!!! And there were shrieks and raised hands of course.
Made me think of this idea of an independent woman. With years of feminist ideology backing us, every educated, open-minded woman should ideally be an independent woman. But what strikes me as ironic, often about myself more than anyone else, is the sheer effort women put in to being independent, of men. If we strive always to "be our own woman", then there is an invisible thread that is still pulling us mentally toward the Alpha Male who in the end decided our fates as human beings- woman, mother, sister, lover, wife, colleague.

Now, the really admirable ones are the women who have grown in spite of the invisible thread. The well-balanced, non-extremist women who, yes admittedly, need and have men, but are alone in their strength and don't depend on a sort of male crutch. Those are the admirable ones. And having in a few in my life isn't just helpful, it's downright inspirational.

\

Triskele/The triple spiral

"She'll take you too a hiiigher plaaace..." You know you wanna sing along ;)

On a related note, this symbol is the triskele, a neopagan symbol for the three stages of the woman : maiden, mother, crone. There's more to it than that, as it is apparently a Celtic and pre-Celtic symbol as well. Must do some digging.
If I ever get a tat, this could be it. The strong woman, har har har ;)

The Gurgle Syndrome

Social ineptitude is arguably a sort of wide-spread disease. You see it in a wide range of individuals in the geek-nerd-sheltered spectrum. I see  it in a whole lot of people I know, but have never actually been affected by their ineptitude because of my strong Social Butterfly characteristics.
However, what is worth further research is the effect an uncompromisingly awkward situation of a personal nature can have on a usually highly socially "ept" ahem individual.
Like how a Social Butterfly (SB) can be rendered a blundering, silent, boring, morose wall ornament in a singular situation. True story. Said SB could frantically construct amusing little comebacks, little anecdotes, small jokes, intelligent word sparring in the HEAD, debate it again MENTALLY and finally produce from the vocal chords a sort of...gurgle. Or even like a moronic statement that manages to be moronic, offensive and completely non diverting all at one go. It could be seen as a rare feat of sheer awkwardness.
Obviously, the extraneous factors should be taken in to account here-such as the reactions of the other individuals in group, the willingness of the said individuals to interact with SB, the location of the interaction etc.-however, it can be safely hypothesized that at least a good 80% of the resultant stunted  communication is purely the fault of the unadulterated ill mental health of the said Social Butterfly, SB.

Obviously more research is required in this regard. I'm just hypothesizing here. I could be wrong. 

Things that remain unsaid

Corrode from the inside.

Hi dear!

The monsoon has hit Colombo in full force, all rain and gloom and slush. I actually took a break from the (exciting not!) work space and stared at the rain for a while, it was so romantic. Even my counterpart in Sinhala writing agrees, " athi wenne neha" he says, a poetic soul by nature, he says you can't enough of it. It makes you think drippy thoughts and miss people who might be there to share the moment.

Then, I had to step out in to the romance. Rain, slush, mud, whizzing mud whirls vis a vis vehicles, and not a damn tuk in sight. Then,oOne guy actually slowed down next to me...but only to leer "Hi dear!" and whizz off.

Dude, I could have given you business. Fuck you man. That's what I told him too.

The trouble with love

The trouble with it, is that it whether at its best or worst, it tends to overcome you, to the extent that you lose sight of yourself. Your whole vista of thought and perspective fills up with one person, one idea and *bang* you've lost them: ideals, goals, self-motivational-guru-type quotes by Successful People, even, possibly your very carefully preserved mental restraint. Suddenly you're willing to imagine anything, fancy anything, hope for anything that will enhance that sweeping feeling, or just, make it all go away.

At times like this, one of my favourite quotes from possibly my favourite novel springs at me from nowhere, invariably, like a prayer;
" He stood between me and every thought of religion, as an eclipse intervenes between man and the broad sun. I could not, in those days, see God for his creature, of whom I had made an idol"
-Jane Eyre, Charlotte Bronte-

Dangerous at the best of times.

Why you should not necessarily write when angry/depressed

1. Names might come out.
2. It might result in a completely uninteresting-for-anyone-else rant on how much people suck and why the world just needs to die off in general.
3. It might be unnecessary.
4. You could do better.
5. It may result in pure, unadulterated drivel designed to take your mind off your problems, thereby resulting in it being a piece of no literary worth, whatsoever.

Hmm :) Always one to take my own advice :)

Weighty expectations much?

The Big Guy says today that I'm trusted like no one else before. Ideally, I THINK this should pressurize me but also make find some way of furthering my position here but strangely, I feel like someone put a damn paper bag over my head. Air cut off, HOLY SHIT! Aiyo, I just want to write and be loved for it. I'm thankful that I have the chance to do so in some way. Eh?
We had a conversation on writing today, too. It was interesting, Somehow what I feel slipped out, I generally try to keep it reined it, I'm safe like that. I told him that the spiel I generate on a daily basis is not me, that's not personal. What I write here, my poetry, the mumbling that go on in my head as I scrub my feet, that is real. That is me. Everything else is just the smart part of my brain, honed with the help of countless books and thesaurus.com

Write write write!

Like you've never written before!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Discovered a new love for all things written :D