Random Musings

To truly love and then to let go...how difficult that must be, i wonder. That leap of faith i think only a few people can boast of taking...Parents for generations have been doing it without regret or remorse. Like a torch that needs to be passed on from one generation of parents to the other... From being the protective parents looking after every need of the child to teaching the children to stand on their own, physically, mentally, morally and spiritually. A couple of my friends have recently sent their teenage daughters for studies abroad...continents away. I know that the world is just a click away, but to send your 'child' however old for the first time away from home, i don't know what worries it entails... If my time comes, i wonder if i can pack off my daughter with the resilient fortitude that my friends displayed. A smile on the faces, a tear in the eyes and a prayer in the heart...What courage to love and let go...

With the popularity of social networking sites spreading like wildfire, number is all that seems to matter...the number of friends you have on your profile that is...It all somehow brings it down to a number...The more 'friends' i have, the more popular i think i am...Random people, random acquaintances, business associates, colleagues at work, sometimes even strangers, qualify as 'friends'. If we have only a few but 'real' friends, aren't we more blessed than those who have N number of friends, but nobody to listen to them or talk to, when they want...People too busy with their own routines to spare a minute or share a thought with people they care about... I used to be of the impression that friendships should be effortless, that communication should somehow just flow, yet, with time and age, i now know it differently. Any relationship needs to be nurtured, one has to make that effort... if only to make that phone call, or to write that mail, or to just ...

Solitude, Serenity, Silence...are these possible amidst a cacophony of voices, amidst a multitude of people. Can i achieve it, and if i do so, wouldn't i be in a state of absolute serenity and calm, a state of tranquility...a state that is achieved only by the enlightened ones, after years of practise (or so i've read)... Even if i do shut myself away from the voices outside, how do i suppress the voices within, the echo of the day's conversations, doing their constant rounds in cyclical precision in my mind...of things said and things left unsaid...of the work done and the work left undone... How i wish i could distance myself, from all that is without and all that is within...Does the secret lie in trying hard, or not trying at all...Will i experience my moments of solitude instinctively or by an exertion of conscious effort towards mind control. In pursuit of that solitude, i strive day after day...

Edgar Allan Poe and i have something in common. Though i wish it were the gift with words, it is more singularly the Raven that comes a-calling! Had heard of and seen stray cats and stray dogs that sort of become pets. But stray ravens, that have the potential to become pets sounds like a first to me! The bond that we unintentionally and invariably forge with these stray creatures...loving them, yet keeping them at a distance... bonding, yet withholding somehow... caring for them in a somewhat distanced fashion. The raven with the 'Mohawk' hairstyle landed on the tree near the house along with two bigger ravens a couple of months back! One of them lovingly feeding this young Punky in the mouth. And now, it's a daily affair...of course, Punky has since learnt to feed itself. Every morning i wake up to Punky's cries, like a small child calling out for food, for what i presume must be his first meal of the day. With shrill cries in a clock work precision i am reminded...

Last evening as we were bidding adieu to yet another member of the Club, i was stuck by this thought of how life can be just a series of beginnings. You meet people, have a good time with them... for a period of time, you share every moment of life with each other, and then...just as casually, drift apart, either because you no longer stay in the same place, or don't work in the same department or...whatever the reason. Have to call them friendships of convenience i think, for want of a better word. This is what most of these 'acquaintances' are...when i want to crib about the boss, conveniently, i have the co-worker's shoulder to cry on, when i want to crib about things at home, i have the friendly neighbor, to whom i can pour my heart out over a cup of coffee...that is all they seem, friendships of convenience. I think it's impossible to sustain enduring friendships in this day and age, when the here and now seem to matter more than anything else. These friend...

Bangalore always stood out among the Southern cities, as the hep and happening place. It somehow always exuded that cosmopolitan aura which was found lacking in Chennai or even Hyderabad. As you stroll down popular places like Commercial Street or Brigade Road, it is but evident, that the Bangloreans have an innate sense of style...it is very rare to come across a shabbily dressed person with ill-fitting clothes on these roads or the Malls or anywhere for that matter. Age seems just a number here. And gender, just that. Both, not affecting or even limiting the sense of style of dressing...It is not as if the people here are all dressed in trendy, fashionable stuff, but mostly you would find them in clothes that seem to state their sense of personal style, without a care for what is latest... In that seemingly cool garb, comes the calculated casualness of Bangaloreans.

Families lie. They lie to please, yet it hurts. Hurts real bad, when you finally stumble on the truth. I should have seen the tell-tale signs of my family’s unwillingness to tell me the truth. I should have sensed it in the gifts they brought me; in the way they avoided looking me in the eye when I asked them how I looked. Well, in case all this doesn’t make sense, then the good way to begin is at the beginning…. I think what prompted this strain of thought, is not one particular incident but a series of them actually. It is only on this cloudy, gloomy and terribly humid day, all of it became clear to me. I was sitting on the verandah, sipping my piping hot coffee, (beat the heat with the hot, was my mantra) when my thoughts traveled back in time, to all those years gone by, when I enjoyed doing just what I was doing today. And, I thought, ‘Next month’s my birthday, and I will turn 39 and enter the 40s’. I couldn’t believe it, 40, me? Why, it seemed just like the other day, when...

Today i pack one more carton and i know, i am that much closer to leaving this place, a place i call home today...somehow the distance already seems to be building as if i already belong no more... The milkman, the vegetable vendor, the newspaper delivery boy, the maid, all seem polite today...the warmth with which they greeted me, the innocuous news we exchanged, the stories we shared, are there no more...From the time I've told them of the move, something has imperceptibly changed...the warmth is now replaced by politeness, the casual and careless conversations somehow seem deliberate and affected...am i being too sensitive...that, i do not know, but i know, i sense, this place is mine no more... The elderly gentleman i used to occasionally meet on my walks, he lost in his thoughts, i in mine...and then we would sometimes just fall in step and discuss random things...the conversations always leaving us both with a lighter step and a better mood...Today, the dialogue is not so fo...

People who change residence often or travel a lot as part of their routine lives know what it is like to uproot ever so often...is it human nature i wonder, that even though we know that we may not live in a place forever, we make those places as comfortable and as livable as possible...as if we are never going to leave them...as if, they are permanent places of residence...Be it a hotel, a motel or a temporarily leased out apartment, any place merits that touch of permanence from the residents. Some take up these acts of establishing their roots consciously while some unconsciously, but the fact remains that each one of us, is in the pursuit of firmly growing our roots and establishing them, just as much as we want to develop wings and fly out...

'gr8 gng' my friend said, when i told her that i had started writing a blog. Being new to the cyber-world when i chat or receive 'msgs' i am constantly coming across terms like 'btw, lol, ttyl' and i am, to say the least, flabbergasted. I still take time to decipher all the short-forms of the sms or IM language... Educated by strict nuns all through schooling years, and graduating in Literature, do not help either. The gross 'misspellings' almost always make me feel guilty! I can almost feel the angry looks of my English teachers from yore, shaking their finger at me as i surreptitiously glance around before 'txtng msgs'. But change is inevitable and the faster we adapt to the changing times and trends I am told, life becomes that much easier. So, i am sure, I'll catch up, as most 'ppl' have already done. Very soon, I'll be able to not only decipher the meaning of all these short forms and abbreviations, i am sure, I'll ...

Blog - "read, write or edit a shared on-line journal"...this is how the blog is defined on the Net. Blogs have become one of the most popular ways of sharing information, 'random thoughts', anything and everything with a much larger audience. They have become a way of expression, hereto, restricted to an old diary; most times, unread and unappreciated, 'un-commented' by any third person. Today, when i write, i want to be read. Those of us who depended on others' approval for our writings to be published are no longer bound by these chains. All professional or amateur writers now can at the click of a mouse 'publish' content online. Now the wait is not for approval or publishing but that, it would be read, by family, friends, strangers, anybody, who is interested in the same things that i am. The need to be heard, the need to share, the need to know that somebody 'out there' is reading what i write....i think these are some of the facto...

Only a book-lover can understand what it is to pick up a new book and smell between the covers, or to pick up a favorite book and turn to those oft-read lines, or to browse in a book-shop in air conditioned comfort or to tread footpaths in summer-heat for second-hand books,...any exercise related to books or has books as the focus seems enjoyable, pleasurable even. With the turn of a page i am transported to a different world, without moving an inch i have the power in my hands literally to traverse the earth, walk across time-zones, even eras...at my will i can become a part of another world, another era, another life... Re-reading old books almost feels like catching up with old friends, the familiarity and comfort of knowing what to expect and what to overlook...and reading new books akin to making new friends, sometimes, unsure at the beginning, sometimes establishing immediate comfort-zone... The power of the written word, to move us to to tears, to make us laugh, to take us to a...

Can mobile phones or Internet connections really empower us...empower us to communicate...maybe they do...but the question is at what cost? They enable us to communicate with out any restrictions of physical, geographical or social borders...But, are they doing just that...Aren't they successfully alienating us from those that are in physical proximity to us? The moment i hear the cell phone, come what may, an instant desire to answer it overpowers every other necessity...it is almost like i am at its beck and call...as if i have to, have to answer it...It doesn't matter, that i am sitting next to the most important people in my life, and having dinner...i have to answer that phone...come what may! It is not difficult to visualize ourselves becoming slaves of something we have created for our convenience. Something which is supposed to empower us in now enslaving us, and knowingly and willingly we are ready to swap our seats in the power game. Ironically, i use the very medium...

First the name, why "The Cloak of Invisibility"... Because, i think that is what we are hiding in..With blogs, chat rooms, tweeting, ...in spite of all that we share, there is a part of us, that is happy in this cloak of invisibility. We readily share things about our lives, our likes, dislikes, our happiness and sorrow....in the complacence that the people we share this with, will somehow never know us or reach us in 'real-time'. It reminds me of how as children while traveling by trains on holidays, we would often see grown-ups exchange fair amounts of information about themselves...their lives would be open-books to fellow-travelers. Probably, the comfort of knowing that we may never meet them again, gives the reassurance of sharing intimate details and family secrets with them... Isn't that what the Net is now offering us? The Cloak of Invisibility...to share things...to express ourselves..without fear or apprehension...of either being judged or misjudged.....