Chiffonesque

You can tell a lot about a person from what they notice in a rickshaw. My mother doesn't travel by ricks often but when she does, she notices the driver's face in the mirror; in case, she will one day have to identify him in a police line-up. So she'll sit and surreptitiously move towards the mirror and try and get as good a look as possible. This, of course, makes the driver uneasy and results in a very bumpy ride. But the big plus is that the rick guys take the shortest route possible. There's just so much of a paying customer you can take. I have urged her several times to drop that 'I know what you did last summer' expression, only to be told that I'm naive. Since this discussion comes up after I've been swindled of money, a strong counter-argument is usually absent. The offence rests. My roomie usually notices the scratches on the upholstery and likes to guess how long the rick must have been operating on the roads. Or that is what she liked to do ...

This happened one afternoon that stretched langorously over many anaesthetic eternities. I read a verse by Poe. Something like this: 'If in your dream you went to heaven, And you plucked a flower, And then you woke up and found the flower in your hand, Ah! What then?' Excellent drowsy imagery. White, poisonous, spectacular flower - like Datura. Linen - soft creases, thick drapes, cool glass of water at the bedside table. Japanese beads at the foot of the bed. Some chimes ringing like the Chariots of Fire tune. A very gracious conundrum. A soothing cenotaph of reason. My bai cooked meat when there was no oil. Hadn't realized there was meat in the house. My fountain pen had stopped leaking, all of a sudden. Hadn't realized that stain was ink. Strange. Like Poe in the afternoon.

My friend JD, her three year old daughter, and I were walking to a restaurant to have some steak. Or at least that's why my friend and I were walking. The little one had decided to humor us. But for some reason, she seemed disgruntled. You'd think that dimly lit roads and concrete craters would probably make the walk adventerous, but no. It was just plain tiring. I found three jasmine flowers on the road that I offered our tiny companion. I couldn't find anything else to distract her, other than a sleepy dog; but since I'm scared of them, thought I would let the sleeping dog lie. She took the flowers willingly, yet remained unsure of whether they merited a change in mood. So the furrowed little brows and cute pout stayed put on her sweet, round face. Now, JD is a 'Wish I had a camera' kind of photographer. She has the eye to spot brilliant compositions but lacks the initiative to come prepared with a camera. Yes, it can be argued that it's not her profession...

I believe that I must die. It is important to do that now. Not as something that occurs as an error of cosmic judgment. More like the fulcrum of the destiny of the glistening, unshed tear that will drop from hooded eyes. There is too much going on. There is too little sleep. There is too little time for myself. There is too little of myself to make time for. It is not enough to change jobs, and constantly look at tree-trunks and poisonous flowers, and evil sunsets to find a story. It is not enough. It is not even close to being enough. What would be enough to get started would be to first end it all. The words, the verbage, the analogies, the descriptions, the twitterings, the hollowness, the constant spiralling ascendancy to decline. Therefore, I will not write for a long time. I will not write until I am garblingly new and I'm freakishly happy. I shall be my own Othello, and weep in conceited silence over my plight. I shall bleed ever so slowly to get the stinky muddy mundaneness...

One morning There’s no point in setting the alarm in the mobile if you’re going to keep it in the silent mode (which is what I do.) And equally ineffective is setting the alarm, keeping the volume high and squeaky, leaving it in purse, and putting purse in cupboard (my roomie’s trademark). As a result of such dysfunctional stupidity, we both got up at 9:00. We rubbed our eyes, smiled at each other across the room, and then she slapped her forehead. That’s usually her reaction for not keeping the garbage out or forgetting to bring the milk. My response to such distress is a sedate, “There’s always tomorrow; and I prefer black tea.” “Today’s Monday”, Za says. “Ah!”, I cheep like a Prozaced sparrow. “The cartoon strips are the funniest today.” “We have a meeting today.” I blink. “At 9:30.” By 9: 15 a.m., two women with varying degrees of messiness and culinary skills are dressed, fed, and out of the house. However, just as I lock the door, I squint. I know that I’ve forgotten something bu...

None of the people I hang out with in Pune are from Pune – except for one. A few of them are from Mumbai, a couple of them are from Delhi who’ve stayed in Mumbai, and one’s from Hyderabad, who padded around Mumbai briefly. Mumbai – the city we left to get away from it ‘all’. Mumbai – our ever-enduring lowest common denominator. This Mumbai clique, by the way, is not deliberate. It’s water finding its own level. It’s destiny magnetizing the soul so that it attracts similar spirits. In fact, I think a Mumbai-person out of Mumbai would be rather insufferable unless he or she met other urban prodigals and got along with them. After all, it’s the Mumbai-tainted ones who really understand all the whining about the sea and ever-willing auto fellows. To the rest of the people here, they (or we , since I’m one of ‘ them ’) are dangerously afflicted with attitude. I can’t blame them though – ‘Mumbai this’, ‘Mumbai that’ can be very irritating. After a while, we all sound like Bilbo Baggins with...