Chiffonesque

For some unbridled missing...I miss Bombay. Out of nowhere, I miss Bombay today the way I haven't missed it in ages. I miss my home there, my friends there, my friendships there, my freedom there, my work there, my offices, my bosses, my colleagues, trains, cabs, buses, the busy-ness, the business, the life, the ennui, the living, the way I was, the acceptance, the non-labelling, the resilience, the oblivion on a platter, the sense of hope, the gritty broken truth behind every fragment of every façade the stories, the shifting endings of stories...I miss it so so so badly. I miss that I could meet people I'd understand and very little seemed to be fake and friendships, if hollow, seemed to be hollow, and if deep, lasted a long time and rode out many storms...not the fucking play-acting happening in Pune...with the endless scrutiny and the incessant labelling and the slow-poisoned judgment of whoever you are. (Having said that, very thankful Shaniwarwada, KP, and Bhandarkar Roa...

Some time ago, I had written about a very low point in my life in recent times. There seemed to have been a lot of build-up, resistance, and denial about it I feel. Around that time, when I was going through what I was, Deepika Padukone had just come out with her confession regarding depression. I applauded that. Then one day, in office, a colleague told me about what she was going through. It seemed very similar to my predicament. My reaction, though, was not one of empathy. I told her to suck it up and also to just stop playing victim. I was telling her the same script that I was telling myself. I think I was doing that because, for some reason, I was denying it in myself. Then I had that moment where I wept to my mom. I went to a counsellor and I wrote about it. A couple of people read it. That, still for some reason, surprises me. That people read what I write here...but so it goes. Anyway, I knew a couple of people who did read that post. I knew them and I met them. Now, I...

This video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HyUYa-BnjU8

Here's the weekend in broad strokes... Lots of food. LOTS. My mom was here so, of course, there was plenty of grub. But she returned to Bombay and left behind her cook in Pune for a few days. And she's awesome. So yesterday I had her make vegetable samosas (at home - samosas at home!), halwa made of wheat flour, a crushed chutney made of these dried rice pellets you get in Orissa (this was a huge hit) and small uttapas with a topping of onion, capsicum, and tomatoes. Called a friend over for chai , we ate all this, and then we went for a walk, and swung on the swing and I tried to forget that my shorts from Zara are tight. Anyway, this month, I will be lax. Next month, I will get disciplined.  The day before that I was a friend's place who was housekeeping for her folks because they're away. That place is posh. Like P.O.S.H. All gleaming ceramics and pretty stone artifacts, even in the loos, pastel, sandalwood theme everywhere, ornate copper bells hanging a...

I watched  Katti Batti yesterday and I really liked it. Imran Khan has improved so much! Also liked that, maybe in a seemingly cheesy, mostly unliked film, someone seems to have got it - that moving on isn't all that it's trumped up to be. What I am wondering about today - that not all things matter and it perhaps doesn't matter to matter. So, does nothing matter? Hmm. I don't feel that the answer to that is an outright 'No'.

The day before yesterday, we had the farewell for a colleague. She was a friend, I suppose. Situational. We both liked watching movies in cinema halls. On a New Year's eve that we found our calendars empty, we hung out together. She had introduced me to the meetup groups in Pune and also to a man who, for better or for worse, taught me a few hard lessons. She left yesterday. To travel. To take a break. To make other plans without also having to juggle the mundane. Yesterday, we had Ganpati visarjan of the idol we'd kept in office. That friend wasn't there. There was dhol taasha  and there were modaks and I didn't go because I had work. It felt normal, funny, hollow, regular. Like we try to piece together a jigsaw of the void and every piece of puzzle is made of vapour.

I prayed like a pagan that day To clay that had the imprints of tide and thumb, To a single hibiscus in the softest shade of peach That had petals and stamen gilded with the gold of the sun, the blue of the sky, and the translucent glory of rain, To hand-crafted sticks of incense from which wafted fragrances like soul, like music, like memory, To a single tiny square of raw sugar, To the lust and lush of flames... I prayed like a pagan that day When I was distracted from the void and the peace When my fingers stroked every bit and bend of artful form When I stared at every pixel of purple and green When I only saw beauty in all that impermanence And was grateful for believing That the impermanence redeemed That the beauty was enough  

Some days one is so lucky to actually meet up with two friends. After work, met up with a friend at Peter Donuts. We had coffee and eggs. He told me about the writing he had gotten done by taking a week off, a sushi place he had tried out (Soy at Koregaon Park), and some other random things. I drove home and just got the feeling that I wasn't quite done yet. So I took a chance by texting another friend if she was up for a drive. She said yes. Picked her up, we drove to Koregaon Park, had salted caramel yogurt from 'Yogurt Bay' - which was very tasty, and drove back. All in all, a good evening.

A friend who lost her dog recently had come to stay over last night. I really liked that sweet, affectionate cocker spaniel. While I warmed up the egg curry and heated up the rice and fried some chilly with garlic, I couldn't believe that the dog was gone. I mean, not in a sad agitated way. Just that the dog has gone off to play somewhere and the owner's exaggerating. Where did he go? There's a pigeon laying eggs under a table in the balcony. I am not pleased about it...but maybe I am a little bit. I have never been close to flora or fauna but now I lots of lovely plants that I've tended to since the last two days. And I like that a pregnant pigeon found it hospitable enough to want to bring forth life here. Maybe pigeons don't give it all that much thought. I told my pal to not smoke in the balcony. Maybe it would be nice to make things a little pleasant for the pigeon. But when will those eggs be laid and when will they hatch and when will I get my terrac...

Yesterday I went to a counsellor with my mother. We were late because the doctor's office was quite a distance from my house. (Vashi to Babulnath can take a while!) But I always like taking the new highway and try to stop my heart from lurching with love and awe every time I see the skyline! Anyway, the drive was fun, even if long. The session was short, though, and I guess there wasn't much breakthrough. But I noticed that after nearly 6 years, I bought and wore a necklace in German silver, earrings, and went for coffee with a friend. So, small steps maybe...but a little bit of joy. This morning, on a lark, I gave a scene to my mom and her masseuse to act out. The scene was this: There's a matriarch of a large family that is largely absent. She is still a stickler for propriety and so, even in a large empty house, instead of having her meals in the bedroom in front of the T.V., she still has the table laid out, the chandelier polished, the drapes match the table place...

The flowers are blooming so nicely. A bright orange hibiscus was dancing away in the early morning showers and the chilly plant, with its dangerously long chillis, is a rockstar! I'm thinking large black and white portraits of each plant.

I will lay this baldly. First two days in Bangalore were very bad. I was hurt and weepy and walked around like an open wound. I think it was because around me I saw couples and I was tired of being by myself. Over dinner one night, I shared it with a friend. I asked him what men looked for in a woman. He casually said that I should get laid. It felt very, very bad. Like that scene in Kill Bill where she puts a sword through someone's stomach and twists it a little before pulling it out. But later it became better. I stayed away from that friend, roamed around, and had food and fun. The heart and stomach still ached and it felt heavy and vacant...like it was carrying sadness like a dead, black baby (or that was how Sylvia Plath described it in one of her poems...or was it 'Bell Jar'?) But I got through it - one long bus ride at a time. One coffee by myself at a time. One dinner with some friends at a time. One sleepless night a time. I came back. That night I held ...

Yesterday was a good day. Got an email from storymirror informing me that I've won their Season 1 contest. Watered the plants yesterday. (Mum has got me close to 10 plants, of which some 7 have flowers.) They are too pretty! A friend at work had got me home-made gulab-jamuns. Had dinner with a friend and her dog. We had corn poha.  

After going through a dark night of the soul, so to speak, one finds that that one's favorite author has written a new book. And that suddenly stultifies all grief and one finds a million specks of the most beautifu sunrises floating about one's room. This is exactly why books save and why writers can be very generous people. So, for the publishing of the book 'Two years, Eight Months, and Twenty Eight Nights, Salman Rushdie rescued me again tonight. Rushdie, my hero. A review is here: http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/sep/04/two-years-eight-months-and-twenty-eight-nights-salman-rushdie-review

Sometimes I really wonder just what has to happen to make rude and personal remarks so blithely. Like really - what ought to have happened to make a deeply personal remark and then say that it was a joke! What part of the brain or the heart ought to have shut down so definitely to not have any kind of empathy? Anyway, since one ought to end the day on a good note, here are a few fun things that happened. I bought a bunch of books - Life after Life by Kate Atkinson and The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins. I also ordered Signature of All Things by Elizabeth Gilbert online. I left a copy of this book in Bangalore and I haven't been able to get one at any of the bookstores in Pune. Ate a lot of rice today which always makes me happy. There's also this preparation of a sweet puri that we make for Janmashtami that's real tasty. Also, did some yoga again after a really long time. Ma left earlier in the day which was harder for me this time. But hopefully she'll be h...

A post from long go: http://reve3.blogspot.in/2007/04/fresh-from-closet.html?q=paul+reiser Somedays it's harder not to look back...and dwell. After all, today is teacher's day. And what teaches more persistently than the past?

from where i sit i see a blue sky with clouds it stretches across as far as i can see i am told, it covers the whole world every piece of earth can look up to it... it starts off as blue from where i sit but somewhere along the way it becomes dark and grey or purple and gold somewhere it holds the sun somewhere else, the stars somewhere in the midst of a billion nights it hugs on to the the billion lights

I wonder if one searches for someone stronger than oneself because one is looking for someone to protect and save her from herself. She hasn't managed. Maybe someone stronger will? Am really liking this song 'Saware' from Phantom: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CsOsmgUmT9U