That time when you sweeten your coffee

Usually, I have my coffee black. I like it that way. Also, I have lots of coffee - more than 10 cups a day. So my tongue us familiar with that bitter, coarse taste of black coffee. It has also become my mood, I think. The mood of stark survival - slanted towards something simple and strong.

But what this kind of a boot camp mentality does to you, I think, it makes you a little brittle. You may be getting strong but parts of you may also be getting chipped off.

Yesterday I'd gone to Phoenix with mum. I had such a lovely time! Yes, I was working a little and taking calls and setting up meetings. But just spending time with her in a plush place felt good.

We went to one of my favorite stores - Muji. I love that brand! Everything is so simple, beautiful and basic. Usually, I do not like earthen colours. However, I like these colours there - especially for their cutlery and tableware. And stationery. Really like their black erasers.

Anyway, the last week or so, there has been a knot of anxiety in my stomach which goes away when I focus on it and breathe deeply and all that. It comes back again. But I believe it can be tricked into submitting to a will.

Yesterday, that feeling was there - but it was like that as a full-grown person sitting inside and in front of me. It is very surreal. And I did with it what I would do with a friend. I invited it to have coffee with me. And this time, I did not have my coffee black. I had it milky and frothy and sweetened. When I tore open the sachet of sugar and added in spoons of  it and stirred it, it felt like adding in some power. A sweet, soft, gentle power.

I had that cup of coffee and really enjoyed it.

After that, for some time, there was peace.

We're back to black coffee though.

Nothing much

I am in the middle of some work but I will take some time out to write a little bit.

I was just going through the shelves of my bedroom. Now that I am in Bombay, I don't have a room of my own. So I don't get to go to my bedroom anymore. But today I did. I found a notebook in which I had written earlier. You know what I love and hate simultaneously? Notebooks that have so much written and a few empty pages. It's like an invitation to stop everything and purge your soul, writing and writing and writing. I wonder if there is a parallel to do through writing what Buddha did under the tree - meditate and not move and not give up until enlightenment is acquired. 

Long time ago, in college, I had once told a friend that I would like to die after having finished writing a book. Just put in the last word, cap the pen, close the book, settle down in a rocking chair, and go.

But then I changed my dying dream again. I thought of going away parked in one of those nice, quiet, leafy neighborhoods in Juhu. I am sitting in my car, listening to a song. My hair is long and it;s tied in a pony-tail. I don't know why that is important. Except that sometimes these details come to me. In the completed book version of me dying that I have written about earlier, I am wearing a pink pleated skirt. And a thick white shirt with large roses printed on it. I had such an outfit earlier. In college or school I can't remember when I was very very fat and could not fit into jeans. Also, the pleated skirt made me look hippy. It had box pleats. But it was so comfortable. 

I love skirts and dresses. I just love them. And I also like palazzos a whole lot. I don't quite like denims. I don't like anything that is tight or constricting around the navel.

Today

I got my periods today and so I did not run. Actually, I could have run but I was feeling very emotionally exhausted. I really cannot afford to feel emotionally exhausted because I have a lot of work to do, to pursue, etc. But I thought, "What the heck? I will not run."

I walked slowly. I spoke to a friend who chided me strongly for being very meek. Am I? Maybe I am. I have spent so much time being an angry person that I am now compensating for being meek. I will inherit the earth, I think. Looking forward to it.

Today, I was chatting with some people who were very strongly expounding the need to settle all karmic accounts now because apparently, we have come towards the end of Kali Yug - just before Satyug begins and this small window is where you can rewrite your destiny. If you are not careful, then you carry the same destiny across the ages for all 4 yugas.

It's good to have so much certainty over something so nebulous. The notion that there is a chance to never have these traits again, to never make these mistakes with the same people, to be gentler, to be more kind and patient, to let the small things go - the ability to wipe the slate clean and set yourself up for success - it is so appealing. Whether it is true or not, it is definitely appealing.

Basically everyone wants to be a writer and God or Karma is a publishing agent.

My manuscript seems to be half-written and I've lost the plot somewhere. :-) And God is not interested because It is investing in web series now. Ha ha ha!

Today, the lake looked beautiful. It was dark, there was a lone empty boat drifting in the middle of the lake, and the water shone like thick, wet paint. My friend who was chiding me told me that I am not realistic because I only see the nice things in everything. He said that as if it were a bad thing.

People are strange.

Regarding this karmic account, I think there is something to that. There is a person with who I absolutely need to heal my equation. It is getting very painful to carry on otherwise. In fact, my very good friend (you can read her here: www.teerathyatra.com), had taught me a meditation exercise wherein I could visualize any energy-cords being cut with whoever I was having difficulty with. This is a very powerful exercise. I should get her to write about this.

So, this person who I am experiencing a challenge with, I saw him and I imagined trying to cut off the cords. But you know, usually, I have seen a slender thin cord. This time, I saw this thick, black mass of hard brush-type knotted energy. And it smelled. It felt rotten. Everytime I see him or even hear his name, I feel a tightness in my solar plexus. And that is exactly where I felt a tight, rotten energy. This, maybe, is some dark dense karmic account that needs to be healed. That needs to be worked on and prayed on.

I believe in prayers though. I like the act of getting clear and just that process of sweet surrender.

I will go now.

One more day has passed

I don't know what I have done but the font on this screen has become really tiny.

I went for a play today. On the way, I took a short video of us driving past Nariman Point as the sun was setting. Put it up on Instagram.

Shreya had put in a comment in the earlier post asking me about my Insta handle. (Shreya: I haven't gotten around to posting comments but thank you for reading my posts. I didn't think there was anyone around to read them.) My Insta handle is: notamistake23062017.

I went for a play today, Dear Father at NCPA with my mom and brother. We had a really nice time. It was a great play (although it felt slightly long) and each actor really played his and her part well. Paresh Rawal is stellar!

Do you think that, overall, it is a sin to grow old? I always used to believe that things will only get better when I get older. I could never understand why people are scared of getting older. I think it is because of loneliness. I think loneliness must be hugged  - the way you hug a sweet, sad, aloof child. You must explore and excavate that loneliness, wash it and dress it like a wound, and heal it. Not heal it so that the loneliness becomes togetherness. You must heal it so that the loneliness becomes the most tender, fulsome loneliness there is.

I think as you get older, you must become a parent to your loneliness.

More

Now I need to scout for freelance assignments. Looking forward to it. My energy has not been quite up to it lately but I will get around to doing some good stuff soon.

Somewhere around the end of last year and the beginning of this year, I have decided to focus on consistency. I think the simple act of sticking to something has gotten such a bad rep nowadays that maybe we are collectively giving up too early. Maybe we are just calling a lazy indisciplined mindset to be a flow. Or maybe I am just being too harsh.

Matters such as these have occupied my head and heart since a long time now.

It is Friday afternoon and I ate a lot. I had rice, jackfruit and potato curry, moon daal with a tempering of mustard seeds, garlic and tamarind. It tasted really nice. I had never really tasted tamarind with a smoky flavour but it was really tasty. Unexpected stuff.

I also just had a can of Greek yoghurt which was not really nice. So I think I will eat a boondi laddoo. I intend to go for a run early today.

Let's see.

What happened today

I met my friend who'd recently gone to Paris. Her stories sounded lovely. They reminded me of my trip to Geneva. Her first meal there was a croissant, some dried apricots, a piece of cake and black coffee. It was cold, the Seine was flooded, and I wasn't there but for some reason, I imagined someone doodling summer strawberries on a napkin.

I didn't go running today. I feel like running a lot tomorrow. I feel like having fun and taking it really easy.

Also, I am typing in the dark.

I was thinking of this concept where you buy time when you buy a book. That would be cool. And you also buy a mobile parking spot when you buy a car.

I fit into a really old pair of olive green pants today. I'm thinking that I will not buy any new clothes this year. Of course, a year is a rather long period of time. I intend to take it one day a time. So, today I did not buy any new clothes.

I see a Facebook post by Elizabeth Gilbert. I follow her page. She, it seems, has lost her partner. I really like her!

Things are good.

Stuff

Yesterday I went to a charming little shop called Honey Dough. Or maybe it is Honey and Dough. I got myself a ham and cheese croissant. It came in a light blue box with a print of some English neighborhood. The print was in white. The box was sky-blue. The snack was a ham and cheese croissant.

The croissant was really good though. It was buttery, light, flaky. The slice of ham was tender. The cheese was salty.

This first part was written a month ago when I was working in Defence Colony and I was non-vegetarian. I am no longer in Delhi and I am no longer a non-vegetarian. Both these situations may change. I just wanted to get a lot of stuff out of my head.

I am back in Bombay and I am sitting in a very sweet nook in my mother's bedroom. Behind me are these long drapes in aqua silk and white tissue with silver embroidery. So it is pretty and all. But I haven't really gotten around to actually doing any work.

I met some friends the other day in Juhu and it was nice. But you know, when you live and work in a different place for a bit, you feel a certain staleness leave you. It comes back when you are suddenly back in a circle where people make different choices - where they are building homes, careers, lives in one city only and travel to simply get away. It is not a lesser way of being but I wonder if I will ever feel comfortable in that kind of a set-up again.

I don't know. Maybe it is early days now. But I feel I belong more in Delhi now, especially Noida - with its crowd of people from outside, living on rent, everyone figuring out the quickest way home from the station, etc. That familiar clump of uncertainty that blooms like a chrysanthemum.

The only thing that I am really enjoying or rather that I am so curious about understanding more deeply is family. It suddenly strikes me that I am so different from my parents. It then follows that there is such huge amount of love and acceptance on both sides. That is a huge, shimmering prize - to be with family.

You know what I found really surprising - just how little I am reading now. And whatever I am reading now, I am putting up a few lines along with the picture of the book on Instagram.

The other fun thing that has happened is that I have started running. I go in the evenings to the neighborhood promenade built around the lake. I like the way the water shimmers with reflection of city lights. It looks peaceful even as my heart pounds and I sweat.

I had planned to write more. In fact I had planned how I have not wanted to write for a long time. But I am meeting a friend for coffee. She has just returned from Paris.