How many times have you walked down a street and suddenly stopped to see a house or a tree or a small by-lane....something that you thought was never there, although it always existed but you never saw it! Walking down a street that you've walked a hundred times before and TODAY you see the nice little house, with a balcony and a kid playing in the house. Life that always existed but you didn't take notice of! Happens all the time doesn't it? These little jolts we get that bring us out of our reverie...makes something old, NEW.
I hear voices everyday. There is some construction going on just below my building, the noise and ruckus it creates irritates the hell out of me. I can hear the workers when they take a break, laughing and chatting. Just another day. Today i heard them. Not that i understood what they were saying but their voices were new to me. The rhythm of their laughter, their loud banter. In a totally foreign world, i felt at home. Suddenly, it was Mumbai and i was sitting in my room trying to concentrate on something and couldn't cause of the noise a group of people were making outside. It was the same noise... the same chatter and laughter, the same rhythm. Then again it was Chicago, i leaned out of my window to look at the workers. I couldn't make out the language that they were talking in or the words...just that they reminded me of home.
It rains so often in Chicago that at first it surprised me. Loud thunders and heavy rain. I see it, experience it and am bugged by it. One day, taking in the rains and the pitter patter of the raindrops, I think of Mumbai. How similar the two cities look when its raining. So beautiful, like something slowed it down, the beauty slowed it down. It brought a warmth to my heart that was beyond words. I smiled to myself in a way that only reminiscing can make you smile.
I've built a home here in a foreign land, among foreign people. I've built a home with a man I love and who loves me. Little things, material and otherwise have given shape to our world. But sometimes, just sometimes, one has to escape to the world that they left behind to find a ground, to give your heart that something...something that is "different and yet the same".
8/10/11
7/6/11
About a girl
She sat next to me and held my hand as i cried over a broken heart. She listened to endless complaints, boyfriend troubles, impossible teenage dreams and innocent hopes. She smiled my smiles and cried my tears. She hated the people who hurt me and loved the one's who made me smile.
13 years ago i invited a girl to my birthday party. I didn't know her so well but she was a friend of a friend. Somewhere in the small, winding by lanes of Bhavnagar (A small town in Gujarat where we grew up), during the routine evening rides on "Rakhding road" (a term we coined ourselves) and endless conversations on the phone...i found my soul mate, my friend for life - Deepty.
From silly infatuations, serious relationships, broken hearts, to finally finding the one person you want to spend the rest of your life with, to Motherhood....Deepty and I have come a long long long way. The world could fall apart and go to pieces but i knew i would be safe, she was there to shelter me, to love me. She's the rock that i stand on, that i build my life around. I don't always visit it, but i know its there. Steady and solid. To lean on, to cry on. Just as she has me. Two parts of the same thing. We are the same thing. Her and me.
Just how is it that a relationship (a long distance one at that) grew so beautifully and nurtured itself into this wonderful, gut wrenching love that we share, i don't know. Maybe i never will and a part of its beauty is in not knowing.
She is entering another fantastic stage of her life soon, Motherhood. I can't imagine that girl that i shared those silly laughs with, being a mother. But then again, i can't imagine anyone being a better mother than her. With all the love and compassion and kindness in her....!! Am waiting with baited breath to hear of the arrival of her bundle of joy.....of the moment when my loving, silly, beautiful Idiot (my pet name for her) turned into a Mother!
13 years ago i invited a girl to my birthday party. I didn't know her so well but she was a friend of a friend. Somewhere in the small, winding by lanes of Bhavnagar (A small town in Gujarat where we grew up), during the routine evening rides on "Rakhding road" (a term we coined ourselves) and endless conversations on the phone...i found my soul mate, my friend for life - Deepty.
From silly infatuations, serious relationships, broken hearts, to finally finding the one person you want to spend the rest of your life with, to Motherhood....Deepty and I have come a long long long way. The world could fall apart and go to pieces but i knew i would be safe, she was there to shelter me, to love me. She's the rock that i stand on, that i build my life around. I don't always visit it, but i know its there. Steady and solid. To lean on, to cry on. Just as she has me. Two parts of the same thing. We are the same thing. Her and me.
Just how is it that a relationship (a long distance one at that) grew so beautifully and nurtured itself into this wonderful, gut wrenching love that we share, i don't know. Maybe i never will and a part of its beauty is in not knowing.
She is entering another fantastic stage of her life soon, Motherhood. I can't imagine that girl that i shared those silly laughs with, being a mother. But then again, i can't imagine anyone being a better mother than her. With all the love and compassion and kindness in her....!! Am waiting with baited breath to hear of the arrival of her bundle of joy.....of the moment when my loving, silly, beautiful Idiot (my pet name for her) turned into a Mother!
12/1/09
Him, her and me..!
The bhel wala at the corner, the kid working at the tea stall, the guy who sells matching blouse pieces to women, the girl who rubs her nose every time she passes me in office, the lady who talks animatedly over the phone, the paan chewing man at my mobile service shop, the rickshaw wala...what is their story? I see these people everyday. They occupy 0.00000000143% space of my conscious mind. That is, i notice them. At times. At times i am completely unaware. I sit in a rickshaw...am staring out into nothingness or talking on the phone. I am hardly aware of the man's face who drives me all the way to my destination. Not even when i pay him do i bother to look him in the face. He is faceless for me...as are the general "public" around me. People dashing to work...people ambling along...women with their duppatas's on their nose to stifle out unpleasant smells, a 6 year old on a big man's cycle...half standing to peddle it. Its nice to take in these visuals....with music to give rhythm to their movements...they all seem to sway at the same beat. The slow laughter, the hasty run, easy wave of hand...they all synchronize to form one beautiful display of everyday acts.
I give my own stories to them....put words to their muttering lips...guess their life crises on the basis of phone conversation snippets i hear. I give them a larger than life appeal and conjure images of aliens attacking them, loved one's breaking up, life threatening diseases engulfing them and give them happy - sad occasions to live, in my head....they live a life of their own in my head for precisely 6.36 min. Then the song playing catches my attention...or a friend calling brings me back to my own boring, grounded life.
Don't we all wish at times we were someone else?!
I give my own stories to them....put words to their muttering lips...guess their life crises on the basis of phone conversation snippets i hear. I give them a larger than life appeal and conjure images of aliens attacking them, loved one's breaking up, life threatening diseases engulfing them and give them happy - sad occasions to live, in my head....they live a life of their own in my head for precisely 6.36 min. Then the song playing catches my attention...or a friend calling brings me back to my own boring, grounded life.
Don't we all wish at times we were someone else?!
10/7/09
Confessions of an awakened mind
I am 27 years of age and i have never voted in my life. A shameful confession!! For all my passionate views about politics, democracy and politicians....i have failed to exercise my right as a citizen. As a good citizen.
We so often hear, "Bad politicians are voted by good citizens who don't vote", its true. But its such a huge responsibility, isn't it? Such a huge burden, to be right...to do the right thing...to be responsible for your actions..! Scary..at least to me. And then there is the dilemma of which evil guy to choose to represent you, to put your faith in! For its propaganda campaign congress has released numerous ads and radio spots...all of which are in Marathi. They dare not get overtly secular at this point and address their message in Hindi, they can't afford to piss the maharashtrian's off, giving the opposition more than a likely chance of winning. Raj continues to hammer people with the 'Me Marathi' fever. Politics at its best.
We sit with our friends, discuss politics, talk about how our country is going to the dogs, how the mithi river is still as it used to be, roads have gone from bad to worse and politicians are bloody rascals - India ka kuch nahi ho sakta! We admire Rahul Gandhi and Sachin Pilot, for being so young, for standing by what they believed in and for making that difference that we have not made. We sit and hope that tomorrow the country will be a better place to live in, opportunities will be endless, more fly overs will come up, there won't be any slums scattered all over, we'll have metro's to speed up transport, crime will disappear and the prices for everything will fall. These are our expectations. And we continue to say that these things will not happen even in a 100 years.
They won't. Cause we're not changing. Cause I am not changing. Cause i think of getting my voters id every single day, but don't. Then i tell myself that its because i don't have the time...am so busy, i work late, what's the point anyway...etc etc.
I don't know how many of you share the same experience as me, how many of us feel terribly burdened by voting and make excuses to not vote. I, have decided to be the change, to contribute in a small way to the fate of this city and my nation. I am getting a voter's id.
We so often hear, "Bad politicians are voted by good citizens who don't vote", its true. But its such a huge responsibility, isn't it? Such a huge burden, to be right...to do the right thing...to be responsible for your actions..! Scary..at least to me. And then there is the dilemma of which evil guy to choose to represent you, to put your faith in! For its propaganda campaign congress has released numerous ads and radio spots...all of which are in Marathi. They dare not get overtly secular at this point and address their message in Hindi, they can't afford to piss the maharashtrian's off, giving the opposition more than a likely chance of winning. Raj continues to hammer people with the 'Me Marathi' fever. Politics at its best.
We sit with our friends, discuss politics, talk about how our country is going to the dogs, how the mithi river is still as it used to be, roads have gone from bad to worse and politicians are bloody rascals - India ka kuch nahi ho sakta! We admire Rahul Gandhi and Sachin Pilot, for being so young, for standing by what they believed in and for making that difference that we have not made. We sit and hope that tomorrow the country will be a better place to live in, opportunities will be endless, more fly overs will come up, there won't be any slums scattered all over, we'll have metro's to speed up transport, crime will disappear and the prices for everything will fall. These are our expectations. And we continue to say that these things will not happen even in a 100 years.
They won't. Cause we're not changing. Cause I am not changing. Cause i think of getting my voters id every single day, but don't. Then i tell myself that its because i don't have the time...am so busy, i work late, what's the point anyway...etc etc.
I don't know how many of you share the same experience as me, how many of us feel terribly burdened by voting and make excuses to not vote. I, have decided to be the change, to contribute in a small way to the fate of this city and my nation. I am getting a voter's id.
10/4/09
Smelly things!
Some experiences smell different. They have the smell of fresh open blue skies. Smell of openness and possibilities. These scents are my favorite.
An innocent life coming into the world…the smiles, the happiness associated with her…the end of wait. Expectations and laughter. Smells like the open sky.
A simple movie, about love…about discovering oneself…leaves you with a sense of freedom and a dream. A dream that is more beautiful on screen than in your and my life. That smells like the blue sky too.
The smell of the pitter patter of rain, fear of the thunder and lightning. Feelings of solitude then a phone call from an old friend. Blue blue sky.
Experiences that leave a smile hours after you’ve stopped smiling when you first feel it. Images you run through your head, once…twice and then once again. These are the small things that help me regain my sanity….give me grounding even as my heart soars….!
An innocent life coming into the world…the smiles, the happiness associated with her…the end of wait. Expectations and laughter. Smells like the open sky.
A simple movie, about love…about discovering oneself…leaves you with a sense of freedom and a dream. A dream that is more beautiful on screen than in your and my life. That smells like the blue sky too.
The smell of the pitter patter of rain, fear of the thunder and lightning. Feelings of solitude then a phone call from an old friend. Blue blue sky.
Experiences that leave a smile hours after you’ve stopped smiling when you first feel it. Images you run through your head, once…twice and then once again. These are the small things that help me regain my sanity….give me grounding even as my heart soars….!
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