Wear Sunscreen

I’ll give you three good reasons to read this blog post. First, read it if you want to read/hear something beautiful. Second, read it if you want to feel good about life. And finally, read it if you want to know why this song which my best bud shared with me (who I will henceforth refer to as Chee) makes me cry when I listen to it.

‘Wear Sunscreen’ is an essay titled "Advice, like youth, probably just wasted on the young" written by Mary Schmich and published in the Chicago Tribune as a column in 1997.  In her introduction to the column, she described it as the commencement speech she would give if she were asked to give one. The most popular and well-known form of the essay is the successful music single "Everybody's Free (To Wear Sunscreen)", released in 1998, by Baz Luhrmann.

EVERY time I listen to it, I smile, I sigh, I dream, I spurt and I just feel happy. Such simple lines, and yet so powerful, moving and inspiring. The song conversion is simply beautiful. You have to listen to it. Like seriously!  

Here’s how it goes. Read it and savour it. And then watch the video I posted.

WEAR SUNSCREEN

“Ladies and Gentlemen of the class of ‘97,

Wear Sunscreen.

If I could offer you only one tip for the future, sunscreen would be it.
The long term benefits of sunscreen have been proved by scientists whereas 
the rest of my advice has no basis more reliable than my own meandering experience.
I will dispense this advice now. 

Enjoy the power and beauty of your youth; oh nevermind; you will not understand 
the power and beauty of your youth until they have faded. But trust me, in 20 years you’ll look back at photos of yourself and recall in a way you can’t grasp now how 
much possibility lay before you and how fabulous you really looked.

You’re not as fat as you imagine. 

Don’t worry about the future; or worry, but know that worrying 
is as effective as trying to solve an algebra equation by chewing bubblegum. 
The real troubles in your life are apt to be things that never crossed your 
worried mind; the kind that blindside you at 4pm on some idle Tuesday. 

Do one thing every day that scares you.

Sing.

Don’t be reckless with other people’s hearts, don’t put up with people who 
are reckless with yours. 

Floss.

Don’t waste your time on jealousy; sometimes you’re ahead, sometimes you’re behind.
The race is long, and in the end, it’s only with yourself. 

Remember the compliments you receive. Forget the insults. If you succeed in doing
this, tell me how. 

Keep your old love letters; throw away your old bank statements. 

Stretch.

Don’t feel guilty if you don’t know what you want to do with your life.
The most interesting people I know didn’t know at 22 what they wanted to do with
their lives. Some of the most interesting 40 year olds know still don’t. 

Get plenty of calcium. 

Be kind to your knees, you’ll miss them when they’re gone. 

Maybe you’ll marry, maybe you won’t. Maybe you’ll have children, 
maybe you won’t. Maybe you’ll divorce at 40, maybe you’ll dance the funky chicken
on your 75th wedding anniversary.
What ever you do, don’t congratulate yourself too much or berate yourself either.
Your choices are half chance, so are everybody else’s. 


Enjoy your body.
Use it every way you can. Don’t be afraid of it, or what other people think of it.
It’s the greatest instrument you’ll ever own.. 

Dance. Even if you have nowhere to do it but in your own living room. 

Read the directions, even if you don’t follow them. 

Do NOT read beauty magazines, they will only make you feel ugly. 

Get to know your parents; you never know when they’ll be gone for good. 

Be nice to your siblings; they are the best link to your past and the people most likely to stick with you in the future. 

Understand that friends come and go, but for the precious few you should hold on.
Work hard to bridge the gaps in geography in lifestyle because the older you get,
the more you need the people you knew when you were young. 

Live in New York City once, but leave before it makes you hard;
live in Northern California once, but leave before it makes you soft. 

Travel. 

Accept certain inalienable truths, prices will rise, politicians will philander, 
you too will get old, and when you do you’ll fantasize that when you were 
young prices were reasonable, politicians were noble and children respected their 
elders. 

Respect your elders. 

Don’t expect anyone else to support you. Maybe you have a trust fund,
maybe you have a wealthy spouse; but you never know when either one might run out. 

Don’t mess too much with your hair, or by the time its 40, it will look 85. 

Be careful whose advice you buy, but, be patient with those who supply it. 
Advice is a form of nostalgia, dispensing it is a way of fishing the past  from the disposal, wiping it off, painting over the ugly parts and recycling it for more than its worth. 

But trust me on the sunscreen.”

I feel..

Like an a corrugated iron nail in the ocean

Like the wax sliding down a candle

Like a fish thrown on the shore by the vindictive waves

Like a lonely stranger walking alone on a cold winter night

Like the smoke that blows away into eternal nothingness

Like a sad song that reverberates into oblivion

Like lies and contempt that has no meaning

Like a soft whisper that is heard, and then is lost again

Like a lonesome tear flowing from a brown eye

Like a discarded photograph, faded with time

Like a beautiful dream, erased from your consciousness

Like a forgotten memory, that is not forgotten after all

Like an old, torn out yellow-papered book

Like a broken autumn twig on the ground

Like a paper boat that lost its way, soggy and adrift

Like a soft caress, that is felt briefly, and then never felt again..

When I think of Bombay..

When I think of Bombay I think of the never ending flyovers and the palm trees.

I think of the million CCDs specked everywhere.

I think of the humidity.

I think of the local trains, vada pav and bhel.

I think of the beaches, the malls and the big buildings.

I think of Rangeela and Essel World.

I think of Gothic Victorian architecture and cobbled streets.

When I think of Bombay I think of bumping into celebrities, great looking people and the film industry.

I think of Candies. 
I think of Chowpatty and the Taj.

I think of wet sand between my toes.

I think of rains. 
I think of sitting at Marine drive at 3 AM, with the breeze blowing my deep, poetic thoughts into the air, somewhere far far away on the noisy wings of nonsensical talks and sniggers.
I think of poor sweet scary doo, throwing me her protective and head-shaking smiles.

I think of loud music, a dingy place, raucous laughter, drinks with a crazy bunch of friends.

I think of screaming and dancing without a care in the world.

I think of holding hands and street shopping.

I think of homely, loving parents and a home cooked meal with love.

When I think of Bombay I think of balancing on moss covered rocks and the waves crashing and roaring against them.

I think of the warm gleaming sun in the cloudy sky and the feel of the water spray on my face.

I think of the powerful, cool breeze blowing my hair wild and the feel of the intermittent waves lapping at my feet.

I think of the scores of invisible people running about, making out or just walking and I think of holding the hand of that one person who really mattered that moment.

The boy with the infectious smile who looks like a little child when he talks about something excitedly, with a gleam in his eyes.

When I think of Bombay I think of the train ride and the conversation that flowed.

When I think of Bombay I think of friends.

I think of fun, and joy, and laughter and craziness backed by a dosage of unbelievable awesomeness.

When I think of Bombay, I think of dreams.

When I think of Bombay, I think of love.

When I think of Bombay..

I think of him.

Mary and Max

I saw Mary and Max by Adam Elliot yesterday. And I HAVE to talk about it. Because I can’t get it out of my head. It was one of the most sublime, deep, endearing black comedy movies I’ve ever seen. It’s a true story about how a lonely little eight year girl from Australia, Mary Daisy Dinkle becomes pen pals with a 44 year old obese, Asperger’s syndrome ridden man in New York, Max Jerry Horowitz. (Don’t you just LOVE the names? They’re so much fun to say)

The special thing about the movie is that it shows two highly unlikely people becoming best friends, extending their love and affection over two different continents; and how they’re so utterly lonely in their respective real lives. Mary asks him the most innocent of questions, ("Do sheeps shrink when it rains?" "Do goose get goose bumps?) which he patiently answers and shares his own fascinating life experiences with her. They find solace and consolation in writing letters to each other and exchanging exotic chocolates.Because of his disorder, he'd never been comfortable at understanding people and "love was as alien to him as scuba diving." Ergo, when the friendless Mary asks him questions about love and relationships, they send him into severe anxiety attacks and lands him into a mental institution. However, their unusual friendship grows stronger over a span of twenty years and even though towards the end things become a little turbulent, they do manage to salvage their friendship.

Although it’s a clay animated movie, (where the makers of this movie actually created clay puppets for all the characters), it basically focuses on the darkest of aspects about life in a humorous way. It shows how relationships are formed, how they break, how morbid and despondent lives can get and the kind of problems people face while they’re struggling to survive in this mad world. It talks about death and depression and sex and mental disorders, but all in the most innocent manner possible. And all this they’ve done through animation, art, photography, crafts and design. It is sheer brilliance to listen to the letters exchanged between them.

The movie starts with the words spoken by the narrator, “Mary Dinkle's eyes were the colour of muddy puddles; her birthmark, the colour of poo.” If I could, I would have quoted the entire dialogues between them over here, but I’ll restrict myself to my most favourite quotes from the movie: 

Max: “Do you have a favourite-sounding word? My top-five are "ointment," "bumblebee," "Vladivostok," "banana," and "testicle."

(Psst, my favourite-sounding words are’ whimsical’, ‘postulate’,’ impeccable’, ‘protagonist’, ‘ginger’, ‘vegetables’, 'befuddled', ‘pickles’.. and actually many many many more!)

Max: “When I was young, I invented an invisible friend called Mr Ravioli. My psychiatrist says I don't need him anymore, so he just sits in the corner and reads.”

Max: “It would be good if there was a Fat Fairy. She would be a bit like the Tooth Fairy but would suck out your fat.”

Mary: “Where do babies come from in America? Do they come from cola cans? In Australia they are found in beer glasses.”

Mary: "Here's a photo of my other neighbour, Damian. I wish he was my boyfriend and we can be in love and do sexing"

Max: “Dr. Bernard Hazelhof said if I was on a desert island, then I would have to get used to my own company - just me and the coconuts. He said I would have to accept myself, my warts and all, and that we don't get to choose our warts. They are part of us and we have to live with them. We can, however, choose our friends, and I am glad I have chosen you.“

They’re so deep yet naive yet thoughtful, right?  How can you not like such stuff? The last scene of the movie was so painful and touching and beautiful. It culminated with the most perfect words “He smelt like liquorice and old books, she thought to herself, as tears rolled from her eyes the colour of muddy puddles.”

Such movies really impact you and compel you to think. About a hundred things. And I can’t mention all of them here. This movie is going to stay with me for a long time.

P.S. Once again, thanks to my spurtal buddy for sharing this with me. You deserve a colon phi :)

The Weekend

My spurtal buddy came to town to give me a visit for the weekend. It was beyond amazing. Beyond perfect. Right from the moment I saw him walking towards me, smiling from ear to ear when I went to pick him up at the station; to the time he peeped out the train to wave me goodbye two days later.

We visited my school and I squealed telling him stories behind every nook and corner; we hung around in my room and read the crazy stories I used to write as a kid and laughed till I got tears in my eyes and his sides burst; we went out for lunch and had fruity French pudding; he met my college friends and I met two of his, who came all the way from Delhi to meet us; we had pizza in the car, listening to music while the rain drops fell against the glass of the window; we went out on my Activa late at night to get medicine ‘cause both of us were sneezing and wheezing like pigs; he visited khet with me and picked out moong ki phallis; we had a warm lunch where my parents and grandparents shared hilarious childhood stories; we held hands and clicked the cutest of pictures together; and we went to the station to drop him off, listening to Dil Se as it continued to rain outside.

He brought me shampoo for my hair fall problem and he brought me Catch 22 which I really wanted to read. He also got me movies. I did nothing except spurting and PDAing in the craziest manner. And telling him how much I love him. He’s perfect for me. Tailor made and customized to suit me. I’m still trying to recover from the crazy-fairytale-adventurous-amazing weekend and settling back into the college routine. I’m having a lot of trouble doing that.

I’m missing him beyond measure. He always cheers me up (even if all he says is “Tee tee!”) I’m missing his amazing straight hair and his beaver teeth. I’m missing his small but clean arthiritic hands and the way he sticks his tongue out when he’s up to mischief. I’m missing the way he wrestles with the steering wheel of my dad’s old car and says he enjoys it. He is funny. And tall. And he makes me feel pathetic when he scores 98 percentile in CAT. He writes so well. He sends me the funniest and interesting-est of articles and he sends me the cutest text messages you can imagine. He listens to me every day and tries to help me through my whiny complaints and jibber jabber. He laughs when I tell him I have defective body parts and says he loves my nose even though it’s big. He gingerly sings soft kitty with me and laughs when I’m being funny. He calls me Asthie. And Chee pee. And Pop. And other variations of it. He tells me just how much he loves me.

I hope it wasn’t all a dream. It wasn’t, right? Was it? I wouldn’t be surprised if it was. This is all too good to be true man. How do these things happen? How can a person like him even exist? But no, it was not a dream. Miraculous awesome stuff happens. At the risk of sounding cheesy, I'd like to say that I just feel like the luckiest girl ever :D What's happening is beyond belief! It's the legendary incomprehensible super amazing stuff that happens in movies.

And man, do I love it. Please, let it not be a dream God? Like, please? :)

Amen.

Flute Music

My hands smell of school. The classrooms, the textbooks, the corridors, the desks and chairs. I spent a considerable amount of time cleaning out all my stuff. I now have only one-third of what I had in my room before it got painted! Can you believe that?! There was so much of junk.. old copies, books, clothes, pencil boxes, stuffed toys, comic books, notes, stationery, SUPW stuff, and many, many little things with so many memories attached. I read all my old notebooks where I’ve had entire conversations with my friends in classrooms during lectures. I read old slam books, saw all the school photos and read through the notes. I even saved some of my exam answer sheets. It was such a different time and place. Can’t believe it was the same city.

I’ve started setting my room up and I’m so psyched. I’ve given away many of my toys and books and so it made a lot of room to keep other prettier stuff. My books look so good against the purple wall. And I’ve put posters of my favourite bands (S&G, The Beatles, Pink Floyd and Radiohead) They are those small ones, with a matte finish. I’ve put a huge Café Coffee Day mug on one of the shelves, and a scented candle on the other. Oh, and I’ve put pot pourri in a glass bowl and I’ve kept it next to a picture of my sis and me. It smells glorious! It smells of springtime, and monsoon, and little babies, and puppies, and love, and laughter and sunshine and cotton candy clouds, and kites flying in the blue sky, and mom, and chocolates, and friends and the good ol’ memories, and well, flowers :P I’m just waiting to put the curtains and set my wardrobe and I’ll be good to go! Psst, on a completely unrelated note, I love popping bubble wrap. It's so satisfying. Throwing it away before poppin' all o' 'em bubbles in a crime! 

So, while going through my old notebooks, I came across my explanation of a poem by Rabindranath Tagore that we had in out twelfth standard ISC poetry book. And I remembered how much I used to love it. It is called ‘Flute Music’. It goes like this:

"Kinu, the milkman's alley
A ground floored room in a two storeyed valley
Slap on the road, window barred.
Decaying walls, windows crumbling to dust in places
Or strained with damp.
Stuck on the floor,
A picture of Ganesha, Bringer of Success,
From the end of a bale of cloth.
Another creature apart from me lives in my room
For the same rent;
A lizard.
There's one difference between him and me:
He doesn't go hungry.

I get twenty five rupees a month
As junior clerk in a trading office.
I'm fed at the Dattas' house
For coaching their boy.
At dusk I go to Sealdah station.
Spend the evening there
To save the cost of light.
Engines chuffing,
Whistles shrieking,
Passengers scurrying,
Coolies shouting.
I stay till half past ten,
Then back to my dark, silent, lonely room.

A village on the Dhalesvari river, that's where my aunt's people live.
Her brother-in-law's daughter -
She was due to marry my unfortunate self, everything was fixed.
The moment was indeed auspicious for her, no doubt of that -
For I ran away.
The girl was saved from me,
And I from her.
She did not come to this room, but she's in and out of my mind all the time:
Dacca sari, vermilion on her forehead.

Pouring rain.
My tram costs go up,
But often as not my pay gets cut for lateness.
Along the alley,
Mango skins and stones, jack fruit pulp,
Fish-gills, dead kittens
And God knows what other rubbish
Pile up and rot.
My umbrella is like my depleted pay -
Full of holes.
My sopping office clothes ooze
Like a pious Vaisnava.
Monsoon darkness
sticks in my damp room
Like an animal caught in a dead trap,
Lifeless and numb.
day and night I feel strapped bodily
On to a half-dead world.

At the corner of the alley lives Kantababu -
Long hair, carefully parted,
Large eyes.
Cultivated tastes.
He fancies himself on the cornet:
The sound of it comes in gusts
On the foul breeze of the alley -
Sometimes in the middle of the night,
Sometimes in the early morning twilight,
Sometimes in the afternoon
When sun and shadows glitter.
Suddenly this evening
He starts to play runs in Sindhu-Baroya raag,
And the whole sky rings
With eternal pangs of separation.
At once the alley is a lie,
False and vile as the ravings of a drunkard,
And I feel that nothing distinguishes Haripada the clerk
From the Emperor Akbar.
Torn umbrella and royal parasol merge,
Rise on the sad music of a flute
Towards one heaven.

The music is true,
Where, in the everlasting twilight-hour of my wedding,
The Dhalesvari river flows,
Its banks deeply shaded by tamal-trees,
And she who waits in the courtyard
Is dressed in a dacca sari, vermillion on her forehead."

Do you see? The beauty? The depth? The sadness? The loneliness? I love how many of Tagore’s poems have this lonely, melancholic, dreamy, theme about them. His poems talk of longing, and love and separation and music. I especially like the line “And the whole sky rings with eternal pangs of separation.” It’s so beautifully heart breaking. You can’t help but feel for the poor fellow. His lifestyle, his broken relationship, how he still thinks about her, how he tries to hide himself from the world, how he has an almost non-existent existence. How listening to the flute music is his only respite from his dreary life. It shows how hard surviving is for some people. How terribly dull, meaningless, insignificant living is for them. And how they are born poor and how they die poor. Sigh, it makes me so sad. It makes me lonely and dreamy as well. But this kind of loneliness, I like. That is why I like the night time so much. It is so utterly quiet. There’s no one to disturb you. No door bells ringing, no phone calls, no one to remind you of some important work that you’re supposed to do. It is just so peaceful.

I’m looking at the collage I just placed on the wall opposite me. It makes me smile every time I look at it. And every time I look at it, it makes me excited at the prospect of living an entire lifetime of blissful, crazy, days filled-with-random-acts-of-stupidty; singing soft kitty; writing every sentence ending with a colon and an asterick; long laughter sessions; completely inappropriate and astonishingly profane jokes and innuendos; and extreme, shameless PDAs and mushiness and chocolate covered cuddling. It will be similar to the pot pourri in the glass bowl. No, it will be exactly like the pot pourri in the glass bowl! :D

Acceptance

There are five stages that people go through when they come to know they're going to die. They’re called the five stages of grief. The first one is Denial (this cannot be happening to me!) The second one is Anger (why is this happening to me?) The third is Bargaining (I promise to be a better person if) Next comes Depression (I don’t care anymore) And finally, Acceptance (I’m ready for whatever comes)

Interestingly, thanks to Dr. House, I came to know that even the people who lose their loved ones go through these stages. And since I came to know Shirley is going to go, I’ve experienced myself going through all these emotions. When I wrote my previous post, I was probably in the Anger stage.

But it’s not that bad. I’ve finally realized that she’ll be happy in her new home, maybe happier. Although her absence is eating me, I can take solace from the fact that I will get to meet her every once in a while. I keep looking at her chewed up toys, her favourite spot, her rug, her eating bowls. I keep wondering what she must be doing, whether she’d be thinking of me as well. I sometimes forget she’s gone and expect her to come trotting out from some corner of the house, tongue out and ears bouncing. The feeling that follows is terribly painful.

But I guess I’m finally in the Acceptance stage. My mom and dad talked to me for a couple of hours and I was so relieved to know they’re grieved as well. I just wish she’d adjust to her new home and new life and grow up to be a chubby, happy dog :)

On the brighter side of life, my room is now mauve and a bit of purple. It looks.. well, girly. Which is good actually; and I needed a change. I’m going to spend the entire day tomorrow setting it up, getting rid of all the unused clutter. Apart from the literal cleaning up of my wardrobe and bookshelf, I really need to clean out the skeletons from my closet. It is high time I take them all out, instead of pushing them far and far in deeper.

The day started off in the worst way possible, but I’d like to end it on a positive note. I’m looking forward to a few specific events that are going to take place in the foreseeable future. I watched Death at a Funeral yesterday, and I’m still giggling thinking about some of the scenes.

Listening to Simon and Garfunkel now is already making me feel so much better. It kind of like, soothes your nerves you know. I’m terribly missing a certain someone and I really hope that person calls me back soon. I'm exhausted and I guess I will hit the sack early tonight, after a long time. Tomorrow is going to be a better day :)

THAT'S the stuff! :P

I am such a consumer!! We ALL are! Each one of us! I went out to get a pair of earrings but instead of that I bought a pair of gray sporty floaters and a pair of classy chic girly sandals! Plus I’ve got this weird purple fetish, and I bought other stuff.. all of it purple. Man there is so much of stuff everywhere! Shops, malls, showrooms, supermarkets.. they’re all stuffed with so MUCH of stuff!

We also happened to go to Big Bazaar because mom wanted a couple of.. (note: ‘a couple of’) household stuff.. you know, grocery items. Turns out, it was one of the ‘Maha Bachat’ days. They’re like these 6 days where they offer a lot of offers and everything is cheaper. Like we need any more offers :\ Anyway, it was a crazy crazy MADhouse! It seemed like EVERY body was out. Shopping shopping shopping, stuffing their carts with anything and everything. Shampoos, wafers, toilet cleaners, shoes, fruits, toys, plastic boxes, utensils, diapers, clothes.. anything you can imagine! Didn’t matter if they needed it or not. It was on a buy-one-get-one-free-offer man; how could they not buy?! There was no place to walk, let alone move your trolley along the passages. And those loud screaming, overweight women clad in eye-damaging sarees are no fun to watch either. Women just have to see something free with something and they will just lunge at it like it is gold. And they can't resist limited offers. They'll see something with the tag 'Hurry!' on something, and snatch! cling! there it goes into their overflowing cart!

In the end, as it always happens with my mom, our ‘couple of things’ turned out to be a cart-full of stuff. Sigh. In her defense, she is a woman. As I stood there watching our stuff getting packed, I saw all the people waiting in the line, grumbling, looking at their watches, screaming at the others who were breaking the queues, bumping and jostling against each other, I thought.. people go through all this just to come to this maddeningly loud and claustrophobic place to buy.. stuff?! Stuff to put into their already stuffed houses?! How do they have the patience?! What do they do with so much of stuff?

It reminded me of a George Carlin show I had seen once where he talked about stuff. For those who don’t know, George Carlin is one of the greatest stand-up comedians ever! He is cynical, sarcastic, extremely witty, shameless, a little bit of crazy and speaks the truth out bare. This is what he had said,

“That's all you need in life, a little place for your stuff. That's all your house is: a place to keep your stuff. If you didn't have so much stuff, you wouldn't need a house. You could just walk around all the time.

A house is just a pile of stuff with a cover on it. You can see that when you're taking off in an airplane. You look down, you see everybody's got a little pile of stuff. All the little piles of stuff. And when you leave your house, you gotta lock it up. Wouldn't want somebody to come by and take some of your stuff. They always take the good stuff. They never bother with that crap you're saving. All they want is the shiny stuff. That's what your house is, a place to keep your stuff while you go out and get...more stuff! 

Sometimes you gotta move, gotta get a bigger house. Why? No room for your stuff anymore. Did you ever notice when you go to somebody else's house, you never quite feel a hundred percent at home? You know why? No room for your stuff. Somebody else's stuff is all over the goddamn place!”

True, ain’t it? And so we continue, buying more and more stuff, and we continue doing that until we die. There’s never a time when we feel we have finally bought all the stuff we wanted. We’re always gonna desire for more! And boy, do we like the feeling or what?!

It was Raksha Bandhan today and there we were.. brothers and sisters tying rakhis to each other and well, whaddya know?! Exchanging stuff! And I got money, from which I’ll get even more stuff!

Ahh, materialistic pleasures! :P Maybe now I’ll get those earrings after all. Tomorrow! :D

Bow Wow, it's been a year!

There was no karmic connection when I first saw her. I saw her through my front door. She stood there, barely four months old, wagging her tail, sniffing around frantically, moving her body in jerks, trying to make sense of her new surroundings. When I approached her, she looked at me with her big black beetle eyes. I had expected her to be smaller and chubbier and I’d imagined I would just pick her up in my arms. But she was too hyperactive and active and would run away as soon as I’d try to even get close to her. There was much thrill and excitement. There was a new member in our family and we would always keep running after her, trying to make her do tricks, cuddling her, feeding her biscuits and taking her out for walks (truth be told, she is the one who takes us out for walks)

I felt like I didn’t get time to connect with her somehow. Until one cold winter night, when she was sprawled on the floor, I went and rubbed her belly. I wasn’t particularly in very high spirits. She came close to me, licked my knee, hopped on my lap and fell asleep. And then I knew. She would be there for me. The moment was so perfect, with her warm furry body against my thighs; I sat like that for a long time, stroking her behind her ears. Since then, we really bonded.

I would come home after college and she would jump, and lick and go crazy. After five minutes, when I would reappear again, she would jump and lick and go crazy all over again with the same amount of enthusiasm. My friends joke that she has short term memory loss. I say she just loves me too much! :P Umm, actually, she gives such a warm welcome to anybody and everybody, so meesa is no special one. Hmpf. The best thing about her? I’ve never heard her whine or cry. What a strong, happy little dog! She barks rarely too; especially since I destroyed her voice box by giving her ice cubes and she, after playing ice hockey with them, ate them all! Since that incident, her bark has become extremely high pitched and sharp. Um, okay what? I think it’s cute okay!

I am in love with her ears. They are the cutest things a dog could have. I play with them, fold them up, tie them together, make them jiggle, I even made her chew one of them. And when she comes running towards me, they bounce up and down in the cutest way possible, with her tongue sticking out and hanging out from one side of her mouth. Eeeeeee!! God, I hug her till she yelps! She probably feels I’m crazier than she is. She looks at me incredulously, when I dance and sing in front of her, or when I hold her front paws, and make her dance with me! She then wags her tail and tries to lick my face, all the time thinking her master-sister is crazy.

She loves water; she loves to drink it, to jump in it and to splash it all around. She even likes to stand under the rain with her mouth open to catch the rain drops and drink them up! Oh and my god, does she love food! She eats, well, everything. Apart from the food we give her, she eats wood, plastic, paper, leather, cloth, cow dung, her own dung, insects, carpet, shoes, socks, wires… In other words, pretty much anything she gets her paws on. Which brings me to tell you about the fateful day when she destroyed my mom’s 6000 rupees worth liquid clothes detergent. The bottle of detergent was just sitting on the table, minding its own business, when Miss Shirley stole it, chewed the entire bottle up and drank all the contents. Mom was furious and she beat the hell out of the stupid dog. And then began her puke sessions. She puked like ten times in two days until she was too weak to move. I guess she's learnt her lesson. Now, well, she won’t go anywhere near any kind of soap.

After episodes of her furniture eating, breaking her leash and running away with at least four people chasing after her, experimenting with weird species of organisms and throwing up, torpedo-ing up and down like crazy for no apparent reason, chewing up all her plastic bones and balls to bits and welcoming everyone with the same amount of excitement... it’s hard to believe it has been one whole year. She turns one today!

Happy Birthday my unbelievably perky, perpetually high and super awesome, super excited golden retriever!

I went up to her in the morning and molested her for a full five minutes. Even fed her a bread cutlet and a teeny piece of chocolate. Shhhh! I hope you stay with us and make us experience a new adventure everyday. Love you Shirleeeew, you stupid dog! :*

 (Collage courtesy: Mom)

Jabberwocky

It’s 4 AM and it’s raining! I don’t know why people say it’s ‘bad weather’ when it rains; I absolutely adore it. The morning air is chilly and refreshing. How am I awake at this hour? Do you even need to ask? I couldn’t sleep. To be fair, I did fall asleep for like an hour, which did not feel like sleep at all because I had crazy dreams about my sis getting a liposuction and me falling into a drain. I watched an episode of Scrubs and listened to Coldplay and Evanescence and sang along quietly in the darkened room. Yep, that’s me.

I particularly like this part of the song 'Imaginary' by Evanescence.

"I linger in the doorway, of alarm clocks screaming, monsters screaming my name.
Let me stay, where the wind will whisper to me,
Where the raindrops as they're falling, tell a story."


I love Amy Lee's sweet, angelic voice against all that heavy rock music.

There is frightening but awesomely cool thunder and lighting. It is so lovely! I can see the street light outside and the plump drops falling against it. There are fireflies hovering over it. Although how they are flying in all that rain, I fail to understand. I guess it’s one of those little mysteries in life which you don’t understand. Like how when you reach your class on time, the teacher arrives late. Or how you never have balance when you have to make a very important phone call. Or how when you desperately want something, you won't find it. Or why Shirley is deathly afraid of my sister's guitar. (She even peed a little when I was strumming it :P) Or why you never realize how idiotic you actually look until you watch yourself in a video. (I recently realized that when I clap I look like a sea lion flapping its fins. Only, the sea lion doesn't look mental. I'm still trying to get over the shock and trauma)

I just said bye to my sister. She’s off to Bangalore. New job. New life. A fresh new start. Which makes me want to do something about my own life. I need change, and I’ve to bring that change myself. I feel very gloomy about it all for some reason; instead of being enthusiastic. I wonder why. My best friend shared an article with me which said that many times you never know why exactly you feel what you feel, and so you pin point it to something. Like if you’re grumpy, you’ll feel maybe it’s because of lack of sleep, or because you had a spat with a friend, or maybe because of your medicine. But the actual reason can be far from that. There was an entire theory about it. It was ridiculously interesting! Sometimes I wish I was better off with English and Psychology as my majors. But I’ve decided not to have any kind of regrets from life. It’s okay. Even if I made mistakes, I learnt from them.

Oh hell, I’m just rambling, aren’t I? I guess this is just one of the I-just-feel-like-writing-because-the-weather-is-good-so-sue-me posts!

And now fireflies have begun to enter my room through some creak probably. And they won’t let my already sleep deprived, half dead brain sleep because I’ll imagine them mutilating my body when I’m dead to the world and into my bizarre dreamland again. Damn, I guess that is one teensy reason why it’s called bad weather.

Anyway, one last thing. I had a revelation last night. It is possible to fall in love with a person again. Over and over and over again. Even when you feel there is absolutely no way you can love someone more, lo and behold, you fall in deeper. Another mystery, eh? :) 

Well, such mysteries I like! Weeeeee! :D