Teens to Toons

I meet someone new.... I notice the face... I meet someone I know... I notice the face... I meet someone when I look in the mirror... I notice the face... Those lines... those scars... laughlines, dimples, eyes (reds, pinks, yellows, whites and advanced whites), lips, nose, brows, ears and so much more... The faces tell them all... Can faces lie? I got this mail... from an old friend... and yes, I could feel a change... the words after all determine a person... So I being rude like I am always... asked what has caused the change and who is the person responsible... and this prompted an amazingly acidic reply.... Quoting... Tumhaare khat mein nayaa ek salaam kiskaa thaa Naa thaa rakeeb to aakhir woh naam kiskaa thaa Rah'aa naa dil mein woh bedard, aur dard rahaa I went back home and noticed my face... after a long long time... I noticed how time is wearing me... I know that with an attitude like mine... I am going to suffer and it is going to be a long one... ...

(My first ever pilfered blog entry... Reason.. I had no better words for the same experience ) A woman calls, out of the blue. Asks a bunch of very personal questions… her reasoning? She has a daughter of “marriageable age”. How do you look? What kind of a person are you? How much do you earn? Are you religious? How long is your hair? How are you usually dressed? What do you do for killing time? Why do you cycle? How are your domestic skills? How close are you to your relatives? … It all sounds funny if I repeat it to friends. I will laugh, they will laugh and we would get back to work. But it would continue to prey on my mind. Somewhere down the lane, I have got used to being checked out in get togethers. I have got used to whispered gestures and speaking to strangers on the phone. I have got used to being polite to the rudest enquiries. Am I just another one in the market? Am I the same person I used to be? 23 and Single !!!! High earning snot-nosed SOB w...

That prayers don't guarantee miracles,but they still heal and keep me hopeful. That there is no shame in tears,but I would not want the world to see my vulnerabilities. That sometimes being alone helps me disentangle my own redundancies and intricacies,but I secretly wish there was a shoulder I could lean on. That every emotion does not need words for expression,I can feel someone's care through their eyes. That eyes speak volumes,I can estimate perfectly the truth not spoken. That children who grow up feeling need for love, once out of home, hurt themselves many times in the process. That a lesson will be repeated again,till I have learnt it well enough.

"Because... denial , anger , bargaining and depression are the first four stages of grief. Acceptance being the final one." Left or Right? I feel as if I always have a choice for my journey. Both will take me somewhere but it all depends how I feel at that moment. The "Right Path" is the normal, I am STRONG and INDEPENDENT so get lost I don't need you kinda pathway. I see many people, waiting for buses... buying food... screaming at their children...couples holding hands... life goes on. The path I prefer the "Left alone Path" when I just wanna be myself and reflect on what happened, happens, happening. Dilemmas I'm facing and how I plan to solve it and how I wish I can walk that pathway... throw myself onto the grass and refuse to budge... and play a drama queen. Desperation? In having to climb each peak by myself, maybe I just wanna pity myself. Ahh... that's called Self Pity. I'll get out of that very soon. Really. Give me some money an...

The three glorious days of first vacation since I joined here have come to an end (some more to come). Physical/mental assessment of yours truly: - can't eat - can't sleep - too unreal - experiencing abnormal levels of energy - chewing far too much gum as result of aforementioned energy - just crazy about my friends. Yesterday, was overwhelmed by just how much they make me, me. I jumped into a pool of freezing water for the Bath at that temple. And they all joined me with the loin cloth and that was cold and funny. when we came out of the water, it was like standing in naked, but what hindus would not for Gods, I went all religious ;). Goosebumps all over my body, red eyes, teeth rattling, body trembling, and words pouring out. My heart just about exploded right there. - friends, extended family members have helped greatly. Whenever I can, i reflect on how lucky i am to have this many people offering their help. it's the best I could dream of. working with people ...

"God is a concept by which we measure our pain." --John Lennon And if I don't have a god, does that mean I have no pain.. or that I have crossed the threshold of pain... I don't want to sound too sad... I am not... I am doing just fine... I have all things I need to survive and am striving for all those materialistic comforts... I just wish I never settle down till I want to write and I continue to live with my passions... Pain and me... we have a lot in common....

Faith is a process of leaping into the abyss not on the basis of any certainty about where we shall land, but rather on the belief that we shall land. - Carter Heyward Now I can't have that much faith... that's asking too much from me... I am not that good neither am I that innocent... They say " Faith is a firm belief in something for which there is no proof. Love may exist for me, but for someone who doesn't have love in their life, there's little I, or anyone else, can offer to assure them that it exists." The boundless beauty and inspiration in my life, which I've come to know as love, is worth every sacrifice; every dark path navigated; every heartache endured. For nothing else I've experienced nor dared dream can compare. I say to myself aloud in my solitude "Have faith". Faith? "what have I done" ... or rather "what I have done"? I have sacrificed a lot of what made me "me"... for what? I have sa...

In the last few months.. I have been on a sort of exploration for new forms of music.. Besides knocking into led zep, I think the most enriching experience has been coming across the album "Quadrophenia" by The Who.. Quadrophenia is one of those self-introspection kind of albums (i guess there are not many of them...). It has made me think a lot. There are days and weeks, when u end up spending most of your time in the office, analysing and writing reams of codes. U get drowned in your work and end up ignoring your own interests. Somehow, you get lost in this queer crowd of things created by you. Then one day, suddenly you wake up and say to yourself, "Man, where was I all these days". It's a situation when the real you and the present you become two different persons. It comes as a shock to you, when you see your life separating from the real you. Dont know how it goes for others, but I had to live this situation.. It was kinda pathetic.. Luckily, thats when...

It actually began, quite reluctantly. Unnecessary as it may seem, life teaches you what you allow it to teach. Even Life cannot teach you what it offers you. One has to let himself dissolve into the experience and let it sink in, and that I might call religion or education. Whatever the other person is willing to accept. Nay. Does it matter? Nay. Life is about teaching oneself. Being a self-thought-taught "person", picking up bits and pieces from various experiences, I tread on a path; I have myself laid out for myself. Never have I asked, in other words, begged for words, from "messiahs". Never did I think myself of having enough virtue, call it patience, to learn from others. So "rich" were my experiences. Things change, dynamically. Responding to an open question, throwing caution to the winds, I immersed myself into a debate, with people who thought, had streamlined their thinking apparatus and abilities. Gradually, they pestered; read "lee...

When the last tree has fallen, When the last drops of water are polluted, When the last bird ceases to sing, Will “they” realize that money cannot be eaten. Reading these somewhat crazy lines, I was joyous, at being finally able to have convinced myself, that this human race has faintest of hopes of living out the new century. I had been troubled for a pretty long time at, what seems to me, a race to extinction. I am an educated, liberal and informed individual. Having been educated at the best of the institutions, I developed a deep admiration for Mother Nature and her so “wily” ways. Listening to my Guru and his talks on “biomimetic” methods, I sensed a deep concern in him. Of late, all he talked of was “Green” Chemistry. I connect to people, people my age and people “not” my age, irrespective of who and what they are, thanks to my rootless upbringing. I used to be appalled at how short sighted “genuinely” gifted men can be. Talks of Dollar salaries, Ivy League scholarsh...

Last weekend, I was thinking about how people tend to post more about negative experiences in their lives than about positive ones. Today is no exception. I feel kind of bad about having such a negative attitude, but writing about things makes me feel better and refreshed too. The first time was after Puchee told me that I have a super ego and that I have an inferiority complex. Personally, I don't think I have a super ego or a complex, but every time I hear him them say that, I feel as if there's something wrong with me; as if a part of me is somehow wrong. Those feelings of not being normal have been accumulating, and today they seem just too much to ignore. I finally asked him why he thought I had a super ego and an inferiority complex. He said that I seem to get really defensive when we talk about people, people we know and discuss them. I t is that I always tend to blast them away and their accomplishments. He was specific to the way I talk about women in general. H...

I can write the saddest poem of all tonight. Write, for instance: "The night is full of stars, and the stars, blue, shiver in the distance." The night wind whirls in the sky and sings. I can write the saddest poem of all tonight. I loved her, and sometimes she loved me too. On nights like this, I held her in my arms. I kissed her so many times under the infinite sky. She loved me, sometimes I loved her. How could I not have loved her large, still eyes? I can write the saddest poem of all tonight. To think I don't have her. To feel that I've lost her. To hear the immense night, more immense without her. And the poem falls to the soul as dew to grass. What does it matter that my love couldn't keep her. The night is full of stars and she is not with me. That's all. Far away, someone sings. Far away. My soul is lost without her. As if to bring her near, my eyes search for her. My heart searches for her and she is not with me....

Which OS are You?

Withered away, the burning heat of the day Evening silently soaked the heat within Wearing the diamonds came the night O’ Soul why are you silent, smile!! Three things have affected me lately. Hope, fear and death. Silently they walked past me in the night and left me awake. Gasping for breath, a parched throat and burning eyes. These days have been gloomy because days are heavy with tension. Work and nothing else. I need to relax and let the natural “me” take over. But it does not happen. Rather I cannot let that happen. Reading a lot these days has been a need. A need because I need to exist in an unreal world where I can be what I want to be. It would be difficult to be that in the real world. I even pretend to dream these days. Pretense has become my entire life. Every moment of my life is “pretending” to be me. I am doing it for the fact that people might not recognize the “real” me if I were to show them who I am. Living a life where everything is drive...

In times of concious desire for pain, a man seeks loneliness. Loneliness when desired by a human, and is self imposed, is solitude. This is probably the time, when one turns to god or to oneself, seeking answers in a process of self discovery. Ultimately, a person wants to know why is he desiring the pain. It is said of man, that he seldoms does anything, not for his own sake. Almost all our actions are based on seeling for results and have a hidden ulterior motive in the times to come. All our efforts are directed in a way to achieve a goal and in a sense, we become puppets to out whims and desires, thus causing ourselves to be motivated, influenced and manipulated for the result we seek. So is it pain, what I seek? Sometimes they say "follow the heart" and sometimes they say "follow the mind". I hardly know what am I following, but the desire in me, rightnow is to feel the nothingness and soak up all the pain, I can inflict upon myself. Nobody can d...

Naah. She ain't dead. Yet. Neither is she close to it.She is hale and hearty and in the bestest of times, as ever any. She is a charming take of beauty, brains and humor. A personality who brought laughters and joy and happiness. A hare in this world of tortoises, who shellshocked them out of their lethargy and made them dance (albeit slowly and left footed). She was something amazing. I promise to tell her tales and exploits to my grandchildren. I promise to remember her wisecracks and wisequacks and smile in my rather stiff lipped manner, leaving people wondering, as to what the reason for my bemusement is. I promise her to get her out of my system, as soon as possible and that is the reason why I scribble on. Ah, another promise, I hope I coul dnot keep. That's me. Fighting myself all the way. when I first met her, or should it be "when we first met". It was a dark, dank thursday afternoon and a timid me, was being interrogated by a belligerent few, snappy like R...

An IQ of 146 and a rating of complex intellectual. Intelligence Interval Cognitive Designation Below 75 Mild to profound learning difficulty 75 - 85 Below average 85 - 114 Average 115 - 124 Above average 125 - 134 Gifted 135 - 144 Highly gifted 145 - 164 Genius 165 - 179 High genius 180 - 200 Extraordinary genius I am somewhere up there... but does it really makes sense. I do not know. I would believe in my abilities and myself, rather than some tests.

I am tired of myself. I am tired of being myself for the past year. I have accepted things that I would never have. So why am I like this. I hate myself for allowing myself to degrade. From the best to "almost nothing". That's me. A year older. Ten kgs heavier. I am too fat and I am too lazy. I am twenty-two and I am tired of myself. So is that me? I will change. I will win. I will give my best and when it's not enough, I will give more. That's me. I will be back.

Nostalgia... It is a disease and today it afflicts me...

I have some serious doubts about “love” and “relationships”. It has been simmering in me, as to what makes people fall in love. As they say, “love is the highest emotion”. But is it? I wondered for a long time, waiting to experience that highest emotion and all I could do was to wander around seeing people fall in love. Every time, I pretended to fall in love, the other person moved away. Was I unlucky or my pretense not good enough? I had lots of questions for myself. I set about solving the riddle. The first question that came up was “why should I fall in love?” Basically it is an instinctive urge for sex which makes the opposites attract and reproduce. Pleasure is another reason. But how does a person decide on whom to love. I guess that is instinctive too. Men usually see the physical aspects and women see the other aspects along with the physical aspects too. I have seen people sacrifice a lot and paying a high price for such an emotion. Is it actually worth it is unknown to ...