An Ode to the Husband :P

Husbands are good fun I tell you. Not like I have so much experience, but the one I have is simply fabulous! He presents an awesome win-win situation. I mean, sometimes I am caught wondering, is this guy my husband, is he my friend? You know, all that social and cultural conditioning kicking in, with the husband being the guy that one is supposed to treat with excessive awe and respect, bordering on reverence. A friend, on the other hand, is an absolute equal. But then, that's not fair. With my parents as examples, I always knew friendship was an essential component of the soul-mate concept. How does it matter anyhow? He is the guy with whom I choose to live my entire life and he is also the guy who is, today, my best-est friend.

I can go days on end without communicating with most of the rest of the world. But he always knows, perhaps unfortunately for him, everything that's happening in my life. Obviously, this means that he gets all the cribbing and the bitching, the oh-so-depressed lows, the bubbling highs, the furiously flaming tirades against all the idiots in my life. He gets all the chatty commentaries and the monologue-like conversations. He also has to deal with my "I am always right, so if you want to be right, you have to agree with me completely" dictatorship mode. He has to carefully make his way through the myriad, disconnected and apparently random topics I choose to discuss (in a monologue-like manner, obviously). He also has to fight to get a word in, because if he does not say anything, of course I am going to assume that he is not paying attention. And that can be rather fatal, albeit temporarily. But he has survived two whole years of all this madness. And has still remained relatively sane.

The last two years have been crazy fun, brimming with moments that shall be forever etched in my memory. The frantic adventures involving trains, buses and air-crafts that often threatened to leave without us, the leisurely journeys to snow-clad mountains with their quaint hill-towns and to the sea and the family, the stolen moments and the audacious plans. All of this crammed into a few days, snatched out of these two long years. The years were long, because they were spent mostly apart. And yet, it is in the course of these two years that I discovered my husband. To borrow from a cliche, my "Friend, Philosopher, Guide."

This is a toast to all those happy coincidences and the many twists and turns that have brought us to this moment. And a toast to all those moments to come, that shall be always drenched in laughter and happiness and togetherness. Lots of Love!

The girl who reads :)

My sister, Rhuta, writes, and writes beautifully, at that. So here goes, a post from her ...

I love to read. I used to try to not let that define me. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to be known as ‘the girl with the book’. Surely there was more to me than that. But as the years passed, it struck me - what better description could there possibly be? Books are, in a word, magical - even when they’re not about magic. That girl with her nose buried in the book, she can never be one dimensional. There are so many aspects to her character, so much depth, so many things about her that you can only guess at. You might think she doesn’t have a life, you do not know how many she actually does! On the outside she may seem dull, boring, bookish - so to speak. Look a little closer and you might see that slight smile playing on her lips. Don’t you want to know what caused it? The secret is in those pages. Join her in them. Pick up a book! If you don’t have one handy, ask her if she has another. She usually will.

I am not defending myself, I’m trying to explain. Yes, I am the girl with the book. I’m trying to convey just how amazing it is to be that girl. I’m telling you why I wouldn’t want to be anyone else. It’s not because I can’t imagine being anyone else. Oh no! I have lived as so many characters in so many worlds that I can imagine being almost anyone. What I want is for you to experience what I have experienced, to share in the magic that these pages hold. I want your life to be enchanted, the way mine has been so far. I want you to at least give it a try.

If you ask me to pick between books past and books future, I don’t think I possibly could. There’s so much more to read and discover. So much joy to find! And at the same time there are all those stories in my past. Those books are my friends, they made me who I am today. I need the books I’ve read so far and all of those I shall read in the years to come. I relish the thought of coming across all those as yet unknown treasures. Unknown in the sense I know they exist but where and in what form, only time will tell.

The thing about books is they’re always there, waiting for you. I’m never lonely, even when I’m alone because I have them with me, always. If not in physical form, they’re there in my head. They’re a refuge, an escape, a haven. Nothing can compare to the comfort of curling up with a good book. It’s the simplest pleasure you can ever receive, and in my experience, the best. But don’t let me be the one telling you, come find out for yourself. Choose a book. Read.

It’s never too late to read a book. They don’t recognize age limits. Oh, you missed out on Winnie the Pooh? No harm done, pick up a copy now and you can casually walk into the Hundred Acre Woods. You see that door? It’s magical, it never closes. Anytime you feel like it, they’re there waiting for you, tireless and uncomplaining. They have so much to offer, give them a chance. Learn to love books and let them love you. As they have loved me for all these years. Make them a part of your world and they’ll make you a part of theirs. Embrace the joy of reading and no matter where you go, you will always be at home.

--- Rhuta Deobagkar

Fleeting happiness...

Is happiness the same as peace? Is it the heart-felt desire to stay right where you are, forever? Is it in being motionless or in being restless? Forever wanting to be someplace else. Is it in the exploration of places new and dangerously exciting? Sometimes I have felt, it is as simple as just coming home, being with the familiar. But then, the unknown and the surprising has meant joy too. A comfortably warm hug, a quick peck on the cheek, sometimes just a glimpse or a whisper is all it takes. A mother's unspoken happiness at having her kids home and safe and laughing. It brims in her eyes... perhaps you mistakenly think it is a tear. It is in shaking your dad's hand and smiling gently at his gruffly firm handshake and awkward hug. It is in discovering families and finding yourself within them. Shades of you, traces of you. It is in traveling together. Or sometimes just traveling alone, yet to the same place. It can stem from something small like a snatched conversation with some random stranger or the knowledge that it is really about a lifetime together. Scary. It is about growing old. About counting your (few! hah!) white hair and being thrilled that you have one less than him. Hehe! 

Am I always happy? I don't think so. But I know that there is so much that makes me happy. It is a good life when you know that you are always just a moment away from happiness. That you are thrilled to be happy, even for just a moment. It comes and goes. Ever changing. Yet never ending. I am loving it :)

A year gone by...

A year is actually so much time passing by. 365 days, 8760 hours, 525600 minutes or 31536000 seconds. Or so Google tells me. You get older, pretend to be wiser, meet new people, fall out with others. There is a certain comfort of familiarity every year. You know the sun will rise and set a certain number of times this year too. The seasons will change with spring gently bidding goodbye to harsh winters and hot blistering summers making the torrential rains feel like a blessing. You will enjoy festivals, look forward to days of celebration or say a quiet prayer for days of remembrance.

Yet what keeps you looking forward to another year is the expectation of something new, something different, something that shall make you happier. Not because the last year has been just old or dull or sad. Oh no! Surely the year gone by was new once. You looked forward to that year with a lot of expectations. You were blissfully happy, you cried a lot and you laughed more. You fought like crazy and yet fell in love, a number of times, all over again. You were praised and berated. You were unbelievably successful some days and a colossal failure on other days. It has been a good year for you, yet the new one beckons. It glitters with promises of more everything, better everything, happier everything.

The year that has gone by has been, for me, one full of moments that make wonderful memories. A year of firsts, of love, laughter, family, togetherness. Umpteen meetings and partings. Adventurous journeys with missed, delayed or cancelled buses, trains and flights. Time seeming to have a will of its own. At times I could sense it dragging along tediously, at others it was rushing by with a whoosh. There are regrets too. But the joys far outweigh these. I look back on this year and I feel thankful for all the wonderful people who have made this year easier, more joyful and memorable. Family, friends, colleagues and of course, the husband. A fantabulous guy. My best friend. Confidant, philosopher, adviser, lover, magician. Thank you for this amazing year. And here's to another beautiful year!

High up in the Sky

It is a "my-breath-rushes-out-and-my-heart-skips-a-beat" experience. To rise through a dull and misty fog on an overcast, dark day and suddenly glimpse heaven. I have done that, with my nose pressed firmly to the tiny window, which invariably mists over with my afore-mentioned rushed-out-breath. That precise moment when I rise right above the clouds as they hang there in mid-air, in suspended animation, as if they are mighty surprised to find a non-cloud in their midst. When I am gently speeding past the fluffy landscape of clouds and wondering if they will indeed be as soft to the touch as they appear, it makes me feel so tiny and yet so blessed, like I am special :)
This time around it was an even more special sight. Moon mania is all very well, but lately I seem to have been captivated by the sun. Watching the sun rise, its blinding brightness and its warmth seeping into the clouds, making them seem translucent, making them come alive, was a delight!
The glaring, glowing sun, the black and golden clouds and the cold blue skies are like a study in contrasts. There are of course times when the clouds have been angrily thunderous, just waiting to spark and roar, while the sky looks darkly blue and black. Yet they are wondrous, in all their savage beauty. They never frighten me, because they never intend to do so. They just are. That is something to learn. To just be. Yourself. Alive.


The air up there in the clouds is very pure and fine, bracing and delicious.  
And why shouldn't it be? It is the same the angels breathe.  
~Mark Twain

Tales of Tales

Some memories are precious indeed ... and so many of mine are immersed in the pages of long beloved and much treasured books. It is well nigh impossible to pick only a few books from the many that I have fallen in love with. Yet, having decided to relive my first experiences with atleast a few books, here goes ...

A. A. Milne's 'Winnie-The-Pooh' was a childhood favourite. Of Pooh coming down the stairs upside-down with Christopher Robin every morning and wondering if there wasn't any other way down the stairs even while banging his head on each stair. By which time they would generally be downstairs already so it wouldn't matter any more and they would be ready to set off on a new adventure. Pooh's immense love for honey, Eeyore hunting for his lost tail, Piglet and Pooh's friendship and their fascination with Roo and Kanga, Owl's apparent wisdom, the entire Rabbit family and oooh, the Heffalump! Tra-la-la, tra la-la, Tra-la-la, tra la-la, Rum-tum-tiddle-um-tum, Tiddle-iddle, tiddle-iddle, Rum-tum-tum-tiddle-um. And best of all, aai telling me Winnie-the-Pooh stories over and over again when I was too young to read ... ensuring that I fell in love with the characters and imagined them in my own rich, fantasy-filled world every time I did read the stories myself.

Another book I remember being absolutely in love with was Gerald Durrell's 'Rosy is my Relative'. It was so engrossing that it became utterly impossible for me to keep the book down and I had to finish it in one go. It is mighty difficult to pick a favourite scene ... Adrain's surprise at being bequeathed a drink-loving, yet gentle-tempered elephant. The myriad characters he encounters on his journey to the sea-side to sell off Rosy. The ballroom escapade with Rosy pulling down the chandeliers and the pantomime disaster. The court room scenes with the lawyers and the jury and the judge all confused and yet plodding along...  Adrain's love for Samantha, Rosy's love for drink and everybody else's love for utter bedlam made for one of the best reads in my life ever!

Durrell's 'My Family and Other Animals' and 'Birds, Beasts and Relatives' were enjoyable too, not just because of his unintentionally hilarious family but because of his descriptive style of writing. Strawberry-pink villas, forests full of olive trees, loud Greeks and their love for life, food and wine ... Corfu came alive in Durrell's books and his friends, mother, brothers and sister made his animal adventures even more exciting and lively. I am sure the puns in his titles were absolutely intended. He introduced me to phrases like 'deliciously sick' and 'forests that chirped and came alive' and I have been a Durrell fan ever since.

Enid Blyton's books ... Malory Towers, St. Clares, Five Find-outers, Famous Five, The Magic Faraway Tree, and umpteen other awesome books were the stuff that kept me sane during school holidays. A book a day was the norm and I am so thankful that there were good lending libraries in the area I grew up in ... and that my parents were ardent book lovers too, always believing that a book was of course the best gift ever! Blyton's stories have a charm, and though many have criticized her writings for their orthodox style and the implied anti-feminism or discrimination, I do not believe a child will ever be negatively affected by her stories unless an over-smart grown up tries to prejudice the young reader. Her tales are simple, imaginative and full of life. Harry Potter came along much later; magical stories for young adults have been around for far too long before J. K. Rowling wrote her books.

Classics such as Hitchhiker's Guide, Jane Eyre, Mill on the Floss, David Copperfield, Pride and Prejudice, Oliver Twist, A Tale of Two Cities, and so many others have all been on my book shelf at some time or the other. Later I found John Grisham, Arthur Hailey, Jeffery Archer, Ayn Rand and its been an ongoing journey of discovery. Every visit to a book store brings the realization that there is so much I have never read! Over the years, I have forgotten the names of some of the people who introduced me to each new genre. But they enriched my life and made sure that as long as I can read books, I shall never be lonely here. Novels, short-stories, autobiographies, travelogues, diaries ... so many forms of writing. Sometimes I wish that life could be a long long summer vacation and I could just curl up in a comfy chair and read, with no regard for the passing of time and the oh-so-important work and life that constantly await us.

The Stage

Dark spaces everywhere,

Muted whispers in the air.

Faceless entities floating around,

Anxious flutters all abound.

Bells ring, curtains are drawn.

Flood of light ... the play's on.

Charged spaces, myriad characters,

A story told, amid tears and laughter.

Captive audiences, 

Fleeting emotions.

Of stolen glances, 

Actions and reactions.

Silences that speak aloud

Faces that talk to the crowd

Real and unreal converge,

And all my worlds seem to merge...

To let go and yet love so much...

I miss this lady who was strong and wise and fun and all things warm and wonderful. My grandmother. She has been gone a month now yet in my mind she lingers on. Sentimental do you call me? But really, on a day to day basis, I do not wallow in sadness and despair... nor does anybody else who loves her. Simply because that is not the way to be. If a life has been well and fully lived, you cherish the memories of that person and go on with the rest of your life with the utmost zest. What does hurt and hurt bad though is that sudden moment in time when I think of her and it strikes me anew that someone I love is never going to be mine anymore... those half-written but never sent letters, those many conversations that were yet to be had, old stories that I was going to listen to some day. Stuff I want to tell her... so many times to come in my life that I want her to know, to be there with me all through. And it is only at those freakish moments that I cannot help but let the tears fall. At all other times, I am strong. Some things you just gotta learn to live with and smile through because the person you are thinking of deserves all those smiles :)

She was an amazing lady. If a gal needed a role model, she would have been the ideal one. Not that she would have pointed herself out as a perfect person. Constant improvement, constant progress, constant effort. Determination and the strongest and most resilient will I have ever come across. So much wisdom gathered through a lifetime of experience. Makes me wonder if that is the way of life, to learn all along and yet to take a lot of it along with you. She was a teacher and her students must remember facets of her that I must have never seen. To me she was this person that was tied in with this place.  A place that felt like home always. Maybe because I spent a while growing up there. Being her eldest grandchild made me feel selfishly special. Like she would always love me that little bit more than everybody else. 

For me, that she was a wonderful human being is manifested in the fact that she brought up her own children to be some of the finest people I have ever known. Incredibly loving, strong, sensitive, yet upfront and honest and each unique. That she let each one of them be the independent person they could be, never let them be fettered and still made sure there were strong bonds between them... tells of the person she was. No wonder my grandpa loved her so much! Never a person to let anybody take her decisions for her, she took in the best of all the worlds she could visit and created her own best version of it. It worked well enough for her. Or so it always seemed to me.

There are so many facets of this lovely lady who has been an important part of my life... her teaching, her experiences, her people, her plants and the mad love she felt for them... this list can be unending. So much I can say, and yet so much I don't know about her life. I realized only after she was gone that there were so many people in her life, so many untold tales, and they are probably lost to me forever now. It is funny how one person can have been enmeshed in the lives of so many others... may be that is the essence of being a human being. You must reach out and meet new people, let them into your life and become a part of theirs. That way, you live just one life but you get the experiences of so many... Like living a million lives all at once.