Tag: nostalgia

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I glow without stealing someone else’s sunshine.

Heard the song ‘You can’t break me’ by V Bozeman?
It’s great when you have a friend that gets you – you don’t need to break everything you say down for them to understand – they are rare and most precious people.
I say this from personal experience. We were close, I think. I had met her after a gap of few years. It was a new feeling. Perhaps, even exciting. We were close suddenly.
After about a year of sweet interaction, things changed dramatically. I felt they expected me to be a certain way, perhaps even critical and condescending about just everyone who would hava a good cahnce at life.
I never understand this need to talk about others. I used to take it upon myself to be more present and just not speak when I didn’t have anything to contribute.
I don’t like making my life a subject for anyone and likewise for others too.
Similarly, I would show a complete disinterest in all that she had to talk about any one else, mostly who never mattered to either of us.

After months, I looked in the mirror at myself and spoke out loud, “I’m pissed at you.”

This wasn’t a comment directed at myself, but at a close friend of mine — the person I had started to resent a few weeks prior, but instead of bringing it up at the time, I remained silent, distant, passive.

So there I was, alone at home practicing the very words I wanted to utter on several occasions over several calls, uncertain that I’d have the courage to make it happen. I am always struggling with finding the right way to let the people I care about know that I’m upset, disappointed or simply pissed off.
I felt a huge burden on myself. Initially I couldn’t quite put a finger to what was really going wrong . I nevertheless tried to make up with listening time extended, more calls and appreciation messages on occasions and keeping touch, whenever I felt a dip in the connection. I felt it was all wrong. Not working for me, like I would like it to.

After a while, it was awful to realise they just didn’t care, how I would be hurt and that perhaps they found fault in me, for not living up to a certain expectation of a friend.
I understood we all have our lists of perfect qualities. I knew I didn’t match up to theirs. They had other requirements and clearly I couldn’t have of them! I spent months on my own, day by day, as I got over it with the help of some rational self talk.
Sometimes we find ourselves at crossroads with people that we may have been excited to form bonds with at first, and yet are left wondering why they’re still in your phone contacts or friends on social media now. Sure enough, it can be painful, but it’s alright to shrug your shoulders and say, “We had a beautiful connection once, and I’m grateful for it: but now we’re just in really different places.” Drifting apart doesn’t mean you have to formally sever ties, but it’s OK to find yourself less invested in a friendship that used to be, if not your entire world, an exciting part of it. It doesn’t make me or them a bad person — it’s just about coming to terms with the knowledge that sometimes our full original selves just don’t match with old friends anymore.

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I write because I have nothing better to do.

(Source- https://unsplash.com/photos/lBPtkH1Sel4)

How I Write About Love

What do we consider to be a good meeting story?
When it involves chance more than effort. You get bonus points if the chance encounter suggests compatibility, like mistakenly wheeling off with each other’s shopping carts at supermarkets because your items had so much overlap, you got the carts mixed up.
You catch glimpses of familiar faces or a nerve wrecking hello, with the lady in purple, at the elevator, you frequent at work.There is this beautiful disaster. Explosion of curiosity. The onset of displaced feelings.

The Price I pay to Write all this!

Well, the best thing that ever happened to my writing life was living in lockdown.

(Thank-you for reading this article!)

My passion is writing. Everything I write about is geared toward things that I deeply cares about—experiences, thoughts, drama, and emotions. A full-time mom to two handsome boys—11 and 4—I built a career around insurance underwriting and later, teaching of English literature and language in high school, before vanishing into full-time mommy responsibilities. I believe that life is not meant to be serious all of the time, and that we should have fun as much as we can. Besides writing, I enjoy watching spy network series and living it up by creating laugh memes with my two lovely young boys!

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This is why I love being around you!

People who are seen as ‘nice’ are often interpreted as weak or passive.

It’s possible that there are some passively nice people out there, but in my experience, most of the nicest people I know are stubborn, angry, articulate, active, wildly intelligent and deeply caring. They bring immense effort to being pleasant, helpful, useful and supportive, even sometimes to just not saying the mean thing, even though it would be easier. Perhaps even because it would be easier.

And for some of us it can be really damn hard but goddamn, we are trying.
Iam not saying that leaving a stupidly high tip for your waitress at the diner just because it’s Tuesday, would fix things and make your sads go away forever. But perhaps it will help. Sometimes just to be nice. Just to be good.
Sometimes it is really damn hard, but the point is to try.
I just do what I feel like doing, that’s it for me.

Frankly most of us rarely face such compelling circumstances that aren’t of our creation.
Iam going to talk about myself here, as an illustrative example.
Many of my friends are genuinely, quite fervent in their conviction that Iam a good person. This is a result of many conscious decisions and deliberate actions, I perform, of a good person.
Some of my friends are also aware of another side of me. Because there is bound within, also the capacity of mundane evils. These go unexpressed because I so choose. It is a slow lesson.
I’ve always thought of it like a campfire. You can’t just toss some wood in a pit and make fire: it will fizzle out assuming it even starts. You have to nurture it, slowly feeding it more and more until it’s ready for the big logs. Then I have got a fire that will last. Being good, I understood is the same way. You start with the small things: holding the door open for the person right after you( this is a big one..no one likes the door coming back rushing to their face), tidying up your own mess wherever you are, supporting your friend’s business.
Then come the big ones: listening to someone’s troubles, not snapping back when someone insults you (this I have come a long way), smiling first when you lock eyes with strangers accidentally. Like in the case of great fire, this kindling is necessary for great friendships, I am learning.
It all comes down to personal choice. Keeping away from negative vibes, slowly, politely and then permanently, is my favourite game these days.
This was a huge comfort to write and aah, I really hecking needed it!

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Lost in a sea of emotions!

Has it ever happened, that you started reading a book, and you couldn’t resist from finishing the book as soon as possible…?

It was the only thing in mind those days , and whenever you get the time, either at work, or even during commute to work, be at home or a pleasant evening in the park, you were just thinking about a particular scene in the book.

One of my favourite book is The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini. Khaled Hosseini’s writing in this book is so vivid that one can actually visualise all the scenes.

The reason this book occupies a special place in my memory is the recitation of heartrending paragraphs and dialogues. The complex nature of human relations against a dangerous and hopelessly fearsome backdrop makes this book not just a story of longing but also of deepest human emotions.

Khaled Hosseini in this book, indicates that the popular notion that time heals all wounds is just not true. It also drives home the assurance how friendships formed in the young age don’t perish with the passage of time.

This book explores the life of a misfit and his urge to be accepted by the society.

This book is a must read, if you have ever felt the pain of separation, if you have ever felt guilt beyond measure, if you have always been a misfit.

Reading emotionally twisted novels certainly isn’t my endgame..books on spies and terror being my personal favourite…but still some of us love to be captivated by stories that reaches us on multiple levels, including longing and specially in my case, stoic relationships.

Perhaps, we like these stories because they effortlessly connect us with people and circumstances that we dream up in our own minds. That we relate them to our subconscious selves, makes the impact significantly deeper.

Do books make me cry? I would wonder sometimes, is there anything better than a good cry?
I haven’t come across an experience as wonderful as that yet. But I understand, the emotional release some readers get which is so deeply satisfying that it can power them for days.

Human experience is quite similar yet reading the powerful, joyful and sometimes heart-wrenching stories of others can be a life changer.
Always, they will be a part of my growing collection.

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Hey weather..you make me smile!

This is my weather. The charm of monsoons gets to me with apparent ease. If it were not for my shy demeanour, I could do a rain dance like the carefree and joyous Geet from the movie Jab we met!

I love the rain…the smell of the wet streets and the sight of dripping leaves… the sound of the raindrops splashing on my windows and balcony… the fogginess and wetness in the air. I love the overwhelming darkness of the sky. People may often not enjoy such weather. You see a different side of people. You see a different side of the world. Gloom, joy, happiness, worry, fears, troubles. The rains bring all alive. What’s not to love?

For some, it is a strong love affair they have with the rainy season. … From creative writing to penning of songs, from painting to lateral thinking, the rain stirs something soulful within us.

Ever attempted a walk in the rain with your loved one? While at most times, it may appear silly..a walk in the rain has innocence, romance, adventure, excitement.. all rolled into a single inexplicable emotion.

There’s something gratifying about walking through the rain without anything as a barrier between you and the falling heavens.
I dont mean the unending pattern of severe lash that floods the balcony, , but typical showers that occur at unexpected times that give me a whiff of that deep earrh smell. While yes, I look for ways to be involved and feel good about myself and my life even during incessant weather.

For some, there is a natural tendency to wish the rain would cease so life can get back to normal, yet there’s an assuring relief in the realization that everybody is in the same situation of having to deal with the weather. That’s comforting knowing that most are experiencing the “what-do-I-do-now” dilemma.

On the side shelf, there is always a book I’m either in the process of reading or looking forward to get started on. The tough part is finding an hour or so to immerse myself in reading. Either too much to do, sometimes honestly nothing left to do but extreme laziness to look away from stress causing inaction and then after all the day has passed..can’t keep my eyes open long enough at night to make much headway. Today i spent some time with my younger one, loading his truck with little cars and shooting them off the ramp to set blaze the creative race track. I generally feel more creative afterward.

With all the chaos that a rainy day can bring, a constant patter of rain serves to remind one to take a break, to stop the whirlwind of activity everyone is sometimes prone to.

Just another season…sometimes overwhelming but also its own kind of beautiful!

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The maid affair!

I was having a routine morning.

The garbage collected inside the house has to be kept outside the main door. Due to the extreme vigilance the society was observing because of quite a number of infected residents in the neighbourhood, a decision was taken to maintain hygiene at all levels including among the house keeping staff, who would pick up the garbage on alternate days. I must humbly admit that Iam quite popular with most of the housekeeping ladies. Perhaps years and months of honest enquiry on their regular general wellbeing as I pass them, coupled with a genuine passing smile has worked, obviously in my favour. They are always ready to help. They may even state, I rarely ask for help.

My popularity among my society’s housekeeping and househelper staff is a five rated individual performance. Perhaps, they saw me like I wanted to be seen. No expectations of forced conversations and by nature of their ever challenging personal lives, they possess an understanding to let people be.
Mostly, as she was busy sweeping and dusting, transforming my abode into a cleaner place, I had the luxury of stretching myself and sprawling on the couch.
I miss my maid precisely for reasons beyond the normal. She was a buddy. She calls me ‘didi’ in hindi vernacular, which is a respectful connotation and widely used regardless of age structure.
I remember the tasks she used to attempt daily, in mechanical fashion.
Clean the kitchen: open the windows, collect all refuse, wipe the top of the refrigerator and work surfaces, wash, dry, and put away dishes, wipe off the surface of range, clean spilled food from drip pan or oven, dry damp work surfaces, sweep and mop the kitchen floor, take out the garbage and put in a clean liner, clean sink and dishcloth, collect and wash soiled towels, hang fresh towels.

Remember the famous scene in ‘Sex and the City 2’, where Charlotte confesses her biggest fear after suspecting her husband of having an affair with the nanny? She was not worried about losing her husband, what gave her sleepless night was her fear of losing the nanny. The same goes for our maids! They have come a long way of being just helpers. We need them for everything: someone to speak about your day to, understand what’s happening in the world around us, gain some perspective about reality, figure how to get my old pressure cooker repaired and what not.

While her duties are many, and, to one nervous and fretful helper, they turn out exhausting…for some those tasks are mere trifle, to be laughed at and forgotten.
Mine is a nuclear family and Iam left to myself, my good space and my books, after everyone has gone out to meet their life..

I began to enjoy the comfort of chatting up with her and seeing her adore my library like it meant a wholesome to her as well. She knew over a period of time that I like to consume three cups of tea by 11 morning and that I like the rooms dimly lit with curtains drawn over a cleaned space giving it an aesthetic feel.

She became integral to my life as much as any other feel good elements that I have the fortune of enjoying daily. Some even call her ‘family’. Your routine gets upset if she doesn’t turn up. And while you feel it’s easy to throw your weight around at her, you probably need her more than she needs you — your domestic help/maid.

While I have heard stories about bosses from hell who make for terrible homeowners, most of us are far better employers- sane and practical. However, unlike our year-end appraisal, we have probably never sat her down and asked her for feedback.
In an attempt to comprehend her situation better, I sat down today, to write about my pleasant times, with her around…about how she added meaning to my life, in her own little way. Memory can be fleeting and written notes can protect them.
Let me call them … thoughts about my ‘domestica’.

(Thankyou for reading the article.)