Life.

Recently I have answered many people regarding the appearance of the next blog post with either, "after exams", "soon", "after dealing with my entrances" or even "I don't know". I have stopped apologizing for my inconstancy. I really have. I have become increasingly shameless, mostly like a wall when it comes to giving answers. I am failing continuously on answering my own question, even at knowing the questions, rather, dreading questioning my own self because I know what might scare me away. My biggest fears are known to me and me alone. I am the one what can make me or break me. It's me who gets to choose. But to choose I need to ask. Like they say, to get an answer one should dare to ask the question. The blog, following all this rant has nothing to do with this. Enjoy.

Those were difficult times for them, even though the question asked to him was not appropriately at the right time but it was asked. Some how being a Hindu and a Muslim in love did come in the picture. They were together the strongest, both knew. But, family ? Who is stronger than them together, pulling you back, giving you the hardest time between what you love the most or what they would serve society on a platter? The one choice children should be granted liberty at making is taken away from them because, of course, a certain Sharma Ji, or Khan Sahab's opinion comes to play. Somehow their opinion becomes all that one has to satisfy. Marriage no longer remains an amorous bond between two people who know they are perfect for each other and will want to spend not this but all lives to follow, together, but it has become a bond carefully measured on the scale of society, caste, religion, complexion, money and every other irrelevant thing that is. Of course the certain "Sharma Ji" and "Khan Sahab" sitting peacefully at home with their own imperfect lives of themselves are better judges.

He is stuck in a labyrinth of responsibilities and why shouldn't he be. He was the eldest son of the family, had finished his education. Now, he must earn and marry and chase around and die doing all this. He ones had dreams of studying more, excelling at what he does, be bigger, marry her, be a great son, a great husband, a father and travel the world with her but now he is given a choice. Options he cannot choose between. One makes him a bad son, the other takes away everything that he has ever wanted in life. One popular but disappointing fact about Indian parents is their continuous emotional blackmailing. I will not apologize for my language because all I am sitting here to do is say the well-known but unsaid. Indian parents do not consider their children as individual people. They consider them their property which of course at the "right" time should be disposed off and paired with a particular property of another exchanger. The possibility of giving the right to choose their own companion is taken away from the children. The same children whom they trust with running the house hold, making and supporting family are somehow considered incapable of making the choice of marrying the right person. This choice is the birth right of their parents. Who were born to take it away from them. Parents without a seconds thought throw, "we have given you this life, an education" etc. in the faces of their children that they have raised them in a certain way and should be reimbursed by claiming ownership on the right of choosing their life partners. The million terms and conditions that are laid down by parents of choosing a partner if considered by the youngsters of India, I bet, no one will ever fall in love. Love will cease to exist.

He was struggling with all this along with some more issues which were further blamed on his blasphemous and socially unacceptable act of loving a girl from a different religion. Love is to be blamed, always. She on the other hand is sitting in her house waiting or hoping that he would come and see her. See her, touch her, and be together. All she wanted was him and peace and her life back and stability reinstated in his life.

Where the sun sets..

"I am a mountain person", she said. "Me too" he replied. With that thought they left for the coast together. They traveled across the nation from north to the centre and then extreme west. Not only did the languages change with each passing state but also the scenery, food, cultures, people, air and most of all their perception. The diversity of our nation was served on a platter to them in one train journey across the country. It was enlightening. While gazing at the Western Ghats passing by with each second, he sighed, "That's what beauty is, what mountains are!" They passed through a dozen tunnels that were transporting them to a completely different land. A country completely theirs yet different and what was to unfold at the end of those tunnels was nothing less than an experience worth the forty hours spent contemplating it.

They reached their destination at dusk. The sheer beauty and simplicity of the railway station made it seem like a movie. Who expects to have a hill alongside a railway platform ? The sheer joy of getting down the train onto a platform so scenic had amazed them enough to not feel the load of luggage on their backs. They were mesmerized. The air was different. The sky seemed painted with a few strokes of red and orange casting its reflection on the larger blue surface. It was out of a canvas, really. To witness something so picturesque had never crossed their mind. The smoke laden air of their city had blurred those images and tainted them with smog forever. 

At night it revealed itself to them. But, barely. It was so dark that it seemed like the night but more. They could hear loud roaring sounds and flashes of dispersing froth. "I am already scared, It doesn't end." She had carefully drawn a horrific picture in her head but what she saw and heard was worse. While sketching the mental image, she had totally forgotten about the noise its movement creates. It was an encapsulating sound that dominated all the human disturbance around. When the waves spoke, they conquered. Gathering herself and facing her fears next morning, she accompanied him to finally meet the long desired, and, there it was. An expanse so limitless that nothing they had ever seen could compare. It just didn't end. They stood right there on the sand and facing the sea for the first time in their lives. There it was, the angry field of gold, reflecting the sun on it's surface.

She was unwilling to step foot on the water that the waves brought with them to the coast. He held her hand and said, "Don't worry, I am here. I will not leave your hand". And they entered the all encompassing waters. Soon the waves started to rise and fall. Some pushed them out and some took them a few feet within into the depth and that is when she befriended the sea without knowing it. She stood there with eyes closed facing the depth of the sea and letting a few waves devour her. Soon she began to dive into them so as to be a part. A part of that whole new world which resided inside the waters, a world unknown to her, beyond her reach.

The sea still scared them at night but they continued to spend hours watching it. As if they wanted to feel the fear. It's strange how something can be so beautiful yet frightening at the same time. They sat there on the sand under the star lit full moon sky witnessing the angry waves, each night thinking about the captivating beauty of nature and the sheer littleness of us humans compared to it. 

On their journey back home, none of them declared their love for the mountains. Each time they closed their eyes they met the sea. Then came a voice from his corner, "You never really part from the sea, it remains with you, always".

Let go.

Growing up brings along many adaptations, additions and of course subtractions from ones life. Whether it is material objects or materially created people. They are friends, family, people who matter, people who mattered, people who once meant the world to you and today refuse to say 'hi' and even those who never cared and probably never will. When one decides to leave, he should. You must not try to stop them or bind them in the clutches of romantic or emotional bondage. Don't even try to make them stay. No don't. Don't try too hard. In the end, you are the only one who is going to regret it. Remember in the end it is always about you. Their sudden absence might create a void in your life. A void difficult to fill with any other. Difficult but not impossible. The most vulnerable positions are of people who matter the most. Of people you depend on. In spite of the independence one would like to claim to possess, there is always one person in everyone's life who is a Watson figure. It is the first number on your speed dial or the first call you make when in crisis. Have you ever thought what would happen when they are gone ? No ? Of course, you have not. That would scare you, probably wont let you sleep at nights. Such is the power of the most vulnerable spot in your life. The person who is your go-to, the one who is always there, the shoulder, the friend, the guardian, the adviser and even the one like your mother when you need just that, might also leave you.

By now we all are aware of the uncertainty of life and it's almost creative ability to surprise us in various ways, to turn a comedy into a tragedy and to do exactly the opposite too. Doesn't that leave us all without a "plan" in the larger sphere of life. If we are so unarmed against this army of black flags and black horses called "destiny" we will assuredly be defeated by it. So, learn to let go. If only we learn to let go of people and relationships that have unwantingly/wantingly created an undoable knot we could help repair ourselves much faster. An amended relationship is never like the one that you used to have. Also, the pain that occurs in there absence is easily bearable when compared with the one that you experience in their presence. You're together and it's still not the same ? Nothing has changed and still everything has? Their absence when felt in their presence is what might kill you. It
will cause immense pain and might break your heart beyond repair.

So keep your guard on. If it is not repairable in the first go, it will never be. This time let them go without the hope of their coming back. Not all those who go are meant to return.

Akhirkaar subha ka har bhula shaam ko ghar wapas nahin aata, kuch log door nikal jaate hain kabhi na wapas aane ke liye.

A step forward..

Their love for each other was all encompassing. They were one but they had a fair share of individual passions that did occupy a large part of their lives. She was devoted to art. All forms of art. He was a slave to poetry and rhetoric. They were both alike, in love and hungry to spend time together but they cautiously devised a "sphere of no interference". They called it so to completely rule out the issues that arise from the demand and inadequate supply of the much talked about "space". Space was very well demarcated yet fluid between them. They were so unerringly comfortable with each other that it seemed that they had always been together. Long enough to have merged together into a single being.

They spent a lot of time together. He told her all about religion and law and philosophy and she introduced him to her arts. She was shocked on the revelations he made about his religion. The misinterpretations and the lack of knowledge that society presents to an individual as a ready dish on a platter is thoroughly misleading, thus, the root cause of a million misconceptions, she thought. She learnt about their practices and the significance of those practices. It was almost as if society had stripped away the intricacies and the simple logic behind rituals and depicted them in a light that was almost horrendous. But, she learnt and understood and liked it. It was almost like an influx of something she always wanted to know. She appreciated and felt attached to the idea of that religion since she was a little girl and finally being so close to someone practicing it seemed almost like she had become what she always wanted to be, a hybrid with as much freedom to practice a religion as the nation promises.

Her involvement with the religion began early in life, when she accompanied her mother to an auspicious and pious religious spot. She loved the air, the music, the smell and everything around. She loved how people had their heads covered as they enter it. As a young girl she loved to play with dupattas. She wanted to wear a dupatta like her mother did and dance around with it. It was nothing more than a piece of cloth, a trend, that she appreciated but nothing less than an obsession. She stood near her cupboard with a myriad of colourful dupattas thinking about old times,"how simple things become complicated as one grows up ?" A pretty, colorful, decorative dupatta is a symbol of purdah, she thought. But, there is no harm in using it if not imposed. Why not wear a dupatta if you like wearing it. Why complicate things by reading too much into their significance. A dupatta doesn't necessarily signify oppression or purdah. She, for one, wore it for beauty and she loved it !

With that thought she picked out the most colorful of her dupattas and wore it around her neck, looked at herself in the mirror and and smiled. She felt beautiful. She decided to take him to the kind of "Art trips" she loved. She wanted to introduce him to that part of her that belonged to a different time, a different age altogether. She met him at the tea stall where they first met. He looked at her and smiled raising one of his brows. He meant, "You look beautiful" and she laughed because she understood. How beautiful is love when it becomes independent of the servitude of speech, when souls and silences become the new language.

P.S.- The pictures are mine, nothing else ! :)

Getting older.

I still remember my second birthday. No, I am not lying, I do. I remember what I wanted the most on my second birthday. Just cake. That's all I wanted. I wanted to stuff my mouth with that colorful creamy sweet dish, a bundle of joy. I have a video tape of my birthday where I am literally jumping from my father's arms onto the cake. But times change and so do priorities. On my third it was about gifts and actually that remained so for many many years. I remember waiting for all people to leave and the party to finish so that I could first sit around the beautifully packed presents and eventually open them. One by one. Diligently. Trying hard not to spoil the wrapping paper in the first few and eventually tearing them apart in excitement. After that it was the dress I guess. All I cared about during my teenage was the dress I wore which was again carefully thought and shopped. I eagerly waited to wear that on my birthday. I felt like a princess, I remember. In college, it was just the party and my friends. Only the amount of  "fun" that we could have. Now, it's nothing. I no longer feel anything. There is no excitement. It's like any other day. In fact it's worse because people who have not even thought about you in years will suddenly call you and say "Happy birthday", You have to call back and all. People for the sake of social formality will write "Happy birthday", even "HBD" on your facebook timeline that will eventually lead to a million notifications. Most of them are doing it so halfheartedly that they don't even put pains enough to spell "H A P P Y  B I R T H D A Y", they just signal or register their presence, like marking themselves present on a class they never wished to attend. What is the point ?

The above mentioned "fun" almost becomes a baggage once you grow up. You're expected to throw a party. Invite people. Treat them with food and hospitality. Soon your birthday becomes a social responsibility. The party almost becomes a pressure. It's like the Indian marriage concept parents believe in. You ate at mine so you ought to call me at your's. No one is no longer interested in what do you want to do for your birthday. 

What if you want to be alone and do nothing and maybe sulk about getting one year older.What if it is like a clock ticking on your head. What if you want to go away and switch your phone off and take a birthday off and maybe spend a couple of days in peace in the mountains (Mountains <3). Or sit in front of a beach, all day doing nothing. Just thinking about what has the last one year added to you or what has changed and how much have you grown. Or maybe you want to set up a plan for your next year. You might want to lock yourself up or shout on the streets. Just do it. Remember, who was bloody born on that day ? You or the innumerable ones who think about you only once in the whole year, on your goddamn birthday ? You, of course. Then live it. Live it like you want to and spend it with the people who you love and who really care for you to be around you on your birthday. Spend it with the ones who you would want to keep in the coming year and in all the years to come. It's your day after all. Make it special.

Desire

Desire. A sensation locating its place somewhere in the middle of conscience and choice. A desire buds through a temptation and then cements itself in the back, front, middle and at times all over the human mind. I know this seems blasphemous, the use of words like desire and temptation that could be read as eternal sins but do we really submit to the conscience or work towards the fulfilment of our desires ? Desire leads to happiness and everyone around the world is in the pursuit of nothing but happiness. Then why not ? Why not let the desires rule out your conscience and strive towards its consummation. At least, this is what they did. The two of them. Who were religiously pursuing each other in the midst of the hustle and bustle of the eighties while the constantly moving chariot of the sun God declared day and night as days passed.

Once they had made room for a kiss, passion flew like waters from an open dam. There was no stopping them, no looking back. Carnal love is not to be damned. Contrary to the popular belief, what it really does is bring two people more and more close to each other and finally binds them with an eternal lot. They didn't care of what the world would say. By "talking", the world did what they are best capable of. Why should they not love and exercise their own best capabilities of loving and kissing and being one. Marriage, people consider, is the sole, legitimate initiator of the exercise of such a passion. A desire for love making. It provides the license but who knows this passion is obligatory or not. Who knows if people involved in the act are only procreating and not loving. Why are the carnal pleasures assumed only to be a recourse to populate an overtly populated world ? Why is this pleasure not an outcome of unrestrained passion where love leads to procreation as a product of love and not a means to an end ?

She had her hands locked around his neck and was looking eagerly into his eyes once they had opened after the spiritual commingling of their lips in a lip lock. He was burning with desire and read the same fire in her eyes. He tightened his grasp a little more around her waist and drew her closer to himself and soon she loosened her locked hands from around his neck and let them fall through his back up to his chest. The signals had been sent and well received. She knew it was time to be swept off her feet and placed on the spongy bed and turn red the white bed sheet. It was a historical moment in her life because it was her first time. Barely had she known that it was his first too. They both swam deep into each other and were both as happy as one can be. They had never been happier or more passionate.

They were both excited but nervous. Nervous but way more excited. They had barely known where exactly to begin because the unavailability of internet had barred a lot of education that we receive today in the modern tech-savvy world. So they just followed the signals their body gave them naturally. They moved from one part to another, from the head till the toes. They were exploring each other like travellers explore new lands and make geography. They were exploring bodies and making art. Art, the form of which was common to all, yet, was different for every couple. The bodies moving slowly to built positions and shapes, only too conscious to avoid hurting the other.

And then suddenly he screamed once, twice and thrice, signalling the completion. He asked her, "did you like it". She blushed and said "of course", barely knowing whether she was done or not. Although it surely was the best thing she had experienced in all her life and wanted more and more.They decided to meet another day, the next perhaps. He left being the happiest man on earth, while she still felt his presence both around and within her. It was a beautiful feeling. They had both explored something afresh. Something only heard till then but now, experienced !

To much of her surprise there were no reds on the bed sheet to mark her chastity. She was astonished and then remembered it couldn't have been so. Was it the swimming pool that had long ago defiled her ? "Then, what is all the fuss really about ?", she thought for a minute. But she was too happy to care. There was a sudden sense of growing up, of becoming a woman. There was a welcome change in her body, or at least she wanted to feel so. She was happy. Very happy. It was worth a million such penetrations. Was something so beautiful kept away from her just because of a wall she had already broken ? She thought. Then again the face of her charming knight took over her imagination and she felt so much more in love. From then on, they were one. Spiritually, emotionally and physically, one.

Something old...

Possession. Not of people but of inanimate things. We all possess a million things since the time we are born up till the time we die. We use, over use, discard and forget. Sometimes buy, never use and then forget. But we never think about what happened to those things or try to dig into their side of the story. This reminds me of the staple autobiography grammar exercises that introduced us to the autobiography of a rupee or a railway platform. Those were like the Johny-Johny's of autobiographies, every one had read them at a certain point in life. They were among the first's to give us an insight into the perspectives of things.

All of us have felt this strange sort of pleasure in unintentionally finding a note in some old book, or even an old book lost for years, a symbolic currency, an old piece of cloth, or a vehicle that we once rode and all those things that were so dear. It some how stimulates immense joy. It is like meeting an old friend that you have been loyal to for long but had to part ways or like a lover that time and space took away from you. It is never about the object that reminds you of an older time, a simpler time and then leads you into an abyss of thought, more thought, a chain of thoughts that begin with the irrelevant thing but soon jumps to How you were then ? What were you doing in life all those years ago ? but about people. People you love or once loved and looking at it reminds you again of how the memories associated with those people are still fresh in your mind and you have completely washed away all the negativity while not even trying to do it. It all comes down to the fact that the times that people generally remember or ever wish to remember are the happy ones. All sad memories are dependent on both time and space and eventually fade. Like Prophet Mohammad said, "reconciliation is the biggest charity" not only to others but to your own selves.

Coming back to the value-less, memory-rich findings. All things that you use from the laptop, to the mobile phone, even to a diary that once was the only "hidden-treasure" you possessed or a pen given by someone you love/d, share a story. They have a story that we share with them. They are constantly a part of our whole. Each used eraser reminds me of a sketch that I once made and clothes well they just remind me that I once did fit in them.  ;) I love the idea of ruins. No wonder the whole world is after antiques which are both historically and culturally loaded. 

The monuments(can't help it) are also the biggest example of the same fact. They remind us of the stories of the ones who owned it and left them for us to make our own stories in them. Have you ever come across a tree that had a very thick bark, thick enough to bar you from being able to hug it ?
I am sure you have. Have you ever thought about all the history that it must have witnessed. In fact it must have seen an undivided India, a tree that is in Pakistan right now could have been planted in India or summers that weren't so hot and winters that didn't lock you inside. Not yet ? Now do, Think about it's memory bank and all the silences that it has maintained. Such is the beauty of old objects and ruins, they are beautiful with all their faded colors and blunt edges. In all their deformities they are still loved an are always dear.