Thursday, August 30, 2007

Confessions of a dream

Time: 7pm in the evening
Location: Home (Just entered)
Conditions: Cloudy August sky, heavy downpour expected anytime
"Hey champ, whassup?? You look like somebody slapped you".
"Nothing chachu"
"nothing...hmmm, ok, lets go for a ride"
"no chachu, don't feel like it"
"But I do!!so get your ass moving"
"no chachu, have to complete my journal. Submissions tomorrow and anyway it's gonna rain"
"Do you think I care, now are you coming or do I need to drag you..."


Time:
7:30 pm
Location: Riding with the wind, feeling like God on my Blue Avenger
Conditions: No rains, but no clear sky either
"where are we going chachu"
"On a dark desrt highway, cool wind in my head, warm smell of colitus, rising up through the air..."
"chachu, where are we going"
"tu hi meri shab hai, tu hi meri duniya......"
"CHACHU!!!!!!!"
"oye hold on bache, upvan jaa rahe hain....aa chal ke tujhe mai leke chalu ek aise gagan ke tale...jahan gum bhi na ho, aasoon bhi na ho, bas pyaar hi pyaar pale...."
(for those who don't know where upvan is; it is a lake in Thane(Maharashtra) where couples used to coochie coo...but the government's making ample arrangements to kill the love from the love birds and turn it into a family park)


Time:
8pm
Location : Bike parked, sitting in Upvan
Conditions : Still not raining
I remember, Upvan is a place where Jayesh and me had many head-on conversations, arguments, cribbing, laughing, relenting about love, life, girls, career, family, tensions....everything, almost everything. Sometimes Abhya would also join us. We used to spend hours and hours there. It was one of our favourite adda in Thane. But this was different. Those were our days. Now theirs!!!

"So champ, what's happening in college"

"Usual stuff chachu"
"and what does usual mean"
"lectures, canteen, bunking, movies, journals...usual stuff chachu...usual stuff"
"and hows ur guitar classes going on"
"not much chachu...still stuck on the same old chords...still the same problems in chord shifting"
"highway star kabhi bajaake sunaa raha hai"
"highway star...haha...abhi tak to gulli star bhi nahi bajaa paata hu"
"so did you propose to her"
"what???"
"what did she say"
"what are you talking about chachu"
"naa bola kya"
with stealing eyes "chachu, are you ok...can't understand what you are saying"
"it's ok yaar, since when did you start hiding things from me...we are friends, aren't we"

A long silence prevails as it starts to drizzle. I give him time and he takes it. The tension on his face resembles the same when I opened up my bike for the first time and then didn't know how to re-assemble it. The confusion of "to tell or not to tell" is dominant. More dominant is the heavy task of "how to tell". Finally, he gathers himself up to look at me. He looks at
me for a moment and then shifts his gaze. The heaviness on his heart shows.


"Chachu..."

"I'm listening stud, go ahead"
"Chachu, there is this girl in college. She's in my class and we are friends, atleast we were till now"
"Girl? or beautiful girl?"
"Very beautiful girl"
"What's her name?"
"Arpita"
"ok"
"It sounds foolish chachu, you'r gonna laugh"
"If you are telling me a joke, I'll laugh unless it's a bad one, else I don't have reason to"
"Bhaad me gaya, I'll tell you chachu. I started interacting with Arpita long after I actually met her, rather got introduced to her. By chance, we were in the same group during practicals. You know how shy I am with girls. I used to speak to her only when required. She, on the other hand is a very friendly and extrovert kind of a girl. We started chatting, cracking jokes and all. Infact she's got a terrific sense of humor. We started calling each other pretty often. She started calling me after college hours also. Sometimes, study related, other times just to chat. We talked about movies, her family, our family, anything.... She knows you pretty well by now chachu though you two haven't met each other."
"So you guys discuss me haan? Nothing more interesting to discuss??"
"Chachu, I like speaking to her. I started missing her calls when she went with her family on a holiday. I don't know when or how it happened, but it did. I started acting funny. I just couldn't concentrate on anything. She just occupied my mind completely. I couldn't understand what was happening. I didn't tell my friends, cause anyway they always tease make faces when we'r around. Infact, i was gonna tell you, but something somehow stopped me. I thought, i thought you would be amused, you would think it was a faaltu and amateurish thing to discuss"
"Nothing in life is not worth discussing, atleast that's the way I considered it was between you and me"
"Sorry chachu, but...."
"No problem, carry on"
"Chachu, I have never felt like this before. I knew I was in love. I didn't have the guts to tell her that. Once those shitty things came to my head, everything changed. The way I looked at her changed, the way I spoke to her changed. She marked the change in me, but she couldn't read my thoughts. She used to ask me 'why have you become so serious all of a sudden'. Earlier
we used to chat comfortably about anything and everything, but now I started asking irrelevant questions to her, which later I understood were very foolish. I missed her humor, i gave stupid answers, I lost control chachu, i just lost my mind"

"And all this time you kept it to yourself. That's the worst thing to do son. You should have blurted it out to somebody, if not me"
"No chachu, you were the only one I should have told, but I didn't. I knew she would drift if I kept acting weird like this. I knew I was hurting myself, was making myself miserable. I just didn't want to lose her, but that's exactly what I did, i guess."
"Did you try telling, explaining, expressing your feelings"
"Many times chachu, but I couldn't, I just couldn't. Every night I used to make plans, sketch out exactly how, where and when to make the execution. I used to prepare myself"
"And in the morning, whenever you confronted her, you turned cold, froze, ins't it?"
"Yes chachu, yes. How do you know? I just couldn't tell her anything. She used to get confused at what I was doing. She couldn't comprehend anything. She asked me if anything was wrong, and I always shook my head. I could make out that she's getting pissed off at my weird antics, but couldn't do anything about it"
"hmmmm"
"Chachu, I think I'm pakaoing you. To cut it short, I envisaged that I couldn't blurt it out to her, so I wrote a long letter pouring all my feelings in it. I'll show it to you when we go home."
"Same old story...then? did you give it to her?"
"Yes, one fine day, I developed the guts to atleast do that. After classes, when we were coming back home, I gave it to her and asked her to read and reply. She asked me what it was. I just asked her to read it and left."
"Great going champ!! The result?"
"The result was bad chachu, very bad. I didn't go to college the next day. You remember I was down with fever"
"Yes I do"
"The next day I went to college, I tried avoiding her. More than her, I was avoiding a 'NO'. Somehow, she walked up to me. I looked into her eyes. She looked frightening. Her eyes were red. I could tell that she had been crying...for two days!!! For seconds she just glared at me with those bloody eyes, I couldn't say a word, not even 'hi'. She took out a letter from her bag. I recognised it was mine. She tore it right before my eyes chachu and then she said 'I didn't expect this from you, please don't try to talk to me again. She walked away and I just stood there like a stone"
"Hey champ, you should have.........."


Ka..Ka..Ka..Ka...somebody was patting me on the back. My sleepy eyes recognised that it was
my nephew. My nephew, whom I was already with, a few minutes back. My nephew, I remembered was less than 2 years old.I suddenly realised I was dreaming as he turned me into a horse and rode on my back.It felt funny to be dragged into the present when you were having such a lively discussion in the future. Wouldn't it be wonderful to have such vivid discussions between 2 generations, inspite of the gap.........looking forward to it dabloo!!"


PS: Good that the dream, the conversation ended where it did, else I would have given my precious romantic advice, which would enrage some people as they think I'm the most unromantic fellow on this earth!!




Friday, August 17, 2007

F and F



Its really funny how small incidents can trigger inexplicable thoughts and lead you to a completely glorified cogitation.

Today I was playing with my nephew, Sahil, just 1 and a half year old. I made him burst into peals of laughter with my stupid antics...it doesn't take much to make a child laugh. He, in turn, made me smile...a word to treasure!

All of a sudden, he started hitting me....for no reason at all...he slapped me thrice before me getting my face away from him. And what did I do? I just picked him up and pecked him on the cheek. That's that, nothing more , nothing less...

Later, when the whimsical incident just breezed my insomniac thoughts, I wondered....there was no ire, no repentance, no sorry's, no forgiveness...nothing..no expectations...WHY? Was he expected to do that, and was I expected to react the way I did?

Juxtaposing the incident on the broad palette of life and everyday happenings, if a similar or milder experience met me in the overcrowded mumbai locals....

For those who are not aware of the mumbai locals(trains, lifeline of mumbai), it's the daily dose that the city has prescribed to us. We just can't live without them. Fighting a battle in Kurukshetra would have been much easier than to get in a crowded train, i suppose....a little exaggerated you say...i say, just a little!! Your nasal senses are filled up by the invigorating mixture of various sweaty smells as you hang on to your dear life, balancing on your left foot while the right one is rightly entangled somewhere....where...you don't care....as long as the limb is still attached to your torso.

Coming back to the original source of digression, a gentle shove in these overcrowded locals can sometimes lead to the biggest of fights...and could bring up your mom, dad and many others who are not physically present at the site...in the form of abuses you must have guessed. Thinking about it, we have just forgotten to forget and forgive....or did we have that in us, anytime at all?? Unlike a child, who fights and patches up the next minute to smile at you and draw attention no matter how hard you got on him earlier.

Is it so hard to overlook, to go beyond the usual and stay calm...
Is it so difficult to be ignorant of the little sufferance and let it pass, considering the fact that you may never see or hear from the pain causer again....
Is it so painful to adjust, when you are aware that you have to live in this very life with the very set of people we call family and friends.....
Is it so tormenting to forget yourself for a moment and look at the world from somebody else's eyes.....

EASIER SAID THAN DONE.......

Wish we were children yaar...wish we were!! No shame, no blame, laughing, crying, enjoying!! Drawing attention no matter what we do, with the silliest antics, with the cutest pranks.

Every time I see my nephew, he makes me smile....I feel like cuddling with him, holding him tight!! Wish I could trip over my apprehensions and put a brake to my reservations and feel the same about the rest of the world....wishful thinking!!!

Tuesday, August 14, 2007

Stranger


Strange things happen, strange things do...
beyond the dark angry rains, the sky's actually blue....

met a stranger in a strange city
in this city, didn't know, i would sign a treaty...

she did, i did, we spoke as the clock ticked...
don't know when or how or why we clicked....
destiny yet again played its game....
as our apprehensions were brought to shame...

we'll dream, we'll share, we'll love, we'll fight,
through life's turbulent waves, we need to hold our hands tight,
trust persisting, beyond the hype,
lets make animated happiness of our everyday life....

dissapearing rains on a disappearing novemeber,
will certainly be a date we'r gonna remember....

strange things happen...strange things do..
now of all people, its me and you...
and the story begins thus...
with you and me being US!!

Tuesday, August 7, 2007

Missing You



A small, silly poem written for a friend to be presented to his girlfriend during my post graduation days. Was never used, so putting it here since there's not much to put here anyway as my hard disk has crashed and all my stuff has been lost.....forever.....

Out there on the mountain top,
Standing alone, thoughts circling,
The clouds strayed by, the wind blew hard...
The sky grew a distant fading.....

The Sun just made a disappearing act,
Leaving me alone pondering in the darkness,
My mind just couldn't erase a thought,
Cudn't make out what it was all about......

Then the moon lit up,
Illuminating the sky....
Clear thoughts began to surface by.....

The moon was you, so close to me...
It was you I was missing in every heartbeat