Diaries of a disturbed mind

Confessions - 50 Reasons I Miss Delhi

2011-10-17T10:49:00.000-07:00

1. Aloo Ke Paranthe – for breakfast, lunch, and dinner
2. Punjabi profanities that no one seems to mind, that don’t make me blush
3. Money that has a mind of its own
4. A million desires - Hazaaron Khwahishen Aisi
5. Saffron and Almond tea at Passion
6. Listening to Charkha by Wadali Brothers at midnight
7. Zeeshan Ali – trusting him implicitly
8. Learning to shop at Khan Market – learning all that I should have known at 14
9. Writing letters – real ones with pencils on beautiful stationery
10. Trying to figure out if this is the interlude between two phases of life or if This is life
11. Living like an ascetic one day and like a princess the other
12. Appearances that are deceptive but very important.
13. Having my own place, the only place I could ever call mine
14. Cooking my own Sunday lunches – realizing I cook as well as mom did
15. Winter dinners at NFC – and coming back home late without having to explain
16. The fiesta at work – every day feels like Friday
17. Lunches and after-work drinks with colleagues- where you learn more about work than when you are at work.
18. Writing to my son, diaries he may read when I’m dead and gone (or never).
19. Treating God like I’d treat myself
20. A midnight accident – regrets that sprang to my mind as the car went into a spin
21. Moti Bagh – my pretty, pretty nieces and a brother who always “knew”
22. Shoe shopping – till mom threatened to trash the next pair I bought.
23. Looking at my mobile a million times; wondering what time it would be at GA or CA
24. ‘Being on the same page…’
25. “Barking dogs seldom bite” and yet, “Might is always Right”
26. Learning to own without feeling guilty
27. Delaying the Shatabdi - once in a lifetime
28. Learning that men who teach integrity also stagger
29. Believing that there is a book in me, waiting to be written
30. Discovering that my idols were also human
31. Having my bags packed all the while, ready to travel at the ring of a phone
32. Spending hours at the Kali Bari. In silence. With mother and mother-goddess.
33. Being rescued. From hot summer power cuts. Dumped into comfort and a dreamless night’s sleep.
34. Love is priceless. Marriages cost a lot.
35. Rhyming with my Mumbaiya friend. Limericks galore.
36. Believing in forever
37. Siri Fort chaat – a sardaar- tamizh couple and their kids that talk only tamizh
38. Not living up
39. Living it up
40. ‘People and organizations need you, not the other way round’
41. Being stalked, being told all that I am not – no, I don’t quite miss this one
42. Meeting my Savior – my Guru. Noida sessions.
43. Kriya
44. Kadhi Chawal
45. Meeting Kiran. Amazing grace where you least expect it. Learning to trust her word.
46. Chal Chitra. Memories galore.
47. Fears – Dark and Bright
48. Tears shed alone. And waking to midnight fears. And calls “across the seven seas”
49. Confessions – Browning’s. And mine.
50. Coming back home – to Mom

Confessions - Loneliness

2010-08-29T09:15:00.000-07:00

Fear drank again, from the pool of my Soul. Where are you tonight? When I need to be held, closest to your heart? When I need to be told you are mine, forever? When I need to be lived, to be sung like the melody of your Love? The skies mock me – the bright smiles of the stars taunt and tease like cruel children that pinch and pull at my hair. I need to dress in your touch; your caresses shall be my garb. I need to lose the poison that runs through my veins drowning me in this slow painful Death. I need to be reborn into sunshine tonight – make the sun glow for me, rid me of this ever-blackening darkness. This lonely life shall consume me. Either you hold my hand tonight and take me into your fold or I die…

Confessions - Fire

2010-02-04T11:33:00.000-08:00

I quite like the danger. Of flirting with fire.

Down South, there is this cult of Goddess worshipers which holds an annual festival. The grand highlight of this temple festival is the walk through fire. A pit of fire is prepared, with dedication, with reverence. Fuel added, fanned, fed. The fire is nurtured, with love. Never allowed to blaze, to burn out. The heat, the embers build up over days to a climactic culmination on the day, nay, the night of the commemoration. And also arrive the "chosen ones". What thoughts sustain them as they walk through the fiery pathway, I know not. What passions drive them to plunge every step through this fervent undertaking; what permits them to cast aside every thought of self preservation and walk the Fire.

Perhaps I do. I have been in Love. I have walked the Fire. I have flirted with the knowledge and the ignorance of the next day, the next hour, the next moment. What turns this kaleidescope may take, what hell or heaven it may lead me to - I know not. But that's perhaps exactly what I am in love with. The lack of safety, the vulnerability. Am I challenging myself? Or am I destroying my semblance of sanity?

Confessions - My Seven Deadly Sins

2009-07-06T07:47:00.000-07:00

The young at heart, the young of mind. But "lust" is after all a good thing. What else do we base our lives on? What fun is waging a war you don't care about? What fun is life if desires lie rusty?

The young at heart, the young of mind. But “pride” is after all a good thing. What else is life all about? If you take no pride in your existence, in your work, your desires? Why else do men stray from the mundane and pursue miracles?

The young at heart, the young of mind. But “avarice” is after all a good thing. Why do we live in ‘society’ if not to yearn for what the other man owns? Why do we live in ‘society’ if not to learn where the other man fails? To seek out what another mind has conceived of?

The young at heart, the young of mind. But “wrath” is after all a good thing. What is life if I cannot stand up for what I believe in? And cry out in indignation when dreams mine are trampled? When I seek to rebel against FATE?

The young at heart, the young of mind. But “sloth” is after all a good thing. What good is life when I can’t rest my tired soul against your soothing bosom? If I cant shun the frenzied world to savour the sunshine glaze your eye? If not to sink in your wet kisses?

The young at heart, the young of mind. But “gluttony” is after all a good thing. Where in life do you not demand MORE? And why not? I seek more of me and I seek more of mine.

The young at heart, the young of mind. But “envy” is after all a good thing. I envy you your peace and your restlessness; I envy your ignorance and enlightenment, your sensitivity and sensibility, your caresses and cruelty…

The ancient at heart and tired of mind, the scorched and weary of soul, I am steeped in sin, I AM Sin.

Confessions - Of A Mother

2009-03-19T05:49:00.001-07:00

Dear darling Son,

I have never loved one more than you; never have my tired arms ached to hold one more than they do to hold you; never has sleep been more poisoned than now, with you so far away. Accursed life that I lead, I cheat you every day, promising to return…with no hope. I am indeed the most debased con known to mankind. I cheat my own son. I cannot return, I have no source of earning there. I cannot bring you away. I have your “best interests” at heart. Is it in your best interest to stay away from me? I know not. I don’t wish to spoil your chance at a comfortable anchored life quite unlike my own. I wonder what you shall say to me when you grow. Shall you ask me “ Why mother did you forsake me like my father did?” I didn’t son. I live a life called You. With every moment you grow, in my consciousness. Will you turn into a hard hearted cruel person with no mother to shower you with affection? Will you addict yourself to the scourges of mankind? Am I depriving you of the warmth the passion only your mother is capable of imparting? I know but one truth. I have deprived you of the one person who loves you most? Will you forgive me for this, ever?

Desolate,

Mom

Confessions - Of Logic and Love

2008-04-14T11:25:00.000-07:00

Being realistic is not ignoring the anomalies in logic when it comes to emotions, but making room for them...

Confessions - Of Soulmates and more...

2008-04-14T11:23:00.000-07:00

There is a certain pleasure that comes from the warmth of a relationship; a certain satiety, that makes one never look for another...a pain that takes over when they fight, a fight that neither can sustain for long, a love that neither can explain, an affection that lingers...and then there is no choice...for better or for worse life is meant to be lived together...'till death do them part'

Confessions - Love

2007-08-12T09:03:00.000-07:00

Too long have I desisted from writing this diary. Holding it close to my heart, I have hugged my secret —— till today. I have a confession; Confessions. It all started with Oprah, I think, years back. “Most women believe in fairy-tale notions of Love”, she had said. I disagree; rather fiercely. Most women settle for THE mundane, THE ephemeral, THE material. I hear their protests even as I write this. But I persist; for I wage this lonely battle for my most cherished ideal: for LOVE.

Ever since I have known my existence I have worshiped Love. Revering it with passion and adoration, I have hugged it close to my soul, exalting it beyond all others. I have watered Love with my tears, giving it what no one has —— perhaps, which no one can. I lose, today, my garb of humility and stand out, stark and proud. I have been in Love, once, twice, a million times. I have believed men have loved me and have realized they have not. I have known men who lust for me and have tempted them not. Perhaps I have set up my Love on too high a pedestal which no man possibly can reach.

Whenever I have surrendered to Love, I have done so with complete abandon. With no thought for my own wellbeing or those who cherish my welfare, I have indeed ended up hurting those who have loved me for those whom I have loved. But, in return, I have sought as well. I have sought rewards off Love that defy the comprehension of most men (and women) —— Love itself. And I have forever been lonesome in this scramble for Love.

Perhaps that is what had set me apart even as a child. I knew no one else who could feel Love and pain as intensely as I could. Why did I think so? Instinct? Intuition? But I know I have not been mistaken. I have believed that Love would happen; and happen magickally. I have believed in soul mates and karmic bondings; always believed that soul mates separated at birth are left to seek out each other. It is this process —— the trial one needs to go through to attain bliss; moksha; nirvana; salvation. The soul's instinct is to search for, to struggle for union with its Twin Self, its soul mate. It is this anguish of separation, this fiery path that brings out the best in oneself. Gradually, one learns of the intimate relationship that Love bears with spiritual emancipation, with learning. It is this chasm that one needs to bear cross with forbearance.

It is here that most men (and women) fail.

They settle for the less than perfect. Or think that they Love. We all make mistakes. Blindly infatuated to the wrong person by looks, wealth, lust, social norms and a plentitude of other reasons, we 'marry' and 'settle down'. And, as the saying goes, we ‘fall’ in Love. We take the hollowness of the relationship to be the truth. And after a while, the charm wears off. And once more the soul is awakened to restlessness.

Most ignore these nudges and lead “normal” lives. For those who manage to break free from the shackles of their illusory love affairs/ marriages awaits perhaps a worse fate. They know not what they are seeking. ‘Groping in the dark’ is the phrase that comes to my mind.

It is by chance, then, by some turn of Fate that soul mates meet. And fall in Love, again.

What then? What thereafter, as Dave asks in his comment. Do they live “happily ever after”? No, not at all. If Love were to be the static, the unchanging, wouldn't it lose most if not all its charm? I can only quote:

Tulsi, chatak prem ko nit nutan ruchi rang.

Love is like the hues of the sea, the mystique of the sky...ever-changing, ever attractive.

I read The Little Prince when I was barely out of my childhood. In times of need, I turn to my childhood, I seek solace in the dreams I dreamt, ideals I believed. So I recalled, ‘Here is my secret. It is very simple: It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye.’

“What makes the desert beautiful”, says the little prince “is that somewhere it hides a well.” My LOVE, my soul mate exists, then, somewhere. I see him with my heart, though not with my eyes. I sense his presence in the world and that makes my life bearable; the world a more tolerable place —— if not beautiful.