Shut Up

 

Its so dark i cant see anything 

but the granular blackness of them all

no doors open all windows shut

In dead silence I lie

prodding with my hands 

looking for a space to escape

the claustrophobic hole of nothingness.

As the quiet lets out a deafening shriek

my ears ring with pain and i plead

Mercy, mercy, Im asking of you

Let me be, let me go

Im so worn, so torn in this endless trap

Im so shut up inside these confines

that wrongly define 

what i mean to be

Is it too late?

Is them too far, those lights that trade hopes with fear?

Is it too silly to wish for a second leap?

Can i turn this around? 

make it stop, this all?

Theres no space, no light, no definite sound of encouragement

In this dark I can only see within 

and there too i see an endless abyss

Maybe ill jump and see

maybe ill find the answers 

and the way that leads me 

to me.

 

Letting Go

How hard is it to let go?

It's hard. Really very hard.

It is excruciating at times. Beyond words… beyond thoughts.

Then how does it happen? How and when do people let go?

It certainly doesn't happen overnight. Don't people wait for years yearning for closure?

How then?

I look back at myself for answers. I don't find them initially. But when I rummage further, I find a beackon that beckons me towards a forgotten memory... Lost in the process of life. So much so that the only memory of it is what I have been told. Nothing else.

Then I see. I know life had already made me do it. It was the first thing I did before I opened my eyes and spoke to the world, much before i sat up, walked and felt... I had learnt to let go.

Life taught me to let go of the damp, dark comfort of the uterine world, my umbilical cord was slashed off without second thoughts as I was pushed into this side of living - so full of light, noise and confusion. I hated it. I resisted. I cried. I revolted.

But then I blended in. It took time, maybe. But I did it finally. I let go.

Wasn't that the first lesson I learnt in life?

Nonetheless, letting go is still painful.

But with this knowledge that I'm wired to do it, there is a sense of emancipation. It may take time, I may hate it, I may want to resist it, but it shall finally flow into me and I, into it. And like immiscible liquids, we shall become an entity that was seemingly always there, waiting to happen.

So I shall not be in denial... let me embrace it, own it this time. Let me appreciate the presence of this excrutiation. And let it fade away on its own. So after some time, it shall throb no more... it'll remain as the residue of a sweet memory of something that I seem to forget - A nostalgia that brings smiles with it and not tears.

And then I shall have done it.

I would have let go.

The Universe of Thankless Living

Sometimes thankless people amuse and intrigue me. How they manage to live with themselves is beyond my understanding. Then this bizarre idea of putting them on a giant petri dish rushes into my brain. Maybe add a situation or two with the quintessential pippete and study whether that changes color of the blot on them. Then i step back and realise that this would be unnecessary. Perhaps they are already on that petri dish. I should save my brain for the kids.

Gyaan!

We are born to change. My Four and a half year old was a different person two years ago. And i realise she will change more as time shall pass. Dont we all? I am not the same that i was five or ten or maybe fifteen years ago.
But though we may change, our souls remain the same. At least they should. So we feed it with good thoughts and good deeds and save it from getting scarred to the extent possible.
We may then change multiple times, but would always remain good people. 

Intro-Spec-Shun

Today I'm in a total look at myself mood. And contrary to what the wise would do, I turn to facebook - a world where every one looks so skittishly happy that the gunk literally explodes in your face. Of course, that's not true.. i tell myself. Look at the brighter side in life! Wait a minute, most of the wise would certainly do that!
Then i see a pic of a friends friend who traveled to some remote 'hilly paradise'. One of the pics was a giant hand (well, it was a close up) holding some food served in a giant leaf which was drying at ends and showing off particles of what seemed like dust. My mind instantly wanders to the newspaper article that talked about tapeworms and a relating interview in a shady news channel (yeah, they are all gung ho about how tapeworms are invading the Earth and shall rule humankind for the times to come).
I bury my head into my tired arms and sigh. Forget it.

Kriya Karma

In death, her face looked disgusting. Unlike the death of Pishi Ma's character who died with a smile on her face in the story of 'Debyani', published in the weekly Bangla magazine, Daya Ma's wiry figure looked scary. Indira looked at the still body without breathing, as if she may wake Daya Ma up if she inhaled loudly. Was she afraid she may wake up again? Oh, so was she happy she was dead at last? Indira waited for tears to appear. But her throat was parched and her brain blank. She was devoid of emotions that moment. Paralyzed. So she continued staring. Sans words. Sans tears.

Daya Ma's white matty hair was scattered across her face. Her mouth was half open partly showing the lower gums and a bit of her tongue that was attempting to peak out of her toothless mouth. Her eyes were half open too, as if unwilling to close, unwilling to give up living. Her sinewy hand lay resting above her head, the ingrown nails displaying an ominous blackish blue sheen. The other hand lay on the other side, marked with obvious atrophy owing to lack of use across so many years. It was just pulp and bone now. It was the hand that Indira stroked every night for the last eleven years, before she went to bed. She knew it couldn't detect her touch, but she refused to relent. So she went on with her daily night time ritual of massaging the right arm, in hope of waking it up from the stroke that paralyzed Daya Ma. It never did. And now, it never will.

Indira slowly rose and hobbled towards the door. The creaky little wooden box that held Daya Ma's dentures stood smiling on top of the chest of drawers. She made a mental note of throwing it away at last. She was disgusted at the thought of someones teeth being outside his/her body. God knows how she put up with it till now. As she trudged along the corridor, she tripped on her pallu and lost her balance. Ushering her giddy self up she walked towards the telephone. Was she giddy due to shock or relief, she couldn't tell. And she coudnlt tell whether it was the demons within her or the demons outside that were devouring her brain with such sick thoughts.

She picked up the receiver and dialed a number.
"Hello?" Said the voice.
"Come home.." She said.
"What? Whatever happened?"
"It's... It's Daya Ma. She wouldn't talk."
"Come on. You know her tantrums. Talk her out of it!"
"This one, I cant, Bijoy. Come home. She wont wake up now... Please, come home!"
There was silence on the other end for a while. "Im coming."

Indira sat down and hugged her knees. Daya Ma had not been not the best mother in law. Indira still remembered the first holy day of shravan after her marriage, when Daya Ma had showered her with curses on for having imagined she could visit the temple with Bijoy before finishing all the chores of the house. She was distraught. And that was just the beginning of the ordeal. But she hadn't also thought for a moment that fate would have her nursing Daya Ma in a vegetative state for more than a decade. It was a dirty job alright. She doesnt remember a day when she hadn't retched at the smell of urine while washing the bedsheets. Neither does she remember going out of the house without thoughts nagging her about a helpless woman back there who may need to be attended to if need be. When was the last time she visited her own sister? Amu would fume at her for having not bought even a little toy for her boys.

"You both spend every dime on that hag!" She would retort. "Why, isn't it enough that she cursed you so you never even bear a child! I tell you, she is the Devil!"

But Indira would take care of Daya Ma. That was a part of her life she had come to accept. And it was a part of her life she could not imagine without. She would wipe her clean every day, feed her, wash her soiled clothes and read her the Ramayana. Sometimes during the sponge baths, the old eyes would well up. Then Indira would look away and wipe away the tears with the end of her pallu and pretend to focus on her work, trying to picture Daya Ma shouting at her with tiny drops of red syrupy betel leaves spraying out of her mouth mimicking her fury. She knew how it was to be left alone to fend for oneself. Hadn't her life before marriage rife with sorrows with her single mother? This was the least she could do to undo the wrath of Karma.

Indira's eyes scanned the room to fathom were the ringing was coming from. She rose from the corner and walked towards the door. Bijoy stood there, his hand resting on the wall on the side, his eyes partly red and partly wet. Indira watched Bijoy and Bijoy stared at Indira. And when she put her forehead on his chest, he sighed and held her for moments that seemed like forever.

Liberum Arbitrium

"Sometimes you just require to be strong, Hema.", Says the counselor. Hema watches the doctor's beautiful majenta chiffon sari and her chest lightly breathing the air conditioned oxygen in and out. She nods. She has always been the strong one. There was never a problem with that. But dealing with death was another thing. All that running around along the hospital corridors, queuing up at the TPA desk, listening to the doc with acute concentration, seems juvenile now.. almost unnecessary. Why all the drama when she always knew she this was how it would have ended? If it were not for those anti depressants, she would have been a vegetable by now.

"My child was just fourteen, Doctor.", She says studying her nails and trying to appear calm.

"You have another daughter, Hema."

"Yes i do. In another years time, i shall know if she suffers from the same gene defect. That means another round of running around and preparing for death. Well at least next time, i would be prepared. Sorry, more prepared."

"If that gives you the strength to move ahead, i wont stop you."

Hema nods and leaves the room. On her way back her eyes linger at scenes that have been a part of her life since the last six months of weekly visits to the counselor. The Nimbu Soda vendor wards off flies from his cart, the little old lady a large mole on her forehead nods to sleep in front of the many jasmine garlands she intends to sell to the vehicle owners, a young couple sits at the bus stop with their backs to the road.. the guy's hand on the girl's beaded dupatta, watching it chime against the steel bench, his jeans hanging dangerously low revealing a part of his butt crack.

Hema stifles her giggles and walks by, both marveled and disgusted at how monotonously everything around her goes on as if nothing happened.

A few steps ahead, her car is parked with Ameya watching her walk towards it. His large eyes have become more droopy than ever and the hair near his temples suddenly seem to have grown more strands of white than black. In his eyes, she reads love, expectation, hope and... need. He is in no less distress than her. But he shall never show.

She musters a smile and quickens her pace.

Not yet. She tells herself. I dont have the mind to give up yet... and opens the door of the car.

"Hi Dear, wish to have a Nimbu Soda?"

The little mayhem called life

I scratch my cheek and watch the fly crawling on the sandpaper. It makes funny noises as it walks all over it, stopping intermittently to rub its tiny little hands together. My nails are dirty and filled with soot. It comes from scratching... and off late it has worsened. But i don't think i can do anything about it. I don't know whether i am supposed to. The tap from where i filled water for myself was uprooted a few days ago to make way for a wide road. The new road looks nice, i must say. But there's less space for me and my brother to sleep now.

I yawn and sit up. The fumes from the vehicles blur my vision. It may be twilight or it could be early morning.. i cant tell the difference. Cheenu opens his eyes and crawls to me. It has been a few days since our amma left. She usually goes away for some time.. but not for this long. But i am not scared. There are so many people around. Why should i be scared? I am just hungry. And so should be my brother. He cries a lot and i do not know what to give him. He usually goes to sleep after drinking some water but now there's no tap so there no water too.

I cross the road and pick up a packet. It has a few biscuits. I share them with Cheenu. For the first time i see him feed himself. I kiss him on his cheek and he taps on my chin. We shall wait for amma today. And if she does not come back, I'll take Cheenu and walk away. I don't yet know where to. Perhaps a place which has a tap nearby. Yes, that should do...

The Ride and the Rider

Take back the reins you handed me,
It's better you ride me home.
And on the way you may sing me
my favorite lullaby song.

Let me sleep unbounded
let me dream of the skies;
let me hear you breathe
near me, as i close my eyes.

Ah it's so amazing
this beautiful snowy dream;
Hush the noises lest they
wake me up again.

Dont tell me it's all over
dont say that it's time;
that we're back to where it started
and that it shall be fine.

Once the circus starts
the show would have to go on
and on the vicious hamster wheel
shall run the hapless clown.

So just a few more winks
before the sky turns blue;
Let me enjoy these moments
of being ferried by you.

God and other Topical Concerns

Courtesy: http://www.ikedaquotes.org/


I have stopped believing in religious/cultural traditions. Well, the thought in itself is not very jarring as much as a fact that it is coming from a person who was her pious-most a couple of years back. I do not know the exact moment when my thoughts and beliefs clashed with each other and i chose the path of rationality. It was certainly an very sub-conscious decision. Or perhaps it was a gradual transition. So one may ask, do I believe in God? And the answer would be Yes, I do.

But God, for me, is not Krishna/Shiva/Allah/Christ/Saibaba. It is just a force. An invisible hand that leads me to my destination. That holds my hand when i am in doubt. That forgives me no matter how wrong I am. That helps me tell the wrongs from the rights. That makes me a better Human. I am no more under any compulsion to give that force a form or a face. I want to believe in that force, irrespective of its gender, its power.. only conscious of its presence, its relevance in my life.

I do not know whether this is right for many. But i can feel that i am convinced about its truthfulness. Going back to the facts that led me to this situation... as i mentioned, I cannot pin point one. Maybe it is when i see how people blindly follow a tradition without attaching a meaning to the reasons behind it or its consequences. Or perhaps it is the way people kill/brutalize/loathe each other in the name of religion/Gods. Or maybe it is just the realization of the way my life has become like a hamster wheel... more about the chores to be finished and less about feeling accomplished/content. Or maybe it is about how the concept of God and Godmen has been so commercialized that it has lost the charishma.. the want of belonging to it.. the want to be unquestioningly following it. So many so many reasons. Or should i attribute it to the inevitable and quite evident mixing of cultures that triggers a want to question something before doing it. I dont know....

But i still believe that this Universal Force sees it all. It is sentient like us.. just more forgiving, more loving, more giving, more encouraging.

As a child, and while growing up, i followed many a customs/traditions without asking my Mom why it was done in the first place. Being an Hindu entails performing poojas/rituals/participating in festivals/social gatherings, etc. And i have happily followed most of them as a youngster. My mom herself was not an extremely pious woman, in that some of these feelings may be genetic, so to say. She never used to light diyas every evening or teach us many slokas/mantras/ tell us loads of mythological stories or anything. I was an avid reader and learnt about many stories on my own.

To be able to think about and talk to God about my problems (which i feel were much less earlier) was quite relieving. To be able to tell myself that Krishna would protect me and that Devi would give me strength made me more confident. And the fact that these Gods had forms that i could relate to made them comfortable to talk to and to be confided in.

Then along came this awesome book (which is now quite ubiquitous too) called The Secret. It introduced the power of Universal Providence into my life. And it actually worked wonders for me! I dont know whether i sound too naive when i say this, but now i have what they call an undivided and absolute faith in the theory of how the latter gives you back what you give it. In due passage of time, i was exposed to the concept of duality - that there are good and bad in every form. Even Gods made mistakes. Even Asuras have their own side/version of stories where they were the right ones and Gods their rivals.

The fundamental paradigms shifted.. and cultural shocks ensued. Characters in mythologies suddenly started seeming false and make believe. Gods were now just extremely powerful human beings.. some of whom could manipulate due to their influence and charishma. Asuras were only people at the wrong place at the wrong time (pretty akin to a youth being transformed into a terrorist.. who would you blame? - the society? the organisation/outift? the terrorist himself?). Stories/legends now looked pretty dreamy and man-made. Then grew hatred towards the 'fear' that was created around not performing a ritual or praying daily to God. And i slowly started disbelieving and then one day just stopped believing.

Above is just half of my problems. As a child, the aforementioned cultural traditions gave meaning to my childhood. The stories built me a land of fantasies and magic. The temple visits, the get togethers, the dance practices and bhajana groups, the songs i learnt and sang and were appreciated... my childhood was built around all this. Even now, some of my best memories are built around all this. It just becomes more confusing when i realise i wont be able to practise all that with my child with the same conviction that i possessed then. How then would my child be able to relate to my childhood? Would her childhood be bland and blase with TV and electronic gadgets that have nothing remotely worthy of being cherished later on? How do i ask her to pray in front of a particular God when i myself am no more comfortable doing it? How am i supposed to explain a tradition/custom to her when i have doubts about its origin and reasons?

While i am usually confronted by such nagging thoughts, i find a window of hope when i ask her to thank God for everything she has. Perhaps that's the way around it. And then a few mantras to keep her in the faith of someone out there protecting her. It is my duty to give her the freedom to choose what she would be comfortable doing. I would surely not make her do things just because everyone else is doing it. What is the use of being a staunch believer of a God if you are not a good human being.. if you cannot understand someone else's pain. What is the use of performing all these rituals if you dont feel gratituous of being alive and being there with your family.

For me, the fact that I am alive and healthy to be able to think about all this itself is overwhelming. Life and time does not wait for anything, Anything can happen to anybody and then you'd be caught unaware. I just want to be a good human being. Not a staunch God believer. Id rather believe in the Supreme force which would give you back all the good that you give others. Id rather be a person who is kind and giving and empathetic, than be someone who would chant mantras and back bite someone.

I am still learning and trying to find out who i am and why i am here. I am trying to fathom where i started and where i am going now. I am still learning. And i hope the God or the Force, as i see it now, shows me the way... gives me strength to keep going and never give up. And is patient with me when i go wrong somewhere... I am still learning.

The haven't yet found the answers to my questions. But i am assuming they will come to me sooner or later. Till then...

Stories from Hair and There

What's so much hair doing on your head? Trust me, you have no idea of the perks of going bald, or being so. The glamour of that shiny pate visible through the black seemingly disturbing strands of hair is much like silver linings through dark clouds. It stands there looking at you, showing you the mirror of reality. This is what it is. Its like life. It's there and then it's not there. Only, this process is a slower motion of the former. In a nutshell, what was the crowing glory in one era is a clowning story in another. Invariably, thus, bald/balding people are wiser and less self indulgent than many others with their little heads overflowing with hairy tufts of vanity.

Notwithstanding the fact that you take simply a few seconds to decide a hairstyle (or a hairlessstyle, whichever's the case), you dont have to spend a dime on futile hair spas and massages. When its all clear, why fear? For those who have ventured into mommiehood and have beautiful daughters with beautiful hair, well, right guess, there is always buffer time to dress them up! And believe you me, when you are travelling in Mumbai locals, the lesser hair you have on your head, better it is. When the trains speed up wildly blowing many a mane into the air, you don't want to end up a menace to the community which is already hassled enough with pollution and politics.

For those who are not married yet and are horrified with the prospects of presenting their receding hairlines to prospective candidates, please be well aware of the fact that with all that coloring and straightening they are already on the path to where you currently stand. So gleam with pride and welcome them in advance. :)

Ever wondered why all the models in the ads have beautiful hair? Duh! That's why its called an advertisement! If things they said were actually real, there would have been no woes in the universe.. no world wars in the history of mankind, and Kejriwal would have done more and whined less!

And finally, tell me.. which of the following were better?
Captain Cook that slipped fast from fingers or Tata namak that stuck to them?
2014 Macbook Air that has 1.4 GHz, in vogue Intel Core processor or a normal white hued desktop computer from the 1990's?
The super fast Ferrari or our 'good old' Premier Padmini?

If all our hair has to shed one day anyway (one by one or whatever), then those who are bald/balding are only shedding it faster. So what does that make them? Eons ahead to their lesser mortal peers!!

So pull up your collars and say with pride - I am bald/balding. There is nothing to panic, nothing to be ashamed about! That's your style... wear it boldly! And the next time someone quips about your 'clowning story', tell them to go update their slow and backdated processors. :)

Way to go!

Pic Courtesy: http://www.cartoonstock.com

Get the drift? - Part II

When i had the time and opportunity to have fallen in love, i dint have the guts to do it. Now, after being married and having borne a child, i am a gutsy woman. But neither is this the time, nor is there any opportunity to fall in love with the opposite sex (yes, i maintain my 'straightforwardness')! Not that i want to cheat on my precious hubby. Thats not the kind of gutsy im talking about, you see...
Its like having missed going to Disneyland! You can still go when you are sixty! But its never like the fun you would have had when you were six or sixteen!

Get the drift?

By the way, i havent gone to Disney land too.

Shucks. That's my cue.

The End.

Pic Courtsey: http://lowres.cartoonstock.com

Wired wrongly

I'm eccentric. No, i mean it comes to me very naturally. I think of people i haven't met for along time and make up imaginary conversations in my mind, envisaging what it would be like to have bumped into them all of a sudden. I fall in love with people without knowing, buy them things for the sake of nothing and then at times stop and tell myself that may have been too silly.

That takes me to another issue. I think i have forgotten how to make friends. I mean close friends. Remember when we could sit with someone, chat with her and then realise that we were made for each other and would go back to one another for everything. Well, even if that could be a short stayed relationship and we may realise that we arent actually pieces of the same jig saw puzzle, at least the initial part of socializing came naturally. Now, i have to painfully make it up. Sigh!

There was a time when I did not know anything about myself and was really happy. (well not necessarily happy that i was clueless about it, am pointing towards the blissfulness of now knowing about the not knowing). Years later, I am still trying to understand myself and now since i know about the not knowing, im not happy. Get the point?

Guess it's time to go for a shrink. My poor new blog has become a garbage bin of sorts. :)

Pic Courtesy: http://beautifuldecay.com

If you care to choose..

God knows in how much dilemma i am right now.

On one side i can be this brilliant student and a scholar in an institute of repute.. and on the other i have to be a mother, and a daughter without having to compromise on the quality of the relationship. Managing a house is not a joke. Mom used to mention that, but now I know.

I cry.. at times silently at times boohooing at the top pf my voice so i can tell myself it's alright to be upset. But unless i pull on, ill be dead. So iv decided, im going try. Its really scary.. and i feel really lonely and horrified at the thought of having to manage everything. God knows, i can do with a big box of tissues as i type this. But i know i want to do this. And so badly!

While life does give everyone a chance, i dont want to give up without having put up a fight.. But im already so tired.. so scared.. so will i be able to do this? I do close my eyes and try to envisage that i can.. but its too faint to be a picture that i can keep to remind me again later. But it would be a shame if i do not.

Its better when there is only one thing to do.. and you have to do it.. theres no choice you see.. Its when you have a choice that you get so bloody confused!

If only i could see it.. If only there were a way ahead on the path that i choose! Fingers crossed.

The Minute Blog

When does a friendship die?

Pretty much like life, friendship too dies a slow, painful death at times (assuming there is no major upheavals causing the same, which by the way can also be a reason for its downfall). It is painful for the people who have to go through it. Like a human strapped to bed with multiple tubes inserted into him/her, the heart and lungs on the job through machines, friendship too may give away to the hug of death. Its breathing which gradually wanes is at times almost audible. True, no one can ignore that, even by choice. And then, when death comes tip toeing, and gobbles up the last breath, stopping it midway, the last and the only is done. Nothing follows. People go on with their lives - in office, being health freaks.. jogging, running, moving to another city, getting married, having kids, quitting a painful job or maybe getting a new one, With close to a million things that can be done than keeping a friendship alive, it doesn't come as a surprise why some would choose to give the latter a convenient miss. It would have been so easy if we could tell exactly when a friendship dies. But we cant. I cant. Not even at the very moment its breath gets stalled midway. It's too hard to hear with all that annoying din that life makes.

Pangs II ~ The Invisible Child

I dint find her anywhere today. Searched all those places i expected to find her. :( Ultimately, brought back the fruits i had packed for the little one. I was really looking forward to sitting down with her and maybe ask her name. Next time, maybe. I'm surely not going to give up...

Pangs I ~ The Smile

Hi Baby!

What is your name? Yes.. i want to know your name...

Are you hungry? Hmm..?

What's your age? You don't know? Ahh.. No problem.. 

Are you hungry? Tell me! What.. are you shy?

Where do you live? Hmm... Do you have to sit here all day and do this? When do you eat then? What do you eat? Doesn't anyone give you anything to eat?

Where are your mummy-papa? Do you have a bhaiya or a didi? What about a nani or a nana or a dadi or a dada?

Do you get any money like this? What do you do with it? Do you give it away to someone else? Do they, then give you something to eat?

Are you sleepy? Where do you sleep when you are tired? Do you hug someone to sleep?

Don't you feel frightened at the sight of so many strangers? Don't you cry when they scold you or slap you or shoo you away? You are so brave! 

Do you have toys? Do you want some?

If there is one thing you would want me to give you, what would that be?

Here, take some bananas... You look hungry.

You know, back home, i have a daughter who is your age. You remind me of her...

Can i find you here at all times? Will you be here on the third day from today? I'll come with food for you and your siblings. Will you meet me here? Pakka? Okay! 

Bye bye!

I kissed her on her cheek and walked away. She stared at me, and so did the passengers at the ticket counter, trying to decide whether i was crazy or just making fun of her. I am neither. I will go back to that ticket station on Monday and give her food. Otherwise i would never be able to forgive myself for being selfish. Otherwise i would never be able to justify my being a human.

The Estimable Author

Pic Courtsey: canvassnap.blogspot.com


He ran his index finger over the spines of the myriad books which were kept on the rack and picked up one. He then flipped through its pages by habit, fingers avoiding a paper cut, coming to the back cover to read more about it. The stories were promising, fresh in content and perspective. It would not drain him out, he knew. This was it. The author, however was new to him. He opened the back cover to read the leaf that folded inwards. It carried a picture of the author. She was young, much about his age, splashing a toothy smile, looking through a window of a building which was perhaps her home, sitting with her knees towards her chest, her hands folded over them. In her yellow top she looked simple, yet someone who had stories to tell. The bespectacled lady sat amidst a range of little clay pots, each one with a sapling, a few with little button roses hanging out. He smiled. Her hair, slightly thin in front and subtly revealing her scalp, was tied into a bun, lacking a last possible trace of vanity. What stories did she want to tell? Maybe she had a dysfuctional family like many authors do, who ultimately seek solace through venting on blogs and finally writing a book, as is the trend nowadays. Perhaps she had some deep rooted medical troubles that she wanted to forget by giving into writing. Or is it nothing? Maybe she wrote because it made her feel happy. And that is how she looked in the picture.
He closed the book, looked around and walked towards the cash counter. Finally, he had bought himself a copy of her bestseller.

The Arrival

Pic Courtesey : www.theguardian.com

When Padmini set her foot out of her hut, she did not think twice lest she shed her confidence for what she was going to do. Her life had witnessed a fair share of torment. And it was now time for her to free herself from the woes, scars of which may remain forever, but whose memories she had already left sleeping amidst the rest of her so called family.

She hitched a ride on Grawahi Chacha's bullock cart to the bus station. He eyed her suspiciously. Girls of respectable families did not roam around alone so early in the morning, especially after an eighteen year old was brutally assaulted and left to die the previous year. But when she mentioned something about how the village priest had ordered her to visit the Rambai Temple that Tuesday alone and precisely at that hour to ward off the advances of evil forces on her family, the cart did not stop till they reached midtown, at the doorsteps of the temple. Grawahi Chacha did wait for about ten minutes outside the temple, gnawing carefully on a strand of hay, and making sure the girl was indeed telling the truth. Padmini tiptoed into the temple. It had just a handful of devotees who had come to attend the aarti at the break of the dawn, maybe at the behest of yet another priest who would have probably earned his family's dinner over a discussion on the current affairs in the land of evil spirits. When Padmini had disappeared into the premises, he slapped the whip on the bullock and started towards his destination, making a mental note to meet Padmini's step father and uncle once he returned. By that time they would have picked her up from the temple and taken her back home anyway, he reminded himself.

Padmini waited for almost an hour, then crossed the road and took the first bus to the outskirts. From there walked a couple of furlongs before she got a ride in a share-auto to the station. She rushed into the platform, Samaira would be there, she knew.

As she climbed on the foot over bridge, she thought of her beautiful friend who she met about two years ago when she had travelled to Ujjain, to attend the naamkaran of her Mamaji's first son, who was born after twelve years of his marriage to Meena Mami. They had three daughters before that. Samaira had an infectious air of energy within her. She lived with her family on the first floor of the chawl and Mamaji on the third. As per her, she was the apple of her Abba's eye as a toddler. Only, her Abba had left their home and progressed to marry a rich Begum from Allahabad and now resided with her. So much for that jinn of a lady, he had never come back to meet them thereafter, she had complained.

Padmini had bumped into Samaira on the eve of Chaturthi, when she was rushing down to fill a bucketful of water to wash the puja flowers. For an instant, Padmini had thought she had encountered the much abhorred panauti kati herself, a legendary poltergeist which was kept at bay using bay leaves and jasmine flowers back in her village. But when the fall was followed by a shower of apologies in pure hindi, sans the bitter accent of her village people, she was enamoured by this beautiful person clad in black burqa. Day by day, their friendship grew despite cold stares and momentary dissent from her Mamaji and his folks. When Padmini left Ujjain, she had made a friend for life, and a week full of memories she would cherish for years to come.

It was in that winter that she got her first letter from Samaira. In neat hindi script, Samaira told Padmini how she had been beaten black and blue when she refused nikah to a Pathan in Pataudi. Her pierced nose ring was torn out along with her skin so much so that the nostril had to be held with a meter long cotton chunni so it would stop bleeding. She had had enough, she had mentioned. Her laments in life were as long as her sentences, adorn with deft commas. If only, it could end like those sentences. Padmini cried for her friend, not able to withstand the imagination of the pain she would have underwent. And it was that very night, as fate would have it, that she was dragged half a kilometer in a jeep and taken into the woods to be abused badly and left to die with a severed hand. If only she had died.

When she had regained consciousness, she did not open her eyes fearing that her tormentors would still be around. But the thorny grass that she last remembered being thrown into was no more there. There was a sting of antiseptic in the air and a sound of intermittent beeps which came from something behind her. Before she realised how sore she was everywhere, she went back to sleep yet again.

By the time, Padmini was in the right senses and physically able to reply to Samaira's letter, three months had passed. Padmini poured her heart into words and in whatever possible way she could write, recited the past few horrifying months she had lived to witness. This time it was Samaira's turn to cry. She beat her chest and wept for her friend... in the kitchen, in the bathroom, back in the garden... every place where she would not be asked for a reason why she had a life of her own.

Mid spring, Samaira wrote back from Pataudi. Apparently, there was a baby in her tummy the previous week which was no more there. She had bled badly that morning and hence received a volley of abuses from her in laws for having eaten the paan from an open box. It was nothing less than suicide for pregnant women, they had contended. She had been reprimanded and kept inside the house till she bore again. It was only the maids in the house who showed any sign of sympathy to the bereaving ex-future mother., who was only too shocked to realise the gravity of the matter.

When Padmini was carefully storing her friends letter in her trunk, her mother's husband, drunk and delirious came on to her. When she mentioned this to her mother, she slapped her and told her it was time she took her to the village ojha. Bah, evil spirits!

Then almost an year went by. Padmini mostly worked throughout the day and slept throughout the night, sometimes lying awake and overhearing the conversations between her mother and her husband... his travails to the town and journeys to Kolkata to sell wares.

At the crack of a dawn one morning during the spring, she sat upright and wrote to Samaira. "Im coming to Ujjain. Will you too come?" she wrote in broken hindi. "On the tenth of next month." She thought about it again, and wrote, "I want to live. I want to be free. Will you too come? I will wait at the railway station till  afternoon and head towards my destination thereafter. My friend, will you too come?"

A train hooted and brought back Padmini from her daydream. Reminiscing the past two years, she clenched her elbows tightly and made way to platoform no.6. Her eyes rummaged the crowd. She would not miss spotting a burqa for sure, she told herself. She walked towards the platform her head turning everywhere, her eyes scanning both sides of the station. She had not come. Had she missed receiving any letter from Samaira explaining why she would not come? Her heart thudded aloud, her ears ringing due to the loud clamor of metal wheels on the tracks. She had not come. Was she being held hostage? How far would Pataudi be from Ujjain? Maybe she was pregnant. Yes, that would explain. She had not come. Hope they kept her alive. Hope she was well. Hope she received her letter. Hope no one else did.

The dark brown dupatta was flowing in the air. The lady was clearly restless, uncomfortable, due to what she was wearing, or what she was not, no one would know. But when she lay her eyes on the platform across her, she knew that Allah himself had showed her this way. She rushed across the bridge, her eyes not leaving the woman. She trotted fast, half excited, half heart broken, at the sight of how frail her companion had become. After about half a dozen miscarriages, she herself looked no less than a jinn herself. She took her hand above her head to adjust her burqa, only to realise she wasn't wearing one. This journey dint require one. Nor did the journey henceforth.

When she arrived at the platform, she deliberately slowed her gait and waited for the climax. The frail woman looked so lost in searching for someone that she had not realised she was right there. She stifled a giggle and put her hand on her chest. That moment, the woman's eyes stopped at her. They breathed for a while, imbibing the moment... looking at each other, not saying a word, one with a huge grin and her hand on her heart and the other holding a bag on her left shoulder, her blue tie-and-dye dupatta revealing a stump instead of a right hand.

As they walked towards each other, they knew they were actually walking towards a new beginning. A train hooted and screeched to halt at the platform. Life had arrived.

The book shop

pic courtesy: http://vi.sualize.us

A lot was going on in the bookshop.
That moment.
When their eyes met.
Some toddler toddled over comic books, some customer cussed over flimsy looks.
In some time came a benign smile, call it a lifetime, call it a while. 
In a silly move, he waved at her, and quickly regretted his demeanor.

A woman ran her finger over the lines, as another held two books by their spines.
In a flash he was a nostalgic mess of those wonderful times of togetherness.
Hadn't he grown over that hurtful phase? Those depressing nights and doleful days?

A rude old woman made the owner bark, silence met a worthy counterpart.
She faked a blink and another two, to make for time to say hello.
Wallowed in a vacuum of words and yet, enjoyed this silent tete-a-tete.

A five hundred pounder plunked on the couch, while the poor furniture stymied an ouch!
And just when they were exchanging smiles, she eagerly tried to read his eyes. 
A lot had changed from those times, from hearty talks to subtle signs.

The cat meowed and tried to pounce, only to miss the bookish mouse.
So this is it, she thought and sighed, there's no running away and nowhere to hide.
Then slowly touching her pouting belly, she sent a message specifically.

The beeper howled in dire protest, when a shop lifter din't try his best.
His nod told her he understands the weight of the current circumstance.
They were now beyond realms of heart, within arm's reach, yet world apart.

The corny owner strained to find some contentment and peace of mind.
"The one who stole from me is dead!", he flung a thesaurus on the crook's head.
He whacked the lights out of the pawing cat, and marched to where the fatso sat.
He growled and ask the man to leave and the sofa heaved a sigh of relief.

The hag meanwhile had zipped her lips to save her dentures and a dented hip.
The others who toyed with his precious books were now reminiscing the vows they took.
While a lot happened, just two of them stood, and weren't bothered as they have should.
Wonder, whether they would ever forget, that moment, when their eyes met.