This is what I sat and wrote about by the River…

I get ready
I choose my finest dress
I step into pencils
And click out of my address

To another,
hosting a party in through the big, red gate
I do like red,
But will have to excuse this date.

I cross the big gate and walk towards the river
Rubbing the blue robe on the street all through the way
I can’t walk fast so shall I rather try to run?
So that I break them heels to make an excuse to throw them away?

I reach halfway, still clicking on the ground
It’s getting dark, I see fewer people around
It’s good because that is what I would like for tonight
Just me, a pen-a paper, watching the flowing river in the moonlight.

I finally reach the banks, it must be cold
Cause’ the only folks I see, they shiver
My skin doesn’t move, not an inch
As I stand there straight, looking right into the river

I climb downstairs, now I am closer
Just a few steps and my hands will be wet
It’s the Ganges and we worship it first with its water in our hands
Before our feet inside it we set.

Now it’s silent, I can’t hear a soul
Only the water, flowing
Touching my soul.

I sit,
I want to stay there
Till the color of my robe matches the color of the sky
Till when there are plenty of sparkles
shining out of my eyes.

I want to sit by the river
And think of the times
When I was there barefoot
And my clothes didn’t shine
When dad would push me in
Making a big, thunderous sound!
But instead of sailing,
My ship would drown!

I want to sit by the river
And think of how
He would catch hold of me
And pull me out somehow

“Ready for another push?”
He wouldn’t ask, I wouldn’t allow.
Next moment, I would be in the water again,
Struggling to swim somehow!

I want to lie by the river
And think about you
About the similar peace
That I would get with you…

I want to touch the river
As if it was you
I will swim through it tonight thinking it was you
I want to hold it and kiss it thinking it was you
But damn!
It would slip out of hands as if it was really you!

I want to walk by the river
Thinking of my friends
My priceless possessions,
My everlasting trends
My babies, my parents
My strength, my ears
With whom I have shared all my laughter,
My fears.

I will not waste a second thinking about the people who left
They don’t matter anymore, not because they left
But the ones who managed to stay even after they left
Are the people I will sit and smile about by the river…

I will think about the relations that lived
Will not whine about the ones whom life dismissed
But those which fell off weak even after I built them for years
Are the ones I will sit and cry about by the river…

I will wipe off my tears,
When it’s the break of dawn I see,
Now I will let go of the gold
And let go of the heels

I will hide them
And pretend as if I lost them in the dark!
Now I am barefoot again and suddenly my eyes have a spark!

I am waiting,
Maybe dad would come and push me back into the river?
Wondering if now he would ask for permission since we are older?
Hoping this time, I will sail through the river
Explore a direction I had been to never.
Hoping I will find my way back home, like ever
To the people we call as family, or rather call them forever?

I will not forget to think about the people I love
Whom I couldn’t have with me, forever?
Whom I dream about every day,
For whom I could get locked up in a cellar

Whom I wish get everything they ever want in their life
Love, success, compassion in their life
Whom I could give up my dreams for,
Let alone my life
These are the people I will sit and Pray for by the river
These are all the people I will sit and write about by the River…

Spreading love

Bangalore, February, 2018

Just like the wind, clouds and our planets, Winter keeps moving too.

It came to Bangalore in the early days of December. It has stayed here for quite a while now and is finally moving away.

These days the Sun doesn’t forget to knock my window early in the morning and I am happy that its touch feels better than my alarm. I sleep alone and cover my face with the blanket anyways!

I remember a few years back I was a different person. I couldn’t live alone and needed my parents for everything. I felt suffocated if I covered my face while sleeping. I wouldn’t sleep without a night lamp. But now I prefer pitch darkness. I changed.

 

My home changed too, quite a few times actually.

Year 2000, my family and I move to a new house, mom and dad turn it into a beautiful home, balcony, garden, flowers, butterflies, colors. Much love.

Year 2013, I move a thousand miles away from home, to Chennai, to my grandparent’s place to study further.

Year 2013, my grandma becomes my mother and her house my home.

My grandpa cooks for me, packs me lunch boxes, grandma takes care of me when I am sick (which happened very rarely, thanks to her again), gets me Wifi, buys me new clothes on festivals, even though she never buys for herself, takes me to temples, teaches me Sanskrit shlokas, good values. Much love.

Year 2017, my parents move to a new home.

I move to Bangalore to work and stay at a hotel over night.

I stay at another hotel for the next 15 days.

I stay as a paying guest for the next 15 days (hated it).

August, I move to a flat. Find friends who turn it into a beautiful place to live in. We cook, wash, clean, no T.V so we talk for hours, help and get helped. Much love.

 

Nothing is constant and my people moved.

I moved.

Year 2018, February 15,

I shift to another flat. The TV makes me feel at home, if not the people. It’s just been 2 days and I barely know them. First night in the house and I dream about being posted to France. No doubt I wake up excited.

“This place might be good for my dreams at least”, I wonder.

 

Why I wrote this blog was not to mention my timeline but to record these little gestures of love I received, so that I don’t forget them, ever.
February 14^th I am cleaning out my closet and housemaid comes. She knocks everyday by 7:30 in the morning.

It had been exactly 2 months since we had hired her and one month since my old flat mates moved out and new ones came, only physically replacing them.

I handed her salary in her hands.

“Aunty, I am leaving today evening, I am moving to another place…”

 

She fell out of words.

So did I.

I used to sleep on a thin mattress on the floor and every morning I would fold it up, collect the stuff lying here and there on the floor and make the room ready for her to clean. So she liked to clean my room. She would clean my vessels at times even though i didn’t pay her for that. She reciprocated the gesture I guess.

“What Madam, u also leaving.. even other two Madams left.. am I supposed to leave too?”

“No you stay, I have told the new girls to pay you timely.”

“I am gonna charge extra from them.. their friends make the washroom really dirty.. it takes more effort!”

 

I smile. I know whatever she said was true and she was a nice lady.

She speaks Kannada but manages with broken Hindi with me.

“No no… how much we are paying for you is fine Aunty.. .”

She smiles and tries to convince me but stops in middle and resumes her work.

 

A few minutes later, she calls out for me telling me that she was going…

And I feel empty.

After my friends left there was only this lady and now she won’t be there too. I wont be there too.. what about my home. Will it miss all of us after we leave? These windows and the balcony and the shower, would they feel empty too?

Idk.

“Madam..what Madam..you also going now..”, she repeats with a heavy heart.

“I am in the same society.. just another flat..”

Her face lights up.

“yea..the condition of this place is not good..better you are going.. if u need a maid there call me.. hope we will see each other!”

 

She has tears in her eyes and smile on her lips.

I tell her bye and get ready for office. She leaves for the day.

It’s hard to forget her face. So Much love.

 

Next,

I call my mom and tell her that I have finally moved to the new place and she is stressed out.

“I don’t like you moving here and there all by yourself! There is no one there how do you manage? I couldn’t have done that if I was in your place.”

I am sure she could have. Just like I did. Like everybody else does. Situations always come along with the strength to tackle them.

 

I wish I could tell her about all the love I received on the way, at all the places I took a halt at.

When during vacations I am going back to meet my family, the conversation goes on like this,

My Mom: “Where are you right now?”

Me: I am at home, still packing.

Mom: “When will u reach home?”

Me: I’ll start from home at 1.. I’ll reach home by 6 in the evening! See you soon!

Bye for now! 🙂

 

they didn’t teach me to speak a language that they understood

There is this needle
In my head

It goes in and out
And in and out
All through the day
So bloody pointy I don’t know who sharpens it while it’s already at work, ALWAYS.
It’s unbreakable too, at least that’s what I have discovered.

I didn’t tell Them about it.
Looks like they speak a language that I do, too
But they understand a completely foreign language that I Know nothing about!
So it’s hard to explain them, about this needle

I don’t know may be unknowingly they played their roles too,
In sharpening its parts, its tip.
I think they did it when they forgot to teach me to speak the language that they understood.

It’s so hard being in here,
In this dark room with windows
Where the light pokes the wounds instead of healing them.

And then suddenly everything! This and that and yes that in the corner too,
Adds onto the pile
There are so many needles now
All of them trying to bind me,
Put me through their hollow parts
Crush my ends, spit on me just to be able to crush me all the more!

Till when I fit in
When I finally give up and sew my dear tongue
And my ears and my lips and then my heart
Damn! Their points bite and rip apart my skin
And they think that they are making me beautiful
Shit, they think that they are making me better.

Just like that man, who plucks the flowers and puts them on her tiara
He thinks that he did those selected few a favor,
“You are the best ones so you got picked, do you understand that?”

“How will they?”, I ask him!
Man they don’t understand the language that you speak!
Lucky are the ones, who aren’t that perfect,
They aren’t picked so soon.
They remain intact with their souls
A little longer
Until they die and fall down on their own will.

How they were all in the same mud but each felt differently.

He fell into a puddle

and dirt gripped him from all around,

A law student likes to stay neat

first thing went home, washed his clothes and cleaned his feet.

He was in the puddle

a car ran away after painting his shirt brown,

he cussed the driver fiercely

his face marked a big frown.

He was pushed into a puddle

and those boys screamed and laughed.

the mud was innocent, it didn’t hurt him,

bullying did, and so did those tainted hearts.

He jumped into a puddle

pulling another three of them along!

“Mom says, Surf-excel will take care of our clothes, don’t fear that dirt!”

I suppose he sounded convincing as, “I like Earth” said another, in a song.

MUM, your MOM is actually your MOM :D

In my early days in Chennai, I had to confront a lot of things altogether. Coming from a joint family of 10 members I was suddenly shifted with my grandparents. The ratio was 10:3 = 3.33. Meaning I had to grow three folds at once to adjust to the present lifestyle. But I had other issues to handle too, like emotional instability (living away from home is not easy), adjustment (which is a pre-requisite when you leave home and fly to a different place), courtesy(in which I lacked) and I could make a full list, but in-short, I was just not READY for the shift.

Yeah my mom did teach me a few extra skills before sending me here, one of it being cooking thinking it would be nice if I helped my grandparents in the kitchen. That is what she thought I needed to survive here, cooking skills. (Though she tried teaching me other things too, like how to manage ones life, but I couldn’t take out time for it, I was always busy with my studies.)

But she was wrong. That was the last thing they expected from me here. They wouldn’t even want me in the kitchen because there they disliked anybody else’s interference, specially of someone who didn’t had any prior experience in it.

So what did they want from me? And why am I writing this article today? Using my phone and tracking the time I found out that I have spent around 900 days here. Almost two-and-a-half years. Then suddenly what special happened today?

I folded the blanket perfectly.

The following is a story about my blanket, which is just a blanket for me, but for you it can be anything. Your cupboard? You dining table? Maybe your entire room or maybe the habit of misplacing your wallet everyday in spite of your mom telling you the correct place for it a thousand times already. Actually my blanket could be the entire YOU. And I folded mine perfectly today, so yeah… goodluck to you too!

DAY 1-

I woke up at 6 to get ready for college. Brushed, bathed, collected my tiffin box and left.

DAY 2-

Same.

DAY 6-

It was a Saturday and there wasn’t any college today. Woke up at 8, Sun shining bright at my head, brushed, had milk and relaxed. At 10, I saw the unorganized room and arranged the pillows and folded the thin red-blanket. It appearing obviously pretentious than desired, because it wasn’t done with interest. But that was how we did it at my home, making the blanket into three-four folds and dumping it onto the pile with the other blankets and pillows. Everyone dumped their blankets together and that particular place would be little messy, but my family would like it just that way because we were accustomed to that mess. It appeared beautiful to us.

But when I came here, that beautiful picture was termed ugly. A sudden change of terms and definitions left me irritated.

“This is not the way to fold it”, said my grandma, unfolded and did it herself when I cared less even to look at her and was busy with my personal work.

Also I was surprised by finding out my untidy room arranged perfectly every day when I came back from college. I started taking it for granted.

DAY 7- Sunday

ROOM- mess.

“This is not the way to fold it”, said my grandma, unfolded and did it herself when I cared less even to look at her and was busy with my personal work.

DAY 15- Saturday

“This is not the way to fold it”, said my grandma, unfolded and did it herself when I looked at her and said, “that is the way we used to do it at home.”

“Really? Then I will have to talk to your mom about it.”

“yeah sure!” I was growing more and more irritated. She was challenging my past. That was the way I lived and I didn’t want to CHANGE or LEARN from HER. I thought “I AM CORRECT, SHE IS WORNG.”

Well that was certainly not the case, but I was blinded.

The first light came to me I think on Day 35 when I gave up on my ego and my strongly held beliefs and TRIED to fold it like my grandma. I FAILED.

Yeah it sounds foolish when I say I failed to fold the blanket when sit everyday in a class of to-be engineers.

“we build the world”, said a professor while teaching us about the soil and structures in the first year. Well what a shame, I couldn’t even do the blanket!

But let me tell you, it wasn’t just some folding. There were linked threads. My thin-red-blanket had a small patch of threads at two of its edges, maybe some decorating technique the weaver had choosen. Well thank you sweetheart, I may not have written this article if those two edges had not had that patch of threads coming out!

DAY 100-

I tried to look at her, tried to learn how she did it.

DAY 150-

I went for vacations to home and forgot about all about the discipline.

DAY 155- (assumed to be a Saturday)

I tried to do it again.

“This is not the way to fold it”, said my grandma, unfolded it and did it herself when I looked at her very carefully.

DAY 156- (assumed to be Sunday)

I tried and succeeded!

“This is not the way to fold it, the threads shouldn’t be seen or it looks untidy.”, said my grandma, unfolded it and did it herself.

“but I did it properly this time! C’mon! You are over doing it!” and that day I called up my mum and complained, “she is over-doing it!”

DAY 200-

I started folding it nicely and she would still unfold and do it again but only a few times in a month.

DAY 900-

She never does it again now. She doesn’t have to. Now the threads are never seen. They hide somewhere beneath the careful folds and the room is neat with the pillows on their place and the books on the shelf.

She transformed me from, being an irritated -> unwilling to learn -> to calm -> willing to learn -> to learned.

I thank her. Though it’s just a blanket, but it taught me great lessons of my life lying underneath its folds.

You want to see that thing? That beautiful-thin-red-baby of mine whom I sleep with every night? Hold on!