4:30 am

I miss you...I keep looking at your photographs.

Keep repeating your words in my head.

You.

I miss.

Some goodbyes...

Some goodbyes are the most silent of all. No one cries, no hugs, no tears- no promises to keep in touch and no revelations of how the other person will be missed. Goodbyes of this sort make me feel the most empty. Because at times like these I have no idea how to express my self. I can't cry, or hug or promise to stay in touch or let them know that they will be missed. It is completely unnerving.
My room mate is leaving today for China. Forever.
She tells me that she is leaving tonight and places some gifts in my hand. She is almost apologetic for giving me those gifts. That is how she is. One of the most silent presences in my life.
she hardly ever raised her voice, or whined or complained or said anything harsh or rude. I think I said enough for the both of us. She never ever complained about anything. In all practicality she knew in her mind that she was here just for a year. Thus when my stuff over flowed all over the room- she didn't mind. My friends came and stayed over all the time- she never said a word. She hardly ever said much.
The most we talked was during a power cut once when i explained to her how elections in JNU worked. She audited one of our courses and attended more classes than I did. She bought all the course books and politely let me know that I could borrow them when ever I wanted. I didn't even buy ONE of the course books.
I don't know whether she hated me or liked me- but for hours when we sat alone doing our own work in the room, literally oblivious of each other - she would pass me chips or an apple and at times I passed her my things.
She taught me this incredible thing- if I was asleep at the odd times (which is like all the time!) she would switch the main light off and work with her table lamp on. My earlier room mates had never done that. That was a very small gesture- but it meant the world to me. I knew that I mattered to her.
Since then i never put the main light on when she slept- no matter how many times I bumped into things late into the night.
I got her stuff back from home and she sent stuff back with me for home. On nights when I had nightmares or was crying my heart out in silence- I would turn to see her sleeping figure next to me.
At least someone was there- I was not all alone.
Now, as I write, she is packing her things. One by one, everything I identify with her goes into the suitcase- the electric kettle, the multipoint charger, the chinese army mosquito repellent, the contact lenses case...
I don't know what to tell her.
She told me that she was leaving tonight. Her mentioning that made me realize how incredibly short a time I had to let her know what she had been to me. For a whole year I had not mentioned a word to her about anything emotional and yet here I was writing about how I felt.
I am writing what I want to say Wang. If ever you come across this piece- you will know.
She told me that she won't be back for the next semester. I just said - "Oh...". she smiled and carried on with her packing.
Our lives are changing now- people are leaving and some are hoping that no one leaves. But some journeys always end for others to begin.
And I for once don't want a room without her.

The Shit Pot Monster

S - im shit scared of flushing at nite
Me - why not flush?
S - im scared
Me - are you scared tht the things you flush may come and get you?
S - no
just the sound
Me - hahahahahah
u are a riot
S - hahahhahahahahha
thank you
and sometimes i feel that somethings gonna come out of the shit pot ka hole and grab my bum
Me - i so want to post your last comment on fb
S - karde
but dnt give MY name
Me - hahahahahha
fuck
S - wot happened?
Me - no just tht
i am still laughing
S - hahahhahahahhahahha
im SERIOUS
bachpan se he
i have felt like that
Me - then maybe u shud shit in plastic packets and chuck them
no flush
S - DNT gimme IDEAS
i mite just
you know
Me - no bum grabbing
S - start shitting on newspaper
heheheheheh
tujhe nahi laga aisa kabhi?
Me - nahin meri ma
S - hahahhahaha
how UNIMAGINATIVE
Me - rite
nothing really interferes between me and my personal hygiene
S - ???
Me - u do realize tht i will never me able to look at u and not laugh
ever again
S - hahahahahhahaa
doesnt matter
as long as you dnt LEAK the information
Me - wen u come to my house i will give you a plastic packet if you need to use the loo
promise
S - hahahahhahahahahahhaha
Me - can i put this in my blog?
S - my potty-scapades
Me - hahahahaha
yes yes
perfect
S - hahahhahahahahhahahahaha
NOOOOOOOOOOOO no
you cant do this
my reputation will be ruined
no one will marry me
OR
take me to the toilet
hahahhahahaha
Me - or you never know they just mite have the same fears
S - MAYBE
Me - we all look forward to hot men taking us to the toilet to shit...
come with me or the shit pot monster will come and hit you on the face with your plastic packets of shit



One of the most hilarious conversations I have ever had in my life...every time I read it I invariably crack up...

I am looking for myself out there.

For a mother...where ever she is.

Last year roughly some time in November my best friend's mother passed away. I still have the message he sent me. It simply said- "Mom is no more...she has left me...and gone away."
I thought he was joking. I refused to believe the message though when I read it my insides just jumped off a cliff and plummeted below. Another friend who was close to the both of us mustered up the guts to call him up for I could not manage to task myself. She spoke to him for a minute and looked at me. I didn't hear the rest and I couldn't hear the rest.
I just started crying. Shamelessly, sitting right in the middle of at least 30 other people I broke down. It was the most natural thing to happen right then, And some how, sitting here, so far away from my best friend and no obligations to holding him up I cried.
I was never really that close to his mother. I had been to his house so many times but had spoken to her very seldom. The most i spoke to her was possibly when she asked me what colour muffler I wanted, She had made me a baby blue muffler. She cooked for us, stuffed us silly and watched all the soaps on t.v. Even when we went for shows she made us food to take with us. She even made me pickles to take them to Delhi with me. A whole jar of pickles that just sits there on the shelf in front of me even now. I am scared to finish it. It's like the day I do the very last bit of her will vanish from my life.
I think I cried more for myself than my friend that day. I just thought of losing my mother and my heart just broke. I couldn't even start to imagine what my friend was going through. His world was shattering around him and I was miles away, crying.
The other friend who had made the call excused herself and went away. She probably didn't want to cry as shamelessly as I had.
I miss my mother. And I can't imagine life without her. I probably love her more now than I ever could and when I think of my best friend I want to run to my mother and ask her never to go away to a place where i can't call her. I want to keep my mother forever and probably even let my best friend have a bit of her. Just a bit. Just so as he can get the love.
I never spoke to my mother about this. Nor did I talk to my best friend about it. He kept saying that he needed to talk to me. But I didn't want to. What could we talk about?

what could we possibly talk about?

MEMORIES

Is that you? You finally noticed that I was there. It was getting rather lonely here. I am so glad you returned. Please don’t ever leave again.
It is wonderful to see you smile; I almost started believing that those tears were painted on your cheek with permanent tones; I had thought that the nervous chin and the downcast eyes would forever be you. I had thought that I would reflect your deepest pains and lost passions forever.
But now, look at you! The brightness, the colour and the hope! Come closer...you know these old eyes. I don’t see too well these days.
You want to hear stories?
Ah! A treat for my ears. Sit. Let me entertain you.
You remember when you were small? When you were too pleased with the new crayons in school and you did not notice the shriek in the bedroom? It wasn’t the neighbor. It was your father hitting your mother for the hundredth time.
You remember the next day? Your father told you that your mother had gone for a long holiday. He lied. She had killed herself that night.
You remember your sister? She ran away from home because she hated you for being the most loved.
You remember the first boy you fell in love with? Did you know that he cheated on you the very night he promised to marry you?
Your convocation? Ah! The best! Did you know that you didn’t get the best student award because your best friend lied to the faculty?
Did you know that you were adopted and till date your father loves you and yet hates you the most?
And do you know that these stories about you are stuff of fairytales?
Don’t you remember your first boss? He used you unfairly and yet gave the promotion to his prodigal nephew? Do you recall the first pitch you lost? The first insult that was hurled towards you? The first desolate moment of heart ache?
You don’t remember?!?
My beloved, now you do! You must forgive this old mind...there are so many things one tends to forget.
But I am happy for your smile. For the steadily diminishing glint in your eyes and the vanishing colour of your cheeks. You are so beautiful this way.
I am happy for your present and the future but you must remember.
You are going?
No! Wait!!No...
Why must you pick up that paper weight?
Are you going to...NO...STOP...NOT ME...

The coloured paperweight crashed through the silvered glass and the mirror lay broken in a million pieces at my feet.
The memories were dead.
So I turned and walked away.


(This was written for a story writing competition in the annual festival of our school.)

The life, the truth and Everything.

A professor of mine made us write about love in her class. She gave us whole two hours to write about love. "Make it personal" she said and sent us off to class. Like a retarded bunch of immature kids we sat around a giggled, joked, wasted time, each person looking into the other person's work to see how 'personal' it was. None of us were 18 or 16 or 12.
We were all adults who have had relationships that were nor platonic. Well, most of us in class that day. These adults had also by all probabilities has sex, cheated, broken up and had their hearts broken.
Yet, while we were ordered to write, we acted like children.
Some found it cool to associate science with love and give some redundant explanation. It was most insulting to him, he didn't realize.
I'll tell him why if I could. Talking about love the way he did made it seem like a theory. And theory by rule cannot be proved/disproved and is always subject to change. So is what he made of love. Yet this was the guy who asked other guys for their rooms when his girl stayed back on campus.
Irony.
Some called it power to fulfill their aims, some called it faith, beauty and many such heavy things.
The professor patiently heard us all, lauded us, appreciated us and told us that she loved us. She said that every relationship was a negotiation. She said that to love someone you did not have to like that person. She sent us off with a new novel to read with this new vision and idea of love.
It felt like a personality development class. 2 hours of squeaky clean thoughts and heaps of lies. Everyone hid the truth about how they felt about the person they loved. I probably did too. For there are always proper temporal and spatial zones for some abject discussions. You obviously can't tell her professor that you love your boyfriend...that is blasphemy.


That very evening I had a huge fight with someone I loved. And in the end it all came down to negotiations.

What do you want to be?

She asked me this question when i was almost dozing off in the car next to her. I fought with the sleep reflex and opened my eyes and looked at her. Well, she didn't know I was half asleep and I was wearing sunglasses.
My mind screamed out - "Do you think I am 8???"
"I don't know..." I said and i looked out of the window and nothing in particular, I had to show that I was thinking.
"There has to be something that you like except advertising..." she asked changing the gears.
"Yes...sleeping..." I wanted to say.
"Well...maybe...I don't know..."
I didn't have an answer.
When I was 8 I had a lot of answers.
For then you can be anything you want to be. You can be an astronaut, an architect, a forensic expert, a historian and God knows what else.
But now you can just be one thing.
And sometimes not even that.
When you are 8 all you really need to do is to imagine. And everything just happens. It's so simple and you can be a new thing every day. You can even want to be a housewife and say so...and your mother will not raise an eyebrow.
But I am obviously old and lost. I don't even know what I want to be for 5 mins at a stretch. Every day was the end draws near I wonder about what I want to be.
And every day I have no answers.
I didn't have an answer for her. Well surely not one that i could tell her.
"I want to be me...for every day that comes now on I want to be everything i used to be...and for days that I have left behind in some long lost age I want to be EVERYTHING you can't imagine...yes even a rockstar..."
But i told my nosy classmate today-
"I am going to fly a plane..."

'' "

- Someone I do not know is reading my poems and choosing them for an event of embarrassment and discomfort scheduled for Friday the 13th. Bravo.

- Battles were fought and pitched on our grounds and we were not a part of it. Nor will we be.

- They will dance till the moon goes right up to the center of the sky.

- I lie. I don't like you.

- 9 Songs is a STUPID movie but i enjoyed the time i spent watching it.

- One of my friends is a chauvinistic, biased freak.

- I threw hot pink and violet gulal on black boxes and made it look funky.

- Went all the way to another state to have pasta in a shop that was closed.

- My room mate is going away for 2 weeks.

- Every memory is a trace of a tear.

- We live in an Utopia...yet some traces of happiness are so hard to find.

He didn't jump.
Instead, just to make a point he took of his shoe and threw it down form the 7th floor of the library. That is where he was dangling his legs from. He drank a lot of water, spoke on his cell, and talked animatedly to the people inside. Only once he addressed the crowd gathered below to say that JNU had no value for his life for the life of others. He got the police and the fire brigade and the tv crews in.
He didn't jump.
He came out looking like a martyr leaning on the shoulders of our student union president, he looked as if he had gone through hell sitting up there dangling one of his legs and his privates placed precariously on the window ledge.
I think he came down cause he had to pee.

Daddy!Daddy! It's just like you said- now the living outnumber the dead.