A few minutes ago, I
lit my first joint in weeks. A friend left me some, more for his safe-keeping
than my consumption and I rolled one out of boredom and an acute need to break
the stagnation that is my every evening nowadays. I went out to the balcony of
my room and kept out of the eye of my mother’s driver. Lit it. Waited. The
lampshade hanging in my room casts a diffused glow into the balcony. It looks
pretty. Below, the dark of the children’s park next to our house is hollow
black. My eyes don’t see very clearly anyway and I can’t make out anything in
the dark shapes below. All I can make out is the streetlight some distance away
and a car or bike passing in the road. In the dark, all that moves is their
light.
The buildings don’t move. They never ever move. In the
darkness, they look more patient than ever, waiting only for people to animate
them. The ones who built them. I thought about a story and here I am writing
it. The problem, the one that’s really biting me, is that I can’t thread it
together for nuts. I have been alternating today between mild love-type exhilaration
and uncontrolled laughter and a dull sword-over-my-frustrated-head kind of
moments. And wondering if I would black out after eating the humongous monster
aloo chaat made by this guy in the marketplace earlier today, i.e., wondering
if the unexpectedness of the giant gut-buster would cause a serious alteration
to my physiology. My playlist goes on and on and on. I went to the riverside
today. The river is calmer than the sea and I am dreadfully out of practice (writing).
Kites and crows fought for scraps of dead fish strewn around the sands, while a
deadly sausage-fest style party of about 200 boys danced (?) in the
restaurant-ship close by, to Chikni Chameli that played real, REAL loud. The Kites
won the fight easily (boy, they are huge; wingspan, large) and scattered the
smaller scavengers who waited their feeding turn.
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| Me VS giant Gut-Buster |
I am just a little buzzed. December is cold in Assam and my
hands and feet feel numb. Apparently, it gets colder next month. I can’t wait.
For a long time, I have been thinking and thinking of how this is my first
proper winter at home after years. I am completely confused over what to do
about it. Eg. Bonfire, morning walks, work, live life to the fullest, etc. Everyone
keeps telling me that I do nothing. Day in, day out. Every day that I have
moved back home. And I know it to be true. I am so bad at freelancing and
setting any rules or boundaries for myself. But I don’t really want to rant
about it here again.
So my new rant will take on a more conceived form. Do I mean
controlled? Maybe. Or maybe I mean concentrated. Maybe. Since I can’t and won’t
post my exact thoughts on to the internet, maybe I can think of some metaphors.
Damn. Back to Plath again (Metaphor is a poem by her about pregnancy). She is
so scary. She is so subtle-ly scary. You just don’t realize when she slips you
a good, solid one that hits you right on the top of your brain, a resounding, light,
but well-placed smacker. Some pages left to finish her novel. I’ve abandoned it
in its most terrifying chapters. Sylvia has woken up in an asylum of sorts. Face
is different colours. Hair in short tufts. Under electric-shock treatment, etc.
Scary stuff. And so wonderfully metamorphed (tisa word) from the initial
opening pages of a thinking-girl’s Sex in the City style New York.
Flash news: Gut-Buster has got me. Am I stoned, cold or
sick? Can’t tell because I feel fine but keep imagining/noticing my eyes
darting way too much as I type this. But while I was in the loo, I thought I
looked fine. Maybe it’s a good idea to fall sick for a few days. Then I can
bypass the whole bling ka-ching Xmas/New year’s hype.
Idiot. Not escapist at all.
I think now I shall write a bit about my confrontational
issues.
I cannot confront.
On a personal level. Anything. Anybody. Myself. It gets a bit too much and was pointed out to
me today. I kind of knew this in parts, but today, friend said it’s been a
problem with me. I think she said it from experience. And that makes it true.
And if it is true, then I have a serious problem that I have to do something
about because it may be a root cause of my frustrated sedentary life. Friend
(as friends do) gave me exact advice on what to do to counter the
confront-issue, the execution of which is being currently delayed on my part. More
on that later. It’s a vicious loop.
Gut-Buster has shattered my illusion about having a tough,
Indian stomach. I have prided myself on it, many a time, eating many a junk in
copious quantities. Pride, pride, pride. Shame on me. Where does it leave me in
the end? Wondering if the maker of the GB knew what his lovely, exotic, 120
bucker concoction would be doing to me. He had insisted that I stand next to
his chaat-chariot and eat it. He even PACKED some extra for us before we left.
It was ditched at the earliest convenience.
Pride. Another deadly transgression. Is it not a fine line
we tread between actual egotist pride and a self-preservation purposed defence
mechanism? I think it is. But how do you know all the time that which is which?
You don’t. And hence, the fine line, as always, is blurred.
Since I am sort of spilling all, might as well write about
the puppy thing. Looking at the new puppy, I wonder with what ease people tell
you that a young dog will get used to anything, eg., sleeping at a certain
place, toilet-training, whatever else. My point is that puppies are expected to
adapt to given circumstance, enthusiastically learn their manners and not
really question. This they do. And isn’t this very doggy-attribute the hallmark
trait of the evolution of the human kind? Adaptation. Human ability to accommodate,
progress, develop, face odds, eras, disasters, dictators, diseases, Justin
Bieber (LOL)? Then aren’t we all feeling a little too smug about being the “masters”
of creatures whose very characteristics we mirror so discreetly?
Who will learn cursive anymore? Who will take out a notebook
and (fountain) pen down daily expenses? Who will make dog ears in books? In some
future, I may well be so accustomed to technology that I find it easier. It’s
with a painful ache towards analog that I think I may ditch it someday and not
care anymore. Digitisation brings us all a futile step closer to the far more
superior alien life that we descend from and I just pulled a below-the-belt
one. Futile only because us mixed-humans are stupid. Attention spans are
extinguishing. There is no privacy left un-invaded. Weed is illegal. Gay sex
too.
I cannot think of what to write about anymore. But I am
happy about writing a little today. Sad that it’s about to end right now. But
let this be recorded as a beep/dot/jolt in the recently-so-symmetrical line of
my evenings’ life-support system. One small step for me, a giant leap for...
Jalebi. The Day the Buildings Ran Amok and the People Froze.
And beeps are important. ;)
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| Jalebi at work |
