"freedom" and more....

*PRESENT DAY*

of all the rotten luck to run into someone guaranteed to make me feel like a complete loser.
the worst part: i didnt even remember him!
that too on a day...i thought i was on top of the world.
grrrr....

the universe has been conspiring against me for a long time.
but this was open war.

*FLASHBACK*

the first time id met him was...in 2004 i think.
i cant even remember clearly.
i just remember that was the time saroj REALLY wanted me to get married and was trying every trick in the book.
she'd put a matrimonial advertisement out for me.
yes, it happened.
can you imagine how many deaths i used to die everytime my family joked about the "responses" i was getting?!

he was one of the fools who'd answered and under duress and several fights with saroj later...id gone to "meet" him!
yes, id sunk that low.
as i sipped my coffee and pretended to be interested in EVERYTHING around me except the moron sitting in front of me...i could feel his eyes sizing me up.

i hated his smirk.
afterall who did he think he was?
i was the cool journalist and he was just some random dumb-ass MBA!
but patriarchy teaches us that i could have been goddamn godzilla;s friggin sister and it wouldnt have made a difference.
he would still have asked me about my salary and my "open-mindedness"!!

finally...really irritated id asked him what he did for a living.
now get a load of this..
"i sell freedom to women." he said.
is he trying to be cool and poetic...i thought to myself.
"excuse me?" i said.
"what does freedom mean to you?" he asked me cockily.
"listen, im just a dumb-ass journo so lets not waste time cos i got work to do. why dont you make it easier on everyone and just tell me." i snapped.

for the rest of my life il never forget what happened next.
he just leaned back (well as much you can lean on stupid uncomfortable barista chairs!) and smiled.

"im the head of marketing for "whisper"...the sanitary pads....for all of north india. so essentially i sell freedom to women."
(the smile grew bigger)

there was so much loud clunking in my head as i ran...im not even sure if i paid for my coffee.
apparently i mumbled something to him that could have been "my mother has gone mad" or "you have gone mad."

i came home...shouted at saroj...joked about it with my girlfriends...laughed till i cried at the absurdity of the situation and forgot all about it.
i mean imagine a cool cat like me married to a moron like him!!
i mean....really!

*CUT TO PRESENT DAY*

out celebrating with my friends...the fact that my divorce has FINALLY come through.
im free as a bird...ready to fly again.
and in the mad crush of the club who do i bump into?
ya...its him.
he shouts my name.

i smile and look closely trying to place him.
he says "im the guy who was selling freedom....only you didnt want any!"
normally i have a very expressive face.
its the bane of my existence...never being able to hide my feelings.
but thankfully for once, i was blank.

he pushed the girl next to him towards me.
"that's my wife. we've been married for 4 years. we have a son. he is home with grandparents as his parents get drunk." he went on and on..
"thats great" i mumbled.
"so, what about you?" he looked questioningly at me.

i struggled.
believe me i did.
struggled to tell the truth.
but finally i decided id taken one hit too many...this year.
so i smiled and said "freedom's great. i got some of it for myself too."
and before more questions came flying...i wished them well and ran.
i figured he never needed to know the irony about my freedom.

i dont think im a coward.
but sometimes i do wonder about life's choices. atleast the ones that ive made.

maybe il get saroj to put in another ad for me.
the one that will talk about how beautiful, open minded and friendly i am.
"put in well travelled also." my sister will insert the obvious joke.

or there is another alternative.
this city has just way too many reminders of my flawed and decidely crazy past.
so i think i may have to move.


m

the next step...

the step before the last one is always the toughest to take i think. the air of finalty that decides which side of the rope ul walk.....is still not there i guess. Struggling for 2 weeks and trying to put down the gazillion thoughts flashing in my head, i finally give up....

....and take refuge in the writings of the only man who hasn't let me down...yet.

“What is the feeling when you're driving away from people, and they recede on the plain till you see their specks dispersing?......It's the too huge world vaulting us, and it's good-bye. But then we lean forward to the next crazy venture beneath the skies.”

- Jack Kerouac



m

que sera sera...

i was so excited about meeting R and S that i almost didnt notice him at first.
perhaps the shadows inside the car ensured that i couldnt see his face.
or maybe it was the beard.
i dont know.

he didnt say much throughout the journey.
i guess we didnt give him a chance.
quietly i could sense him laughing next to me as the rest of us played catch-up.

R busy with a phone call, he started telling us about living alone in a mad city like delhi. the houses to hunt for. sometimes flat-mates if ur a bit tight on cash. hunting for the 'right' house-help who wont rob you blind.

i couldnt remember his name.
just your average-joe going on about mundane things in life.
joe with a soft voice and an accent.
joe who is from bangladesh, living in america and now here in india for a bit.
joe who likes classical, jazz and guitar.
joe who seemed so serious, i assumed he was much older.

as he got out, unloading his things from the car, R rushed to help.
S said he is not supposed to lift heavy stuff after his transplant.
"his transplant??" i asked.
with one of the bags tucked under his arms, R grabbed another suitcase and said,
"his father's liver got completely damaged, so he returned home and donated half of his liver."

shaken, i saw him run about getting his things together.
"how old are you?" i asked.
"23" he said, looking straight at me and smiling.
for the first time i clearly saw his face, his eyes.
as they stared back at me, they were calm.
no hint of panic and shock that i was clearly feeling.

"thanks for all the help. il see you around." he said and waved.
"will he be alright?" i asked R and S, as i saw him walk away.
"he's come this far, he'll be ok." R said shifting gears.

our car sped away into the misty night.
my thoughts with .. i still couldnt remember his name.
but atleast i now knew that he is no average-joe.
he must have guts of steel i kept thinking, wondering if all will be ok.

suddenly over the din of the traffic...i heard the radio playing...very very softly
que sera sera...



m

this year i will....

discussing the blues of life at 4am....cos both of us among many of our disorders have insomnia right there at the top!....one of my dearests sent me a poem last night.....his masterpiece just for me.

sharaab ki do boondon mein khushi aaj ghar laaye hum,
nasha utarne ke baad i DO feel like a bum;
par kal hum aur tum zaroor saath honge,
aur khushiyon ke hazaaar bahaane honge...

i went to sleep smiling...grateful for great friends.
but the blues had hit me cos someone yet again asked me that ever uncomfortable ques that i avoid every december! what was the year like for you? and what are the plans/resolutions for next year?

the years are going by in a flash with not much worth remembering. oh and i stopped making plans a long time ago. so what do i say?
all of us in the same sinking boat of life naturally gravitate towards each other...and board our very own titanic!

so this time we;ve decided to re-write history.
we will not let our titanic sink.
we will take life's lemons and serve it with tequila shots on our boat.
we will NOT squirm each time our failures are thrown at us.
we will embrace them cos thats how we're on a big boat full of people like us.
we will delete all attachments. those files dont open on most computers.
we will drink both beer AND wine.
we will smoke cigars and sing 'beedi'.

and yes a lil something just for me.
guitar lessons and belle dancing...to be able to make more music next year...



m

not quite the jackpot, but...

saroj isnt a huge fan of what she calls "mall culture".
they can sell you designer cow-dung she says!

i on the other hand have a compulsive "mall" disorder.
i can window shop for hours and hours and hours.
i go to malls. take a round. then start again...just gaze at things that i will never use and hence never buy. well...almost never.
sometimes they are just too pretty to resist.

but there MAY be something to be said about that whole designer cow-dung-phenomenon. for example...at rosebys (i love that store no matter what anyone says!) the other day i came across a very beautiful maroon packet with something in a ... well ... brighter maroon i guess!

i looked closely but for the life of me couldnt figure out what was in that plastic!
imagine my jaw hitting the floor when the salesguy said it was a towel.
at first i thought i hadnt heard correctly.
WHO buys a towel for 2 grand??
but then he repeated more firmly and pointed towards a tag...and lo and behold it said...a towel laced with secret desires!!!

i think there were wayyy too many expressions crossing my face at that moment cos he gently said that it was very popular.
reaffirming my faith...i see.
well i put it back with as much grace i could muster...having realised that i may have to make-do without any secret desires in near future since "the towel was out of reach"...and walked out.

but im thinking there IS something to be said for aggressive, strangely innovative marketing these days. double income households where money may not be an issue but imagination is sadly lacking. so a quick fix towel to the rescue!

why else would you need to rely on a towel or a pillow for some imagination!
yes pillow too! at cafe turtle ... they have these little heart shaped ones...depending on your mood.

purple one is for calm serene thoughts..i think.
there is a bright red one for lustful vibes. (yeah go ahead and laugh...i did too!)
infact gifted it to a friend as a joke.
the couple was having some problems and split up anyway.
not sure how much the pillow contributed to it...or maybe dealyed it...i dont know.

what i DO know is...a towel for 2 grand will only ever give me secret "guilt trips".
are you wondering why i told you this stupid story that u dont probably care about?
wel...here;s the punchline....

as i was walking out of rosebys....still reeling from what i now call the "towel effect"...the salesman gently pressed a paper in my hand and said he'd filled out a coupon for me for some lucky draw.

i stopped and without going into my whole life history...gently told him that id NEVER EVER in my life won anything...so it was kind but lucky draws werent for me.
he still insisted on taking down my details.
and though im always cynical about these things...for once i wrote it down for him.

a call just came...informing me that i have WON that lucky draw to shop for TEN THOUSAND rupees worth of stuff at rosebys...absolutely free of cost.
yieeee yieeee yieeeee.
i went back to thank the salesguy who'd pushed me into the draw.
he apparently lasted only a week in that job and had moved onto something else.
i still have my voucher for TEN GRAND.

any suggestions...what i should be shopping for at rosebys??
pls dont say towels!


m

CTRL-ALT-DEL

imagine suddenly finding an old diary in your cupboard.
it smells musty...with paper thats gone almost brittle...and ink that looks like its starting to leak a bit.

doesnt it make ur heart jump a little with excitement? just wondering what memories you'll find there...

for me....its always been about the romance of all things old....books, ideas, thoughts... all written down...and then reading it over and over again for hours...each time coming up with a new interpretation..

till i recently realised that i may actually be stuck in a time-warp.
swimming in the same old ideas and thoughts that one should have let go of long ago.
and everytime an old diary falls out....its like revisiting and then reliving every failure...with a new interpretation...one failure at a time.

so finally im a convert now.
converted to loving this thing called a "computer".
no more brittle memories on brittle pages...or old failures that have a potential to leak/bleed onto your present.

i still write.
only.....whatever i dont like....is now just a delete button away.
so can i now log onto a new beginning then?



m

the lost "me" in the collective "we"...

he was my last hope.
the one person i knew i could really bitch the world out with, as he blew smoke rings and sang and kept cynicism alive.
even he finally gave in to the pressures.
pressures to adapt to this consumeristic cycle of life...completely.

yes, consumeristic because every relationship and every emotion comes with an expiry date these days. even marriages.
ive celebrated my failures with him.
so im not surprised why i was the last one to know.

but he, who for as long as ive known him, had rejected every cliched conformist idea in the book....to now see him running around getting his "life ready" to get married scares me.

life has no answers he always said.
let yet another question get added to the long list...he now says to assure me.
il continue to fret over the layers and layers of mysteries of this life.

but i wish him all the best and hope that he will be able to find...the lost "me" in the collective "we"...


m