The other day I googled and read something and was fairly troubled. If you place someone on a pedestal, admire their spiritual accomplishments, read and savor their words with patience and respect—and then learn something to the contrary, a blemish, a major character fault—it is upsetting, disconcerting to say the least.

No smoke without fire. If that makes me a nasty bitch, so be it.

And like Caesar’s wife, I expect someone to be purer than driven snow.

You may have once held my respect. Once.

But I’m afraid I don’t give away my discrimination. I will not. Not this or any other lifetime.

There was so much that one had conquered, so much merit that one had earned, why would someone operating on a presumably higher plane throw it all away for mortal ties? Biology? 

But at a stage as advanced, and a path as arduous but known since several centuries to be demanding—have the baser instincts not been burnt out, conquered to a meaningless state long long ago? Isnt this basic?

Is my filter wrong, am I judging too harshly, and who am I to judge?

If this is true and not the handiwork of a posse of deranged women, what else is true, and what is not true?

Why would someone throw away the earning of several lifetimes?

I’m calmer after watching the forest yesterday, the play of light and the cycle of destruction and new life.

The take home?

Better recognition of the pitfalls.

An increased sense of wariness.

A refusal to be “influenced” blindly—if this is ego, so be it.

Let me remember, even the sage Vishwamitra had been waylaid.

You sit on the edge of your chair, gawking, heart staccato, you stare at the precarious line of a road snaking up the high mountains. The world’s highest motorable road, the anchor mumbles. He’s short of breath. Nerves tingling. No  guard rails, no barricade, nothing.. over that edge and you’re nothing. The temperature’s minus ten, minus twenty..Boulders teeter held in place by invisible string, you’re riding first clutch and your machine gasps for air every revolution… you sit on the edge and thank the Gods you’re sitting in your living room, and you whisper Khardung La...

DO NOT MISS.

Perilous Journeys/ Criss Crossing the Himalayas/ Marsh Mokhtari….National Geographic Channel

There’s a YT clip as well.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lIRjdJ1L1oo

Yesterday I saw the ending shots of A Passage to India.

Must have been a super movie.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Passage_to_India_(film)

Why only the ending shots? I was waiting for Ram Kapoor to finally meet Priya, whom he believes is dead, but who isn’t. Amazing how this story goes on and on and on.

Finally decided to go on a tree-watch trail this weekend. 

Else I’ll get antsy and pack and unpack and repack.

Shabnam Virmani at the Ramkrishna Math in Khar.
Still echoing
**

Before I lose the essence, let me put this in clumsy words.

On Sat I trekked through the urban village shortcut and reached Khar in time for Shabnam Virmani’s concert. Accompanied by one back up vocalist and one percussionist, she held the standing room-only audience enthralled for two hours.

Her repertoire of Kabir bhajans crisscrossed the country. The Baul ballads of West Bengal where despite the language gap the meaning made you cry—and I don’t cry easily, not anymore. The songs of Malwa and Rajasthan’s hamlets carried with them the fragrance of the tilled soil and endless horizon. After the performance and the standing ovation, and past the notes of the music, there was a soundless place she took us all to, a place of silent echoes where words are immaterial

And this is the part I snipped out:

While walking through that up-and-down hill village (now a lineup of shanties and tumbledown homes) the sole and upper of my sandals parted company. Even as the heavens opened up. Found a content cobbler who repaired these instantly and was surprised at tipping—a quiet man who packs up by eight  so as to spend time with his family, and revises homework with his sons every evening—wants his sons to go to college.. A builder’s board for a redevelopment scheme has been up for five years, and well yes, they’d get more space in rebuilt flats.The home-grown air about the place would be lost... Once, leopards roamed these slopes where industrial units and fancy office blocks stand tall.

The ceiling of the vaulted meeting room was far higher than in modern structures, and the bookcase held volumes of leather-bound natural history journals dating to the early 1900’s, just past a plaque with the names of the eight founding members, circa 1883. The adrenalin surge got me going, propelled me past heritage buildings, as well as a  crush-packed-to- the-max local train ride, and then from the station making my way via two once-villages (gaothan) back to work…what I will not forget is the grins on a gaggle of kids being escorted back from school, maybe 7 years old or so and perfectly at ease in the crush, nudging and teasing and laughing.

If you hang on by the door, you get a glimpse of some beautiful trees.

Yesterday I took the bus! Forgive that exclamation mark, but I enjoyed the smooth ride, and the elevated view a BEST bus offers. Nowadays tickets are quite hi tech too,digital slips, none of the ticket-stubs of my school-college days.

And I finally got home the tulsi sapling from the temple, which I visited after the ritual mourning  period. This morning I had it potted at the park, and then placed in my tiny box window. I returned grinning from the park. I’ve made new friends--children who live in the nearby municipal quarters. We watched frogs and a lone tortoise in a pond.

Limitless is very good. Solid science to the idea too—if serotonin reuptake inhibitors are possible, this is possible as well. Smart pharmaceuticals.. wish I had thought of this...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Limitless

Great essay, a take off on The Snow Leopard. Must find the book.

http://blog.contrarymagazine.com/2012/07/searching-for-the-snow-leopard-again/

The more I see, the more I read, and the more I interact, I see how critical it is to protect one’s own energies—a bounden first duty.

This delicacy of language

hints of subtext

restraint

Allusions and shadow

Lost in translation

The new form brittle, angular, brash

Like my words, wringing hands

words

That always fell short, no matter what

Now-- I can see that

“The hills! You must be going to some Ashram I bet!” the stranger scoffed.

“No…” I said, gesturing a walk.

Why is pursuit of the matters of the spirit looked down upon by “high” society—a choice of last resort, a time pass, something one pursues if one has nothing to “do” in life?

Mildly amused.

If my crisp work persona is what you see, good!

It is another matter that my God is the God of  the skies and hills and trees and rain and the whole world is his ashram--as also his play thing.

My moment of gut-punched epipany struck at the shop.  I was shown that shoe designed with perforated sides so that water could go through… returned home and watched as much as I could on YT. Swirling mists and craggy peaks. Keeping my fingers crossed and praying hard.
Whatever is willed.

Published!
http://flashesinthedark.com/2012/07/09/sandstone-with-gem-inlay-by-mira-desai/

This morning, after switching off FM announcing nonstop traffic/ storm at 7.30 AM, I randomly picked up a CD from Baba’s collection and heard a rendition of nonconventional Malhar by Pt. Jasraj, beginning with Ramdasi Malhar.

Just perfect for the season. A celebration of the skies.

 I can hear rain lashing the tarpaulin with fierce intent.

There is music in its beat.

Finally the skies have opened up

Gods have been kind

A patient earth awaits

Gushing manna from dark clouds

Thirsty greens revel

distant hills shrink to an  outline

The skies gush forth, endless, breathless

Electricity

A distant clap of thunder

This earth trembles

Renewal

Once again.

So many things can happen, once again.

A friend with a 1.5 hr commute one way treats it as “quality-time”, a picnic, a long drive, listens to songs,  has breakfast enroute and is all smiles when she reaches work… what an attitude!

Today I paid respects at my aunt’s funeral, holding my uncle up by the arm, what a loss for him after sixty plus years of being married. Though for the last six odd years she was bedridden and immobile, gradually becoming unresponsive with motor neuron disease. Nothing drives home how little time we really have--smashan vairagya as it’s called. How little time really, and part of the reason I step back from acknowledging, taking credit if I do something “good”, why should the right hand know what the left has given? At some point in some lifetime I have paid with a substantial punya-loss for ego, for arrogance, pride—by design or ignorance--who knows?—and in this lifetime I’m careful to not even lead at prayers, lest that breed pride, or self praise. Weird, but let it be.

Sweet Sixteen (yeah right!) is the title of a crisply-written, fresh young adult novel by Vibha Batra. A people-like-them Delhi kid moves to Chennai in Class 11, rebels a bit and then adjusts, even makes new friends. Sixteen is upbeat and enthusiastic, after long I finished a book at one go, staying up beyond midnight to finish. The writing is smooth and smart-- young, peppy--and I quite enjoyed some of the devices she used to sort of slot the book differently (but I shan’t give that away!). One identifies with the protagonist, her voice is very clear, as is that of her mom’s. The father for some reason gets minimal treatment, just a presence in the background, the man who pays the bills. In some ways a window into another world, one of cocooned privilege, where one isn’t terrified of not making it to the right college,or about current events, and where parents are anything but marks-driven and hands on, no angst, no rebelling. Perhaps small town India is different, or perhaps it was, and isn’t anymore and what do I know. The distractions and pressures that a sixteen-year old faces are not to be shrugged at, yes, I did gape at some of the escapades and guesstimate, wide eyed,  her pocket money. A happy, happy  read.

I dreamt of her last night, not the way she was later, not at the end, no not that, but a sixth-seventh grader, her hair in that tousled cut that I’d tease that the mice had nibbled at. In an underground manmade cavern, a ramp led to a lovely pool with great light and Moorish tiles on the walls, and suddenly the kid laughed and ran free and jumped into the pool, swimming like a dolphin, darting below the surface blowing bubbles, and just so happy, so free, the happiest I’d ever seen her. I awoke to a sense of peace, her pealing laughter tiptoeing into my day.

I'd be very worried if I were she
destroying a raven's nest embedded in a canopy 
of golden green, perfectly formed
where sunlight played hide and seek
green executed roughly on flimsy excuse-- 
 a call for trouble, tempting the fates
I'd be very worried indeed.


the silent afternoon errupted with the cries 
seemed like the skies were filled with black
 distraught crows flapping about
that majestic banyan tree came alive with their pleas
as they watched the chopping, merciless
branches tossed asunder
each cut of blunt axe a slap
to be earned back many times over
such is the curse of the ravens, the messengers of our forbears
I'd be very worried indeed


I usually sleep the sleep of the dead
but last night I awoke with a jolt
3.30 the clock read
I walked to the windows, watched worried
the amputated tree without its nest, the mother sitting over her eggs
in the cosmic game of give and take
what fury would this bring on
this callous call to a raven's might, this sly tempting of the fates
then i tossed and perchance slept
in this game of unending cross and naughts
perhaps this too, was called for
the die is cast, never undone.

Snoopy died early this morning, two days after his return from the dog hospital.

He was restless and disinterested in food these last few days, and one had to follow him  pleading.

The sight of his lifeless form by the parking lot will stay with me to my last days. And the memory of our man wagging his tail, having spotted me at a distance with his food bag late in the night, so as to avoid unctuous neighbors.

Dogs will bark, they’re dogs, it’s in their nature, right? Yet Snoopy had quietened quite a bit, wouldn’t take handouts from other people, and generally kept to himself.

RIP Snoopy.

 Move on to a better life.

The nearer you get to that half-century mark, the more you realize how little time there really is.
Yesterday I watched travel plans (a few months into the future) crumble and vanish, that elusive line of mountains grow hazy, as work deadlines intervened.
I raged and i fumed and roared, and I *adjusted*
Today the world has set itself right, flowers have their bright colors back.
Deadline restored.

back in the hometown, they had a townhall meeting to build a new, vibrant, buzzing city...
how I miss home sometimes, and how Mumbai sometimes feels like home...strange and unsettling feeling, this.
some photos in the meanwhile.

Inner Courtyard: Maharani Shantadevi NH

Baroda. Yes, the city of Kings. Including one who turned his back on the Emperor of Great Britain, the ruler of all domains.

Baroda. Heritage city. And its young who’d rather migrate to US UK NZ AZ anyplace even Fiji but not live here.

I want to go back someday. Which is why I still pay my property tax and light bills.

Baroda. Where the temperature sways from 7 degrees (in Dec.) to a sweet 47 (in May).

So shut up and tan/freeze.

Baroda. Where you have one of the world’s best art schools and a fine music college. Where every place is fifteen-some minutes away.

Baroda. Where you know the shortcuts that no one else remembers. And you still rue the time you returned an early Dickens to the Central Library, cause that was the right thing to do.

Baroda. The place that is still home in your dreams, where the stars spread silver on water-cooled terraces.

Wasn't this the Reading Room? opp Dandiya Bazar, off Rajmahal Rd.

Kalabhavan, MS Univ. The Faculty of Engg. The pharmacy dept was housed in a modern building, alas.

Kothi, the District Collectorate. Just how regal this looks!

The Old Police Headquarters.

Shiyabaug Police Chowky. Amazing wood cut outs.

My late aunt's house. Now this entirely gracious way of living is being abandoned.

Some beautiful work.
Anusha Jasraj’s Commonwealth prize winning story


Fatima Rashid’s Massachusetts Review story, *It Takes Two Hands to Clap*
(Winter 2010)


That envy-mountain took me a week to get over.

So right that the heavens tipped over- drenching me to the skin
this morning, the first real day of the monsoon
celebrated with a walk though a inspired forest
amidst Asia's largest slumland.
eighty feet of soil spread across seventeen acres
a bricklined path zigzagging
and a forest of sturdy medicinals and perennials planted
 nature left to do her job
birds, butterflies, bees, moths
humming, trilling,
creating a magic neverland
after the skies poured
notebook tucked away
trying to soak in all the wisdom
only the taste remains
and awe

Venus trails her fingers

across the face of the sun,

surrenders herself to  fiery nothingness

delights in the scorching  flare

her dance languorous

every moment made to last

the next hundred seventeen years.

~

Venus transit

Suddenly the resident crows on the banyan

Turn silent

Cowls, mourning

But how did they know?

~

All day I sat

my back to the glittering sea

The waters tipping to the horizon and beyond

A little quieter today,

witness to the dance of the celestials

All day I sat

Clenched fist.

I must be the strangest person I know

Every morning

I talk to trees

Grin at new leaves nodding in the breeze

Exult at the touch of sunshine on green

Frown, coax a branch that’s given up on the fight

A strange kinship, unspoken

Binds me to the ground, this ground

Yesterday

I met them again, all of them,

As if for the first time

Reveled in their families, their origins

Snippets of their history

From the hoary passages of time

Two plus hours trooping from tree to tree

In the park where I usually rush past

This once a note-taker, hanging on to every word

So yes, I met them all again

Tivar, Cajuput, Sita arjuna, Nagakesar

But the sense of pride at the expert’s exclamation

Or a special feature

Was something I lack the words for.

Only in Bby do you venture from work at 11pm, and are not scared out of your wits driving past almost empty industrial-area roads, only in Bby do you call and tell your vegetable vendor to leave your order with the security guard at the main gate of your complex, only in Bby do you eat s'wiches at midnight listening to songs over the radio, and no one gives quite a damn. 
Salaam Bby.

Vedic hymns

Rise to the skies

Fervent prayer

~

Marigold, ashoka leaves, jasmine

Festive crowds but no jostling

the red of the shamiana reflected on eager faces

Such is the power of the presence

What must happen when avatars visit?

~

Young boys enunciate in precise sanskit

Proud heritage

of limits, bounds and standards

Reciting from memory, perfection

I watch with envy.

Back home

the loafers, the idle, time pass

Mohawk cut and long tressed,

smoke weed, play cards,

begin every second line with the F word

These guys don’t even hobble to the starting line

Karma!

Amongst beautiful things encountered:

A perfect alphonso mango, an aaphus, from my friend V’s ancestral lands somewhere along the sloping hills of Ratnagiri; I wait for this one since it is the only mango I shall relish this season,

The glittering shimmering sea from the 19^th flr at NP,

The wow factor of my first ever telepresence conference…astounding!

The brilliant look of Madame Tutli Putli : YT
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7icAFa8fdLY
those eyes!

Awe at this poem from Rasala

http://www.rasalabooks.com/krishna-as-magician/

I crave the sun. I thirst for it, like a junkie needing his fix. Or his eyes go all wonky and his hands shake…or whatever it is that happens--but a fix all right, this walking in the scorching sun, walking as my skin warms and then sizzles and tans, and my brain makes whatever connections it does to energize my day like a shot of electricity. I thirst for it, like the green that lines the track, chlorophyll coming to life as sunlight seeps in, nourishing, validating a reason for its existence. I think of Karna, paying homage, arghya, to the Sun by the lazy waters of the Ganges. And then walking back, bronze-rippled even as the Sun coasted overhead, aloof but watching. I think of the wife of the Sun god who’d created a shadow personae, Chaya, because she couldn’t withstand his brilliance. And mostly I think of the play of light and dark, and the unending cycle of seasons, and lifetimes.

the gulmohur are in bloom.
delicate and generous.
glamorous!

Today’s beautiful thing was the celebration this evening with my friend X.

She  celebrated her four walls becoming her own, her loan repaid in full. Now she and her son are secure for life.

The mandatory six-month wait for her divorce will be over next month.

Peace of mind, freedom from mental trauma is a truly beautiful thing.

That line of mountain-valley
Hovers over my day
an invisible charm


#


deft line strokes
haiku masterpieces.
in translation:
The effrontery!
enchantment vanishes


#
lines on a map
hop, skip and jump
a ribbon to the horizon
neat


today's beautiful thing: Google images for Valley of flowers + India

Today’s beautiful thing: The art of Henry Darger



Discussing with my friend A, abt whether imagination limits what one writes, specially if you’re writing essays, CNF, and what happens once you’re done, you reach the limit?


She pointed me to Henry Darger.


What a story.


What amazing art--- what ABANDON… his figures fly off the plane of the page into the ether with a whistle


BUT to think of all this while plodding on at a day job? A lower level one, cleaning floors and rolling bandages?


To think and make such AMAZING art cloistered in a room, WITHOUT the pat on the back that you and I and every single one professing to be CREATIVE craves?


HOW?

(If we must put Darger in a box labeled strange and borderline psychotic—a lot of artists belong in there, starting with Van Gogh, and I can live with that, damn and ptoee to the labeling.)


Google images for Henry Darger

Today’s beautiful thing:


Yesterday, thanks to my friend N, I watched some fantastic work: Motley’s presentation of One Act Plays by the redoubtable Mr. George Bernard Shaw. Prithvi does not tolerate the unprepared---with that perfect-acoustics amphitheater there’s no room for goof ups. GBS would have been proud of that perfect British diction, sharp accent and polished acting.
Three One Act Plays were featured: English Pronunciation, How he lied to her husband, and Village Wooin’ (see links)


English pronunciation was amusing and an eyeopener; I learned how much of the language I happily maul. But as long as I don’t have to present anemones to a Viscount in Islington, I should be all right.


Yes, the diction was so sharp it could slice a brick. Given our Indian propensity for rounding edges, bringing in a dash of local flavor from all the vernacular languages  we’re proud to know, and mumbling words-- I wonder how they did it.


Perhaps this is what professionalism is, delivering a flawless performance despite.


The cast deserved every single clap of that standing ovation.


English Pronunciation: http://seit.unsw.adfa.edu.au/staff/sites/hrp/useful/EnglishPronunciationGBShaw.html

How He Lied To Her Husband : http://www.gutenberg.org/files/3544/3544-h/3544-h.htm


Village Wooin’ : http://www.indianexpress.com/news/by-george-its-classic/823976/

Today’s beautiful things

When I picked up yesterday’s images from my long-patient flickr account, I found these.

Stone work from a window at the Nizam’s Chowmahalla palace, Hyd.
Stone work from a pillar at Baroda Palace gate.


Spectacular craftsmanship.
When I see good work, it pokes and prods me, what have I done recently? Anything chiselled?

Today’s top beautiful thing:
http://www.rcahms.gov.uk/news/lost-imagery-of-india-discovered
Have you seen THIS? Photos from the Raj, 1912-1914. What a gift!
Don’t miss the Sahib in sola topee and suit in sweltering Calcutta, and the tea party.

Compound interest is one of the more beautiful things on earth. As lovely as dividend income, preferably tax free. Compund interest pays the bills and school fees when you have to downsize your job to take care of your ill wife and young daughters. Some of my earliest memories are of depositing dividend cheques at the bank, at a time when perhaps the teller counters were higher than I was. That change from a driver-driven car in class 1, to class 3’s pushing into a crowded school bus , first weeping and then damn well learning how to. Art class- batik work, clay work... Hobby Center.. Music lessons on and off and on. Sleeping on the terrace-- silver on concrete,  the cool touch of bedsheets, that endless array of stars in the sky, feeling scared at an odd rustle in the night, and pretending to sleep. Those vacations spent reading all the books at Cinderella’s, the neighborhood library. Those vacations at tourist spots in the state, Tithal, and Chorwad and Saputara and Dandi.



Perhaps that  was mindful living.

I returned slightly fuming from the park this morning—if such a thing is possible. Something’s off about this man playing so intensively with this child that’s not his, taking her on bike rides and all, does her grandmother not see?

Then on the other hand, my intuition has tracked way off radar in the past, so perhaps I should just shut the fug up.


Ma would never have allowed it. Never.


This—personal space, not letting someone touch you in certain places, walking away, even hitting if someone acted funny, telling her no matter what—this is one of the first things she’d taught me at seven.


Ma as in Mummy, my stepmom. As Lincoln said, his angel-mother.


My own mother (who’d been very ill for most of her life) died when I was five, and then for a year I was a vagabond, traipsing from house to house, bai trailing sometimes, sometimes not, hair uncombed, meals not eaten, homework undone. A skinny unkempt brat.


Just as I was about to be packed off to public school, a family friend introduced her once-classmate in distant A’bad, aka Mummy.


I just guess I was just very very lucky.


I still remember—now someone would tell me what time I could come back from play, someone would pack my lunchbox. Instead of vagabond avatar, I began going to art class and music class at Birla Academy. Ma made a wall calendar from my first painting. That year, I remember I got a prize for civil deportment. That was Class 1.


Class 2 and life tumbled all over again. The doctors who were taking Ma through childbirth in A'bad, goofed horribly, and while the princess was perfect, thanks to God’s grace; Ma was in coma for three months and paralysed completely when she miraculously awoke.


But she was a different person. The loving, sensitive, generous woman, a classical sitarist, had become a poor joke of herself, a parody—she couldn’t move a finger and boy was she going to let you know about it. So there were these tornado-like downtimes but there were genuinely caring and fantastic times too, you never knew which was coming next. She waited for me to come home from school, asked me about my day, she nursed me when I ran raging fevers of 104. Music lessons, art , how to talk how to walk, how to behave, how to speak, how not to, how to hit out—all of this she taught us. In time, the kid and I developed private code to identify the weather. Sudden dust storms, sudden cyclones and lightning were phenomenon you learned to live with and navigate, tip toe past and sure enough calm seas would ensue, Sometimes I think I adjust too much, give too trustingly and expect little in return on account of this conditioning. It is only now, at 47 that I have learned to watch myself and to demand and yes, stomp my foot hard, literally and figuratively, too bad if you don’t like it.


Ma was very bitter when she died after 22 years of illness, the princess’s death added to the toll. But she had her good moments too.


And if I walk with a straight spine and can converse equipoise with beggars as with kings, I know where the credit is due.

The laburnum are blooming, their color a match for the scorching sun. Last few nights the moon has been magnificent, a giant helium balloon riding the sky. Wonder what it must’ve been like in places where it spills silver on the ground. Wonder what Van Gogh would have done with a moon like this, as magnificent, as crazily generous.



In other stuff, that Tagore thing didn’t come thru, licked my wounds but I shall survive and recycle.


Satyamev jayate is piercing and cool but takes away 1.5 hours on a precious Sunday—I dusted and cleaned shelves during the ad breaks. Solid guts the man has, to make this. female foeticide is a tough one to tackle head on.


Was on thin ice, y’day morning my aunt had reminded me of all the vows and boons and beseechings the parents went thru to have me, and how I’d been dressed in second hand clothes for the first five years to keep a promise. Guess I’m lucky, superbly lucky to be born in a household where my birth was keenly awaited, where I had the freedom to step out and make my own way... But for the grace of God.


Lucky too, to be born on this side of the border, and despite myself am reading Tehmina Durrani’s My Feudal Lord, parts of the story remind me of a certain someone.Yes, the grace of the Lord.

The great Mughal Emperor, Jehangir, is believed to have said about Kashmir, “If there is Paradise on earth, it is this, it is this, it is this.”

My very modest attempt to salute this enchantment, “These Secrets of Spring” is published in The Valley Scribe.

A poem, “May Morn in Mumbai”, is on page 10.



http://www.cwc-sfv.org/ValleyScribe/


(page 8, 9,10)

These last few nights

I’ve been dreaming-- recurrent dreams
Of health emergencies
that you didn’t have
not on that last journey
never ever
Each worse than the one before
I awake thoughtful, perplexed.
Perhaps in a part of my mind
A space
still holds fast
still denies
Perhaps I still need to surrender
What I cradle in these thoughts
To the five elements;
Let you roam free where your spirit soars
and infinitesimal slivers of your soul,
finally free
dance with the sunlight
to rebirth

Nagphani. And that steep incline to the top, after the level, walk-in-the-park bit… That thudding-heart clambering about on rocks and climbing on, ever upwards till that steep rock face with no toe-holds and no-shrubs-to-hold-for-dear-life incline Perhaps it was the slope of the treadmill or its speed, but while the doc continued to make polite conversation, the machine hummed and the probes recorded, that’s what I thought of. That stress test was neat, no fuss.

*

I’m delighted to announce publication of a short story, Brittle, in Them Pretentious Basterds, a smart, cool magazine out of Chennai. The artwork is amazing.



http://thempretentiousbasterds.tumblr.com/post/22042722353/them-pretentious-basterds-teal-issue


(See page 45)


*

Other people, other places

Slices of memory, wisps really, that seep through the indifference of an ordinary existence. Sentences remain, disjointed, or the memory of a look, and add color to the arc of a life lived, somewhat. Sentences of unexpected concern permeate the thick cloak of an everyday-thick skin that one sheathes oneself in, the better to do battle with the contingencies of the day, and reminds one of the kindness that we bring to our transactions merely by being human.

Years later, these lines reach out of the ether and pour the salve of kindness and understanding on wounds that may otherwise remain raw lifelong.

The high school teacher, rumored to be from an old Chicago family, who’d brought life to history in small town India. Else all kings would have built roads and planted trees and had wells dug for travelers.


That sub-zero day in DC, and that tall lady in afro hairdo who’d taken pity on my shivering self, the trail of moisture from my eyes, and said, “ Your stole’s about falling off, dear.” Its been eight years, and yes, I remember. And its her I remember when I think of the US, and not the slights at check in.


That wizened tribal who’d offered us a hand up, that day that we’d gone to remote Amboli in a rattling, empty state transport bus. She’d almost lifted the parent and helped him alight.


Amazing what stays alive in this storehouse of memories.


The kindness of strangers on the writing circuit, sheer goodness that goes way beyond the scale. Rob of six sentences was the first to give me a break, my sentences terse and staccato, and strung along on a bonanza of commas. But his acceptances had helped me gather up and put together scattered parts of myself. A few lifetimes may not suffice to thank MS, who like an angel from some scripture, had stepped forth to direct me to the IWW that day in 2006. Yes, it has been as long..


And the generosity of strangers on IWW, strangers who’ve become closer than family in some ways.


How do you even begin to thank them?
#

Once upon a time, my neighborhood’s maze of buildings, shanty-towns and glitzy hi-rises was a jumble of forest, tiny velvet fields tucked in by an ancient Buddhist shrine. A story, *A Kondivita Girl*, featuring a puzzled ghost, won a prize and was published in *The Mahakali Voice*.

My portfolio is on tumbhi!

http://www.tumbhi.com/dowatch.html?watch=xyz24950abc

Go read. If you've read, then re-read. And so on.

“Perhaps its me.” All this time the man would talk some and switch off, talk some and yes, you get the drift-- connect and walk away, this over YEARS—and all the time I’d keep wondering what happened, what I’d said wrong, and then I’d go on living my life. My reticence and thankfully traditional 17th C mores kept me out of any nonsense. Of course there were tears, and much beating of chest, I was an emotional idiot those days. Now I’m the cynical bitch (and loving it).

NOW I’ve learnt what

The man is a CYCLER.

Yes, a bipolar, MDP.

Explains so damn much.

So where do you step in. Should you even step in, people resolve their own karmic paths, their own journeys, life lessons, and all that. Not to discount the ego-build up brownie points, that do-gooder pat on the back, which creeps in automatically, can’t miss those red flags of I, I I…. The new lady who cleans the washroom had lost her husband in a nasty road accident a year ago, the kids are pretty useless and the family distant, as it sometimes is. So where do you step in, if at all--do you? A note or two passed wouldn’t make much of a difference to me, but might help her. Usually by conscious effort I try hard to stay uninvolved, preferring people to sort out whatever they have to, would helping interfere with a path of repair and learning that is already on?



I wish I knew.


I wish I didn’t remember what kick-in-the-gut grief feels like, every time I see her

Trees laden with yellow cassia

laburnum trembling awake

To birdsong

And someday perhaps I shall write of these

In happy, complete and content stories,

plump and placid with ever-afters.

Until then I find delight

In giving shape to

The sly and crafty, shrewd and cunning,

Shortcut prone, gritty underside

The city trembles when they walk.

Women with rich pasts and edgy tempers

And smiles like steel

Stories that waft in with the wind.

much as you’d like to believe otherwise

When I dot my I’s and cross them t’s

Tis with glee, at least, or a smile.

An underworld-inspired story, A Day of Silent Prayers, is now published on Pure Slush



http://pureslush.webs.com/dayofsilentprayers.htm

It is your birthday today. April 17.


I shall do all the usual things one does on birthdays.


Then I shall stare at the skies.

Yesterday I’d dug deep, googling an author who was a very distant name (my stepma’s grandfather) and I’d almost fallen off the settee. The accomplishments were awe inspiring, numbing, even a hundred years after- Bar-at-law, fellow of the Royal Asiatic Society, reference works that are perused even now. Yet, the immediate family, his third and fourth generation descendants, does not quite give a damn. Got me thinking about legacies, particularly of the written word. And lineages that go beyond the geneline.

Delighted to announce publication of a poem, Spring, on 7 beats.



http://www.7beats.com/herenow.html

So little time to the day. And there are personal commitments I will NOT cut down on. I will walk. I will cook. I will write even if its scraggly. Work is not too easy, not too tough, requires I keep up with a barrage of information, just keep moving. Personal time is limited—very. Just realised that it is personal ENERGY that is limited. Must be very careful about who and what I invest that energy in. If I spend 1.5 hours in front of the idiot box staring at a Balaji story that really is my problem. If I tell bai that locking someone’s keys inside their house and running around to hunt and find the keys was a result of her perpetual hurry—but I frown about this all day, then that energy drain is MY problem.  Why should I play any part, however reluctant, in anyone’s life dramas? Tumhara natak, tum sambhalo. If I fritter away energy, where will I find the time to invest it, direct it?

Link OD

Chanced upon a dream home in kota stone and white. Perfect for dry hot cities (like back home), where temperatures are above 40 degrees C most times and above 47 C a few months.



Loved the way they’ve used stone, light and splashes of color.


http://devyanijayakar.com/guggari.pdf






The AT small cool entries are drool-worthy…


http://community.apartmenttherapy.com/contests/smallcool/2012






“Wish-I-had-written-that” envy at the tumbhi shortlisters, specially Vibha Batra’s The Survivor. Perfectly crafted.


http://www.tumbhi.com/short-story-writing-contest/somewhere-sometime.jsp

There is a time for all seasons....



What a googly life throws at you sometimes.

You can butt your head against the wall, and to no avail.

And then be surprised out of the blue.


I wish I could've told you.


But I shouted to the skies anyway.

Today I tracked down the closest bank branch where they’d do a Western Union transfer, and collected $50 (or Rs.2482, to be precise), but how rich does every pence feel when its for your writing.

Bai’s son has flunked his 9th standard. Yet again. Bai slogs at 5 homes, an endless round of “top work” chores, stretches her limited salary and pushes her sons to an English medium school and tuitions. The vagabonds skip classes and play marbles or whatever is the equivalent thereof. Her eldest, a driver with some travel agency, took his boss’s car on a midnight spin with his coterie, crashed the car, and the lady slogged to repair and return the car to its owner to avoid a police case. For a calamity, any of the memsahibs would have helped, but who wants to throw money at a lost cause, the boy is a scoundrel? Of course it is not the son’s fault, he is good, his friends made him do it. Why does she not make the 9th class–in-limbo a wireman or an electrician or plumber instead? No, he must clear his tenth boards and he must go to college come what may.



One can take a horse to the water but one cannot make him drink, as Baba used to say.

Had I known installing plants on that tiny window ledge was going to be as inspiring, evoke a sense of ownership and yes, contentment, I’d have done that long ago.





In the shanty town these days there seems to be a season of nonstop recital of the Ramcharitmanas.




Yesterday from 4 till ten I visited two worlds. Negotiated a single person-only, winding alley in a shanty town to reach a friend’s engagement ceremony. Later, dined in understated opulence elsewhere, making polite talk, calculating the manhours it would take to keep the environs as pure and pristine white.