The anatomy of depression

 Sometimes in the midst of a happy moment

The black clouds of gloominess come calling for me

It appears like depression is marching towards me with its black arms spread, aiming to devour me 

I scramble to save myself, looking frantically for that dollop of sunshine I had a few moments back

Scavenging my box of golden moments to drape around me and escape the approaching beast

I try desperately to reason with the cruel mind that what I am feeling has no rhyme or reason

But the heart listens to none of my mind’s shenanigans and the body also betrays me

With time I am learning to be thick skinned and grow thorns

so that unhappiness gets bruised when trying to overpower me

But this hardening of heart seems to harden my soul too

The butterflies in the stomach are long dead

P.S - Not the best way to re-write on my blog after more than two years, but the most honest way I could think. I will never let go of this blog despite FBs and Instas ruling the social media. I hope there are people here who still want to read me.

Stop..renew..play

Boredom is creeping inside me like a deadly snake..snarling and hissing
Pouring its venom on every organ...on everyone I meet

My mind tethered to the sameness of everyday-ness...pivoting around mindless things, things that dont matter yet make me mad

I think its the time that the snake sheds its exuviae..and adorns itself with new skin

To be or not to be

Is it possible not to exist for some days, as in choose a day in the week when you dont want to exist

Non-existence- Don't confuse it with being at home and lying around and not doing anything

Its like being wrapped in a vacuum bubble, where nothing changes, nothing in the world, the world thats mine

Aaru and I both, no therapies, no physical tasks, no supplements to worry about
And that day should not count at all in history, its not a day wasted

When the whole day I tire myself with thoughts of what next to do, what next to accomplish and I hit on a spot where I feel numb by the end of the day and just vaguely wonder..if only tomorrow did not come

But tomorow I want to exist, as tomorrow is the day I began my existence :)

Moments of God

Every morning I like to grab all things auspicious

I sit down with my lemon tea and smell it deep...trying to breathe in bits of pleasure

I savor my son's half baked smile..when he is half awake and smiles like a dream
Sleepy yet trying to return my false exuberance

And I sing for him "Say hello to the Sun..shining down on me"

I pay my attention to Ma's chit chat..Ma who has been with me..my only solace and punching box in the last 2 years..

I try to do my part of the work in the morning, trying to keep my heart light
Pumping in energy by trying to steal it from Aaru..No No..not steal, but multiply

Then we all sit down. Aaru eats, Ma feeds and I sit on the side having tea and whatever is left of the morning's beauty

I call these moments of my life now..moments of God..
When s/he is holding me upright to combat the rest of the day

Who knows what the day would bring in?

Nadir

I feel like I am falling down in an abyss daily
It's not a free fall, a free fall would hurt less

But with my eyes wide open I am getting rubbed against each debris around me
Gathering all the dirt and pain
The lies and deceit, the web of master strokes people weave around you
Catching you off guard

People who were supposed to protect and shield you..

Sometimes I wish I could blind fold myself and have a free fall.. 
At least have the exhilarating sense of speed

But that's not a luxury I am entitled too

So I watch and get hurt... Knowing well and sure that one day I am about to hit the base
Not sure anything in me would remain by the time I reach my nadir!

Marriage...yet again

Marriage can be an enriching or a debilitating experience

Before you realize what it is..it gets too late
Then you are left trying to find a balance between the 2 extremes

But that can never be done..not a possibility for a human with passions

If you have passion for yourself, you would find the debilitating in something which is not enriching
You would find disaster in something which is stereotypical
You would find doom in something which is moderately OK

Who is to be blamed, what is to be done?

Cos someone like me can not be part of mundane

I have decided on one thing..I will say all the things to myself that I wished someone else would say to me..someday..sometime

How does it matter that the words you want to hear are said by you and noone else

So somedays I tell myself..you are strong as hell, noone can touch the fire in you..I am like Dagny Taggart from Atlas Shrugged(someone had actually once said that to me) or Maya Angelou's phenomenal woman

Or some days I revel in my own mystery, and fall in love with my own slightly kohled eyes..
I feel like embodiment of all the secrets a woman is made of..like Binodini of Choker Bali, like Anna of Anna Karenina, like Tess of Tess of D'urbervilles

And on another day when I feel defeated, I feel a nothing, I feel like a wind in barren land..I still presume there is some beauty in that, must be..cos someone like me can not be part of mundane

Yes its just that one last thing about me which keeps me going, that I feel like that about myself..always..forever

Rebuild me..from scratch..you(who does not exist, only in my mind now)

I surprise myself at the contradictions that I see in me, and the way I deal with different situations with contrasting attitudes

There are times when in the grimmest of grimmest moment, I have acquired a happy disposition, I am actually acting better than before, not panicking, just trusting and believing in something good.

But then comes some other times, I just break into pieces, scattered, not a bit of me knows how to arrange myself in a recognizable fashion.
Those things one might consider very small, and find an outlet to dispose off the garbage, but I find all my outlets clogged and the feeling forming a stench and stinking within me

Sometimes the small things that I wanted in life..they look so big now..
Anything unfulfilled becomes a disease, a nagging pain, an all encompassing feeling pervading every bit of you

Probably those are something so core to you, so abstract, so fragile that you had never known how to deal with them

टूट के बिखरना मुझको जरूर आता है 
वरना इबादत वाला शऊर आता है 

I, for sure, know how to break and get scattered
Otherwise I know the beauty of praying

(I think the translation is not great, and I dont know the best words to do it)

The journey begins again

Why do people stop blogging? The ones who loved doing it once.

I fail to answer, as I am one of them.

And to top it, I think of it everyday. I scribble things and then read it and find it trash and never get to publish. Its like my writing has not ripened enough to be shown to the world.

What stops the flow of eccentric enthusiasm which brimmed earlier? Is it that you have become stale and can not conjure enough novelty? Or is it because you are bored of it? Or is it because you are not sad and yearning for something, which stops you from being dramatic in your writing? Or that you are too busy (most lame excuse, noone is ever too busy to do something they love)? Or is it cos you are too happy in your world that the blog world does not hold any meaning to you anymore?

I dont think its any of that! I think its more of the inertia of things which gets to you, once you get into the motion of not writing. But you keep thinking, I will get back to it with a bang.

I have things to say, share, create. I have too many drafts to publish.

So I have made a pledge, I will write at least once a week. Be it a line, or share a song, or any bullshit.

But I wont stop it to get into that inertia.

My blog has been my shiniest spot in life for over 7 years now, and I can not let go of that.

Not for anything new in life, not for any sorrow or for any joy.

So I hope someone is still looking at this corner of mine, someone is still interested in hearing what I have to say.

And say I will, about me, about things around me.

The journey begins again...

Why Big Boss?

I dont know why I become so hyper at times seeing some shitty reality show!!
I know I sound loony even to myself, but for some reason I get too passionate and obsessed about some people I hate/like in a show like Big Boss.(similar to Big Brother)

I have noticed this has been happening with me since last 3 seasons, basically last 3 years.
Though in the last Big Boss, I was not crusading for anyone specific but I had a few pet hates. I could not stand hypocrisy of some.

In the last to last season, I really rooted and voted many a times for Mehak and I hated Juhi Parmar for ganging up with the likes of Aakash deep and Pooja Bedi, complete brainless,  loud jerks.
My cousin (who used to watch it with me in that season) and I, would usually stand for the same people and share our exasperation with one and all, even though others could not comprehend our madness for T.V actors.

And this season I , with all my heart hate Armaan and that shitty, joke of a woman Tanisha, who has no self respect. She swoons over a jaded, bad-mouthed, MCP like Armaan as if she is some 18 year old nubile nymphet.

So when today,  nomination for eviction was announced, these 2 along with other 2(Andy and Sangram, who sided with them for votes, in-spite of both of then having major fights with Armaan earlier, as Armaan is one abusive person who does not leave anyone) were fool-proofed, I have been feeling a palpitation for who would be eliminated this week.

I wish not my favorite Gauhar. It would be sad to see the only one who maintained her dignity, to leave the show to a bunch of bullies and doormats.

But I am more bothered about my deep association with these characters, than the characters themselves.
I have no idea why such a reality show should inflict anything on me.

Gradually I have come to understand only one thing for such a grave obsession , that all my anger from people, from my life, from injustice I have seen or borne, from conniving treachery others close to me have been subjected to..all of it comes alive when I see a show like this, with real people and real situations.

I know its stupid and irrational, but when was I rational?

Quick Post

I have been away for more than a month, ,with lots of thoughts to write about..but not much of time or inclination.
So all that is lying in my draft, or my phone's notes.

But thats cos I have been busy with preparing for something pretty extensively.
And I need best wishes from all on that front.

I will let you know what it is and how it goes, when that happens.

I just had to write this post, cos I cant let my blog abandoned for long.

Jobless in Bangalore

I sit on the couch for hours watching back to back recorded episodes of "Grey'a anatomy" (the earlier ones on star plus and later ones on Zee Cafe), One tree hill, mad men..and anything which catches my fancy while flipping channels

I start feeling as if I was born and raised on this couch

So how does it feel being so free and having time to yourself to pursue whatever you want, must be really great!
NO it sucks!

There were so many interests I pursued earlier, while I was working and they seemed interesting to me
Now even dance does not excite me...cos everything looks like a compensation for something major I am missing in life
My job..I dont recall a day of my life where I ever thought I would not be working

Even the blog was such a respite earlier..and now it seems like a task!

Some women might be OK not working after marriage, but I was never going to be that woman, thats what I had sworn to myself

And look where life gets you sometimes...amongst the 3 of we sisters, I am the only one not earning right now

The body loses its energy if it does not do what its always meant to...then no substitute is enough.. reading..dancing..fashion...dining out...nothing helps!

So every day I go through such weird thoughts, sitting alone on the couch, willingness to move having left me

Then I pick up broken pieces of my heart and start all over with.....hmmm Grey's anatomy... err One tree hill..

Today while coming to work my auto was stopped in the middle of the road, along with other traffic moving in my direction.

Some workers, who were working on broadening the road we were moving on, stopped us.
Reason - The bulldozer needs to come this way, from the opposite direction and enter this road from wrong side.

Whoa! And this happened right at Vellara Junction which is a prime area, just off MG and brigade road. To top it it was the peak traffic hour when all are moving towards their offices.

I started asking auto guy as to what was happening, since I dont understand Kannad(even after 8.5 years in this city). When he told me, I got furious and stepped out and told them to move away and let the traffic go.
Such work is not to be done during peak hours, plus getting that huge thing from completely wrong direction? Who does that?
Seeing me, the other girl in a car next to my auto started meekly too.

Those workers tried arguing with me for sometime. But since I wasn't relenting(and when I get furious no one can argue with me), they thought its best to tell me that they don't understand Hindi and cant speak to me
Oh, so after conversing with me for sometime in Hindi, they had momentary lapse of Hindi-knowledge?!

But thankfully my auto guy was decent and took over from me in their native language(not for the love of me but auto drivers hate wasting time in traffic and many a times would reject dignity of a red-light too)

So they had to finally stop from stopping us, before their bulldozer can make its grand entry.

But I was left wondering where can such bizarre things happen in this world?
I dont think metros like Delhi, Bombay are tolerant towards such idiosyncrasies.

Bangalore has yet to learn that it is also in the same league!

The same old feeling

I felt very friday-ish today.
Picked up a harem-pant and short top to go to work.
I usually dont go this casual to work.

My hair is mostly let loose, but for some reason I felt like doing something different.
Put on earring and tied a plait.

I looked at myself in the mirror and felt different too. I felt I was 20 again. A refreshing feeling swept over me

I mostly dont remember how I felt when I was younger, I dont even remember what it felt to be me, a year back

So sometimes I play a game with myself, of role-play
I play my own role, to myself, from some other era
And believe me you, the moment I step into that role, I feel exactly the same
its as good as being in those times again

I felt the same pride in myself, a little coquettish, a little elusive, a little flirty , a little bit of drama-queen

I had a spring in my feet, I tilted my head in that same familiar way

So today, I spoke a little more, laughed and joked a little out of my character, with people around me and saw surprise on their faces

I could smell fragrance of old times around me
I could force pores and nerves of my heart to open up different chords, the ones I hadn't in a long time

I could wire up strings inside me in the wrong-most way, to get the right-most feeling
God lets me play such tricks at times

And all this just cos I felt like feeling it
Its easy to switch back in time, if I decide to.

I thought of picking only the good today
Discarding any vile feeling
I will pick up a smile on the way

On days like these, I will make a life, of my favorite picks

Life outage

Sometimes I dont feel like writing
Cos my best words are always swallowed in my mind, before time

And the moment I begin to write
Its just mediocrity which flows
UN-impressive and UN-inspiring
So I clamp up

This thing, coupled with internet outage at my place has made me write less here
To top it, even at work today there was no network for an hour

I felt crippled for sometime..

It was like I cant do a thing without the net
Strangely for other inconsequential stuff also my mind kept telling me : this cant be done since there is no net
For stuff like going out and getting myself a cup of coffee

I have to be either in front of the system or Tv Or in some transit
To feel life is moving

Else its a shutdown of life.

Single and Independent

I have been hospital-hopping for the last 2 days. I have visited 3 doctors and 2 hospitals in a span of 2 days.

Its not a survey I am doing, but as usual my stomach. I had to miss my Pondicherry trip cos of this. That trip which I had forced others to plan with me and finally I had to drop out

And whats the consequence of all those blood tests etc ? - "Essentially Normal". As usual, which we found even 2 years back

Its some mysterious undiagnosed thing, which burns me out completely.

And sometimes its conversations with some doctors which ticks me off!

Here is one with one of the doctors I met yesterday:-
"Whats your age"
I tell my age
"Single or married"
I - "Single"
He - "I admire your independence"

Strange isnt it? That a woman of certain age, and single is perceived as independent. As if, its something commendable.

Which age are we still in?

So how about a man who can still be ten years elder than me and a bachelor? Yet no one would say the word "independent" for him. Being single for a man is ordinary and routine thing, but for a woman an achievement?

Men can survive without a woman, but a woman doing it attaches a label to herself "independent","admirable". I find it so funny and hypocritical!

I think a man as much needs a woman, as a woman needs a man

And about the doctor, he was least interested in any of my issues but kept asking me personal questions. When I mentioned that I need medicines for some issue, he would scribble some medicine in the prescription and continue asking me weird questions.

He gave me a big lecture on why I should stop alcohol and he also got into chemical formulae of how alcohol is made!!

Thankfully my cousin was there so he could not continue with his questions but has called me again this Saturday,maybe to discuss my love-life.

I dont think I will go, cos I dont need to learn anything from a man who isnt treating me for my disease but trying to psyche me.

I think I know much better about life than such male doctors who show unnecessary and unethical interest in their female patients.

I read this quote somewhere, is that true?

“She's strong! And scary...I bet she's single...I'd put money on it..”
           ~ Masashi Kishimoto

Voracious writers

I have heard about voracious readers. But have any of you heard about voracious writers?

Yes, there is a category like that.

Some people just dont know when to stop writing, once they begin to write.

They have this habit of(and no knack whatsoever) dissecting every human emotion, nature, very clinically and then serving it in a platter.A dish made of amalgamation of their own sick mind, complexes, in-inadequacies.
As if they are some authority in reading human mind and its complexities

They are not even psychiatrists. It beats me how they churn boring sentences after another.

I'm talking about few specific people here(2 in mind), and I am pissed. Very, very pissed.

If only this person knew when to stop!

But just to tell them - What you write is ill-written, utterly boring, repetitive, senseless and nauseating to me. Probably over the years some people have fed you with the notion that you write well & now you have gone ballistic with it. But please read what you write. May be its not exactly what you had in mind.Your thoughts and your writings might be miles apart.

I understand that you have the rights to write whatever you wish to in the confines of your space, blog, diary, journal or whatever it is.
But stop badgering me with your over-the-top theories, ideas, conjectures, pseudo-intellectualism. It becomes difficult to even comment on another blogger cos of this.

I can not read beyond 2 lines of what you write. I swear I have tried, cos I believe in giving everyone his/her due. But I start yawning and my head hurts.
Man, you are caught in your own mesh of objectifying everything and fail to see beyond it.

And then there are some people who have created a whole blog just for me. To lament over me. The blog was created for the sake of putting me down, and it was made sure that I know of the blog, and every single post is a response to what I write here.
It makes me smirk at times, cos that's the degree of effect I had on this person.

But just a question to you, do you know the definition of a loser? Maybe just do a reality check and see if you are a synonym for it? Move on!

I could have let this go, as I have done so many times in the past, but since i have decided that I wont anymore, hence this post. Hopefully once and for all.

And I dont wish to be in the category of voracious writers, so I will stop my rant here.

They say....
Don't hold on to things, don't hold on to anger, don't hold on to people who are meant to go away

I tried doing that, but life has come to a full circle and I have realized some preachings are just momentary and do not work in the long run

One has to decide what works best for them

I am not the sort of person who lets go easily

So letting go initially, gave me freedom..a high of being someone else
I could heave a sigh of relief, to let that burden off..whatever it was..in whichever form
I felt a different me, within me, which was refreshing and delightful

But I dint know, that all the burden I let off, kept perching itself somewhere in the recess of my personality

So much so that I no longer felt like me,
I no longer felt myself within me..
I let go of my spark too somewhere

Letting go loosens up your senses ,
And for a highly strung person like me, its like a sedative
a drug which had started mellowing my senses,

It makes you lose the strength and the ability to hold on, to fight, to cherish your individuality

And thats one thing I cant afford to lose, cos thats my sanity

So I have decided, to hell with letting go..

I have given you reasons to remember me by
My words, my laughter, my passion, my anger

But you have not..just an insipid idea of a could-have-been

Maybe that makes you more generous
For not giving me memories

Maybe there, you have a one up against me!

A few good things

I have these small pots in my house, with plants and flowers.
6 of them.

I never had a thing for plants, or anything to do with aesthetics of the house, till I got my own pad.

My mother has a beautiful terrace garden and gardening is a passion for her.

So I bought these, while she was here with me, and took tips from her how to take care of them.

After she left, the plants were not doing too good.
Some died, some turned into this reddish-grayish colour, which made them look unhealthy.

There was one plant, a small flower made of green petals, some variety of cactus I guess. That was the most beautiful of them all.

It started drying and dying, but I put my heart in it.

Took it out for sunshine, put fertilizers and water..cos it was really pretty and I wanted it to survive.

And it started breathing, the old flower petals fell off and I could see 3 small, petite buds coming out.
It was a weird feeling, something like giving birth...my own creation

Few days back Ma suggested that I should take out all soil from all pots, clear the roots of some plants and re-plant them.

I spent an hour in doing all that.

But the very next day my favorite plant died.
It was a sudden death. The 3 pretty flowers, all 3 of them, turned gray and shriveled.
I might have done something to the roots, in the process of re-planting.

It made my heart churn a bit when I saw them.

I immediately called Ma and told her in an anguished tone.
She just said - "Dont worry, I will buy you new ones when I come there"

I dint know sometimes such small things work wonders. I was instantly appeased.
I dint know Ma's words could work on me...even now.

I felt like that small girl, who used to go to Ma if a doll was broken.
And Ma would tell me "I will buy you the one you always wanted"

It was as simple as that.

After that, looking at the plant dint cause much grief.
I was assured that the pain I felt earlier, will be taken care of now.
By Ma.

If there is someone who tells you s/he will take care of whats gone wrong in your life, its all that we need at times.

Whether it is taken care of or not, might cease to matter later.

I realised we have to let that part of our heart untouched, a part which gets affected by other's small gestures..which I thought I closed long back