Ever felt love welling up inside. So much love that you start feeling compassion for even people who say nasty things to you. I was telling motu the other day that how it is so easy to love a child. One can just shower love on them, adore them and they never find it out of place. They are so matter of fact about it. But the same is not true for adults. No matter what the expectation for reciprocation comes in. And of course, it is not possible to show affection unless the person allows it. And also there is this whole thing about living a lie. It is so difficult to figure out if one is dealing with a real person. People seem to be caught up in role play. Ever known what it feels not to be part of the drama.

It is ironical, what we call fiction is so real whether it is literature or cinema. The real as we know it is made so contrive, the real ends up being a farce. I happened to watch the movie 'P.S. I love you' day before yesterday. Chickflick is it? Anyway today morning the girl from the movie popped into my head. And I thought, this movie is nothing but an example of how by constantly living in fear we make our worst fears come true. Here is a woman living in fear of being left alone by the man in her life. Because she has seen her father leave her mother alone with two children to take care of. She cannot bring herself to have a child and there are several excuses set up as a boundary around her decision. Eventually her worst fear, of losing the man, is manifested and in such a fatalistic way. We are so afraid to live our life fully always afraid of something or the other. The funny thing is always standing at the periphery, never taking the plunge into the river of life, bound by our fears, yet we think we are qualified to tell others what to do with their lives. Let go.

give me some sunshine, give me some rain, give me another time, I wanna...

Put your guard down and bang they zero in on you. I didn't see it coming, settling in and then playing havoc with my system. i am talking of expectations, other peoples, that are conveniently passed on to you as something that belongs to you. Before i left Mumbai for my brief sojourn abroad every damn person, even the ones that don't bother to be social otherwise there is something in it for them had an advice for me. And the advice was, find yourself a guy there! Now, before some conclusions are made, let me clarify, finding a guy or to say it more appropriately to have a partner is definitely on the agenda. But it can't be 'the plan' not for me. Important things happen in life, they do, it is the mundane that needs planning. And to find a partner is not mundane. So here I was giving myself a hard time since last two days for being myself. For not going out there and finding a guy :). For being a disappointment, to others. And it did not help that it was raining here, it actually only drizzles. But when it does it becomes very cold and there is always breeze flowing (does breeze flow?) making you stay in to be warm. Two days of no sunshine and seeing hot guys (Oh the policemen here. and they dress in black. This is how men in black should look) I think took a toll on me. Actually it all began when I started reading this book which I have to analyse for my socio term paper. The disappointment I felt with the book got channelised to me without me even realising. I was like what's happening. Everything was fine until the last time I was out in sunshine and looking at hot policemen. And fortunately, all those unfulfilled expectations, of others, toppled out. They got washed down by the rain.


To the world,

I love you, yes, but I can love you only when I love myself for who I am and not for who you want me to be. I disappoint you, I make you proud, I fulfill your ambitions or I don't, I fit in or not, well I don't care. This is me and this is what is.

Love
FM

Walter said it

Watched Band Baaja Baraat again today. This time on TV. Enjoyed it just like the first time. Some movies just get the ensemble that goes into making a movie right. It couldn't have revolved around a more loved topic than what else but weddings. Somehow for a long time I have been eluding The Wise One. My elusion wasn't to last for long. Recently I happened to attend a get-together with my ex-colleagues from my first job. Towards the end I was sitting by myself and enjoying the ice-cream when my state of solitary bliss was interrupted by a friends' husband. He asked me if I got married or if am still single. I told him I am (still) single. To which he asked, "No boyfriend" (neither). I told him I am single in every sense. Friends' husband, "Arey get settled yaar. Celebrate karne ka mauka do." I couldn't help laughing and said, "Settled toh already hoon, par celebrate karne ka mauka bhi doongi. Don't worry." At my reassurance I was allowed to go back to the ice-cream induced blissful state. It's funny how being settled is associated with marriage. Why the assumption that if one is not married one is unsettled. I look around and see scores of unsettled married people. What about them? Its like every person is an amorous nomad, who at some point has to be tied down to some person and bingo! the person is settled. I have never been able to buy into this meaning of 'settled'.

I see it the way the character Walter sees it in the movie 'Sleepless in Seattle'. When finally Annie tells him that she couldn't possibly marry him, he says, "I don't want to be someone that you or anybody else settles for. Marriage is hard enough without such low expectations. Isn't it?" Followed by a very cliched retort by Annie, "Walter, I don't deserve you". Once again Walter gets to rise above the caricatured portrayal of his character in the movie by saying, "No, I wouldn't put it that way." For me Walter ended up being the protagonist in the movie. Yes, the lead characters meet and may be all the talk of destiny and such may come true for them or not, a movie doesn't allow one to know the entire story. One is to make assumptions based on how a movie ends. Whatever the course of stories for a Walter it will always end on a truer note.

Midnight's whatever

An optimist stays up until midnight to see the New Year in. A pessimist stays up to make sure the old year leaves. --Bill Vaughan


The pragmatist gets a good night's sleep and wakes up the next morning, the first day of the new year, fresh and happy. --Yours Truly

What do you hide?

I have been observing all these people with whom I spend so much time. Could they be hiding too, just like so much of me is hidden from them. New people, surface relations, none of them that will last long. I can't say too much when a judgement is made about me, lest too much of me is revealed. You learn to just let it be. It is not possible to be all of you with everybody. That is why time alone is so much important.

Sometime back, I read a very simple paraphrase of Buddha's view/thought on his enlightenment. One of the 4 things he says he achieved freedom from is opinionated views. When I read it, it made sense. However, just because something made sense does not mean it is easy to incorporate. It is difficult, very very difficult. That is the paradox of existence, you might know one thing, but end up doing another. And only you can change that, to make the paradox cease.