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Why Be Sisyphus?

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There are certain mornings when you don’t need to actively reflect upon anything. All you need is a cue, a trigger, a nudge, a few couplets of Urdu poetry to launch into a tirade against oneself. And to step down from one plane of consciousness and into the rabbit hole of nostalgia. A wild montage of images, sounds and smells takes over your mind as you lie perfectly still on the bed that you slept in the night before. Your body remains still but your mind is shuddering, pulsating, rocking to the sounds and beats of the times flown by. What happened to the dreams which you dreamt about during your wakeful hours. To those things which you wanted over everything else. For whom you left everything and everyone by the wayside. How did you land up here where you didn’t intend to? Is this all a chance or some misdirected motivation towards the comforts you secretly crave but openly despise? What is the idea of work? Is it what is done for purpose and passion or a mundane activity undertaken ...
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Happy New Year

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                              It was a Sunday morning. Like most Sunday mornings I was expecting dread with breakfast. I suspect many others who took the train with me to business districts every day were also expecting it and experiencing it as well.                 All of us in identical shades of blue shirts, mimicking our mood - bought online, carrying our tiffins with a bulky laptop to boot, switching between Huberman and Latest Bollywood hits on Spotify - all of us on a singular mission of increasing shareholder value, while wondering if we would get a seat on the train that would always be running late on Monday mornings. What was unknown to me on that morning, however, was that the dread was not about the upcoming week. I had been numbed into believing that working diligently was the purpose and mission of my life, among other things. ...
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Gifted Books are Time Portals of Nostalgia

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When you find yourself sorting out your entire book collection, just do that. Stay focussed on the philosophy of organisation - subject wise or author wise or alphabetically? Who stacks them by colour? What are you - five?  Do as you please but have a maniacal focus on the task at hand. You should brush the dust and the white mould that has grown over them, wipe them up with denatured alcohol and stack them up. Do what you may but do not bother opening them up. Especially, never open the books which have been gifted to you.  Don't open the jacket or the turn the cover. Just let them lie in the corner. For, you are bound to read the messages written inside, with a date if you are lucky, in a handwriting that you will never forget.  The book will work like a time portal and will take you back to those times.  You may have forgotten what the book was about, but you will remember holding it the first time it was handed to you. In a book store or in a cafe, or in the smal...
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The Year The Vishu Refused to Bloom

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I was introduced to the Vishu tree a long long time ago. I had not seen one until I saw it on the cover of PCM's The Children Magazine - a popular magazine published in Kerala. I used to read the magazine as a child until I grew older and then became hooked to the Reader's Digest. It was a Vishu special issue. Vishu, like many regional festivals, is one of the major harvest festivals celebrated widely in Kerala.  It is marked by the blossoming of the beautiful yellow flower of the Vishu tree, every petal of which shines bright in the summer months. Ever since I learnt about it, the Vishu tree started becoming my favourite tree to spot as I roamed the streets during summer holidays. Though in Bombay, back then, there were very few spots where this tree could be seen. Perhaps there are even fewer such spots now. There was the one near the railway station, you could only see it when you were standing on the footboard, living life on the edge. And then there was one by the flyover,...
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February is the Coldest Month

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Five years is a long time in today's world. Stay at the same workplace for that long and you join the gratuity club. Every five years the Indian democracy presents all of us with a chance to change our world. But five years is not a long enough time to heal you. Personal loss takes a long time to heal they say. I can tell you that they are right.  Every February as the sun makes its journey up north, it begins to warm up everywhere. The faint signs of spring - the occasional tree in bloom signal promising times after a cold winter. As the days turn longer and the nights shorter, I feel myself drawn to the chilly evening of 2018. The breeze was cold as I rushed to the hospital. The air was crisp and fresh as it is often during the bewitching hour of midnight. The gurney was ice cold, and his face was getting cooler. The light had gone out of our lives.  Death severs all bonds or maybe it doesn't. But the time spent together when alive is far more precious than you think. It is ...
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Of Cyclones and Cold Weather

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Each time there is a cyclone near Chennai, Bengaluru goes into a melancholic mood. The skies become overcast and if it weren't for the steel and glass buildings on the skyline, I swear I could have been at a hill station. During such times it is hard not to be inflicted by its gloom. The chilly temperatures and the cold wind don't brighten up your heart and for a Bombay boy like me, it is hard to remain cheerful. That's when I try to find comfort in a warm plate of Thalaserry Biryani. I always prefer a good Donne Biryani but all the Military and Naati places are too far from where I live.  What is the point of food? Most times it is only to satiate hunger and provide nutrition for the body. But on other days it does more than that. It provides comfort and hope. For instance, when I fell sick recently, a warm bowl of rasam provided much hope and reminded me, at least temporarily, of what good health feels like. With every sip of the hot liquid, I could feel its transformativ...
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Silence

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There are various types of silences. Some are more welcome than the others. A silence that follows a din, for instance, provides respite. It offers time and space to reflect upon the events that caused the cacophony. Some silences are deathly, often they are feared. And rightly so.  What kind of silence do I prefer? I prefer all kinds of silence nowadays. It has been a long time since I heard anything else. Nature sounds are part of my environment  - white noise as they call it. Human voices, however, are rare in this part of town. I was not used to it before but right now I don’t mind the silence.  This one is what they call the comfortable silence. Shared between friends and lovers. I was a prisoner of this silence. The awkward silence. The kind that is shared after arguments. But now I don’t mind it so much. How did I grow fond of my own captor? They call it the Stockholm syndrome it seems.  Sometimes I sit and ponder over the mysteries of life. I don’t need a cav...
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