tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-260032882024-03-08T07:38:43.649+05:30the spirit of the timesa gamut of emotions, a swell of the heart, an expression of life, a take on issues, a figment of imagination, a statement of angst, and the spirit of my timessatyajithttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09006013937555831197noreply@blogger.comBlogger132125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26003288.post-3424280714639062222011-10-22T16:42:00.002+05:302011-10-22T16:45:40.926+05:30strain at gnats and swallow camels<span style="font-weight:bold;">Quiet!</span><br /><br />Why have you brought here,<br />this tambourine mouth?<br />To wreck the afternoon—<br /> <br />A peep shall awake the devil,<br />if he flinches.<br />A drop, below the eddy of his ear,<br />will lurch and skate <br />down the rings on his neck, and <br />the auburn chest hair.<br />That he will scratch in a sour rankle<br /><br />Who will be responsible then?<br />Your tambourine mouth?<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">Togetherness</span><br /><br />How can I promise the best of me?<br />Every day is a gamble.<br />Who I am is hinged to<br />everyday indiscretions of strangers: <br />how many mind the signal, who honks how much, if the order comes on time, how the service is…<br /><br />I’ve forgotten<br />what it used to be like<br />to not mind.<br />My tongue slurs like wheels <br />moments before a collision,<br />the stew <br />only a breath away, always.<br />If I make any promise<br />it’ll have to be in another world,<br />for this one I go to sleep in<br />strains at every gnat,<br />makes even velvet chafe.satyajithttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09006013937555831197noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26003288.post-53010812830290129642010-08-07T22:17:00.004+05:302010-08-07T22:24:01.666+05:30the perfect new worldIn the perfect new world, we all will accept that we're whores. And then the playing field will be level. There'll be war on an equal footing. Self-denial will be the only evil. Rest all will be the truth.satyajithttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09006013937555831197noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26003288.post-1743207400680866782010-07-31T08:24:00.008+05:302010-08-05T14:14:27.351+05:30At the risk of immolationWhen you break a bulbous drop perches itself in the corner of your eye<br />waiting to chart the path of unleashed emotions<br /><br />Those eyes become shimmering sheets at the mercy of,<br />reflecting the pain of old bedroom mirrors<br /><br />No dewdrop is wholly new<br />fed as each is by smidgens from previous nights<br /><br />growing in pennies strained from<br />the inequitable taxes of a shared life<br /><br />Then you let it trickle or gush<br />and fetid things run down your puffy cheeks<br /><br />He twitches, shifts, mouths half-eaten mumblings<br />Leave me alone, says your voice wadded with grief and phlegm<br /><br />and he says what doctors say when they can’t save a life:<br />I’m sorry.<br /><br />Enough to wipe clean, start afresh<br />give another chance to that incorrigible demon of habit<br /><br />It is forbidden: like toadstools, or candy from strangers<br />yet you do it <br /><br />What flames you let singe your heart<br />what burning you endure<br /><br />Just to feel what it is to have loved<br />at the risk of immolationsatyajithttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09006013937555831197noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26003288.post-22636547124434981572010-05-18T01:13:00.001+05:302010-05-18T01:13:39.057+05:30Baby are you down down down downIn the eleventh, N and I went to Calcutta. It was our first trip on our own. The next few days we roamed around the falling city, stayed here and there, got our pockets picked, watched movies at practically every theater we passed by.<br /><br />After we returned, things started falling apart for N. Or that’s the way I put it because my imagination is stunted. His dad was out of a job, disinherited from ancestral property, they had to move out, his brother was an incapacitated recluse—getting by became this angry, insistent visitor who sat at your threshold every morning, waiting for you before you even woke up. The business of the house fell squarely on N’s shoulders. He dropped out of college, started giving tuitions, counting every penny. <br /><br />More than ten years have passed since. N finished his twelfth somewhere along the line, a few years belated. He couldn’t do his graduation, hasn’t yet. Between then and now, he has taught tens of school kids, been in Amway, taught spoken English/personality development/all sorts of things to BPO aspirants, aspiring MBAs, all and sundry.<br /><br />I don’t take stock of N when I meet him, which is every year and a half or so. I mean I ask him what’s up and he tells me animatedly—non-perfunctorily—and I listen interestedly. But that’s only what it appears to be. What I do instead is listen to the story of dignity. And it’s a tale that grips me ever tighter because everything he does is a metaphor. He doesn’t slog to pay the rent or take his family to Esselworld. He’s giving dignity a story to be remembered by. How else could we even begin to teach our kids about it? Without people like N, we would sound so vain and pretentious mouthing words we have no business bandying. <br /><br />And the life-reassuring thing is that there are others like N. I know a few myself. What each of them inadvertently says is that it is never too late to pick a dropped stitch. It’s never wise to throw our fabric away, thinking there’s nothing more we can do with it. Because if we do—if we let ourselves believe that it will unravel to shreds—we just choose to exclude ourselves from the story of dignity. And that would be a pity. <br /><br />I wish Gujja the very best for his first performance at Zero G, Residency Road, Bangalore, this Friday the 21st. Who would have thought.satyajithttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09006013937555831197noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26003288.post-24776972379897876082010-05-08T06:40:00.006+05:302010-05-08T10:01:05.729+05:30The CleansingI wake up at five am<br /> before the ghosts have been buried,<br /> sudden, to a sticky back on a marble grid<br /> and<br /> to birdsong on the western coast before<br /> it is mowed by revving engines<br /> in this place they call the metropolis in weather reports<br /> how long has it been?<br /><br />Yester night’s remnants in system ridden of<br /> beer mouth rinsed, beer smell scrubbed<br /> clothes dumped<br /> huddled in red bucket in shame<br /> a roundabout way of undertaking<br /> project ‘I’m going to clean myself’<br /><br />Fridge checked for happy surprises<br /> water gulped down parched throat,<br /> some cake bitten into<br /> through the window I can see<br /> clumpy wet hair draped over<br /> ironed polyester salwar<br /><br />Stray thought: fifth standard, picnic day<br /> killed before it began<br /> by pop and mom<br /> playing ‘I blame you’<br /> why did we go then?<br /> something bigger than happiness<br /> showed up at the door<br /> mr. and mrs. neighbors were ready to leave<br /> lunch packed, extra tissue taken, ambassador purring at the turn<br /><br />Old blood swirling in my veins<br /> thickened with self-pity<br /> a caul of disgust enveloping<br /> no illusions harbored,<br /> i have been riffled the same cards<br /> will be singed too, to the roots if i don’t<br /><br />Call, find those numbers<br /> and call<br /> ‘hi! sorry i can’t come to your party<br /> i’m not sure i want to, actually something came up’<br /> you social rat, still wriggling the old leathery tongue?<br /> no, brace and say: the truth<br /> then call after call<br /> no, i don’t care anymore; it doesn’t matter what you think<br /> voices thick with sleep soothe<br /> awww! it’s just a meltdown<br /> don’t worry, it’s only the stress, nothing really<br /> relax, we still love you<br /><br />By then I have hung up.satyajithttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09006013937555831197noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26003288.post-56002687502619501172010-05-04T18:42:00.014+05:302010-05-05T16:18:08.405+05:30Revolutionary WhiskeyJust finished reading Revolutionary Road again. Took a rather long time even by my standards. I can’t finish a book in a few sittings. I don’t try either, makes me feel like a sieve when I want to be a sponge. There’s some collusion between my reading and whisky-drinking habits. I also just happened to use up a Jack Daniels a friend had gifted last December. I’ve been sipping at it for as long as I can remember (ok I might’ve tempered my greed because it was scotch) and last night was the last of the swigs I took. And there haven’t been any conscious periods of whisky abstinence much the same way the story of Frank and April Wheeler has never really left me. I’ve kept going back: a page here, a small there. They’ve always been around the bend, just a few steps and I bump into them.<br /><br />So, the book, yes: the writing is sublime, Yates is unforgiving. Harsh or unforgiving is not the word actually; I don’t think it’s any one thing at all. It’s definitely not a style unless you think holding a mirror to the deepest recesses and the darkest motives is. It’s just relentless dissection of what appears to be the truth. There’s a line where Yates could as well have been explaining how he wrote that book. <em>If you wanted to do something absolutely honest, something true, it always turned out to be a thing that had to be done alone</em>. The book’s embarrassingly beautiful, really. To think that some of those who have read it will draw on the experience to merely engage in social conversations, fill out silences with their grasp of things, (‘Have you read it? It’s so depressing but so nice.’ and then in the same breath, ‘You should also read Three States. It's unputdownable.’) is pretty deflating (and very cynical of me).<br /><br />What does having read the book mean but? I’m in circles. Reading about the Wheelers doesn’t bring me closer to any realization. (Self-deception is no realization, I think I know it well enough after years of trying to fit in.) Writing something as singularly honest wouldn’t change a thing either. Yates picked up some numbers in his time: two marriages, two divorces, nervous breakdowns, drinking binges. Writing is a release, I guess; a simple but excruciating business: going to a dark place, pouring your heart out, hoping to be understood. <br /><br />Awareness is not a gift, in fact it can be rather unsettling. At least when the take-home is that you are not the only one to have fucked up, people have messed up in eerily similar ways. It’s a fairly non-usable purport, you know. Like when facing an incomprehensible problem, you suddenly have a private Eureka moment: you have finally managed to figure out what the problem is. That gives you a kick, even if you are still as clueless about how to fix it. Living is the same beast. Taming it is as slippery.satyajithttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09006013937555831197noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26003288.post-17794374586877631222010-04-27T00:07:00.004+05:302010-04-27T14:04:00.778+05:30desultory prose, desultory livingThe security guards in my building seem to be on a rotating employment roll, they keep changing. From the heartland, they come tumbling like humpty dumpties. The yadavs, the ojhas, the kumars. There are never any south indians, they seem to be opening udupi joints. What remains uniform among these guards, like symptoms of a disease, is how they greet building tenants. Like bound by some feudal custom, they rise from their chairs and stand up when you pass by. It’s an act of obeisance, this relinquishing of the comfort of the chairs, though they are inexpensive PVC ones. Anyway, the point being the show of deference and, to a certain extent a corollary, the dignity of labor. <br /><br />I keep telling them not to bother, to remain seated, what I don’t say is that they make me uncomfortable more than anything else. I also don’t dare utter that I’m scared, sometimes morbidly, that a civil war might erupt. That this subservience will turn into vandalism. They’ll steal your Nokias, your Dells when you’re sleeping.<br /><br />But they keep doing it, as if programmed genetically. Their spines are coiled springs, ready to be straightened at your look. <br /><br />Class—there are unwritten codes everywhere. You may or may not have quotas but how do you remove this vermin from the minds of thousands. Why can’t they—and we must allow them to—do their jobs with quiet dignity? Is it too much to expect respect if you are working class? <br /><br />This shouldn’t disturb me, it’s none of my business. But I don’t know what’s my business. We live in our small worlds, connected but estranged. We choose things, little things, make them our life, and slip into disaffection like a second skin. All the information—this ocean, this tide after tide—washes our doorsteps unable to touch a single molecule in our hearts. We have become animals already, alive only to survival, numb to living. But then by some cruel irony, a little bit of the human lingers like fish smell on hands. It reminds you of what the hands had once touched, what they have since dropped. And this hardens you a little more, puts a little dead weight in your heart so that at least it is not empty. The truth is what doesn’t kill you kills a little bit in you.satyajithttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09006013937555831197noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26003288.post-36015000322359843552010-03-02T00:22:00.003+05:302010-03-02T00:32:10.650+05:30The Hurt LockerWhat can make a man unafraid of death? If his life is not worth living—irredeemable—and the end of it is a decidedly better alternative to its continuation. What then if it is the irreverence that injects the sublime into living? The utter disregard for the most primal fear frees him in a way nothing else can. Because his mind is unfettered, his actions are not crippled by the (potential) fatality of consequences. They are compulsively reckless; they release the being from the cage of fear and foreboding. Two sides of the same coin?<br /><br />This is my single most important takeaway from “The Hurt Locker.” I will skip the chance to analyze and rate it (though I think I have said more here than I could have through a review). It is a movie unlike most others on war. It simply tells you, War is a drug. And let me add, for people like Staff Sergeant William James.<br /><br />Toward the end of the movie, you realize that the choice for James is between love and fear. And he chooses both, in a way. His fear of ordinary, grounded existence pushes him as much as his pure love for what he does best drives him. To him, the life most others lead is probably even more terrifying than death. Surely, he is an escapist then. Yet, you see he’s anything but one. Both judgments are deserved, for both crimes are committed. <br /><br />Everything I say about James seems insipidly worded, pablum. For he is that kind of a mystery. You can only watch the movie and then maybe you’ll get what I’m trying to say. Long after you’ve seen it, as you’re sitting by the window, wondering, things will fall into place.satyajithttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09006013937555831197noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26003288.post-47996843456887662892010-02-23T14:14:00.004+05:302010-02-23T14:38:13.318+05:30excerptHer body fights and extricates her mind from those bubbleheaded years. Memory is a living thing, she thinks. Where it is amputated, severed, it swiftly grows itself into a whole again. The completeness in her memory makes up for the void in her present. The laws of compensation. It is a game, she believes, where the conscious and subconscious are at play. The objective of the game is to salvage the self, to not let it lose respect for itself. Now she understands self-respect. That’s what her life has become: a pursuit to earn her self back. She is returned to her world now. To enterprises undertaken in another bubble. A space of reason and practicality that she has to furnish with the living furniture of honest toil and reparation. She feels ready.<br /><br />PS: It's an excerpt from what I'm working on. Just wrote this bit and felt like putting it up.satyajithttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09006013937555831197noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26003288.post-74818664537289289972010-02-20T21:41:00.004+05:302010-02-20T21:54:00.288+05:30i’m so sorry!I don’t know—maybe I know but don’t quite get it—why Tiger Woods has to apologize to everyone and anyone. What possible crimes could he have committed? His public apology would have been fitting in magnitude had he mortgaged the world’s oil fields to Martians for a romp with nubile, supple aliens. <br /><br />International sportsmen seem to have made Faustian bargains with their sponsors, their media managers, and the general public. The “with great power comes great responsibility” dictum has been twisted beyond context. How can it be that people are stupid enough to look up to public figures as perfectly moral archetypes? <br /><br />What a pity Tiger Woods is such a wimp! If his only “problem” is that he likes sex with multiple women, he should just never have married and spared himself the effort of doing it on the sly—given his list, it must’ve been like hiding an elephant in a cupboard. <br /><br />How wonderful it would’ve been had Tiger Woods just carried on with his business, unapologetic and unperturbed. He would’ve lost the sponsors, half his wealth in divorce settlements, his media-created public image—basically everything extraneous to his actual talent. With a media wave of derision behind him, he would have returned and won a major just like old times. But that was not to be. This world is warped. Here we have to issue apologies and publicly atone to be deemed cured.satyajithttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09006013937555831197noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26003288.post-33462467263981269262010-01-29T18:25:00.002+05:302010-01-29T18:28:52.576+05:30to cut a long story shortI was ready to resign<br />To the fury of indifference, convinced<br />That inaction will (at least)<br />Shelter me from the heart of feral hatred<br /><br />The immediate aftermath—<br />I wanted to grow my usual carapace that<br />Saner days and weeks had worn down<br />Like water sheets ploughing soft earth<br />Leave me alone!<br /><br />But you stood. Rooted. <br />In the corner of my eye<br />Refusing to budge: “I’ll be here”<br /><br />I shrank and withdrew <br />Indignant and stubborn<br />Hurt and accusing,<br />Burning bridges to the island<br /><br />Oh what hubris, how selfish!<br />Reading of the balance statement<br />Actually, it’s quite clear<br />He’s wrong and you’re wronged. Pronounced.<br />Advice to you: Don’t you bother looking out. <br />Tch tch…not worth you<br /><br />But you stood. Rooted. <br />In the corner of my eye<br />Refusing to budge: “I’ll be here”<br />Even when <br /><br />Shadows grew long<br />Night after night<br />And wildflowers became weeds<br /><br />What happened then?<br /><br />While I was doused <br />By apathy’s anesthetic<br />You (must have) <br />Cut open my empty chest<br />And like a helping to the famished<br />Left a warm heart inside<br />For when I woke up that morn<br />It throbbed<br /><br /><strong>Epilogue: to cut a long story short</strong><br /><br />A firefly blinking <br />I relayed my signal to <br />Where you stood rooted, refusing to budge<br />Saying “I’m here”satyajithttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09006013937555831197noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26003288.post-45613350823082913152010-01-06T12:35:00.003+05:302010-01-06T12:42:24.336+05:30intellect and clevernessBeing intellectual versus being clever. There’s a difference she apprehensively explores. Cleverness works in a tightly packed arrangement; she uses some very common form of it, which she finds in abundance in engineers and programmers, to make moves in her life (like a videogame with made-up rules). It’s a quickness she discovered and exhibited in school, where the brightest always answered first. It’s a sharpness she finds comforting, yet wants to grow out of. It hangs on to her—reminding her of the many occasions when it has propelled her from the contrails of competition. <br /><br />Now is too late to escape. Her constitution has been altered. She doesn’t have a core that is worth an honest investigation. There’s nothing unknown in her, so there’s nothing unknown in her world. Convenience has turned out to be lastingly seductive; she cannot, is powerless, to leave her arms. What lies ahead? <br /><br />Will she outwardly ridicule art and abstractness and intellect and the spirit of exploration to quell her inner dissatisfaction with herself? Will she marry self-mockingly? Will she deny her inner misery and dreams and undertake a normal existence? Will she never pursue the intellect and challenge the verdict of fate? Will her life be a series of limp undertakings and therefore protected from the depths and darkness of true exploration?satyajithttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09006013937555831197noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26003288.post-62070770961772195342009-06-28T23:55:00.003+05:302009-08-26T21:53:50.685+05:30I choose toYou choose who comes into your life. You choose what becomes of it. If you get yourself in a mess, you better get yourself out of it. Forget the past; you can’t improve history. No matter what, you can choose to start afresh. If you believe in this, you’re ready to take the blows without looking for excuses.satyajithttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09006013937555831197noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26003288.post-37739534042474375272009-05-05T21:28:00.001+05:302009-05-05T21:31:55.326+05:30Where the spirit falls shortMy voice slumps<br />In conversations with you<br />What do I talk about?<br />My tongue hangs dry like tinder<br />Ready to catch fire at petty provocation<br />Then, as you say, I <em>keep</em> the phone<br /><br />The new sun beams cold rays<br />On either side of the peninsula<br />Where we lie, at the mercy of geography<br />Chained to the remains of last night’s dreams<br />Distance is a poor excuse for what separates us<br /><br />I bank on memories<br />To offer you some vestige of lingering affection<br />Being apart breeds new images<br />It stiffens the soft cotton of your sari<br />I somehow forget: Of the nine yards you draped<br />You kept the longest to shield me<br />From His harsh gaze<br /><br />Now, I think of you as the Past<br />A temporal truth<br />The Present has saddled me with a different version of it<br />Teaching me the composition of silence,<br />And the war that wages when human beings retreat into themselves<br />This is a more lasting truth, I tell myself <br /><br />You and I<br />Travellers of different landscapes<br />Cannot concede<br />That we are separated by a wilderness called human nature<br />Intermittently, we make cripples of ourselves<br />In trying to reach out<br /><br />The boundaries between are not physical<br />They rise where the spirit falls short<br />There’s little place for largesse<br />In hearts that have shrunk with time<br /><br />Yet, like all cruel/blessed things in life<br />You dare to believe in your notion of me<br />And allow selective ignorance<br />To eke out pounds off irrational happiness<br />Preserved even in a deluge of ready evidence <br />Against a son<br />Who is frugal with lovesatyajithttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09006013937555831197noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26003288.post-68982506782376236682009-04-10T18:41:00.002+05:302009-04-11T15:12:38.687+05:30a solution/problemA solution is composed of words<br />Them strung together in an order<br />With pauses and gestures—wafting, floating,<br />And agreeing to your mien<br />A solution is an inching closer<br />To delightful experiences of living and learning<br />Of distant music in familial gatherings<br />A solution is an arrangement<br /><br />A problem is an arrangement<br />(1) Of phrases and their turns<br />That travel determinedly to reduce you<br />(2) Of silence and empty vocabulary <br /> That crush hopeful will like a sombre second opinion <br />Once they reach, overcoming space<br />They create fissures anew<br />Of anxiety, dependence, and lifesatyajithttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09006013937555831197noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26003288.post-44820509587356976432009-03-22T13:11:00.003+05:302009-03-22T13:56:09.136+05:30moving around in circlesIt was in the 1980s that some popular Hollywood movies began offering consolation, by way of jingoism, for America’s losses during the Vietnam War. It’s hard to imagine <em>Rambo</em> and <em>Uncommon Valor</em> being made between ’64 and ’74. In the late 60s and early 70s, the public mood was more of snowballing rebellion against a war that didn’t stand up for anything that the American people valued. There were <em>Apocalypse Now</em> and <em>Full Metal Jacket</em>. <br /><br />Was there any one point when the public realized that the war had gone wrong? The answer, in all probability, is no. The war continued for more than 6 years after the My Lai massacre in 1968. In fact, Nixon started a new war—by ordering an invasion into Cambodia—in 1970. The so-called Christmas bombings happened in 1972. The war moved around in circles.<br /><br />The US won every battle, yet as the majority believes it lost the war. Or did it? Either way, it’s hard not to be a cynic. The US entered the war to contain communism. It was the height of the Cold War. Maybe US involvement was justified. Yet, if you trace back steps, you find giant Pandora’s boxes strewn along the way. These boxes lock ugly, enervating truths that make you echo Tommy Lee Jones’ words in <em>No Country for Old Men</em>: “I don't want to push my chips forward and go out and meet something I don't understand.” That’s the overriding feeling I have. <br /><br />Sometimes, it pays to be a spectator. There’s more room for solace. Ignorance, while probably not being bliss, is definitely a good sedative.<br /><br />----------------------------------------------<br /><br />I visited my friend’s dad in INHS Asvini, a reputed naval hospital, this weekend. Asvini is located in Navy Nagar in Colaba, south Bombay. Not often you see a yawning ocean through hospital windows. The place doesn’t quite exude sickly gloom, or maybe it’s just me imagining things. <em>Uncle</em> has been an eccentric man all his life. I was wrong-footed by his second question—a deep backhand volley when I was at the net, exchanging pleasantries: “So how is life? How much do you earn? 25,000?”<br /><br />I burst out laughing. It hit me that he hadn’t really changed. Don’t know why I had assumed that he would have mellowed. He pulled me closer to him and held my hand for a long time. Very unlike him. Later, I realized why. Diabetes has eaten his retina. It has also fucked his kidneys and weakened his heart. We had a regular conversation. I didn’t ask him anything about his health, how he felt, etc. He asked me if I had visited Siddhivinayak, Haji Ali, or the Mahalakshmi Temple. And then chided me for being a <em>nastik</em> (atheist). I said I was too scared to visit Siddhivinayak because a friend—a deeply religious guy—had had his pocket picked there. He looked at me and then we both burst out laughing at the ridiculousness of the answer. He showed how swollen his legs had become, pressed the skin near his ankles to show the depressions that would form. When we were about to leave, he asked my friend to level the bed. It was one of those beds with a handle you can use to lift the bed. As he raised his head, I saw tufts of hair on the pillow, like a puppy had slept on it. I felt the saddest then, don’t know why.<br /><br />Old age is not inevitable, not depressing. If you were to ask him, he would shout back at you, “It’s just ridiculous.” He’s that kind of a man.satyajithttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09006013937555831197noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26003288.post-59849335412443081132009-01-19T22:54:00.001+05:302009-01-19T22:59:06.310+05:30My planI plan to take myself<br />by the scruff of the neck<br />turn myself upside down<br />shake myself<br />until the last drop of poison<br />spills on to paper<br />and soaks it<br /><br />And after that<br />who cares.<br />There’s absolutely nothing beyond that.satyajithttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09006013937555831197noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26003288.post-48976659223911379152009-01-15T22:37:00.002+05:302009-01-15T22:46:23.969+05:30TimeMy hands—brothers in arms—keep adding bogeys to this toy train called continuum. The hands are three: the long and short, and the frenzied. Together, they keep ticking. They keep everything running. <br /><br />When early resplendence slides in through doors ajar, I am there to witness musty corners shrug off their wimpy edginess and mingle with the smooth whole. The world as a brave whole…aah…where does it begin? <br /><br />When the silence of after-lunch siestas eats the day’s vigor, and activity gives in to abeyance, I stand moved. I continue my merry-go-round. Lending substance to naps and dreams that appear and vanish like meteors. When lurky servants pinch off sleazy magazines from under mattresses and spill themselves on Persian carpets, I am there. When they remember the spots of spillage and smile at having stained a rich master’s possession, I am there too.<br /><br />When shadows make two of each, I am there. When old memories return with long shadows on deserted walks, I walk too. When aggrieved patriarchs rant endlessly in after-dinner outbursts, I do not pause to stop them. When the socially respected take off their contraptions and defenses for others like them before retiring, I bear testimony. <br /><br />When my hands meet—seduced by coterie—I egg them on. And they start all over again. And they make you start all over again.<br /><br />Mine is just a job. I don’t know why you do it.satyajithttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09006013937555831197noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26003288.post-30184017733515954152009-01-04T20:26:00.001+05:302009-01-04T20:32:34.192+05:30witness to lifeI read somewhere that one of the reasons people marry is that they want a witness to their lives. Like much later after things have happened, a married man will have someone to testify what had happened. In conversations, he will not be the only one rambling; there’ll be someone to finish his sentences, to furnish details of the past, to lend credence to his claims. <br /><br />Which is partly why long-distance relationships are difficult to sustain. Because there’s no constant witness. Witnesses change, and more importantly the ones that are there don’t pay much attention. Or else your work friends would be your best friends. <br /><br />Solely as proof, the “marriage” kind of a permanent association isn’t worth it. Photographs and home videos should suffice. That marriage rewards you with a guaranteed history is a given. But exactly what sort of history? <br /><br />I dislike the kind of history that paints pictures in broad, sweeping strokes. I find it irrelevant. There’s just very little detail. It follows then that I don’t particularly like to know about what couples have to say when they sum up their lives together in a few pithy sentences. Such remarks are more like comments fit into a small box in a report card. Like you had to deliver a judgement, so you did it. The judgement is not the truth. Truth is in the details. And at different points in time, truth is different. And part of the truth is that when you do choose to marry, you’re offering yourself as a witness to your partner’s whims and fancies, his vices, his unacceptable traits, his irritating habits. And also his absolutely adorable qualities. <br /><br />The question I ask myself is whether the virtues redeem the vices. Whether it’s only the sum that counts—not what goes into the final figure.satyajithttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09006013937555831197noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26003288.post-38272393277898549902008-12-09T00:00:00.003+05:302008-12-09T15:34:30.844+05:30XIt’s that time of the day when the chutzpah starts to melt. When you realize the fight Obama needs to put up is gargantuan. That all the mayhem around you is not your life, yet is maybe not something that you can extricate yourself out of. That you have no obligation, yet you somehow can’t let things be. It’s that time when every minute is a new thought connected to the previous. When truth is close at hand, but only as a nightly visitor who shall leave your bedside in the morn, is. <br /><br />Is there a burden of truth? Should truth just be left on its own? Should you not carry it on your shoulders, listen to where it wants to go, help it get there? There’s a waking life in these questions. Yet there’s too much to be lived beyond them. Beyond them, in the territory of farcical democracies, dysfunctional societies, staged performances.<br /><br />Life is the bubbles you chase behind closed eyelids. It’s ever elusive, yet you know it’s so bloody easy to see those bubbles. It’s a fucking tease, like a little show of naked skin. A possible indulgence.satyajithttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09006013937555831197noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26003288.post-14076304889117990532008-11-12T00:39:00.007+05:302008-11-12T01:04:16.880+05:30success and escapeI work for an editing company. A couple of months ago, my bosses took me off editing documents and put me on something very vaguely defined and unstructured. (You may call it business development.) This was because they thought I could add a lot more value and deliver what they wanted. Between then and now, I’ve conceived of and implemented a very important change in the way we edit. I’ve also worked on and launched a new editing service. I’ve written pages of web content and news items and press releases for promotion; created content and design for two ads; written job ads for 4 different positions; created and compiled training material for editors working on the new editing service; written content for internal purposes; worked on the design of a few web pages; held numerous meetings with the most important people in the company; modified work processes and briefed teams about changes; written 45 seconds (150 words) of the script for a show on CNBC in which one of my bosses was featured; and tried to avoid documentation as much as I could. <br /><br />Today, I was working on case studies. I had to showcase some of the interesting tie-ups my company has had with clients in the recent past. I went to my boss with 4 case studies that I had written. He liked the text but wanted some images to go along with it for impact. So, he gave me 80 minutes—until we met next—to work on it. I decided to try something different. Instead of using flowcharts and diagrams to show how we have helped our clients, I drew stick figures on the back of the printout of each case study. I wanted these stick figures to illustrate the “before” and “after” situations in each of the cases profiled. As I continued to work on it, the idea behind the sketch became clearer and I began to visualize how it would look on a web page. It was only when I was sketching for the last of the 4 case studies that I realized I had something good on my hands. I thought the figures were very different, carried great visual appeal, and conveyed the point succinctly.<br /><br />When my boss first saw the stick figures, he seemed amused. He looked at them carefully, turned each sheet to read the case study. He seemed ok with the first and the fourth (they were the simplest) and undecided with the rest. After a fairly long time, he mumbled “hmm… very creative.” It sounded more like “good, but sorry we can’t use them.” And they won’t be used.<br /><br />***********<br /><br />I enjoy reasonable freedom in my job, and I’ve got a conventionally bright future with my current employer. However, I like the disappointments that arise from working for yourself much more than I like those that come with working for someone else. And I don’t like authority. <br /><br />I’ve tried to compartmentalize myself into the “work me” and “me.” But I’ve found it difficult to separate one from the other. The work me tries to ignore Sylvia Plath and Charlie Kauffman, but me is absolutely rivetted to them. The work me admires catchlines like “Be Born Everyday” but me detests the sophistry in them. When the work me runs after something during the day, it’s me that feels exhausted in the evening. When the work me has to give something, it snatches part of that from me. And “I” end up poorer. I end up looking for escape in social intimacy and beer. <br /><br />I don’t want an escape. I want a better life. And all of me.satyajithttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09006013937555831197noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26003288.post-58550660370174581372008-10-21T06:30:00.000+05:302008-10-21T06:31:31.663+05:30run of the millIn order for you to fully assimilate life’s teachings—the ones that are neatly encapsulated in one-liners so as to save you the toil of peeling off meaning of Rushdie-esque paragraphs—you must learn painful lessons first. And one of them is that you’re just run of the mill. Proof of that? If any vestiges of a maverick were hidden in you, the years gone by should’ve sucked them out for public perusal. But they haven’t. So, there it stands. You’re run of the mill.satyajithttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09006013937555831197noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26003288.post-27872734806721116032008-10-14T22:07:00.001+05:302008-10-14T22:12:17.898+05:30jaunty collar bonesHer fate was in her body, not in the stars. It resided somewhere in the sheen of her face, her jaunty collar bones, her full lips. She had thrown her horoscope away many seasons ago, and had invested energy in preening herself.satyajithttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09006013937555831197noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26003288.post-23609290272878908852008-08-21T10:45:00.003+05:302008-08-22T10:00:35.120+05:30On beautyNabokov, the author of <em>Lolita</em>, on being asked about how American he was, had replied, “I’m as American as April in Arizona.” I read it in an article in the Economist and thought that it was beautiful. But like many things beautiful, the writer of the article stated and I agree with him, it meant nothing.<br /><br />From my recent trip along the Konkan coast, I brought some coasters that featured picturesque vistas: sunsets, sunrises, beaches, sand, shells. Decidedly appealing. But what did they mean? Did they appeal because they were photographs—moments when time was caught static and developed on print. Isn’t that merely a manner of speaking, with little underlying substance? <br /><br />And why did I like what Nabokov had said?<br /><br />Human understanding, as Phaedrus saw, can be divided into classical and romantic understanding. Function and form is how I have come to understand it. Classical understanding deals with the underlying basis, the meaning of things, while the romantic mode is concerned with appearance. What things mean versus how things appear. Art can be said to belong to the domain of the romantic. You can’t write an algorithm to produce a good painting. Art is a product of intuition, imagination, inspiration. Science is primarily classical: it looks for reason and logic. In the romantic mode, the distinction between “good” and “bad,” “ugly” and “beautiful,” is made mainly on the basis of esthetics and outward form. In the classical mode, such divisions run deeper. They cut to the bone, expose the underlying form, in search of a compact structure. To the proverbial artist, the scientist is boring. And the scientist generally has no time for the artist. <br /><br />There appears to be a wedge driven straight between the romantic and classical edifices. However, there has to be something that lends meaning to them in conjunction—that sheds light on their separateness in a manner that builds a bridge between. That is very fundamental—the crux. This is what Phaedrus set out to discover.<br /><br />*******<br /><br />The reason I enjoyed myself so much on the trip was because I was myself throughout. Every day, people enter rooms—not merely physically enclosed spaces but sealed containers in their heads too—and start talking and behaving in a certain way. It’s like something’s in the air: the whole milieu changes. The <em>you</em> starts to watch out and has his hands full watching out. It’s exhausting, not to mention debilitating. <br /><br />Travelling alone, or with a close friend, is like getting back into your own skin. To use the words of J K Rowling (although in an entirely different context), <em>the inessentials are stripped off</em>. You can wander aimlessly; you don’t have to show purpose; you don’t have to care. You become a tent by the beach, not a fully furnished house. No keeping track of bills, no closing doors and windows before going to sleep, no checking of taps and switches. Just listen to the waves and lie in the sound.satyajithttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09006013937555831197noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26003288.post-22083137595913439642008-07-07T03:58:00.004+05:302008-07-07T04:03:37.349+05:30Groundhog LifeRepetition—the implement to turn the hands of time. The old man’s utterances and actions prosper in iteration. In a distinctly personal manner, he orchestrates quotidian happenings. Putting the electronic shaver to his skin, first thing in the morning. Driving to the tender coconut vendor after lunch. Paying him the exact change. Folding the newspaper in exactly the same way. Watching the Great Indian Laughter Challenge every evening. Opening the doors for perfectly expected mirth at the appointed hour. <br /><br />Everything in order and everyone as expected. The maid who is always faced with the same enquiry: did she buy bread and milk? did she mop the bedroom floor? The gatekeeper who is always asked if the car had been given a wash. The <em>bhaajiwala</em> who is queried about the freshness of vegetables. <br /><br />Immersion in simple, continual needs.<br /><br />Empty, urgent, itchy needs. The machinery attending to needs chugging along like clockwork. A clockwork <em>orang</em>. To whom is known all the hues contained in the portrait of life. No sudden realizations, no discoveries; only a quiet manner of putting brush to canvas. <br /><br />Engrossment in tasks that do not pose dilemmas. Preoccupation with positively conditioned reactions. Life as the inversion of childhood. Life as the answer to the perfunctory ‘How do you do?’satyajithttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09006013937555831197noreply@blogger.com5