The Tucked Away Home...

“Life will break you. Nobody can protect you from that, and living alone won't either, for solitude will also break you with its yearning. You have to love. You have to feel. It is the reason you are here on earth. You are here to risk your heart. You are here to be swallowed up. And when it happens that you are broken, or betrayed, or left, or hurt, or death brushes near, let yourself sit by an apple tree and listen to the apples falling all around you in heaps, wasting their sweetness. Tell yourself you tasted as many as you could.”

― Louise Erdrich, The Painted Drum

Your Mother...

I loved this story: Your Mother

*****
Your mother hated being photographed. She had romantic notions of how perfect her body looked at certain angles and to have them crushed by the awkward reality of a still life was simply unbearable. So I learned to capture moments using words and silences.

On this day, she sat perched on the first floor balcony’s platformed railing. Our room overlooked the magnificent Bay of Bengal – swollen & angry. We’d mistimed our vacation and landed up at Chinnakalpet in the middle of the Tamil Nadu monsoon. Swimming in the choppy sea was out of the question & even when it wasn’t raining, the weather was spectacularly wild. Earlier in the afternoon I’d run my hands through her hair and lightly kissed her neck as we looked at the stunning view afforded us by the balcony. When I’d asked her if she wanted to walk along the beach with me, she’d pushed me out of the room – “We don’t have to do everything together, do we?” And she was right. I took off with my camera.

With every step, my feet sank deeper into the golden sand. The effort it took to take the next step reminded me of how we were both getting older and how my body was beginning to express its tiredness. We had tried, your mother & I, to have children over the past two years but two miscarriages later she decided we needed to stop. “I have run out of tears, Arun,” she said. Instead, we decided to get into our tiny car and head off anywhere the wind would take us (her words, not mine).

The wind had led me here and if I wasn’t careful, it would sweep me further into the Bay. “Hold on to your hat, man!” cried a man coming at me from the opposite side. Considering he was the one wearing the hat and not me, I found him amusing.
“Nice weather we’re having, aren’t we?” I joked.
“Absolute perfection. I hope you’re bracing yourself for Cyclone Leela!”
“What? No! I mean, I haven’t even heard about it. My wife & I here on vacation.”
“Vacation?!! That’s rich, dear chap! I’d turn my ship right round and head back for shore. Nigel Forman, by the way.”
“Arun Desai.”
“Pleasure to bump into you, Arun. You will not be soon forgotten. Good bye & good tidings!”

And off he went, striding strongly, pushing back against the strong winds. I stood and watched the strange old man as he climbed the slippery rocks leading into the ocean. When he reached the farthest rock he opened his arms out wide, embracing the elements: the violent spray of the sea, the full force of the wind & the unending sky before him. You might say he had a few screws loose but in that moment I envied him his freedom.

I walked further, clicking photographs along the way. Perfect little seashells, fishing boats making their way back to the beach and the odd little picture that our resort’s quaint cottages made on that stormy evening. I began to miss your mother and so I turned back.

I took the cobbled stone path to our room. Along the way, I came upon the family that was staying across the hall from us. They were out on the lawn taking advantage of the few rainless hours. Two little girls played in the dirt as their parents relaxed over a cup of coffee. The younger of the two was an independent spirit. Barely 3 or 4, she wandered off repeatedly on her own, digging holes in the ground en route. Her mother would call out for her at regular intervals, but she wouldn’t listen. She would carry on on her quest; now a flower to be dissected, now a butterfly to be chased. And then there was the matter of jumping into that puddle. Eventually, the mother caught up with her little imp and hoisted her over the shoulder. Both mother & daughter, laughing, disappeared into the bushes and then out of sight.

I don’t know what made me do it, but I looked up at that very instant and caught your mother looking right at me. There she was, seated cross-legged on our balcony’s platformed railing. She had wrapped a dupatta around herself, one end of which was flying unrestrained in the wind like her uncombed hair. She had never looked more beautiful. I instinctively lifted my camera to capture her breathtaking image. But in the very next instant, I changed my mind and there I was, running up the stairs as quickly as I could. The door was open, I rushed right through it and scooped her up in my embrace. We held each other so tight that not even the cyclonic winds churning up outside could have torn us apart.
The next morning, we admitted defeat in the face of Cylcone Leela, packed our backs and returned home. Not long after that your mother announced that she was pregnant with you.

From, Aquatic Static. Do visit the blog, one of my favourites.

*****
Stories like these make it so hard to come back to the real life, no? Sigh.

Older...

Okay, I know I have cribbed a zillion times about age here, but someone just addressed me as "bhabhi" today (in a respectful manner)!

I am...

Books...

“We are the people of the book. We love our books. We fill our houses with books. We treasure books we inherit from our parents, and we cherish the idea of passing those books on to our children. Indeed, how many of us started reading with a beloved book that belonged to one of our parents? We force worthy books on our friends, and we insist that they read them. We even feel a weird kinship for the people we see on buses or airplanes reading our books, the books that we claim. If anyone tries to take away our books—some oppressive government, some censor gone off the rails—we would defend them with everything that we have. We know our tribespeople when we visit their homes because every wall is lined with books. There are teetering piles of books beside the bed and on the floor; there are masses of swollen paperbacks in the bathroom. Our books are us. They are our outboard memory banks and they contain the moral, intellectual, and imaginative influences that make us the people we are today.” -Cory Doctorow

Recall...

For me, the movie does not end at "The End". I am the girl who'll wait till the last name in the closing credits is rolled off from the black screen.

Too Much Sugar...

Yes, hearts will be broken, trust will be betrayed, people will cheat and you'll be left disillusioned. But don't give up. Hearts will mend, you'll meet someone who'll make you want to give them your entire world, you'll go ahead and make friendships that'll last a lifetime and you'll find in yourself inexhaustible power to forgive. So no, we should not be in the business of bursting bubbles. Not now, not anytime soon.

People deserve to have their faith rewarded.

And if you stop being grumpy, you'll realise, it always is.

Someone's Preferred Ending...

The things about you I appreciate may seem indelicate:

I’d like to find you in the shower

And chase the soap for half an hour.

I’d like to have you in my power and see you eyes dilate.

I’d like to have your back to scour

And other parts to lubricate.

Sometimes I feel it is my fate

To chase you screaming up a tower or make you cower

By asking you to differentiate Nietzsche from Schopenhauer.

I’d like to successfully guess your weight and win you at a fte.

I’d like to offer you a flower.

I like the hair upon your shoulders,

Falling like water over boulders.

I like the shoulders, too: they are essential.

Your collar-bones have great potential

(I’d like all your particulars in folders marked Confidential).

I like your cheeks, I like your nose,

I like the way your lips disclose

The neat arrangement of your teeth

(Half above and half beneath) in rows.

I like your eyes, I like their fringes.

The way they focus on me gives me twinges.

Your upper arms drive me berserk.

I like the way your elbows work, on hinges.

I like your wrists, I like your glands,

I like the fingers on your hands.

I’d like to teach them how to count,

And certain things we might exchange,

Something familiar for something strange.

I’d like to give you just the right amount and get some change.

I like it when you tilt your cheek up.

I like the way you nod and hold a teacup. I like your legs when you unwind

them.

Even in trousers I don’t mind them.

I like each softly-moulded kneecap.

I like the little crease behind them.

I’d always know, without a recap, where to find them.

I like the sculpture of your ears.

I like the way your profile disappears

Whenever you decide to turn and face me.

I’d like to cross two hemispheres and have you chase me.

I’d like to smuggle you across frontiers

Or sail with you at night into Tangiers.

I’d like you to embrace me.

I’d like to see you ironing your skirt and cancelling other dates.

I’d like to button up your shirt.

I like the way your chest inflates.

I’d like to soothe you when you’re hurt

Or frightened senseless by invertebrates.

I’d like you even if you were malign

And had a yen for sudden homicide.

I’d let you put insecticide into my wine.

I’d even like you if you were the Bride of Frankenstein

Or something ghoulish out of Mamoulian’s Jekyll and Hyde.

I’d even like you as my Julian of Norwich or Cathleen ni Houlihan

How melodramatic

If you were something muttering in attics

Like Mrs Rochester or a student of boolean mathematics.

You are the end of self-abuse.

You are the eternal feminine.

I’d like to find a good excuse

To call on you and find you in.

I’d like to put my hand beneath your chin. And see you grin.

I’d like to taste your Charlotte Russe,

I’d like to feel my lips upon your skin,

I’d like to make you reproduce.

I’d like you in my confidence.

I’d like to be your second look.

I’d like to let you try the French Defence and mate you with my rook.

I’d like to be your preference and hence

I’d like to be around when you unhook.

I’d like to be your only audience,

The final name in your appointment book, your future tense.

-John Fuller