Hello 2011

There is technically no difference between December 31 and January 1. The same routine passage of time spread across 24 hours in the same order of morning to night. The same sun, the same moon, well, even the same clear sky. Yet, everything is different. The expectations, the reflection, the new hope, the quick burial of unpleasant memories, and the sudden excitement in and all around you. Time's old trick of fooling you into structures, yet the humane tendency to romance time. Everything is still, and everything is moving. All are the same, and they are born again. A new reality. A new dream. A new beginning. I have my arms wide open to welcome 2011. Hope it fills my life and yours with happiness, health and contentment. Happy New Year everyone. It just could be yours!

Thou shall doubt!

From DOUBT to FAITH to TRUST....how long is that journey? Life-long?

Of Bread and Brand

Was at a small store to buy a loaf of bread on my way back home when I noticed a noisy group of construction workers checking on the stuff on display. Their shirts were slightly torn and dirty from a muddy wash. As I checked and rechecked labels of wheat bread to bread with multi-grains to plain old sweet bread, they quickly placed their order, specifying brands from cigs to chilly powder. Brand reach or viral marketing in local dialect...I'll never know. Meanwhile, bread labels were too confusing. I bought a pack of biscuits instead.

Walking...

Serendipity...the joy of discovering...being pleasantly surprised...all this by a hasty decision of stepping out alone on a Sunday evening. My ususal thing would have been typing away to glory on this laptop or scanning through a book or catching something completely insane on TV. But then I stepped out into the cold windy evening with not so much as an idea on what I'd want to do in the next 20 minutes or which direction to head. It was drizzling already. "Why did I step out in the first place?" But then, I got lucky. The rain stopped and I found myself in a park with ample pathways. I started counting my steps...I walked 5000 steps that evening, and felt sweat breaking on my forehead. I remembered how I used to go walking to my school when I was 6 or 7 years old, the days when I decided to walk all the way uphill to my college, and times when I walked back home from work. It wasn't that I was forced to, but just an old dear habit refusing to disown me. I hope it stays too, no matter what life throws my way!

where is the world that used to be...

I read this today and it brought back truckloads of memory about a world i had long left behind...
I have learned that if you must leave
a place that you have lived in and loved
and where all your yesterdays
are buried deep...
leave it any way except a slow way
leave it the fastest way you can
never turn back.
and never believe that an hour
you remember is a better hour
because its dead.
passed years seem safe ones, vanquished ones,
while the future lives in a cloud,
formidable from a distance.
the clouds clear as you enter it.
~ excerpt from West With the Night by beryl markham (or so i believe)

Break the walls...

The other day I chanced upon Randy Pausch in Googleland, yet again. His Last Lecture continues to trigger a whole lot of positive energy in me. I think I'll go back to it whenever I feel the slightest of self-doubt. Time to break the walls and be honest to your childhood dreams. Hpe my Karma will take care of itself!

Explore the world

Travel brings you face to face with yourself...says the Louis Vuitton ad. Deep, eh? Was recently travelling, and I must say I'm in touch with myself a wee bit more. For one, i discovered i can actually break my fears only by facing them.

Just what's wrong with the world?

Churches burning. Visiting politicos. Dead ears. Shrill voices. Frenzy. Chaos. Loud and louder. Then, complete silence. Do you hear a grandmother quietly chanting a prayer, her frail fingers trying hard to hold the long-worn beads? A prayer that drapes an invisible warm blanket called security. Do you see it?

Working since...

The other day, my 4-year old daughter asked me since when I'm working. Have no idea what triggered that question, but I realized I've never asked that question myself for quite sometime now. I slowly counted. It's more than I had remembered it to be. And strangely, I joined my first job in Bangalore on a September morning quite like the one she asked me the question. Bangalore was my land of possibilities. A city I'd start my life all over again. Now, thanks baby. My resume is more up-to-date now. My memories too.

If you're happy, you hardly know it

What defines happiness? Today, it's been reaching out to my laptop bag in the middle of the night and typing out rubish blissfully. Listening to the soft taps on the keyboard adding rhythm to the otherwise silent night. My neck is paining and eyes have slowly turned red, but who cares, eh?