I am not a bad person, I am not a bad person, I am not a bad person.

How does one avert a train wreck one sees coming eventually. Is it far enough for me to think, let me enjoy these years first, or what?

Train Wreck. Train Wreck. Train Wreck.

It's not my fault. I know it is useless and meaningless to appeal to me (reading at a future date) and I've even said so before, but you of the future, remember what my intentions were. I hope you escaped.

Vessel for the soul

And from the sickly sweet post to the real prickly thorny ones...
I wish and I wish that every concern in life could be resolved into the spiritual and the intellectual. Unfortunately the physical, the body will intrude with its pains, its aging, its wants, its needs...
I feel ashamed almost to tend to it, to see that its doing fine and when I ignore it, it spills over to my daily life with complaints of tiredness, mood swings, erratic behaviour.

I don't know how to compromise, I was never taught to think about myself that way. Was never a sports fan, never really vain, never really concerned about the human form. But when I am being affected and ill health, mental and physical is the result, I think I need to rethink this.

Resolutions and Memories of 2008

Blogging for the sake of blogging isn't always the smartest idea. I could be and am thinking of too many things to be coherent. Yet I feel that I'm not putting enough of me into the moulding box of this blog and when the cast is chipped away there will be a very imperfect sample of my year.

This year has been about possibilities and boundaries. It has been risky, motivating and scary in parts. I am afraid that the alertness I feel is just due to freshness of the situation and when the bloom is nipped I will return to my old ways. Pact, Bloggy. I will not. You hold me to it, okay? The point of this blog is for me to come back and remember and be glad I don't regret. I've been pleased to be able to read my old posts with nonchalance. (Shrug) so here I am and there I was, there is no real time capsule from the past me to me now. Yet, if things went wrong and I looked back, I think I would writhe.

So, Pact. No writhing. No disappointing people. It's not exactly a resolution, its more a brake. No backsliding but I may go where I will.

And this year, my parents have become very involved with the engagement. As they see it, its their last duty. As I see it, I can't fathom why they would. They should have washed their hands of me already; the deed never matching up to the idea and promise. Anyway, I don't understand the need of spending money on a wedding. This is really all for them.

I've never felt less inclined to defend myself, be defensive. Maybe I'm becoming a whole person, but I fear that to be whole and totally independent of feedback is dangerous. No real fear of that. I'm plenty shrinking violet still.


My dearest friends, my books. I can't read fantasy any more. I feel unsatisfied and seem to see author wish-fulfilment in every page and plot point. I'm beginning to feel LOTR withdrawal. I want a movie, to reread the book entirely, deeply, in a sitting, alone. I want the words on the page to embrace the impressions in my memory. I want to feel it in my bones, my marrow. But other than that I want people on my pages, not dolefully sad, not flippantly happy, not grim-jawed or comic relief material, not built of single dimensions. I want to read of lives and loves, but real. In the same breath I will admit to wanting to read trash to simply get my mind out of work. A roll down the windows, let the breeze blow through the stuffy car. Never mind that I won't really remember the breeze, but the fusty interior of my car-brain will be fresher for it.

And the bitter bitter cold. I am going to have to go through these months in my intrepid polar explorer mode. Expect many blogs on my mishaps and triumphs in the winter.

Finally, I must make all of this pay off. I am deeply in debt in many ways of the word. I must be found solvent in all those meanings. Financially, my loan; emotionally, my friends; intellectually, my new friends.

Every day I live a little, every day I die a little
Sap like this post, I suspect kills me just the little bit faster.
So with a theatrical sneer at naysayers and the petty
With a downwards glance when faced by the rest, I'm going back to all the other stuff I do.

Need good book...

Need good book...

Will the Jonathan Strouds of the world please write some good fantasy for me?

Seagull

Never mind Uncle Vanya and three sisters. It was all a case of envy. When I am a prisoner of sloth and cold, wrapped in my own living room, I watch the white birds flying outside jealously. Will someone please tell them its -9 C out there?

I succumbed to the temptation of fanfiction. I always regret it. It's always inferior, and usually tripe. But trust the true LOTR book lovers to step it up a notch. Lovingly written and in the memory of Tolkien traditions, no sap, no tripe, Strongly middle earth. Strongly Fourth Age. Perfect language. Grammatically correct (As far as I could tell) Sindarin.

Ah, we real LOTR buffs are a cultured lot. Notice how I sneak myself into their ranks.

Talk about being pliable. I was in misery reading this. 

"The general manager lost his whole family in one of the fires in the building," Tata said. "I went up to him today and I told him how sorry I was, and he said, 'Sir, we are going to beat this. We are going to build this Taj back into what it was. We're standing with you. We will not let this event take us down.'"

Another little gushing tribute from me to a great person. Whom have I listed so far? Tolkien, Tolstoy, Pearson? I don't know. But today I want to mention George Eastman. 

You'd think with examples like these, I'd be a better person.

I feel cold clammy chills when I think of his note "My work is done. Why wait?"

Will you tell me when my work is done?

That's right, rip that binding off. You look and you realise that another fetter you weren't even aware of has come right off.

What I mean to say is that, for all that I nod and agree that there are binds and limitations and prejudices holding people back, I don't open my eyes wide enough to see these fettering me, making me shrug and agree that good enough is good enough.

Now to hold on to that thought before the fetters creep back on.

I can't read it. I can't read it again and remember that he's going to die. 

back to the book

Nathaniel is dead. 

Every time I realise that again, I want to curl up and cry.

Characters in books affect me like this

Cold, crisp, the air is like a lettuce leaf. I am high up and I am leaning heavily on a pole, chin snuggled in my warm jacket. Dictators who stand cloak flapping as they surveyed the extent of their power must shiver so much in their defiant pose. The long white beams of light from below swing from side to side, their colour catch on the low hanging clouds. There is no power in me and its a shame. There ought to be. Drama demands it.

I suddenly realised why I love this place. I've got profs in the news. So this is how universities work. They bring you near the pinnacles of excellence and make you yearn to be superlative. I can't believe I'm studying with these people. You'd have thought I might have thought of all that before I applied. Nopes, all i was hoping was career advancement. Now I feel foolish and shallow. There are such big brains and intentions humming in the air. I have got to get good.

" Journalists writing popular treatments of subatomic physics could take a lesson from the scientists: Tell it straight and have a little faith that the subject matter itself—a major advance in our understanding of the cosmos—can generate its own wonder and excitement."

I fall into this error sometimes when trying to communicate what I feel. I should sit back and tell it like it is and those who can feel it will feel it.

7 Billion and everyone elbowing everyone for expression and to everyone they are the only ones alive. I know you and I know them, but in the end the only thing I know is me and sometimes not even that. In this heat and battle, how am I in any way unique? To be removed a few genes at a time from everyone is not enough.

Delirium and death, I want to be that. 

Sad, I am sad. I'm feeling homesick. the days are fast and varied but I'm still feeling kind of alone. I want meaningful people.

To be fair, this is just a mood, I'll probably be happy like mad on saturday

Trapeze

I am a trapeze artist swinging from the handle of one task to another, catching it just in the nick of time and using it to fly to another. The timing is crucial

Liver

I am feeling tired and my liver is revolting from all the eating outside and contiuous every day drinks. I know milo isn't the best detox but I don't feel like eating any food and I'm just drinking milo. I'll head down and get some fruits after this. the worst part is that I've got drinks lined up for today as well! Sob
I wanted to stay thin for India. Right now thats just a joke.
Ah, my complaining liver

More Friends

I am actually quite surprised.

I have more friends in Singapore than I gave myself credit for. I haven't been good at all or fair at all to them, considering them acquaintances. They're all being really sweet and kind and good and when even those whom I was sure I wouldn't miss become sentimental I feel all teary in bidding them goodbye.

I am actually tired.

I want to spend time curled up in a familiar room, looking up at the ceiling which is dear to me. Walking along sunlit blocks of books, shops and heritage buildings, laze and loll. Going out night after night is taking its toll on me

Bookshops

I made my way to my favourite used book store day before yesterday and told the owner of my impending move. His face fell and he was actually sad, he followed me around the store, holding the selections I periodically picked out, asking me about it and expressing how sad he'd be to go. and in the end, he didn't charge me a cent for the books though I protested long.

I was really touched. I'll miss him and his store too.

There are many many beautiful things, but are they heisenberg like?

Will they become less beautiful once I look at them?

Mental image of them waving arms and saying "Begone Shade of poisonous Visage" but you know what I mean. Pretty places and we tourist the charm away. Pretty things and we leave our breath and fingerprints over them.

From the sleepy desk of IB

A historic vote. And I just said hmm.
I'd liked to have watched it on television. Bohemian I may be, but why this disconnect from reality?

I suddenly feel the pressure of getting everything done before I go. There's a fair amount to do.

One drink too many

And my face is dulled, denied the feel of the breeze I know is passing me
And the stars are pinpricks of fierce burning and I notice the moon has a companion
And the dim white flowers glower at me from amongst the dark bushes
And the deepest blacks of night are like notes in a song and the music is all around me

I have to sit to take it all in. The door is locked and I am waiting to be let in. I chastise myself for being such a lighthead.

Endings

I hate sad endings. No wonder fairy tales and kiddy stuff serves up happy ends by the platter. But after a while, I rebel of happy endings too. How could it be happy? How could it be resolved. No Sirree, I want my happy endings realistic, and if you can't make it realistic, you give me the sad stuff anyway. I'll deal with it.

It's unfair and voyeuristic, I was telling him, that I should casually pick up a book and read a man's life from end to end from hope to death, to the unhappy conclusion. I should read it page a day, growing old with them. Its heart rending for me to sit here in my twenties and read of their lonely ends.

Why can't they be happy? What did they do? Why did they do it? Why won't you be happy? Please?

There are no rewards for good deeds, no justice, everything is by chance and I'm sad. A hole in my heart, ache in my soul, numb in my self, hurt in my hope sad. Which is an okay kind of sad. It feels like growing pains. Fancy that, I thought I was quite old already.

There is a feeling of heaviness in the air. My mental barometer is reading low. All these changes and demands on me, the chicken in my wants to hide, but no head in the hole approach will get me through.

In other news I seem to have reverted into a teen yet again. Caught on Justice league. In love with Batman. Nothing to do with the new movie, but good timing huh? I'm silly, I want a happy ending, there are no happy endings for the Bat.

Break the blog fast

I saw a logo today which tickled my fancy no end.

Consultant Oracular

Had my Linair Strategic Huddle yesterday. To the surprise of everyone I was quite at my ease and spoke sensibly on all topics and questions asked. perhaps I won't flounder quite as much at B-school as expected. But then, during one of the mind challenging games, we had 30 seconds to draw something. It was part of some bigger creative challenge which I won't go into here. I drew a Diplodocus with a purple marker. A lot of stuff was done to it through the course of the game/challenge by others after which it was tacked on the wall. I couldn't stop looking at it through the rest of the day. The Diplodocus was clearly visible in its distinctive purple in clean graceful lines.

I'll never stop being fascinated by dinosaurs.

Au Jeste

I've been lying to myself again. Bad Ipshita.

How many times shall I tell myself it is a practice most disastrous. I have to work hard to get myself on the straight and narrow. I am a crook and a liar at heart. Sigh.. I'd have made such a good villain.

Sternly now

Its okay to make sacrifices and spending money on something you live die and breathe for. But I have to remember it is a sacrifice and find something to do without

LOTR

(squeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeal)
I am going to the LOTR concert
(SQUEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAL)

(Running around in circles waving hands around wildly, metaphorically)

Breathe, bReathe, Breathe...

da dee dum du-di dum

Nothing is too expensive for this kind of thing.

Many many questions

1)Though I am not answerable to other people on questions on my taste, I am still responsible for me. Sigh. I've tried shrugging off my lapses in taste as esoteric, individualistic, hormonal; but in the end its just bad taste.
2)Is it ill-bred and vulgar to show happiness? Just as ill-bred and vulgar it is to paint depression over one's face? Moderate one to the happy medium.
3)I should work harder, I am drawing a salary still, you know. :(
4) How lovely is the tune of the beltane fire-dance. I thought I'd get bored by now but it still makes me twitch. I want to find someone to play alonga me.

Note the shadow. This is not Earth

Rain Dance

I feel all trippy and thrummy and keyed up. My feet itch with the urge to run. I want a nice wide field and the spattering of rain and the fresh smell of green growing things. How lucky to be alive and young.

Boom

There are a couple of planes overhead playing at war games from the sound of it and its making me nervous.

In other news I am having the hardest time concentrating on work now its all winding down.

Just as the Sun and planets were born, they will eventually die.

In 5 billion years, the Sun will cool and bloat outward to many times its current diameter (becoming a red giant) before casting off its outer layers as a planetary nebula and leaving behind a stellar corpse, a white dwarf. The planets will follow the Sun's course; in the far distant future, the gravity of passing stars will gradually whittle away at the Sun's retinue of planets. Some will be destroyed, others will be ejected into interstellar space, but ultimately, over the course of trillions of years, the Sun will be left alone with no other bodies in orbit.

I am sad. I'd like to be alive to watch this. Perhaps I am mistaken and there is an afterlife. I will seat myself in the front row and watch forever. If death is like that, how peaceful it will be. To drift and watch forever.

Hopeless

Only I would look at the photo above at the two scientists responsible for Russia's fusion bomb and the tokamak and say "Awwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww, the dogggggggy"

Lysenko

My I am restless. But the last post made me want to burst out about Lysenko.

How will I explain what I feel and think about Lysenko. You go read about him. Maybe you'll feel the sadess and despair at so much stupidity and wonder if the man believed it at all...
poor Vavilov. What use was a medal given in your name 15-20 years after your death.

Perhaps, Oparin, you oughtn't have... It's okay, I still love you.

Alexander Oparin

Helped his career out by supporting the pseudo-scientific theories Lysenko and someone else came up with, choosing the "party" line of thought. Should I feel bad? No, he did a smart thing. He was plenty brilliant, came up with a lot of stuff on abiogenics and some wikipedia writer is lavish enough to call him the "Darwin of the 20th century" There is no evidence to show he really believed any of the crap Lysenko said. His research was on different lines altogether. So yeah, Oparin, you'll do.

Call me amoral.

(P.S. On hitting spell check I see Lysenko is an acceptable word but Oparin isn't. Odd)

Wilson Cycle

Vaalbara
Ur
Kenorland
Columbia
Rodinia
Pannotia
Pangaea

I lay sleepless for hours last night imagining the earth through all the years.

A bad poem about the fossil I hope to become

Now a little bit of land
A bit of rock spilt out of hand
Moving with the flow
With dead things deep under me.

The first years are young
The soil red
The ocean green
like Mars alive

Then the years are billions
I am ossifying in rock
And the water is deep
Far above my head

It's getting exciting

I was reading over the geological ages and looking at the continental drift. I feel like I'm reading a thriller I've read before, I know the ending but I can't quite remember how it got there. I am at the Permian at the moment. Look at all the tetrapods and things. It's beginning to look familiar.

This is all so horribly exciting. I can't put it down.

Music of Creation

A long time ago, I was in a book shop reading the Silmarillion, reading about the mythos of the creation of the world. Iluvatar began the music from which everything is made. the bookshop was playing this exquisite violin piece. I went in a hurry to the nearest counter to ask what was playing but the person there was incompetent and couldn't tell me anything. I should have been smart and gone to the music section. today as I was walking through the mall the *same*, the SAME music was playing, after almost 10 years I heard it.

Again the impossibility of knowing what was playing over the mall broadcast system. Argh. Do I have to wait another 10 years?

If I have any beliefs about immortality, it is that certain dogs I have known will go to heaven, and very, very few persons. - Thurber


I have frequently thought this must be true. I am glad to see that I am in the best of company. So honoured.

Does it make you unfit to live a normal life when you are dwelling on strange ideals?
Do you go through comparing your real life experiences with those imagined? And is that a bad thing always?
I am at peace listening to a flute solo right now as I type this. If I take the headphones off the clicking of keyboards around me rises to a crescendo and I am lost to this. So, the music is an aid to the peace I am seeking. I could term this as an example of good ideals because it is a real state of mind.
But books? Will I be measuring my life against the quiet heroism of my favourite characters, measure its pace against the despair and speed of plots, matching real relationships with those that heroines and heroes achieve, let my wisest authors set forth the factors I judge my successes against.

I look around me and the realities of things bewilder me.

Funny fiction. My heart calls out for it. I want a book I sneak to class and read under the desk as I stifle giggles. So I'm not in school, the sentiments hold. That is truly the hardest thing to do, be genuinely funny, genuinely laugh aloud funny. I hope I find something on those lines soon. Or I'll just reread my Durrells.

Junk Food

I read a really bad book lately. It's a popular young adult book. It was a huge mess. Again and again I wonder at myself: I think I've got taste but then why do I like slumming it so much. I met some of my uber literary friends on saturday before Venkat's farewell. I had nothing I had read that I could confess to. I didn't care but why do I dwell on things I know which I don't really like. Does the thrill make up for it? It's just sensational to be inflamed with fear, wonder and love. Escapist, unreal, shallow.
And if one does want sensation there is DH Lawrence, Colette, Maupassant. I think its time to go on a detox diet of reading.

Phoney

I can't help feeling guilty. I got hijacked into a semi-date with a guy I don't really know and feel guilty that I almost enjoyed myself. Sure I had plenty of snarky moments with myself when I was feeling like a bitch for laughing internally and loving it; but that really added to the fun of the "date".
But I feel guilty just the same. I should know better.

Sure, I'm a traitor but I am succumbing to the charm of the desert. I am doing a project on the Qatar market for some stuff. It's affecting me, I am beginning to feel warmly towards the country. It's a brash young country, boldly striking out in many directions like a child who feels inspired.

One day, veiled in an Yashmak, I'll go and see for myself.

Why do some live and some die?
What decides fates?
Nothing I suppose.
We work with random probability and hope that it is not our turn yet

Rites, traditions and the future

I have my own and if I ever feel like following any, I will stand in the mainroad and walk, feeling my footsteps echo those of the millions of people who traverse here everyday. Where is there richer tradition except in the feeling of oneness in your own kind?

On another note: you stubborn fool. Whatever disappointment you feel is just fear and cowardice in a novel form. A little bit, yes, you are disappointed, but mostly you are afraid. How will you measure up to a thousand talking bragging people who are older and wiser?
The only advice I have is: Do, don't say. How will I respect myself otherwise. I hope I can.

A good weekend

Had a good weekend as the heading to the blog post indicated. Went for a frog walk and we saw four species of frogs and their tadpoles. Ah, it was good to see them froggies. Froggies are really important indicators of ecosystems and they're cute and all froggy besides. We saw a huuuuuuuuge frog, the Malayan Giant Frog. it was the size of a small laptop.
There were other treats for us. While walking back we saw a Colugo (one of the largest flying lemurs) in the trees. It scampered away from our lights and in annoyance leapt off the tree. She spread her arms wide and glid away accompanied by all our gasps and choruses of delight.

It's a different feeling, being slightly dirty, sweaty, damp, tramping around in the underbrush in the utter darkness relived only by the narrow and insignificant beams of our torches and hearing the sounds of the night around us. I love it.

Was working when a colleague messaged

Colleague X/Sin... do u have any friends who has bought an condor recently?

I blinked. Would I have friends who bought condors? And more puzzlingly why did she want to know? A sudden interest in illegal wildlife trade?

She then typed again

Colleague X/Sin... or any one staying in melvil park condor?

Mope

So much trash gets published. I feel sure I could do it too and I feel despondent. I have to remind myself

• Strength comes from within: don't be jealous and don't be influenced. I'm going to wait.
• One must choose battles to win and not spread forces out too thinly: I can't and will never be able to do everything I want to, at once. I have enough on my plate now. I am going to wait.
• And, one must be wise enough: I can't write well enough yet. I am going to wait.

The Endeavour has landed

Happy.

Go away, they're my band

I loved them before you did. I listened to them before you. Just because you like them now makes you a n00b. So don't talk to me about them.

Their third album is all mine. Mwahahahaha

Today, tomorrow

I want to do something that feels right now but perhaps later I will regret it. Do I live in now or think for later?
I am cross and wonder why should the thought of a deadline change anything? If I am angry or displeased will that change because I only have a little time to be angry or displeased in?
I am tired of waiting, wanting, pandering. I am tired of putting by for later emotionally.
Now. It is now.

I know this is hardly the frame of mind I should be facing my commitments for my studying. Why should I feel old before my time? I am old. Even so, I cannot find it in me to act right now as if I am acting for myself in the future. The future Ipshita and I in my current mood, are not going to be friends. We rail at each other. One for her cautious calculated outlook and the other for her uninhibited restlessness, irresponsibility and search for ephemeral joy. But anger at thoughts we will forgive. What is it that each of us will do that will make us hate one another and will they come to pass or remain as phantom might-have-beens that either one of us will shudder at?

I want to be able to indulge in grand threats, blackmail, tantrums in order to achieve my very reasonable goals, but this is childish and I know I never mean to carry it out. So I am more rational, I know what I want. Why don't I just go ahead and do it or take it? Let those who will stand in the way just sleep.

The un-muse

Whats the opposite of a muse? I have one. If she is around and I happen to have a idea I want to use, to think about; she opens her mouth and says something so trite, so common about the same thing, I lose all enthusiasm about the idea and it is her words who have claimed it.
She is sure to over-exclaim, exaggerate in worn out cliches and phrases. Argh. The originality index of a place drops when she arrives.
Sure, I'm not the most creative or fresh person in the world, but I'm not blind to my shortcomings, I try and I'm not puffed up with a sense of aggrandisement. What I think or want to say could be crap sure, give it a chance.

Irrational as a puppy dog. Clarke is dead, but seeing the notice of his death I was plunged into fresh mourning for the passing of Asimov.

The Muppets

I can't stop laughing.

Pilgrimage

Every viewing of LOTR is a trip to the shrine. I saw FOTR last night. I brim, I brim, I am full, I am happy.

I was wiki-ing Frodo today and saw that the entry was crap! The discussion page was that much more crap. I was tempted to make my wiki-reputation true and sit down to edit it. I didn't in the end.

Wakeboarded yesterday, after a 2 week hiatus. How the muscles ache. How I still make the most wussy jumps. I go 8 inches in the air and land maybe 2 feet from where I jumped from. How will I improve? bah!

Trippy

A nice trip. And two nice trips.

Highs: the boat. She laughed and leapt, scorning the storm and the yawning waves. Not so fortunate the boat dwellers, but I was fine and loved every moment of it.
Then the mushrooms. Well.. I think it was tantamount to vivid dreaming.

I walked, I looked, I petted dogs, I didn't care as time went by, I ate, I dreamt, I thought. A peaceful trip. An introspective trip. But now I've been relaxed I'm roaring to go. I'm signing up for the next level of wakeboarding. I'm restless and there is blood pounding in my veins.

The band was real rouser last night. One of the best performances I have ever been to (bar franz). There. There couldn't be a better lead in to a birfday.

I left at 12:45. A bit early, but by the time I got home it was 1:15 and I had the worst trouble wakihng up this morning, it was raining and stuff. Got to work at 10:00 coz there was n umbrella at home and I had to hunt and hunt to get one. And it was sheets of rain.

Rain bodes well for the new year. I have spoken.

Blue is my favourite colour

Chromium and cuprous salts.
Water and sky
Stone and petal
And I

Operation Splits

Splits or nothing in 4 weeks.

I am predicting some hamstring pull or something. I hope not.

A teenage couple arranged and planned the murder of the girl's family because they refused to let her see him. Everyone was shot and killed, the house was burned down. It's terrible. And then at the end the news articles all mention the family dog.

I quote "On the Caffeys' vast wooded plot, the family's black Labrador waited in vain by the ashes of the incinerated house and a burned van for his owners to return- far from the food and water onlookers have left under the yellow police tape cordoning off the property"

I love dogs more than people.

Was reading an article:

Do Cats Reduce the Risk of a Heart Attack?

a user comment below cracked me up:

My cat lays at the foot of my bed. If I accidently dislodge the little witch she immediately retaliates with a vicious bite to my toes in the middle of the night.

I rather think she will be the cause of my future heart attack,.

I will gladly offer her up for any scientific studies you might have

I slept a lot today and I wasn't feeling so well. So it was well into evening when I emerged outside. I had to meet Aditi and I hailed a cab. It was a beautiful evening. The sun burned large and gold low in the sky; alien, warm and all of the sky thrown into pale yellow; the land grey and shadowy in the slanted rays; the buildings stark against the sky tinted with radiance where the blaze of sunset met glass windows. The cab sped across roads and buildings grew prominent and were left behind, the bougainvilleas bowed as we passed and the sun stayed constantly in sight, spreading larger, like a drop of ink growing in water.

Couldn't sleep last night. My head kept thinking and thinking and it wouldn't close down for rest. I was thinking on and on and if I tried to divert my mind to something more relevant to pre sleep crank-down, it backfired

a)I started by thinking about adoption vs own progeny. I was thinking about nature/nurture, selfishness of my own genes and so and so forth.
b) Suddenly looked at my arm and it looked like a leg of meat. Thinking about cannibalism.
c) Realised I'll be dead sooner or later, point is to be happy. Thinking about how to be happy.
d)Tried to think about lighter topics like blue skies, thought about C02 emissions, tried to think about dolphins, and I wondered which species made it on the endangered list this year, thought about beaches, thought about the report which said no oceans are pristine anymore; decided that nature was not a good topic to muse about. Tried to think about my favourite couples in literature, but then I was thinking about small pox and infant mortality and labour-related deaths.
Pessimistic
Thought about universities, life, death, stars, books, trees, turtles

I didn't worry about any of these, just thought. And every thought budded off to another. My thought chain would have looked like a yeast reproductive cycle.

I slept past three finally. Three being the last time I remember on the air-con remote. It was getting too cold and I turned it down a bit.

Impatience

Surely my flute is ready by now!

One reads of primal languages which were the gateway between people and objects. Words that made a stirring in the world when spoken, words of true meaning and power.

Admittedly most of this comes from fantasy but epics hold them too, be they homerian or the sankrit epics.

Its a nice concept to read about, but I didn't feel really, where it came from, till I saw the following.


I reacted quite oddly. I had this compelling feeling to return home. It might have been the beauty of the word itself, the terse nature of the quote, the art and layout which worked on me or all three; but I get it now. The power of the word.

Frills, Frippery and Placidity

I won't be judgemental and say women, I'll say women of my office (WMO).
But I am so tired of them. They have no energy no interests beyond very feminine concerns such as clothes, weddings, engagements, relatives, makeup etc etc.
I am so tired of it. I like the power and enthusiasm in people who feel and have curiosity and interests in a wider world. I am guilty of some of this but forbid that I am so bad.

I want adventure in the great wide somewhere
I want it more than I can tell... (quoting Disney again)

Thats why I adore my friends. They're great fun, they have eyes open to possibilities, I can talk to them.

Stupidity and Sadness

"I don't want to see greece for I think my standards have been set high by seeing Rome and Venice"

Scorn
Contempt

and at home Saranya trembles with the force of her own emotions as she cries at the helplessness of her situation. (bowed head)

I'm restlessing. There are wings on my ankles and buzzing blood in my ears. What is this office to hohld me down? Gravity and shards of glass keep from shouldering my way through the window, but the elevator is an equally respectable option. However what on earth do I do once I am out?
I ought to sew on missing buttons
I ought to give my clothes to the salvation army
I ought to exercise
I ought to stock up for the weekend

I dont want to do any of these things, I dont know what I want to do. I feel like lying down and letting my dreams entertain me. Hold on, there are movies running. Noone I know is free for a movie today. Wine and pizza?
Ha...


Edit: I've done some of my pressing oughts already. My flute has been sent for repair. I wait, I hanker for them to call back. Fluuute.

Pilgrimage

As the world spins about the sun again, I am going to celebrate with my annual Tolkienity.

Listen, O wanderers by my fire, as I tell you the story of Frodo nine fingered and the ring of doom...

This is something I wanted to blog for a long time. I don't know quite how to start and how much to explain but you should hear the story first.

There was a cockroach and my sister hit it. She dislikes them intensely. However the hit didn't kill the roach and it was merely stunned. She turned to me and said, "Do you think there is life after this one? An afterlife?"

Curiously I looked at her as I answered, "No."

She said, not quite meeting my eyes, "I don't either. That's why we need to be careful how we take it away." And she then killed the roach.

For some reason this incident struck me strongly. The careful weighing of such a small action and then not letting the paralysis of indecision take her after such minute thought. And whatever else may strike you, Bloggy.

Flute

My flute is not working again. I feel horribly sad, as horribly sad as I could feel at the moment. I only got it fixed in december. Perhaps I should buy a newer and better model?

I was getting so into practising too :(

Fluuuute

How nice it is to listen to music on the radio and feel that none of it is remotely related to you.

All those sleepless nights and irritable turns and unsure days and gloom and storm and thunder and rain and low esteem. For this ending.
Cliched as this is, I feel like it's a dream. For I have had several dreams of being accepted by various universities, from which I would awake groaning at the cruelty of my own mind. I don't know how to react though. Suddenly there is no time. Suddenly I'm aware of all the roots I've put out.

Oh well... To be brave and excited.

Rereading the earlier blogs, I feel damn silly. Ephemeral enthusiasm.

It's a game, isn't it?

Yes it is. How many times can you play the trailer and still give yourself goosebumps. For the sake of ouside eyes I won't say. But you and I, Bloggy, we know.

Don't hyperventilate. (Ragged breathing)

I didn't think I was a star trek fan, or a nerd, just an afficianado. oh how I have lied to myself. I was casually reading the wiki entry on the newest film with interest on the new blood injected into the franchise. But then I read the following line

The first teaser trailer debuted in theaters with Cloverfield on January 18, 2008.

Ah, ah, ah... my heart and my bones

"There's a trailer?!"

I haven't seen it yet. I wanted to record this while I am still breathing excitedly.

And now, it has finished loading...

Some songs and lyrics produce a state of happy dreaminess in me. I am listening to one now. Imogen Heap is telling me "Such boundless pleasure, We've no time for later now".
I like this now. I like this minute, this passing second and it laughs at me as it slips out of my overeager grasp. I am so alive. Everything in me is awake, looking out of the windows watching me take them on this journey.

Am I so absorbed in my self that I am losing the sympathy to be in another skin. I liked doing that, I tried the other day. But I just found my maiden-aunt attitude coming on, disapproval of the new skin's actions. I miserably slipped back into mine.

Oh come off it. Do you really care right now? No, no, no. Nothing in me cares. I am not dead yet.

And if it comes to the worst I'll take Ms Heap's word for it. There's beauty in the breakdown.

I can't sleep. I love my dog. I LOVE my dog. Endlessly, fiercely and I am so upset to think these are his sunset years. What will this world be without him? I am desolate while just imagining it.
How will I go on?
Brutus, Brutus, I don't know what life will be without you. If only I had met you near my end, so that I could go before you had to. There is already a huge void in my heart where I miss you because you're not here and you're old and alone at home. I want you happy, my doggiest doggy.

My throat is lumpy and I'm sobbing like a baby. Oh Brutus, don't die

I have a growing frustration with myself. To put in terms that reflect my own interests: if there was a book set in a different time or place, the protagonist would quickly come to terms with the governing forces of the world, be it magic, science, the line of command, strategy and logic. Very well, I tend to think of myself as a protagonist in my own story, but I am so weakly equipped. I refer to my complete ignorance of the financial world. I am resolved to learn more, to attend more carefully to others who know more and to pay attention to the events in the world. I mean, after all, this along with all the laws of physics, science and logic (these with which I am more comfortable) will influence my life.


And I am impressed by the mathematical nature of it, by which I mean the system itself. It's alive!

Rubber

Lots of it.
I feel more resilient and thats good. The sloughs of despondency are no good. And a little of the joy of life has come back. It's lovely and I am lucky.
I am aching however from my millions of falls in wakeboarding. Could do with more rubber there.

I bought some wonderful cheese, a provolone. It's bliss.
I've been trying all day to justify me eating more of it today, but it's a full fat cheese and I'm supposed to be on a diet. Waaaaaaaaaah :'(

On the diet note, its going slowly. I enjoy the extra exercises it imposes on me. I'm unbearably smug with the amount of exercises I've done and am going to do. But Bloggy, I need it. Both the exercises and the smugness to sustain me through the body aches.

Ariel

I am so glad they remembered Bismarck's dog.

I'm missing mine.

When I read about great people of the past and some detail comes through the academia to strike me and I think My God, she was really alive or that he was really alive.

What on earth have I done in comparison to deserve to live?

There are many words in the english language for the relationships between people; those of blood, those of emotion, those of economy. There is one missing. There is no word for the relationship that binds one to another through guilt. It is a binding ceremony indeed.

So its a new year. But it feels a bit like work in progress if you know what I mean. So the feeling of the passing of time hasn' really affected me this year. If only I couuld settle down this way for my birthdays :p

I've been reading a most marvellous book: Greece in the bronze ages. Its better than all the fantasy and alternative history I read. I really should stick more to the history genre. There is a deep feeling that surfaces through my perusal of the book. I feel drawn to the men and women of the times, their efforts, their migrations. Its amazing. For all my modern thinking and education, and for all of everyone elses, how would we ever bear a life like that? Insecurity, fear of man and animal and love for fertility, growth and renewal. And the cycles that pass, growth and fall, that passing time did not always mean growth.

I wonder how much of what we read and our culture harks back to those times and to what extent the memory lives on. Heroes, Myths, Drama, the well worn plots.

I am so very western in my culture though. Where is the bengali part of me? Where is my cultural memory? I do read about it. I think about the villages, my ancestors (recorded for 17 generations, I feel oddly happy about that. It's not pride exactly. Just a pleasant feeling and knowledge of where I come from.) But even with these, I don't really think of myself as a bengali. Unfortunately I am whatever I feel. I am the matriarch of hominids in africa. I am the woman on the raft migrations to australasia. I am the invader, the migrator, the claimer of new lands. I am the opressed, an enslaved conquered, I secrete traditions to mingle with the new masters'. I am a woman of a village, the life soul binding it and bringer of hope for a new generation to keep the culture memory alive. But now? What am I now? I am just a thinker, an existor. That was quite an accolade in the past. To be intelligent, to survive. It means less now but I will keep the compliment I have paid myself.