All the Little Pieces and the Large One

The lost girl went out in search for herself.
She found pieces little and large
Scattered across vast lands and places afar.
She walked till her feet got sore,
Determined to find every last piece.

She stumbled upon a little lake
And happened to gaze at her reflection.
There was so much more to her now,
She was so different from when she set out.
It was a beautiful sight. She smiled.

Perhaps it was time to go back.
She turned only to find that she had left behind little pieces
At every spot she had found a new piece of herself,
Glistening  under the sun,
Beautiful.

She began to walk again.
But this time she knew her journey had just begun.
She went back to collect some lost pieces
And let go of others.
Some pieces just didn't fit any longer.

But she was missing a large slice.
A large beautiful part of her she had lost along the way.
When she found it
It didn't fit so well anymore.
So she sat beside it and waited.
Waited till the pieces aligned themselves and it became part of her again.

The Perfection We Seek

There is perfect silence.
The mind wanders,
Looking for a distraction from the storm within.

The clock ticks away.
The faint sound of one's breath,
Even silence isn't perfect.

A revving engine far away
Only barely discernible,
Drawing the gaze to the window

Warm sunlight washes the face.
The leaves are rustling
Silently.
There is a breeze outside,
And the sun.

The eyes blink and turn away.
And just like always
Everything is still.

So Messed up!

I normally write when I have something going on in my head.
Today I have a lot going on in my head. But it's like a huge pile of mess. Detangling thoughts out of it would be like pulling threads out of a cargo container full of shredded, discarded shirts.
I don't know what to write now. Every time I type a sentence, the thread gets tangled and I can't finish the thought. So you're stuck reading the ramblings of a very messed up mind at work. I apologise in case I continue to babble much longer.

Nope, cannot babble on too much. Having trouble finishing my own sentences. How do people finish each other's? I wish I could dump this whole pile of crap on someone else to sort through. That would be a very convenient solution indeed. But until I can, this bundle of crazy will not let me sleep without nightmares where I am an undercover agent solving murders committed by serial killers. I am feeling more and more convinced I need a shrink more than this blog.

A reality check for anyone who considers me sane.

How the hell to deal with good news

So it's a well established fact that I'm a bit of a sucker when it comes to sentiments. I am not exactly sure if I'm more expressive or if I really am more sentimental than the average person. Everytime someone close to me has some good news, I want to celebrate, but when it's someone I really love it makes me want to cry. Today a very dear friend of mine had some amazing news for us and all the technology in the world couldn't convey what a hug and a teary-eyed smile can.

Technology has brought us so close together, yet taken us so far apart. I hope there really is some god or force or something out there, connecting us altogether, helping us where technology fails us. Sending warm hugs to our friends when we're so happy for them we cry out of sheer joy.

The Parent Contradiction

Nobody could ever say that being a parent was easy. Some realise it before they plan a baby while others stumble upon the fact when they have a screaming infant in their arms. I am no parent but having helped raise a relatively large number of cousins (or at least having been around), I have have had the opportunity to observe many different kinds of parenting.

What is easy to see is that kids are extremely perceptive. The little baby cousin whose parents want the prettiest daughter in all the land happens to love dressing up and looking pretty and those who do not understand the importance of education have children who couldn't be bothered to find out anything about anything besides things that do not affect them directly. All of this made me wonder about me and how my parents raised me.

Growing up, all I ever wanted was to make my parents proud, any way I could. I did whatever I did to be the best. I worked hard at everything, but putting my heart into it helped. I dreamt of being successful and coming home to proud smiles of my parents. All of this came from the constant encouragement that I got from my parents. It's not easy to understand just how big a hand your parents had in making you the person you are.

The hardest thing for parents to do is to balance the urge to protect the children with giving them the freedom to make their decisions and find their path in life. Babies need constant protection, which needs to be lessened slowly over time till you let the kids go when they become young adults. Most of your arguments with your parents would have been a result of this process. As children you resent your parents for all the rules and restrictions. But as an adult, I can't imagine how difficult it must've been for my parents, to let me go and suppress their protective instincts all these years.

I guess what I'm trying to say is, I can't believe how I lucked out having the parents I have. And maybe someday I'll find the courage to tell them that.

The Practicality of Patriarchy

I'm a north Indian from a small town of Haryana where the baniyas (businessmen) lived with the jats (farmers). My father inherited his business from his father who inherited it from his and it goes back so many generations, it's hardly possible to trace. By business I mean property, cash in the bank account, the family home, land that farmers were hired to cultivate, the reputation that comes with so much wealth, and the desire to maintain this all-too-important reputation.

The system is extremely simple and it's practicality cannot be refuted. The purpose of income is to afford the entire family a decent enough lifestyle, no frills necessary, and the wealth is to be passed on to future generations as an insurance policy for the rainy day. Hold on a second, did you think that the future generations meant all children? It means the males of the future generations. After all they're the ones who're burdened with the task of taking care of the entire family. So what happens to the girls you ask. Simple enough. It is the responsibility of the father and the brother and any other man who might be bothered about her well-being to find her a suitable groom with an inheritance of his own that might be comparable to the family's.

Now let's come to the very important issue of the reputation of the family. The family must always be perceived as sanskari. This means that the boys should earn a lot of money. This is of utmost importance. Everything else is secondary. But the secondary issues are extremely important too. The women should be gentle, kind, beautiful to look at and always obey the elders and of course, the husband, as he's the one who takes care of her. It is primarily the woman's responsibility to protect the family reputation. For this she keeps the home clean, manages the home budget in the money that her husband provides her, never speaks to loudly, never disagrees with anybody, gives birth to children, especially boys, takes care of the children, her parents-in-law, any siblings of the husband who might live in the house and helps them with everything they need. Her family must always come first. If father-in-law does not like dinner, it's her fault, and she must be good-for-nothing for not even being able to provide a decent meal.

It can get very difficult to find the right bahu for your son. What if the new daughter-in-law turns out to be tez? What if she likes to go out and meet a lot of friends? What if she refuses to cover her head and likes to wear shorts and skirts. Children today! they just have no sanskar. So the only way to select the right sanskari bahu is to look for a girl who has been correctly brought up in another respectable baniya family. On the other hand, the girls' parents are vying for that high earning respectable groom too. The solution? The big Indian Wedding. Shower the groom's family with all kinds of gifts from diamonds for his mother to watches and cars for him. Throw such a big party that it will help both families become even more respectable. If the girl is dark or fat just spend a little more money. It's a one time expense and it will secure a wonderful future for the girl forever.

So the girl's parents spend a monstrous amount of money on the wedding. It's alright, that's really her right on the family's wealth. She gets a magnificent wedding and gets to become a part of a respectable family. Now the parents have done their job as far as she is concerned and they can concentrate on making the son learn the trade so he can also be eligible for a girl from a respectable family.

This is a very practical system. What belongs to the husband belongs to the wife really, so the wife is now part of a respectable family and they will eventually inherit enormous wealth. Meanwhile, she no longer has any right on her parents' wealth, so the institution of marriage is strengthened. Where is she really going to go? Division of labour is perfect to a tee. The man makes money and the woman manages the home. After all, all her needs are looked after. She has a home, food, beautiful children to love and a lot of respect in society.

What the hell was the government thinking giving equal rights to the daughters on the family property? What if the daughter and her husband come to lay claims on the home where the poor brother lives with his family? Where is he going to go? Why can't the girl just be happy in her own home. She has everything.


[Female feoticide is common in this society. Female infanticide isn't unheard of amongst the less aware and the less moneyed. The dowries keep increasing and the expense of a wedding is unbelievable.

Disclaimer: I write this as a comment on the system in general. My parents have been nothing but supportive. I am dark and fat and wear glasses. I wear shorts in the summer. I laugh and talk very loudly and I also work.]

I walk

I walk along on the wet pavement
Raindrops just keep falling relentlessly
As the skies shower down the pain.

It isn't as if the world is unhappy,
but it's dark and the glow of the blinking signs
just isn't bright enough.

My feet keep moving,
one step in front of the other
in a never ending symphony

It is music. the music that echoes
in a deep, dark abyss.
it's hauntingly beautiful.

In the shop window
there is a baby doll
with a smile as bright as the warm sunlight.
I pass it by.

I walk along. Into the night.
And for a while, I have company.
feet walking with my feet.
But at the crossroads, they turn away.

It is the night, with bright stars in the sky.
The city is vast, and I shall never know it.
I don't even know the street I walk in,
or the alley I just passed.

I know nothing, like Jon Snow,
all I know is that I will never know.
I also know that i will keep walking.
Into the night, forever,
towards that destination that may never be.

I know

We communicate through our words, our eyes, our faces, bodies. But when it gets interesting, is when we begin to pretend. We pretend to be happy so others don't worry about us. We pretend to be upset for attention. We pretend to be nice so people will like us and we pretend to be mean so people will believe we're tough. We always pretend for others, not for ourselves.

Sometimes we pretend to pretend. This is very sophisticated communication. I tell my brother he's a donkey and all he calls me, is Moti (hindi for fatty). We both pretend to be pretending to not like each other, but really, it is clear as daylight that we love each other to bits.

We don't often tell people we really, really love, that we love them. It is unnecessary. Parents don't tell their kids that they love them everyday, and there is no greater love than the love a parent has for a child. I do not remember ever telling my parents I love them, not unless we were fighting, which is the only time it became necessary to establish the fact. 

When you love someone, they know. And I know.

Rational Emotions

Recently, somebody suggested to me that logic is overrated and we, as people, tend to rationalise what we desire and twist logic around our emotions. As I consider myself a logical, rational person, this got me rather disturbed. Was my rebellion against arranged marriage and all the feminism simply my fear of commitment?

Eventually I arrived at the conclusion that while I do rationalise my emotional decisions, a lot of my emotions are based on sound logic. If I think that men treat their wives badly because they take them for granted, because they would never leave them, because they have no choice, because they are not financially independent, because they are not allowed to study or work, that makes me want to get a good job and care about my career and be ambitious. Now I am quite ambitious and a little emotional about my career, but isn't the emotion based on logic?

But of course, we do rationalise other, non- logical emotions. Falling in love has gone out of fashion. It's logical to date and it's logical to move on, even if you never get over a certain someone. Because it's illogical.

Now, I consider myself a logical person, but I also consider myself an emotional person. Some of my friends have nick-named me 'senti'(it sort of rhymes with my name). I think I might die young because my brain will short-circuit from all the contradiction from the logic and emotions it goes through.

I seek intellectual challenges and I love passionately. I am passionate in everything I do, from my dancing, my ideologies to my love for people, romantic or platonic. Life has so many colours and the world is so full of so many things and my desires are as endless as the universe, how does everyday, routine life match up to the imagination of the infinite possibilities of what life could be? I want to live in a certain city, I want a certain job, I want to love a certain kind of man (actually, I have a pretty specific specimen in mind) and for him to love me with the same passion. I want all of this, with enough time to travel the world and experience everything there is to experience, to ski and swim, even though I can do neither. And I forgot to mention, I want to be able to spend lots and lots of time with all of those people I love so much, even though they live on various continents.

Rationality indicates that real life would probably not live up to these possibilities, but hey, a girl can try.