Walk Alone : When you moved on

 Dear Mate 

Last month was filled with so much elation but apprehension on your part. You moved back to a place where you started your journey. A place where you and I became we …. Now I don't know for sure if there is an us anymore. The shock here is I have never known. Seven years of my hopes, love, prayers and dreams and there was never a guarantee that this whatever we have will bloom into something permanent or wither away with time. It has done neither.... 

There were times when I strongly felt there was no presence but a mere shadow of a relationship in my life. Yet sometimes the shadow became a shade in the times of chaos and uncertainty. There were times when I thought everything about us was worthless and the very next moment you were right next to me proving that we had something special. At times I have become hopeless regarding our future and thought seriously of moving on in my life… whatever that means. But one thing is for sure, I am not some jogan in your prem who wants to spend her life in the solitude with only your memory as a companion. I am someone who values her independence and knows the peace that comes with my solitude. Why would someone like me dive deep into a family life without the certainty that the person next to me is worthy of sharing my life?

My family has been a source of joy for me lately with the latest edition of nephew and nieces. The little ones’ pitter patter all over my life and their chirpy voices make my heart warm with love and tenderness. Yet I have not forgotten the past where I had been ridiculed, misunderstood, mocked upon and even frowned at. All that can so easily recur in my life if and when I choose the wrong kind of family.

I choose? I have already chosen a life where I myself value and love myself to distraction. I need no other person(s) to tell me of my worth.  You can take it as arrogance, I call it an informed choice. Be rest assured love, you never were and never will be my reason for not moving on in traditional ways. The fifteen days of pomp and show, chaos afterwards. No thanks!!

With my three fur babies (one of them a virtual adoption), loving and caring Bhagwaan, beta and bahu in whom I found soul sisters and my 32 children (and counting) I will soldier on in my life. Always with a smile and the surety that I have been well loved and deeply cared for. I will thrive in the knowledge that I made a difference in my life and theirs. That we have and we will always be walking alone…. Yet together.

 

 

The Subtle Art of Gifting

 Hi Readers 

Sorry for the long pause. Sometimes in life, you can't manage all the things all the while. So you take a breather or a series of breathers in my case and are back with a bang. Life is blessed these days. I have come back to my work like I had never been away and I am happy to report that the work environment now has shown considerable improvement. On the personal front, I forage into the world of literature and am now trying to be a.... ahem ahem published author soon. 

Sample this:

You have some close friends and one of them is having their birthday soon. Now all of your friends come to you and ask “What shall I give!” You are the designated genius of the group so you think hard, explore and give them a few options. That’s when the trouble starts looming. I might be making a mountain out of a molehill yet it bothers me. Not the effort, not the going through the motions of making the booking/purchasing/ planning etc. but the fact that you are supposed to deal with this from end to end.

Lately I have been crazily and hungrily searching for extraordinary gifting ideas. Boy! This market has undergone a radical change. You name it, you have it! 

Well, then came the sly little snake of trouble. My near and dear ones rely heavily on me to find gifts for their birthdays, their special ones' birthdays, and other special occasions. To make matters worse, my own birthday as well. To those who say, 'It’s the thought that counts!' It does but when it comes to what kind of gift was chosen for you or the value of it. 

Once you have taken a few suggestions from your close ones or me for that matter, rest of it should be your own show, I think. The main thrill of gifting is finding something a person wants, not what a person needs. Needs are basic, wants exciting!  

And with so many hints scattered around... my near ones just lean on me to find the perfect gift for.... dhan tanana Me!! Yeah you heard that right. It is my birthday next month and I am supposed to find the perfect gifts for myself... It’s stressing me out. Everyone will once again go through the motions of “Kya chahiye aapko”? Actually a little attention to details from your end would be nice. What makes it worse is “Kuchch pasand aaye to bata dena!”

This half-hearted ‘Buy something for yourself, I will pay’ just does not compare with the thrill of the surprise of finding something waiting for you... something which you neither anticipated nor were looking forward to. Something that just resonated with the receiver! Gone are the days when you had to turn the markets upside down to find something, then pack and send it off. Nowadays mostly ‘a few clicks on the system or your phone’ is all it takes.

A few minutes of your time and the person concerned would be showered with the love you gave them. I have come to a point in my life where moneywise I am comfortable. Although I now never let my guard down and have a kitty maintained for emergencies….Still I enjoy my earnings in a way which was missing earlier. My book collection has grown exponentially and I have collected many beautiful things like handmade diaries in my home.

Even then, if you take the effort of sparing a few minutes for me and find something, it will make me far happier than asking you to get me something of my choice. There are ways of knowing what a person would like or love by simply observing them a little closely. Please do observe and gift them the smile that comes when they find something waiting for them, unexpectedly and surprisingly.

Ciao! 

Unlady-like

Dear God

Picture this:

I was going to park my vehicle and suddenly someone tries to direct you about the ‘how to’ of manoeuvering your vehicle. Or you are in a crowded street and someone narrowly misses your vehicle all the while glaring at you. Now we have two options if it’s a guy he will step down from the vehicle and start a dhishum dhishum right there on the street, a lady will glare at you with daggers in her eyes and move on. Then comes the unladylike yours truly, who will roll down their window; give the person in question some unsavoury words and then move ahead.

God, for women like me you have made certain rules and those rules are meant to be broken. I must haggle with street vendors, deal with repair walas and get my car to the auto centre all on my own.

I handle my finances whichever way I can and regularly dodge financial advices or lucrative schemes. I get a lot of advise regarding how I should or should not do certain things certain way and turn a deaf ear to all. I am constantly being frowned upon by the way I sit, talk, look or behave. I know people want to peak into my private life, but I firmly keep the blinds shut.

And then I get judged!

I am someone who does not know how to depend on someone anymore. I run my household and run it any which way I can. There are days when I don’t feel like getting vegies from the market and rely on maggie for days on end. And there are weeks of healthy eating spree. There are times when I wish I could have someone to plan my trips, pack my bags and take me to the station… and then there are bouts of adulting when I manage all like a pro.

There are times when I feel there should be someone to open the door when I reach home and then sometimes I enjoy the solitude. There are times when I get unwanted attention for simply being there which makes me uncomfortable and then there are times when I enjoy the limelight for the right reasons.

Living alone has its own perks and pains. I welcome both!

Then there are times when I look back on how far I have come and the things I accomplished. I have a little thing about missing the conventional way of life. Yet I feel complete in my own wake.

Then when people call me Not ladki jaisi ladki  I hold my head high, look them in the eye and say:

Right, I’m a tad bit un-lady like and I love myself for that.  

Walk Alone VII

Dear God

One call, one decision, one trip and then this silence from his end. Experience of a lifetime but apprehensions regarding the future. The year started on a very disturbing note when he called and I once again launched a tirade about how we cannot be together anymore. It’s actually exhausting to stay away, then come close and then again having to move away from him. Retreating with my love, care, concern and my ardent desire of being with him.

Of all the people that you could have given me, how come I have this stubborn bu**head? God my stories have never had happy endings and yet I continued believing them. What do I do? How do I contemplate the end? How to cope with always feeling the end is near and yet getting closer than ever before?

O God!!! Sometimes I feel a clean cut would be so much better and I would finally heal. Sometimes I think it is not my fault and I deserve to live whichever way I want. Sometimes my mind revolts at the shear unfairness of it all. Sometimes I doubt if at all he had love in his heart!

Sometimes my heart formulates elaborate schemes to win his love and other times it drowns itself in the depths of depression.

One thing is sure though and always will be. MY life has no place for a half-life and neither for a socially questionable relationship. Whoever has me has to hold my hands and walk besides me publicly.

It took me all I had to take this trip on my own. I almost jumped down from the train or retreated from the airport/ took the return flight to rush back home… And yet here I was.

I got a lot of flake for giving priority to myself instead of being home for some family emergency. But in my defence that the emergency did not happen unless and until I had already booked everything. Moreover, it was dealt already when I planned this.

Meeting Anku was one of the landmarks in my life and the most wonderful way to start my year!

Looking forward to something more soon…

PS: Its hard to think of oneself, loving myself is an uphill task but I am doing well

Calm down…. Or not!!

 

Dear God

Sample this:

Mujhe samajhne wali ladki Upar wala de dega

Tum meri life se nikal gayi ho yay u kaho nikal diya hai tumhe

Tum hi gale padi thi

Tum us layak hi nahin ki koi tumse shadi kar le

Mere gale mat pado

Jara bhi sharm bachi ho tumhare andar to baat mat karna ab mujhse

Last night was difficult to say the least. Once again, he hurled these insults my way and I chose to maintain my distance from him as I had very wisely done last week after that huge fight.  What was that fight about? He was here and refused to meet me and then proceeded to not answer my calls for hours on end. Then when I called out for his attitude I was on the receiving end of

‘Agar tumhe lagta hai main tumhe torture karta hoon to main tumhe free kar raha

And after the stoic silence for a whole week

Main next month marriage karne ja raha

And all this yesterday night because I lost my cool at him. Why do I claim to love this man if I hurl the choicest insults his way? Is he that bad? Or I am the bitch here? Well God!!

Just like he claims I am unlovable I claim that he keeps hiding his life from me like he has something to hide always. Many nights his phone is engaged quite late in the night and he has no explanation other than network. For weekends he constantly goes AWOL and gives vague responses if I try to meet up or plan something. And the future… He knows we have no future yet refuses to let me foray on a path of my own. His words say ‘You move on’ Yet when I try, he goes to the extent of reprimanding me for choosing to have dinner with friends. Before him, I had no friends… Now I have some but they are all far….

I have always had a minimal social life but with him also its difficult to make plans. He chooses to keep his life in such wraps. He takes and post mortems my phone time and again. Yet he never gave him his to even click a picture… He is positively jumping if and when I have his cellphone in my hands even for a brief period of time. He claims he is not using social media yet shares stories from FB, Insta or twitter with heavily edited screenshots.

There were days when I trusted what he said. Yet I found him lying to me at the drop of a hat. I saw him rather caught him red handed in places he had no business being… With a woman I deeply loath to this day. He talks to women late at night and claims to be a universal problem solver. Yet somehow each of these women seem to fall in love with him and be crazy for him and chase him consistently. He has promised to maintain his distance many times in life yet he has been the one to initiate contact sometimes on the pretext of some professional reason, help or just plain old well wisher’s welfare check for me.

He says I am going to my hometown and asks me to take him to the airport. Yet catches a flight to someplace else. When the guilt is too much he confesses but does not want to be confronted. Openly claims to be my fiancée to all the people he meets in my circle – professional and personal both. Yet in his circles no one knows me. BTW we move in the same circles so from my end they know he is my fiancée and from his end they know he is single and looking for a homemaker wife… Pretty messed up, na?

He claims he wants me to move on and be happy in my life yet ends up at my weekend getaway to take me back home. He starts missing me as long as I am not there and yet claiming he never wants to connect with me again. If I take his word and start looking for a life partner, I will have to subject myself to an endless torture of ‘Comeback please’ or ‘Be happy always’. He is not one to give up his playthings easily. Even if I am married, he will want to keep in touch (!) and be the so-called agony aunt in my life. Seeing him makes me want to just hide myself in his embrace and forget everything. It has been my safe space for so long. I am willing to sacrifice our love for his commitment to his family values. Yet he wants me to give up mine and choose a life detrimental to my reputation and my mental peace.

All I asked for is a graceful goodbye and all I get is the choicest insults. The worst thing in all this is ‘He asked me to wait for him for all these years and now he is asking me to give up…. Now?? After all those wasted years of my youth and prime.’ He ridicules me for my looks and age when half the creases come from the sleepless nights he gifted me. The other half on his ridicules on my knowledge, looks, efforts for dressing up and self-improvement projects and the fact that nothing seems to work when it comes to him.

The fact that when I try to give up on him, he holds my hands tight and makes me come back. Yet when I ease into the comfort of being with him, he outright declares that I was alone and all this love and togetherness was just in my head. All he was doing was being a friend (!). His friendship makes me question what I know about friendship so far.

He invalidates my feelings, overlooks my efforts and yet when I want to gracefully ease out from his life he will be all

You have done a lot for me. I will never forget you.

My better judgement screams at me to walk away from this hell. Eventually he is going to say ‘No one asked you to stay’ Yet I wait for him to move on in his life. Sometimes I want to take some strong steps to throw him out of my life and keep him there. Yet when I remember he has been betrayed before like that, my heart goes out to him. I wanted to be a comfort in his life yet he claims I am a thorn!

Am I that bad, God? Am I actually unlovable? Do I not deserve what I asked for? Once again, I ask all these questions and they remain unanswered… as they have been from years and years of my life. Even if I believe the best of me, I am having a really hard time believing something best for me will eventually happen.

And then when someone asks me to calm down…… the turmoil within soars higher and screams ‘Hell No!!’

Moving in circles

 

Dear God

Sample this:

‘Congratulations on your court marriage!’

Groggy with sleep, I gently shifted Winky* and picked up the phone under the pillow to find this shocking piece of gossip. First things first: I am not married. Second this is the same person who yesterday promised to stay out of touch and maintain distance. Breakups are hard on people and no one else knows this more than me. I got to know firsthand how much I wanted to stay in touch with people I left behind or vice versa. But my mind and heart longed for a more wholesome and equal relationship.

If the person in question cannot give me that, there is no reason why I should continue this relationship. Now he may question my ability to thrive alone or reserve his apprehensions of a girl single in the city. But that would be MY PROBLEM. 

I have every right to give time to myself and think of a world where I am someone’s choice not an option. Its been years of wait with no fruitful result in sight. He just barges in and out of my life as he pleases. The thing is that now when I try to close the doors from inside he wants the master key.

He has somehow forgotten that my life is not a train for him where he can reserve a coup for life. Any relationship has to have two sides otherwise what is the point?

One day he promises me that he will drift apart gracefully because I deserve the right to move on. The other he tries to convey cryptic messages through sending and deleting or drunk dialing! If I let him back in my life now, it will be the same endless wait, the same busy weekends and the same coaxing and cajoling and brow beating for something as simple as sharing a cup of coffee in the evening.

I had been maintaining my distance and giving him space even though I missed him like hell. But this! This accusatory tone, this blaming me for having moved on, this gossipy piece … I don’t miss. Whatever happened to graceful goodbyes God?

It is super hard for me to find someone in this world of yours and I just want to give up. I am better off alone than be with someone who makes it so hard to be with him. I need not punish myself for falling in love with someone who does not know what love is… His warped ideas, his distance, his crass attitude and his constant blaming my attitude for all our problems is now getting on my nerves. I need some semblance of peace in my life God.

But when I try that he comes back with his promises and I fall prey to his charms once again. He makes me second guess every single bad thought I have had, his lack of commitment and our uncertain future. Many times, he said it out loud that we have no future. Yet he does not let go of me in the present. I need to spend some time alone before I can heal and maybe…. just maybe give a chance to someone. Yet I can’t promise that I will move on for good. Deep inside he knows if he calls I'll come back like a lovesick puppy. Why God? You gave me no sense of self-preservation when it comes to this person. I know this circle will sickeningly continue for You only know how many more years to come…

*Winky is my pet dog

 

The lessons of life (My take on the Physicswallah incident)

 

Dear Mate

The recent incident of a teacher hurling abuses at a student and threatening her of physical violence for showing some ahem purple love is doing the rounds these days. So is the half-hearted, not so well-meant apology he attempted. Now to those who are saying BTS is way above these petty attacks and ARMYs should just full on ignore this, the homophobic comments he passed at BTS are not the problem here.

The much bigger problem is the threats he tries to pass off as a mere scolding… Now a scolding would be along the lines of:

Do this and I will throw you out of the class or something like that which is perfectly acceptable since you are supposedly a teacher(!).

But we were shocked to hear words like:

Quote:

If you weren’t a girl, I would’ve grabbed your collar and slapped you. Your cheeks would’ve been swollen so much that you wouldn’t be able to say ‘BTS’…I would’ve punched you so hard your nose would start bleeding.

The video is so problematic that anyone with a sane mind would be uncomfortable and alarmed at the mental state of this person.

It just gives a message that it is wrong to have a successful, positive role model in your life if they do not conform to the society norms about masculinity. Moreover, it emphasizes that anything significant can only be achieved by doggedly pursuing academics and ignoring all other active interests in your life.

It is the same as classifying students who are passionate about their studies as nerds.

Speaking about the apology…,

It basically went like

I am stressed

Engaged all day in teaching and when I am not teaching I am making PPTs

Could not see the doubts other students were posting in the comment threads.

But my parents and wife pointed out that I was wrong.

Ok so you did not arrive on this conclusion on your own. You are saying sorry only because your family members think you are wrong. That too only after the incident went viral and even the Korean media took cognizance.

Some major a** saving there.

As a teacher, your job does not end at teaching the subjects. You are equally responsible for teaching the children the importance of having a well-balanced life. It is never wrong to have and discuss active interests. I leave you with the question:

If it was a couple of students discussing yesterday’s cricket match or world cup football for that matter, would your reaction be the same?

I don't think so!