Tearing Whispers..

There is one thing that I could never do… cry to my heart’s content. I hide my emotions from my close friends and family. I’ve got so used to holding up my feelings that I forgot how to cry. I try and try… but can never cry. I smile outwards, when really inside, my heart will be breaking.


Tears have always refused to leak out from me. They are always well-settled, sealed behind my eyes. Many a times I have craved for an outpour… for the tears to tumble…to sob like a baby. I want to weep out the tons of emotions, anger and tensions inside me. The knot in the throat tightens and suffocates me. But I couldn’t. If they had fallen, it would have been easy to wipe it out. But how can you wipe the tears that were locked behind your eyes? How can you ever erase that blemish? My pillows were and are never soaked. Even when I wanted to cry my heart out, I used to laugh. When I am frustrated, when I am sad.. I smile. Well, the mess is less. Even without the tears washing my eyes, I am able to look at life with a clear view. There were times when the tide of life had turned against me. The boat had been turned upside down. I had waited for my tears to flow from the depth of my helpless despair. They rise up from my heart, gather together behind my closed eyes… but are adamant to come out. They prefer to stay behind closed doors. The pressure is too much. What can I do to release the safety valve?

Is that why my soul becomes dry so fast? Tearless griefs are bleeding inwardly. There are times when I just want to cry my heart out. I knew the tears were there.. brimming, sloshing behind my eyes, like a glass full of water.. but never spilling. Will it ever??????

Swinging Whispers....

I had gone for a short trip back home… just me and my dreams. It was like bygone days. Alone, carefree, without any strings appended… A week away from the reproaches and peevishness. Just one week... I was back before my folks realised they could live without me. A realisation that should never cross the threshold of your foyer.

I had the whole 24 hours per diem just for myself. It had been eons since I had this privilege. I could unwind in silence, I could lose myself in my fantasies... I miss my swing cot. It was on this cot I used to lie down and muse over the big and bigger things in life… muse on the days that are to be… It was on this cot that I waited for the smooching raindrops. A five year old used to lie down on it, shoving the wall with her small legs, making the cot swing, listening to her dad’s stories which took her to a fairyland, slowly drifting away to sleep. It was only for her and her dad. They both used to make her mother sleep in the other cot. But when she woke up, her dad was always sleeping with her mother. “That cot likes only you, darling”, he used to say. “It said only you can lie there”, he would say, putting up a sad expression on his face. And I believed him. And thus the passion began… I believed that it was solely meant for me. None in my house liked it either. So it was mine. Mine and mine alone.. Now did you hear a tinge of possessiveness? Someone who is very special to me always says I am one. But I had never thought in that sense. When you truly love something or someone, how can you confine it or him to a cage? Why should you keep a beautiful butterfly in your fist against its will?

Coming back to my swing cot, it was hung in the corner of the room, having windows on both sides. So I could feast my eyes on the east and north. Swinging to and fro, I used to wait for the trains to pass and envy the travellers. People stuck in traffic when the railway gates are closed used to look up to my window and get the fright of their life when they see a shadow flowing up and down… Especially on the night of Thrissur Pooram, when me and my friend.. both clad in white nightgowns, flaunting our long tresses, slithering from one window to the other… the apparition-effect was tremendous. The shrill from those supposedly valiant heroes are still fresh in mind.

It was on this cot that I used to do my combined studies along with my friend.. she was doing her MBBS and I was doing my graduation in Literature. But we studied together. One will sit near the northern window and one near the east. Even now everyone wonders what we studied together. But we really did. This olden witnessed many a things.. secrets exchanged, friendships concreted, problems solved, decisions made.. it was a silent witness to every important moments in my life. Our laughter and tears were always in concurrence. It quivered in ecstasy and showered me with promises of life when I was deflowered.

But now, my folks don’t want it to be there. And it lies down in the terrace, exposed to the natural wrath…threatening to end its decades old vigil.. A solitary creature abandoned by all. When I am there, I dust it, pat it, and lie on it.. It is like a homecoming.. pining to be clasped in the protective hands of my god father. How I wish I could get it back inside the room. But I have to live in ‘today’. Yesterday never was... Tomorrow might never come.

R(a/e)ining Whispers...

I've now started to become someone who spends more time writing what I would like to do rather than what I actually say and do. There are times when I think I’m more matured than my age, but there are times when I just glide in my reveries.

I was always hemmed in by silence, and caroused in it. For me, silence was and is, never deafening. With the silence emanated voluminous thoughts.

I always had a penchant for Rains. Oh how virile it was! The droplets, ever so small, still able to wash away all the pains from the heart… cool enough to quench the hot fire of our souls..

I was committed to it from a very young age. One and all who knew me always teased about my addiction to it! They knew that when I make a commitment, I stick to it like glue. When I was a child, it would sneak in through the windows, would kiss my nose tips which would be protruding out through the panes. Sometimes I stick my tongue out and savour it. In my adolescence, it used to come impromptu, clasp me from behind, saturating, oblivious of the inquisitive onlookers. There were never any constraints. When it came, I used to go out with it, hand in hand. I’ve always welcomed it with a deep yearning. Sometimes it came with such a fury and hunger and took me in one single sweep. It fell on me rhythmically, each in anticipation of the next, creating a beautiful symphony.

Every now and then rains kiss me at nights while the world is in slumber. It would venture out from its hidey-hole, hisses through the open windows and wakes me up. It embraces me with its robust arms, enveloping me with soft sweet kisses. It was like a kiss on a dry parched piece of earth. It whispers sweetly in my ears as it trickles down… melting against my skin. I would close my eyes and relish the drops... as it strips me… feels me… deflowers me… And then, the distant rumblings! I dare not open my eyes, or else the dream might shatter… that I was alone with my memories.

Does rain have any smell? Does it smell of a man's aftershave? A cologne? A cigarette?

Do I love anything more than a long walk in the rain?

Ageing Whispers....

I am an offspring of the seventies. A couple of years, and I will be embarking on the naughty forties! No, I am not lamenting. Actually I am excited. Can't wait to get naughty. Chronologically I am 30+(a big plus). Somebody told me I'll be middle-aged soon. Personally I think I have just lived a quarter of my life. So still time to cross that threshold. I live my life vicariously. I look 40 something, act 30 something, and live like 20 something. It is all in the mind. If you feel you are old, you ARE old.. If not, you are not.

Two score years ago, 50s were considered as well past middle age, and 60s getting really old. And 70s... oh my!! They were the oldest.. But now, 60 is the step stone to middle age.. till then you are young! 60 to 80 middleaged, and afer 80, you slowly start to get old.. I feel old age is always 25 years away from you.

Last month, I had a lunch with my professor. I was concentrating on the juicy beef when suddenly she exclaimed "I can't believe you people came out from the college 15 years ago". Oh man! That was an instant fill to my empty howling tummy. 15 years? I had thought that it was only 4 or 5 years since we left university. Now, that made me feel a bit.. a wee bit.. a teeny weeny bit.. old. It's really funny. When I was a teenager, I had really felt more matured. But after 30, I keep forgetting that I've left my twenties behind. Filling 0ut forms is always a little tricky. I have a hard time remembering and calculating how old I am! They should actually put two columns there... mental age and chronological. I bet no one would want to fill the chronological column.

Why should these numbers decide how we feel? It should be like Mark Twain said: "Age is an issue of mind over matter. If you don't mind, it doesn't matter."

A heart that loves is always young!!!

What's in a name, after all?

His parents mustered on one side. My folks marshalled on the other. The debate was getting hotter. The topic? Well.. What to name my firstborn!!

Hey comeon! It's my son, after all. And I wanted to name him Nikhanj, since at that time Kapil Dev was the epitome of my handsomeness. (I swear, there IS such a word!) But none could utter the name by the book, and it had to be gulped back as soon as it sprang out of my mouth. Then I implied on Rhett. It is single syllabled, uncomplicated.. I am a hardcore fan of Gone With The Wind. All I got was some glaring and sneering stares. I had another choices too, like Rochester or Darcy or even Chicken George. But I didnt dare to voice it. They were looking at me as if I'm bizarre!

The clock was running in marathon pace, and the visitants were flowing in. Still we were not able to get any near to a decision. The name should start with "M".. proposed his folks. Most of their names were starting with "M". But then ALL our names were starting with "S". So it should start with "S", advocated mine. His and Mine were making Ours strenuous. One squad's proposal were opposed by the other.

The time had come. The lamp was lit. Now no more musings. I had to come up with some name.. I was in a Catch-22 situation. "What about Rahul", a cousin, eyeing my dilemma, hinted. My mom, being a Rajiv Gandhi fan, and my father-in-law, being a pakka congressman, didn't have to think twice. We were all given the same choice.. YES or YES??

Thus the name Rahul was bestowed upon the little one. Little did we realise that this name is going to be the most popular in Bollywood. Every month one or two movies are released with Rahul as the hero. Now when our hero asks us why such a generic name was given to him, I just sigh.. How refined my Nikhanj would have been.... Nevertheless I attain solace in the bard's lines.. What's there in a name!! But.... It IS elementary, my dear......!!!!!

(A)waiting Whispers...

Here I am, sitting with a dab of henna on my hair to colour my blacks, (I won't say to cover my greys.. or should I say to pepper my salts?), shelving my tumbling thoughts, tossing away the unwanted, nurturing the sweet ones, and staring at the blank screen of my laptop, waiting... My darling hubby hates henna. He says it is akin to using cowdung.. When I go near him, he twitches his face as if he is smelling the dung!
This blog is becoming an addiction.. oh not to me, but to my friends and relatives and other altruistics.. they think they can sneak inside me, and know all my hidden secrets. Who would ever think that people might actually be interested in what time you get up, what you eat, what you drink and what you dream! So they think that I am an easy-peasy ? Ahh na naaa.. I am the same old self... a heart brimming with secrets, never letting any cats out.. But they tell me they are waiting.. Waiting for new revelations.. It has been quite a while since I've posted anything..

Speaking about waiting, now I am waiting for that magic name to appear on my screen. This waiting is a real torture. We start to wait from the day we are knitted in our mother's womb.. to come out to this world, to walk, to talk.. We wait to grow up. We wait for recognition. We fill our days with those little moments of waiting... We cannot remove it from our lives. Once, long before, I told my.. ah well, someone, who was planning a loooong trip, that I'll wait for him as long as he wants. "For what, dear?", he asked. I didnt reply. I could have told him.. "For you". But then I knew very well that was like chasing a rainbow. Not the waiting, but the fusion.(It is still a con-fusion). Life drifts by.. still I hold on and wait..

When I was a child, I used to wait for trains. Lying down on my swing cot, face pressed against the windows, enjoying the soft kisses of little raindrops, I used to pin my eyes and ears whole day to see them hasting off whistling sweet lullabies for me... I used to wait for a hug that never showed up on my doorstep. I used to pine for a hug from my parents. I dream of being hugged when I toss and turn during sleepless nights. A real hug came my way from a Russian dentist, and then from a close virtual friend when we met.. but the pity is both were women! Still have to find out how a hug from a man will be.. My hubby adheres to my parents footsteps, and so ensures that he doesn't do any faux pas.

And my waiting continues. I am waiting for a rebirth of wonder. I am waiting for the magic fairy to touch me with her wand. I am waiting for those sweet nothings which I crave for. I am waiting for the Midas touch in my garden......!!!

Secret Whispers...

We all have secrets which we hope will go down the drain with time. But they are always there, hiding in some corner.. In childhood they are innocent, tucked away in the imagination like a favourite toy hidden from a sibling under the bed. In adolescence, it is a soft feather, carressing you warmly, hugging you, and lurking as a smile around the corner of your lips. Then, when the mind grows, somewhere in its labyrinthine hollow, your secrets become your prisoners. You keep it behind closed doors, and seal it tight. If, somewhere along the way you slip, and let your guard down for a moment, someone innocently might crawl inside through those closed doors... and a new secret is created!

One of my best friends had a big problem when we were very small. She got very less marks in Social Studies. When we got the report card, her eyes welled up with tears. Her already round eyes became rounder, like a fried papad....
Two seven year old heads glued together, ideas rushed back and forth, but couldn't crack the case of escaping her father's wrath. Dejected, she was on her way back home, when , only a sandwich away, she saw the way out. There, on the entrance of her house, was her dad's name in block letters! She took out her report card, and her pencil, (pens were not allowed in Lower Primary) and clearly wrote down her dad's name along the dotted lines... IN BIG BLOCK LETTERS! (Well, she was clever enough to know that signature means writing your name..) Next day, with a beaming grin of triumph, she handed back her report card to the teacher, who took it without a blink. But mysteriously, her dad materialised after an hour, and he and the teacher were having some secret whispers.... I looked at my friend's face which was as white as her uniform shirt. A moment later her dad hoisted himself right before her eyes, and father and daughter exchanged a long glance. Her lips began to tremble, and two little pearls were waiting to leap out from her eyes. He scooped her up in his big arms, and giving a peck on her cheeks, exclaimed "Who else can be more creative than my daughter!" That was a bountiful moment. Tears flowing freely from her eyes and nose, she kissed him and hugged him tightly. And the teacher too, witnessed the scene with a sly smile.. What would have been in her mind? Yet another secret...