Christmas of 2010

Its Christmas of 2010. A year that has been filled with so many memorable and unforgotten moments, some of which, I wished never happened. From the start of the day, to this time and I am sure for some more time to go during the night, I have been and I think I will continue to see this all around me.

As far as my memories go into the past, Christmas has been a time when I have been happy, shared happiness, spread the joy, made many more cherishing moments. This has been that one day in the entire year all these years for which I used to wait eagerly. Somehow, every Christmas, always, some memorable moments would occur. Oh Christmas, you have been so dear to me.

Happiness all around, people with joyful faces all around, merry all around, excitement all around, flowers, decoration, festive mood all around, people greeting one another, wishing one another, gifting one another, wanting to be with one another, loving one another, sharing that love. Aah those moments. Now that is Christmas, that is exactly what Christmas is all about. Messages on mobile, calls, voice messages, emails - wishes all over. Take that to the current world. People posting status messages, on Facebook, Twitter, Orkut, LinkedIn, you name it, people writing on one another wall, wishing one another, posting pictures, tagging them, posting videos, tagging them as well. Well, these are some of the many things that people do to wish one another on this beautiful day.

It all begins with plans and preparations, starting some where around 17-18th of December. Decorations begin around 20th. Shopping and everything else would be done and in place by 23rd. All the gifts, well packed, and eagerly awaiting for the gifts, people move onto 24th, the Christmas eve, with everything in place. Time to relax, and get ready for the celebration to begin, starting with the famous mid night mass at the church. People all dressed in new clothes, something that they all seem to be proud to let others see and shower accolades. Bliss.

Fast forward to the mass on 25th. Big one. All gathered, attentive, focused. Post this, family get together, with those who would have been invited for lunch / dinner. To say, this is all that people do, but to do, is what it is all about. Aah Christmas, this is what I had been doing all this while.

However, this time, this Christmas, of 2010, for me, it just is not.

From what I could possibly imagine, this December was filled with a lot of traveling for me. Mostly by air. Flight takes off, is in the air, lands. Hmmm, interesting. That is the ideal situation. Sometimes, during the time in the air, up above, when you think it is all calm, something happens. Turbulence. Turbulence in the air. All of a sudden, all the passengers begin to panic. I can understand why so. Love for life. Captain immediately asks everyone to put on their seat belts. At that very moment, pilot could do two things. One to go back, the other to continue to go further. The moments of turbulence shall come to pass. The pilot goes ahead.

Life took off for me in a memorable manner, to say specifically, the year of 2010. I quit alcohol, got back to God, joined gym, began work outs and lost close to 15 kilos, moved into a better role at work, got promoted, got my first car. Just when I thought that it was all going fine, I came across some shattering turbulence's. The Black Swan moment of my life. The entire course of my future changed with it. As much as I was theoretically prepared for it, when the moment arrived, it was far more difficult for me to live through it.

This Christmas, despite of all that has happened during the year, I am filled with a void. An emotional void. Throughout the day, amidst people, happiness, joy, merry, all that I felt was emptiness. Loneliness. A deep wound, A void. Took me over ten years but I think I finally understand why Shah Rukh Khan sang 'Bheed mein bhi thi tanhayee, yaad har pal teri aayi, roke koi mujhe zara, bhar na aaye yeh dil mera' in the movie Kuch Kuch Hota Hai.

Christmas of 2010 has been very quiet one for me, personally speaking. Love, when it happens, is the most, actually the best thing that could happen to anyone. Its the absence of it that hurts the most, and despite it being present all around me this Christmas, in me, it is absent. Or may be, for me, it is absent.

God - Now, its all up to you..

We sat at Cafe Coffee Day, in the premises of the airport. After several moments of high running emotions with an aura of an inexpressible feelings, looking into her eyes, I said, "If there is anything that I could do, from anywhere, in any manner, at any time, to keep you happy, even if it was for just a passing moment, I will do it."

Stared into her eyes as I completed the sentence, paused for a moment and looked away, with a volcano of emotions wanting to erupt out from within and yet, trying to be calm on the outside.

That was almost a week back.

I met her again, after a week. It was an unforeseen turn of events for her as she did not expect that I would show up again. So was it for me as well. A week back, somehow, as I entered the flight and sat there for two hours to reach back to Bangalore, I knew one thing. I was going to come back to visit her. And there I was, back, but this time, it was different. Last time I went, it was for her. This time I went, it was for us (well, now that is something that is beyond my reach at the moment), for me. Somehow, there was this feeling that time was running out and I had to say, say it all, and get it all out of my chest.

Despite of all that has happened, despite of the pain in my soul, dreary eyes, may be I should be celebrating, for I did what was most difficult a thing for me to do. May be it was due to my prayers that I was filled with a courage to speak it all out and say it all out. Despite the outcomes, it is the effort that was put into that makes me look back into a year and half of my life and smile, though filled with pain. I could possibly write down everything that has happened during my visits, but somehow it just does not seem right for me to do so. Four days that I spent with her, has filled me with memories for the next forty years of my life.

There are instances when I begin to think that only if my heart had the ability to think and feel lesser than what it does, but again, I think again. If it were so, my mind would begin to feel and with that,I guess, my rationality would go for a toss. There is so much of pain within me at the moment that even if I were to smile, it hurts the most.

In the flight, as I was returning back last night, I began to think. Everything began flashing. All those moments, those thoughts, all that had been done, reminding me of the song 'Everything I do' by Bryan Adams. I for one, imagine the destination where I want to be at, and put every possible effort that I could humanly imagine and do because when I look back, I would not want to be filled a feeling of regret of not having done something. So even this time, it was the same. This reminded me of something that I had read online:

If you hoard love, it melts away. If you lock love, it breaks free. If you grab on to love, you end up holding an illusion. When you let love flower in its own way, it stays to support you. When you pass on love, it multiplies beyond measure.

Was it melting away? Was it trying to break free? Was I holding an illusion? Was i going to support me? Or, had I done enough for it to multiply beyond measure? I for one, do not know the answers for these. However, I know that over all these days months and years, it definitely has grown beyond measures. May be that is the reason why it is so difficult for me to be in these circumstances.

So there I was, in the flight, thinking of one and only one thing. I prayed and prayed and prayed and prayed. Only one thing. 'Its going to be really difficult to unimagine what I have always imagined, to go undreamt what I have always dreamed about, to not feel what I have always felt, to not think what I have always thought. God, you have helped me come this far, I have done everything that I could possibly do. I do not know what else needs to be done for I have no clue. Now, its all up to you.'

Four days that I spent with her, has filled me with memories for the next forty years of my life and the words continued to echo in my mind, God - Now, its all up to you.

White with a tinge of Blue

When I began to fall asleep, somehow, of all the colors, I see White. I turn around, I see white. I look above me, below my feet, left to me, right to me, front as well as back. All I see is White. Radiating in purity. It was as though I was walking in a realm of bright White. For a quick moment, I thought the light in the room was not switched off. So I wake up, but as I open my eyes, I see darkness around. It was 04:15 AM. I increase the speed of the rotating fan, to rotate faster. As I close my eyes, the White-ness comes back at me again. With hesitance to continue and second thoughts of opening my eyes, a thought comes to my mind, to just continue and see what happens.

As I continue to lay down asleep, my heartbeat which in the beginning was fast paced, started calming down. After a quick moment, it was at ease. Some sense of relief, calmness surrounding and peace oozing out of consciousness. There sure is some kind of bliss in the color White. Although, one thought continued to keep popping up. Why am I seeing White everywhere? Like an echo, this thought kept pecking my thinking. And as this continued, I saw a dot. Very mild one.

Pecking question in my thinking was now replaced by curiosity. What is this dot? I saw it growing bigger and bigger. Bigger and bigger it grew. And as it grew bigger and bigger, the color became distinctive. Blue. The one that makes the clear sky look beautiful. The more bigger the blue appeared to become, the more clearer I could see what it was. As it became more clearer, I saw it was a person dressed in Blue, that was coming towards me.

I began looking at the person. As I noticed, it was a girl, in a beautiful Blue gown. In her hands, I saw something White in color. She came closer. As she came closer, I saw that she had White flowers in her hand. She was smiling. The smile that a girl has when she is about to meet her beloved. The flowers she had in her hands were the flowers she loved the most. Something that I have always loved too. 12. There were 12 of them in the bunch. Her smile, so prudent as she was. As I could now see her clearly, and her smile, heart that was at ease, now began pounding in symphony, perhaps, a million violins were being played just for that moment.

She came to me, and gave me a hug, lasting few seconds, followed by giving the flowers to me. ( I for once never wondered why would she give me flowers!). Her smile, it was something that I would do anything for it to last forever. Perhaps, everything that I have done until now, it was for that smile, the one that lasts from one cheek to the other, a proud natural jewel she had, an asset that was precious than anything I had ever come across. She leaned towards me, and said, "All in due time.."

All in due time.. All in due time.. All in due time.. Like an echo that went into silence, the words repeated few times before there was silence. I saw her there, right in front of me, smiling in joy.

I held her hands, pulled her towards me, kissed her on her forehead and said, "For as long as I breathe.."

And as I picture what happened next, I saw her going backwards, the way she came. In the same way. Flowers still in my hand, smile on my face, slowly went into the white oblivion. As I continued to see White all around, she began appearing fainter.

Amidst the vast White-ness, I now saw her as a tinge of Blue. And that is when I woke up. The feeling that continued to last was that of the White with a tinge of Blue.

Snakes: What could I possibly learn from them?

Honestly speaking, I am not really a big fan of snakes. I just hate them. Just like the way I hate cats. For a reason unknown to me, the evil side takes the priority every time I see a cat or a snake, blood rushes in high speed, much like an adrenaline rush, which fills me with a want/desire (or you can call it a rage too) to cause harm to the cat or the snake. After a while when I actually think of that moment of sudden rage, I laugh at myself. I cannot recollect the exact incident that has filled me with this dislike towards snakes.

On the other hand, it is completely opposite. My dad, is curious about snakes, so much so that if there were any programmes in the television in either National Geographic or Discovery or Animal Planet (television channels), he would be glued to the screen. I guess the most knowledge that I possess about snakes is probably due to the unwilling viewership (if at all such a word exists) from me while he watched the programmes.

I will admit one thing though. There are few things that I did learn from the life of a snake. The most amazing part is that the nature has hidden the lessons that humans should learn and are often revealed only when the time is right. For instance, a kid in his fifth standard would not come across a mathematical problem of trigonometry, unless of course, he was Spock from the Star Trek era. Likewise, life as well. Only when you are ready to learn Trigonometry, you will be presented (not the gift kinda present, but the present kinda present) a plethora of problems in Trigonometry (Actually, trigonometry was my favorite part of mathematics, followed by Calculus and then Conics). All these years that I watched Snakes on those channels as mentioned earlier, never once did it occur to me as to how I could relate a part of its life cycle to mine, or generically speaking, to that of a human. I always thought about that aspect as interesting, at times, weird.

For instance, lets take venom of a snake. It is there in it, it is not killing it and yet, when released into another organism, that organism is killed. Much like the malice thoughts in our heart, when actually projected ends up ruining everything.

However, what most caught my interest was the way the snake sheds its skin. Before I reached this part of this post, I did quite some reading online to know the need for a snake to shed its skin. Of several aspects of the whole skin shedding process(this is commonly used phrase, which by the way should be called as Ecdysis) some things caught my utmost interest. Apparently. young snakes shed more frequently than older ones because growth is relatively rapid in the first few years of life. Healthy snakes usually have little or no difficulty with shedding and tend to shed their skins in one entire piece. The shedding process is preceded by a period of relative inactivity. A snake will shed its skin as long as it's growing, and snakes grow all through their lives. And soon after shedding is completed, snakes consume a lot of water.

While I continued to think, I realized something that never made sense before. Even in my life, for that matter, I think its common in most of our lives, I had shedding process too. Not the physical skin, but that of an emotional skin surrounding the soul. While I was in school, and thereafter in college, it was so easy for me to get over things, of course, there was a definite period of inactivity, but shedding that emotional skin was of utmost ease. As I began growing, that which I used to do frequently, and that which was done in bits and pieces, was now being done in an entire piece but the only thing that changed this time around was the level of difficulty.

We all shed, a lot. Some do it with ease some with lot of struggle, some with pain, and for some, shedding goes in vain. And soon after it is done, there is an unprecedented thirst, a need to quench it, a void to fill up, but what matters is that now, a new journey begins. Sooner or later, shedding is going to take place again.

One thing continues to exist, despite all the learning. I hate snakes.

My Mind

Recently, a friend of mine sent me text message that went like this:
You see things; and you say, "Why?" But I dream things that never were; and I say, "Why not?"

Interesting as it seemed, a thought suddenly occurred to me, like a lightening..

Let's imagine a chemist holding two test tubes in his hands: one containing two parts of hydrogen, the other one part of oxygen. The chemist says to himself, "In an hour's time, I will mix these two gases together, and I shall get water."

What is the chemist doing? He is actually looking to the future. Wonder why? Well, because he possesses all the necessary information to do this. This future has yet to come into being(the water, that is) but it exists in the latent state(hydrogen and oxygen).

Our mind, actually, the unconscious part of it, is like the chemist. This gathers a lot of information, lots of different factors and then tries to draw a conclusion from what it has gathered. Somehow, human mind continues to amaze me. When I tried to think about what my mind thinks and how it actually does it, I realize that among the countless hordes of memories in the human mind, only some stand distinct. Even if our memories seem 'forgotten' somehow they are imprinted in our memory. Interesting huh? Well, that's the reality, you got to digest what you got to digest.

My mind, my mind at the moment battles many battles of thoughts, from one era to the other, swings in time, leaps in ages, dwells in a bridge between past and present.. Aah my mind..

In it lie,
Painful tensions and insinuations,
A want to live more freely and untrammeled..
At times we got to hold back,
The teeming jungle of the unconscious,
Just to travel the path less traveled.

Inhibitions? Not really..

An illness that starts unbeknown to us, produces an abnormal but unconscious sensation. This is when we begin to think, ponder and at the same time wonder. It is so true. Games of the mind are of very weird kind. They often leave a person, in their thoughts, completely intertwined.

As of today, my life is great. Actually, it has always been I guess, it could not get better than what it now is. It is throwing me too many challenging situations and I am glad about them. It is letting me know how weak I have been although I have been telling myself that I am pretty strong. What a tremendous experience it is when a man realizes that he is not at all what he things he is! (Applies to a woman as well!) In a way, looks like I am very lucky., For life is letting me life circumstances that not all get to live, good or worse, I am getting to live them, so perhaps, I am blessed. Like I earlier wrote, if I am not yet killed by it, I am actually growing stronger due to it.

Red Amber and Green. Three main colors that are associated with my current job profile. Red, denotes an undesirable situation or state that needs immediate rectification. Amber, yet another undesirable situation that somehow is critical and yet not that critical. Green, aah the bliss. That which is Green today, might go Amber or even Red for that matter. But for that which is Red or Amber today, takes a while to go to Green. Every time an activity is Red or Amber, an exercise is done to put an action plan in place such that each activity is tracked to turn the status from Red or Amber to Green. Looking at what I do at my workplace, I began correlating it to my personal life. That which is Green, in real life were the situations that were going according to my plans, wishes and desires. That which is Red, were those situations, plans, desires, wishes, dreams, ambitions, that went in the opposite directions, went out of control, caused lot of turmoil within my being, caused a lot of stir beneath my skin, and huge turbulence's in my soul. And Amber, well, they are there anyway.

So here is my life, currently juggling between a lot of Amber and Red situations, some rare Green ones that make the entire juggling event a memorable one. Nevertheless, life of mine is very colorful. Amongst these colors, I found out that one source of inspiration, that motivation, that essence. Most of the times people live without knowing what they should be living for. Sometimes they realize that single most important thing in their life for which they would begin living for. This becomes their motivation, their basic amenity in life, their everything actually.

Just like the recent Eminem's song goes..

I'm not afraid to take a stand
Everybody come take my hand
We'll walk this road together, through the storm
Whatever weather, cold or warm
Just let you know that, you're not alone
Holla if you feel that you've been down the same road.

04 Sept 2010

Whatever does not kill you, makes you stronger.. Yeah, you suffer, weep, cry, whine, complain, spend time being alone, go into depression, sit in loneliness, wish someone was around to take care of you and what not, but in the end, you are much stronger than what you earlier were. I am not dead yet, so that sure is a sign that I am growing stronger by the day. Not just physically and mentally, but also at the level of my soul. TO grow stronger as the days pass is the only option that is left to be used, if only life was one of the 'choose the best answer' type of a quiz.

Situations and circumstances never come with a warning and when they do occur (I am talking about the ones that we do not want to happen) they leave days and months of effort and belief shattered and in that moment, that instance, everything becomes suspended animation. However, that actually reminds me of the sun. When it sets, it sure is to rise again. This fills me with a confidence that as darkness begins to loom around, I begin to tell myself that light is just around the corner, but only when it is the right time, you will see it.

As I write this post, too many things recur to me and they all come crashing down upon me, much like the weight of the world over on my shoulders. I begin to wonder, if this is really one of those situations wherein the thought of tiredness creeps in and just as that is about to come up, I say unto myself, 'Nope, its not that time yet, and it never will be.'

04 Sept 2010 will be a date that I would not forget in a long long time for sure..