LOST AND FOUND

What happens when you live in a city for almost thirteen years, and you still thank god for the day GPS was built? Hang your head in shame that’s what.

I used to think, think being the operative word that my directional capabilities rivaled that of batmobile on autopilot. There was a belief in my system that booted and rebooted itself into the bloodstream till it became a reality in my mind,self belief in directional capabilities.

If you keep the city I live in as a mathematical symbol, it would best be a circle.

Say the circle was concentric to another circle, and filled in between with a large cobweb,

And as arachnophobia is a bona fide defined fear,and we shall discuss the dangers of creepy crawlies later for the moment we shall send the spider to play politics, while we figure out the system.

On the outer diameters my vehicle,or Elvis as I lovingly call my old boy, we run along just fine, zipping mindlessly past the rearview’s of sedate travelers, moving with a surety and motion full of swerves,all maneuvres of the very knowledgeable.

As we glide deeper into the city circle, we do not loose our edge,the confidence is I agree not at the peak,and as the web keeps spinning roundabouts with four extremely similar exits at us,the stage from confidence to self doubt to frantically whipping out the GPS is traversed in a nano second.

When it comes to admitting or self realization that I am stumped,its usually situation dependent for example if I kicked your shin under the table of twenty people for a slight that I absolve my personal responsibility off and put you on stand ,I can guarantee my angelic smile will easily pass your accusatory scanner as you move on,this LOST situation is not an external calamity but an internal emergency due to genetic shortfall,so I quickly do a mental hands up and hand over to technology, mentally berating the errant navigational gene that passed on to my brother but decided to take the lazy day off when it came to me.

As it happens,the technological marvel in question is my super ultra smart phone which in terms of technology is practically comparable to an octogenarian in all of its two years of life, in a cranky mood.How the quality of Korean products or maybe made in china is deplorable, is a money draining topic you and I could discuss with long faces some other time.Right now we shall just mourn the functional loss of my phones abilities. Mourn its ‘age old’ right to vibrate at all the wrong moments,(not pleasurably so I must add,just a deathly shudder) signaling its will to shut off and restart in its own time.That usually happens when it decides it has been overworked,or when I decide its time to switch on the GPS.whence my lovely yellow beauty decides its life is too low on power to sustain such a drain on its functions .Even as I stare in disbelief, yet again ,at the flashing battery that is ready to die,it again gives its warning vibration shot,before blinking me down.

I tell my friend from out of town with a phone in its teens to utilize her shiny new jazz of a gadget to get us to where we wanted, and yes I do try and be a little sheepish about it.She is an out of towner and I am the directionally challenged guide.(there I said it)But what shame in admitting you need another helpful phone.

Armed with the latest technology and My internal homing device working on the familiarity bred by studying your college degree in the vicinity of the area that was our destination for the feast,got us swiftly till the point where I handed the baton to my friends shiny dependable new device,for the final few kilometers. According to my approximation we were ten minutes away.

How even after half an hour we were talking to a nepali clueless guard,is something I have been told  that occurs when you depend on technology too much or Murphy decides,it's just not your day.

In attempt One at a direct approach, we entered a govt. housing society and not that we were judging the food standards by the look of the colony, maybe the epicurean standards of the cities highest rated restaurant was all for its home cooked ,served hot,experience on the roof top,with domesticated street dog at your feet.

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But even in all sensibilities looking up trying to figure which rooftop,and coming up to a blank with all shirts and kurtas hanging out for drying,hinted at either abysmal décor standards which were wickedly aiming at ‘Homely’orrrrr we were in the completely wrong place even as the GPS mimed "you have arrived at your destination."

Definitely not at the right place , we got down to good old, roll down windows and ask 'bhaisaabs' for direction,but I guess the genteel helpful race of 'bhaisaabs' is also a dying breed.'bhaisaabs' directions were either to his house or maybe just a local colony darshan, because ten minutes and four lefts and two rights later we were chatting with our lost Nepali guard at a locked up dead end, who’s most helpful information was turn around,which we did,only to find ourselves on the other side of theNepali guard's gate in say another ten minutes.

Attempt two, three, four, I have even lost count, saw us do a lot of doubling up,but the humour levels in the car minus the testosterone were relatively upbeat lacking the sexist jokes on ‘lost chicks’. Suddenly to our left we crossed a temple and god must have taken pity on our growling stomachs and found us a good guide who said straight ahead in 200 mtrs," you cannot miss". 

And that’s how we found ourselves eating chicken tikka in a place that is out of the box.

Sitting down on a  highstool,under the night sky,surrounded by the youngest most buzzing crowd in the city,we had arrived.

Biting me back to earth, besieged  by mosquitoes I curled my exposed legs under me, awkwardly balancing in my fight against possible malaria(I left my faithful repellent in the car,or you could not put it past me to lather my self up, all sweet smelling, in front of this genteel crowd)

We reached home in one shot, thanks to my short term memory in retaining directions working in top condition,I am home tonight, but keep your DPS(dad positioning services)on speed dial,a good old paper Map,for your girl scout moment.

But if you are with your blinkers on,staring at your sleepy phone and  god forbid were the spider to arrive and  invite you into its parlor,and you are without trusted friends with a Big Moose built I would suggest do your polite refusal with pepper sprayed confidence,stay glued inside you car seat, do not step out and make an equally speedier,footloose exit towards the lit part of the circuitous web, or dial 100(if the battery sustains)

 I would love to tell you its a furry little spider or fluttery mosquito lost on its way home with an equally stunted directional gene,But watching the piling newspapers burdened with tears of young girls dead, its a chance that I would recommend you don't take and trust that you don't place, as I am afraid the mosquito repellent is just getting ineffective in the fast mutating carnally ridden desires that ,diversify ,amplify and become more horrifying with every illicit orgasm.

HOT WHEELS!!!

It was a wooden house in the cut of a hill,part of a long line of houses that were separated by wooden panels.We were in the hills because we were part of the gang that moved along with all the trucks carrying our whole house in boxes across the country ,the only permanent members to be added to our quartet over the years were Our dogs,Sheena the first one and Tuffy(who should have been ideally stuffy because he could stuff into his little stomach almost any cuisine under the sun,not to be discriminating against the one that’s piled in bins as well,were he ever to get a chance.)Tuffy was Sheena’s child marriage off spring,they were Pomeranian Spitz(or so we were told),got basically as yelping guard dogs but like i said Tuffy dreamt of food while snoring,Sheen was the only one who had grains of sherpa blood in her.

 Our mini circus moved every two years,lock stock and the snoring and guard dog's duvet’s in barrels.

In the wooden house My brother and I had our bed bunks alongside, where when tucked in at night we would pretend to be floating in a river within egg shells,that bounced off the crests in the river.

I remember I used to squeeze my mother's hand and make a good night mumble (ta!! dare you laugh) then burrow my nose,into the quilt to sniff the smell of Napthelene in my cotton stuffed quilt,the quilt had a fawn velvety cover,and there were dark brown trees drawn on it.I loved burying under and pretending to be in a different world,And now I cannot even bear the weight of my feather quilt,which finds my feet wrapped over it.

I remember a lot of things from that house,I was five.I remember standing around trying to figure out what the excitement was all about,maybe someone told me or maybe my mom got too busy baking the cake, whichever was the correct case,I found my self standing in the welcoming committee lineup as the blue little four wheeled drive rolled up the slopes,to brake in front of us, our very own car.A car that took me on a three hour drive to buy my wedding lehenga, a Car in which I sat and took my first dog for a vaccination, a car in which Tuffy was taken for his last few examinations.

So yes ,basically the car also trundled  along with our circus,and when it got a few marks on its ceilings we bandaged and camouflaged it with stickers.Always,proudly roaming in it where no man has rolled before.(okay enough of star trek,but there were hardly any cars then on roads,you cannot blame me for my flights of fantasy,in my blue shuttle.)

And years later, even after we left Sheena and Tuffy as underground guards of the houses we homed in,the little blue stately wagon car of our family continued along faithfully.

I can safely say that this year that car went out of production.

we have become heartless or maybe there are hard walls around our slumbering hearts,we keep noticing  his coughs,noticing the lack of airconditioning  in the sweltering sun. However there is still one guy who stands by his wagon,the head of our travelling circus,My dad.

He takes ‘sabun dani’,(soap dish) as we lovingly call him to his doctor for regular patch ups,my father stands in the heat,hovering over it like a worried parent.If it were to be recorded , maybe every part under its bonnet has been under the mechanic’s concerned gaze at least twice in its life,for reasons more severe than regular servicing.

I am as loyal as they come,when it comes to people, I am a dog when it comes to loyalty,you can probably just love me once and I will always wag my tail with joy when I see you next,for the rest of your life,whether you are in it for a guest appearance or in the leading roles.

But I also suffer from the he dunnit not me syndrome.So placing the blame squarely on advertising,YESSS!!! it’s the advertising which makes me continuously unfaithful.Its unfair how they actually throw cars luscious curves at you challenging you to be young and free, I always have my hands on my cheque book and my feet pointed to the loan department in the bank after seeing ten close friends camping in Leh!!!!!!! See you know what I mean.

There are enticing sunroofs in cars,where I always imagine just lounging back and looking at the night sky(its too hot to imagine me staring up into a sunny sky,so I settle for a starry night dream),there is voice control which reminds me of Knight rider,climate control that simulates airplanes,basically one day I am Living it up in My SUV the other day in my sleeky cury ,showing me the moon,BMW(I am dreaming, here I should punch myself)

Hence the inference that when it comes to cars it strikes me that I am blatantly fickle and shallow around the pocket area. (I am open to negotiations on donations.)

Switching gears back a few car generations when we come back home now,we have to still roll down our windows,using both hands and keep our face out like dogs hanging out excitedly,only in our cases it’s the green house effect that is pushing us into the flapping air whooshing along outside the car.

Its doors close with a BANG,almost as if the old boy is hard of hearing and needs the loud reassurance that all is well at the back and we can key in , gear up and accelerate out.

But every single time I plop into the back seat,I remember touching the small window railings ,as we drove out of towns leaving friends behind, Every time I slide into the front seat I remember sitting on one butt cheek with both feet sleeping from inactivity,  folded and confined,dreaming about their next stretch, sharing the space with my grandfather,who would lovingly ask me every two minutes if I was alright,and I would say yes,much to the relief of the backseaters,who included my largely present grandmom,mom,brother and my aunt,on whose laps I would definitely be transferred to, were the answer to be negative.They were all already strategically lined up in the one to the front, one to the rear,and the one on the flanks turned slightly towards doors, position.Guaranteeing maximum fit,with mini comfort pockets, packed like this  we drove some mad distance away, I am sure at this stage someone did mention the ‘dil mein jagah honi chahiye!!”(eyes rolling totally dramatically)

 The feel of my grandfather lovingly petting my hair,and the continuous gossip from the back row,the wind as it blew through my father's then black hair as he concentrated on the road, these memories can never be unlocked were I to step out tomorrow of a MERCEDES(For a jaguar I swear I will try my level best to simulate,just hold on to the thought of gifting me one, we will come back to that.)

These feelings make this car a bonafide member of the gang and anyone who has ever owned a Maruti 800 would know which era I am talking about.Yes we grew up in the same decade,secretly watching Bold and the Beautiful,admiring the suave Mr.Remington Steele and openly ogling at babes in Baywatch slightly later.

The world may be churning out 90 lakh cars a year, maybe more,but there will only ever be one car that will be family to me. Thank you for being there,and even though today there is Cherry, Elvis(the hatchback of my independent life) and Black Beauty lining the drive way in front of you, I promise to LOVE YOU forever,and there is nothing fickle or shallow about that declaration.

And no amount of advertising can erase and rewrite over that bond with my first car.Sorry Elvis.

STRAIGHT LINES.

When I was little kid like somewhere around the fourth grade, I was packed off in the afternoons of the summer vacation to a painting class.

There I remember,sitting on the ground in a circle around our teacher,a group of about ten.

The only sounds in the beginning being those of shuffling and sharpening of pencils and opening of pencil boxes, repeatedly erasing and retrying how to get our pencils to move along a straight line,highlighting it clearly,giving it definition visible to sight,making them stand up from the white oblivion.Magic.

 I also remember a very plump girl’s skirt that decided to do a Marilyn Monroe, just as she bent to pick up her pencil box to pack up for the day,a last minute sway, positioned me directly in line for a torpedo attack,were gaseous warfare to be declared.

Wrong positioning, but this time it was just kill by sight as the gentle breeze generated by the slow moving blades of the wooden fan,lifted the light cloth off its designated camouflaging position.The other sounds that Ithen remember are shocked intakes and two boys giggling away at the back.

Hence from my painting class I took away straight lines and a dimpled thigh,forever.

Straight lines have a way of evading most of us,it’s a difficult concept to lift off from a painting book and enforce it,over and above our itching little,twitching bodies.

Starting from school assembly lines which will be crooked till the class we graduate out from. Even though our monitor is entrusted with the sole job of military discipline, children shuffling in curved assembly lines remains a global phenomenon.

However from school on, most countries pick up and head straight off to the top of the line,and that’s where our little India gets confused. How to pick up and walk straight,is a genuinely puzzling concept to the common Indian,brought up on the 'tedhi ungli' lore and no its not a concept diluted with all the Whiskey in the system,and its not just in the poor confused Y chromosome in the family who gets everything first, it’s a general affliction or epidemic of Popeye adrenalin which works on the principle ‘so what’s wrong with a little shoving and pushing, if you are fighting for birth rights,while paying ‘chutta’{small change}first in a paan shop.”

Straight lines are they a personal stumbling block or a national stumbling mammoth disaster???

Its almost as we we struggle against asphyxiation if we are left grappling behind.

 In the Metro Queue or in the bank ATM line, thankfully I have graduated from running onto buses ,slipping past stinking shirts slippery with sweat, wading through masses of people,trusting people with my two rupees for the ticket,(yes it has been a long time) seeing the two rupees get relayed across the bus,and thankfully clutch the relayed ticket back, you would think that the amount of trust generated would put you at ease,yes it does, unless you start feeling the eyes.I am fighting a war on two fronts,one my peripheral vision is watching out for the cheeky men in the line behind me trying to get the seat right in front of me either willing to brush past, or happily brush against.Not really discriminating against the end results, both are great and sail his boat,or launch it should I say?

But its in car jams that we get seriously challenged to remember what’s straight…Its all those cars that creep past you to stand onto your right in a traffic jam,blocking a four lane two way road by nearly just climbing into the tree that stands planted well off the road,leaves saluting in the opposite direction,waiting to welcome traffic from the other side which would trickle through if it ever makes its way past our smiling neighbours,who mock our sedateness,through the car windows.We suddenly loose them,with head reeling speed,apparently their peripheral vision works fine too that or the goading by all the co passengers at the 5 mm opening in front,activates the accelerator.We loose them from our right wing only to be replaced by another like minded brother, who has managed to squeeze ahead to our right exploiting his 5 mm opening too.and because we are still reeling from the speedy exit of the first one we miss the celebratory glances of our new neighbours.

I Love straight,straight men,straight shots,straight flights,straight lines(except in my cupboard,where shapeshifting is a phenomenon that Stephenie Meyer could have picked up the concept from)

I also sometimes wonder at the missing straight when I am zealously guarding my spot in the metro ticket queue,which is absolutely ripe for a hostile take over if I slip my guard even for a bit,or in a hospital, waiting for the doctor to give me the time of the day,freeing himself of people who self importantly waltz into his office,I keep expecting them to be spat out,but they somehow get swallowed inside for the longest gestation period,they spin out with a very healthy unrepentant walk,right by our frothing brimming angry presence,only to ignore us in their healthy peachy existence,when our angry redness is getting enhanced only by our 103 degree Celsius fever.

 But focusing on the brushing past, somehow when the lazy, ambling generally snail paced regular,pot bellied Indian man,and why only man, Saree clad,soft spoken,chappal yielding Durga’s also reveal themselves when they  find themselves encountered by a straight line.

 They discover in themselves a propelling urgent desire to break free,its as if centuries of mothers food fed lathered with Ghee,and not being dramatic,maa ka doodh and tea served in bed,suddenly manifests itself in a display of speed and alertness and desire to be the winner in the race of money withdrawl in ATM queues,these Alpha males or Chappal wielding, feminist dialogue spouting,mini spitfires validate their presence, through these acts of breaking free from the system.seemingly reveling in this feeling of freedom of shoving which comes as fresh air, for their bound visceral mundane lives. Minor Seismic Vicissitudes of life.

 The Mystery of the straight lines is a question asked to me by many a foreign travelers to our country whose unwritten bible rules are never to get in the way of an overzealous Indian in a queue,if they are here just for two weeks,make way.

The other rule is that,if you are here for the whole six seasons, then the only way around is to perfect the snooty,ice cold stare that does seem to effectively freeze the semi ambitious muddlers, and part time line offenders.

A  question we most ardently discuss sitting on bar stools, flocking down from the celestial heights of our glassy,day chambers, sipping Cosmopolitans and Bloody Mary’s,bearing in mind we are all  of Aryan-Dravidian descent, and still 100% Indian, is “why can Indians not stay in lines?

This question we discuss animatedly,owning the rights to the critical subject,thanks to our genetic descents which are from the geographically same area,as the country we vote in.(hopefully vote in).

Each member provides deep insight into the psyche that needs to change at the grass roots,Or deeper still, the discussion of the 1.27 billion population being like a stumbling elephant.

(The poor elephant is now over burdened by the Indian heritage, he has been stumbling for so long in its epitomizing description of Indian-ness that the poor tusker may never wander onto the straight path,because it is scarred by the mammoth problems of New age India.)

Pressing the gelled hair back the guy on my table (not my regular company) passes a smile at all of us,probably doing a mental hi Five to his un-gelled,uncontrolled,savage ape man,alter ego, at  successfully distracting the waiter off his projected straight path. He tucks in a 500 note in his pocket ensuring a completely warped path for the waiter for the rest of the evening ,directly translating the slick gesture of monetary kindness to our placement STRAIGHT to the Top of the restaurants food chain.

I should really tell him off mmmmmmm next time..100% pakka,shachiiiiii…Ma kasam….;)))))whenever my genetic right to assert itself critically of its geographic genetic neighbours’ wakes up from the deliciousness of my watered and full existence.Next time i will come straight to the point.

LIFE IS ALSO WHAT HAPPENS INSTEAD……..

 We are a generation that can attach ourselves to clouds and then probably float down in our dreams, sliding off the edges of a rain drop as it splashes into an ocean. Which is probably just having a bad day sloshing around in god’s gigantic wine glass (sorry, but my God is a Greek epicurean God!!)

We are also an all knowing Apple and Banana {republic;)} following, Right here,right now, if not,  I will Google you here and I know exactly what I want, generation.(not very far ahead of Adam & Eve and apes)

Generationally challenged, In my dreams I was obsessively crunching over unknown similar looking pebbles, striding purposefully towards a coffee shop, imagining losing myself and my lips inside a foam that is sprinkled with nutmeg and cinnamon, just so and finally my tongue discovering that hot bite of chocolate beneath the foamy surface Ahh!!( I do not like coffee),but what I know is that the door I am opening has got me exactly where I want. I stand inside the shop breathe in the aroma ( I love the smell of coffee). I feel I have arrived.

 With this feeling I simulate my emotions to mirror a smug cat, with creamed whiskers.

To be where you want exactly, is a placement in the dimensions of the universe that is governed by equations, which are a function of Time , space and variables.

Now what happens when you do not fit? What happens when your purposeful walk is halted by a closed sign?All those images on hologram mode star trek style come crashing around, to the pebble level around your feet.

Do we take it as a sign that the equation was not meant to factor in the heat of the hot chocolate,do we quietly stride away?

Variable in question now is intensity.For me because I have a vivid imagination,the images are like a live news flash with HD CLARITY and DOLBY sound effects, and as we are the google on my smart phone generation So(if the time factor in the equation permits)I Google walk following my nose (please refrain from images of a monkey sniffing in the air,it’s a more refined gentle sniffing walk,preferably insert images of sauntering diva)  I walk till I find myself holding handles of a door that has an open sign.I walk because I know opening those doors will get me exactly where I want.

If I factor in a walk along with an over active, desirous imagination,then the conclusion my dream would reach would still be the same. This time though the governing elements were different from knowledge of the path and everyday Hi- Tech autopilot. The equation is also variable, we realize. It also exists in multiple dimensions and there is never one correct answer and there is never one correct way of getting it right.

This time a different approach gave me the same smug cat look albeit five minutes down the dream lane.

However at the end of any timed , evaluated dream sequence,(maybe you dream of winning Jet Ski’s and lucky drawing Louis Vuitton’s,or just a constant rain shower of Tom Cruise,Brad Pitt and Bradley Cooper’s,or of simple men who cook you meals ,while pouring you wine,its just dreams after all) 

After giving it our best shot(not sling shot,more the dart board focused shot)if we still do not arrive at the conclusion we desire, even after factoring in the constant and variable elements like knowledge,Dedication, hard work,love, luck,black magic,voodoo,magic charms,and in my case warped Google Maps. I realize when we get our test papers back that the “what” was wrong and I was as they say barking up the wrong tree. And no amount of astrological charts will align me with the path A.

But as every solution is an answer to a WHAT. The journalistic “what” in this is a very important point, we are all levitating around.

The need is then to look around and discover the INSTEAD WHAT,or Path B.

And work on that. Maybe it was Hot chocolate I wanted but something else I NEEDED.

Transmuting of desires is a lesson rigidity will do well to learn from.

As I condense down in my dreams, eventually, clutching that rain drop (holding my hot chocolate with one hand does not help with the grip) and crashing into the ocean.

I get thrashed around till I sink right in, level after level,dreaming still of the skies and soft tuffity nutmeg clouds.

But all of us cannot always land up in the clouds again, Evaporation is an extremely tough concept for some lazy people like me, ^ what like flying and then skydiving?  Seriously????? ^

Crashed and burned once already,this dream is seriously making me work. I join the army of droplets floating around lazily brushing against each other in the ocean,some of whom will end up washed up on a beach,sipping a Gin and Tonic which is actually my first LOVE before hot chocolate,and always an answer to WHAT do I want? ;) I plan to be that ‘some’, C’mon this is not a nightmare it’s a good happy ending dream. I will let my self flow with the tide, on the life raft of droplets floating gently towards the beach.

So, with sun warmed sand conducting right onto my behind and in between my toes. With one hand curling around my chilled glass and one hand in the chips packet, I feel exactly where I want to be and more so. SIGH!!!!What equation? What plan? What dream?  Just ‘In the moment’.

!!!!AND IT'S A WRAP WRAP WRAP!!!!!!!!

Rubbing my fingers softly against the smooth feel of the mound, pressing tentatively at first and then with a little pressure on it, my heart curls with thrill and as it softly compresses in, dimpling a little and then going further in ….I sigh!! Each and every time

The pleasure that courses through me via the satiny surfaces touches my joyous chords.

And each and every time, it bursts with a little phutt!!, (Now what did you think I was talking about?) I sing with every compression, I dance up and down with the sensations of pure unadulterated joy!!

 And in this case, (of course I am still talking about the bubble wrap bursting ritual)  one is just too less and I keep going phutt phutt phutt!!!.the softness, the pop. One of the only pleasures of packing.

I will one day hunt down who coined the line…for Lays and award him with a ream of bubble wrap.. “No one can eat just one.” Sheer brilliance hides in those lines.

Perfectly describing the greed that lurks under all our skins, and easily pointing out to all those who open a packet of chips, look around and if they see no one,quickly stuff three four more in their, lubricated mouths, noisily crunching away. Racing against time, and using their keen hunting prowess to train their ears to the audible signs of human presence. Quickly returning to the slow polite chew, a soft munch and a dainty pick at the first sign of company.

Will I ever tell you if I do that???From my own mouth??? Guilty only when proven, I say.

But moving back to packing.

I should tell you the idea of moving my scattered books, and the compacting of those peaks that keep getting restructured in my cupboard owing to my daily quest for clothes beginning at base camp,..Ahhh!!holds very little appeal.

My last move saw the packers form a Human chain from me at the head of the peaks down to the little unassuming shapeless, sorry square is a shape(we live in a politically correct world, god forbid I am held responsible for hurting the box’s feelings), so Yes square brown box. (There… I used the word BROWN)

Our Human chain kept feeding the box till the poor things stomach could just about manage to close its lips, and still manage to look overstuffed.

And so we moved from clothes, to shoes, to dressing table.Each time,I hopped around ignoring the rounded eyes of the packers, which were saucers due to their lack of grasping the capacity of absorbing a girls things, one tiny little room has.

I can tell you if there was a cranny I had it stacked and that day we got it packed.

I resist change in life, I am a comfort hogger,a sofa sloucher, I love watching one scenery out of my kitchen window, And when I leave a house, I say bye to the window that saw me grow up a little bit more, I cry at train stations for the thoughts I thought framed against the window, sipping hot milk now graduated to hot tea. Mostly it was all about boys I would miss, but who is counting the depth of emotions of a ten year old or a thirteen.(Though even now after fifteen years it’s still mostly about boys. extrapolate the emotional graph.)

I get attached to the dip in the mattress; I also get attached to the ritual of bathing according to particular peculiarities that are unique to each bathroom.

Surprising, but I left a house every two years, for the first 18 years of my life.

Thankfully we took our dogs with us every time or maybe I would have just planted roots and sunk them down the very same window.

I should be used to moving, but I am like I said a change resistor and what gets me through it, is the excitement awaiting at the other end.

And in all these years of moving around I have figured, if there is none at the other end, and you are just packing to move on. Move on in life, move on without your dogs, move on without the things that anchor you. Move on without the promise of an exciting day next day.Then the mundane madness, the slow boring murderous chaos of packing will effectively therapeutically, numb you top to bottom, but just, until you find the Bubble wrap beneath your fingers again.

"We saw your...$#%@#",AT THE OSCARS!!!!

Records say Seth Macfarlane is an edgy comic guy, he makes jokes, and he sells his packaging for loads of money in Hollywood.

‘we saw your boobs parody’ sold. The whole world is talking about it.

The women he mentioned are women who consciously *artistically* exhibited the B@%$#*...or is it alright if I say it because I am a woman??

Yes! we saw Charlize Therone hiding and cringing, and yes! We saw a whooping Golden Lady,Jennifer Lawrence. In all probabilities they knew about the song before. BUT, totally authentic reactions?? What is Hollywood if not make believe?

As far as the tag *sexist* goes, Fact is, that nine year old girl IS too young for George Clooney, and again its about choices she should learn the ways of Hollywood as it is a Big bad world out there. Plus we all want him, so she better face reality. So Seth did us all a favour.

There are thousands of Sexist acts and discriminations against women everyday, choosing our battles! That’s the game, And this is not even a battle it was a performance by a Comic.

That said, I personally wouldn’t want the appearance of my boobs to be sung about at the Oscars, because they are very strict about their live performances and definitely stricter about the audience.

CHEEEEESE

PHOTO BOOTH

OOOOF!!!that stitch in my stomach, wiping the stray tear out of my eyes, I stare at my friend who is crying earnestly and laughing at the same time…I turn to my third friend who is laughing and managing to still clutch on to the photo which is that proof in history, that we were at the INGO’s Saturday night bazaar in Goa. Our very own stamp on our timelines.

Strolling through a fair that throngs with life, pulsating with beats from everywhere around the world, it’s a feast of the senses, if I may relate everything to mmmm eating.

But controlling the stomach, just listen, close your eyes, and through all the music you will hear people striking deals in every language of the world.

So moving through the crowd, sometimes excused by a Russian, sometimes pardoned in french, we chance upon this activity hub.

Seeing all those people rushing through the funny costumes to the timer of ten seconds..We knew what we had come up to…all three of us instantly had that epiphany that this was what we just had to do, get into that photo booth.

So we quickly stood in queue for our ten seconds of fame, giggling in anticipation and each eyeing our costume change. I knew I had to get that wig on my head, life long desires of pink curly hair, finally coming into the view, like a runner’s first glimpse of the closing line.

 Anticipation glowing in our eyes we waited and observed the veterans already on the shoot. We observed their faults and laughed at their clumsiness, that polite awkward laugh, which hopes, we don’t look the same.

Breathing was just a notch higher, as we were given our cue.

Clutching the wigs and over sized sunglasses we trooped on the stage, waiting to be directed by the photographer, heart beating to the countdown of ten,nine, eight,seven…..

We all posed like the seventies superfloozies…though later on the Viking phase and the Minnie mouse desires overtook.

As he downed the shutter on the first shot…we ran, tumbled more like it to the changing table and scrambled around for the next coolest thing that would make us look the most foolish…

I was like a woman on a mission…I just stole whatever discards came to hand ,so one shot I was even the Warrior Viking with a penchant for heart shaped blue and pink sunglasses, talk about conflicting desires.

 However in one of the shots my curly haired friend also became Viking,fast forwarded a few centuries , pretty sorted in her  desires, she was the modern Viking.A brave warrior with an open mouthed war cry, floating around with a sign saying "like me on facebook”.

The third photo countdown mad scramble, prize would have to go to my third (first being me, straight haired,second being my curly haired friend) straight haired friend, who at first spent precious five seconds deciding, probably tapping her feet as to which colour wig would suit her best, (I guess the same desire for curly hair, germinates in her too)…deciding to be loyal to her wig she then proceeded to pick the over sized sunglasses which happened to be the coolest ones from a collection of say twenty,why you ask? Is simply because they were the only ones which saw the world through one lens.

And there the count of ‘one’ saw us clutching once again to each other as our kinetic forces fought to overcome the gravitational forces and the jolts, of each of us halting at once ,being absorbed by each other. Swaying,yet perfectly smiling into the camera for our third and final shot.

As it flashed into our eyes and ears resonating with the booming voice of our photographers megaphone, we put our hearts into that effortless smile, because it ‘bubbled’ up from every charged up cell in our system.

We even convinced the photographer that we didn't need more than one copy of our moment of memory making, because we were all technically aware of the world of scanning, the look the guy gave us was purely writing us off as scammers…but when you are on shoestring you really are on shoestrings, so who cares about peoples faces, they are too high up anyway!!!!focus on the shoestrings, and keep sidling past people.

Our high continued on to the table that was held on to bravely by our straight haired friend who in an overcrowded common, open air eating place fought hard to mark our territory on the bench, that was being invaded by an amorous old man, bending in to inflame, a much younger woman on his side, poking my friend with his amply carved camel hump back. Bravo sweety!!!!she held her space till we were all well fed and watered. Relinquishing, only to find more time for a stroll through the colorful stalls. Everything was begging us to save them from the rule of the mean women manning the stalls.We however were not economically placed to do that, but there were a few rescue attempts made, some successful, and some ended in us being batted out by the old bat women.

Overall our march out, was a relatively Victorious one.

The story of what we did with the soft drinks that were not allowed in has to be a tale on its own…FOR NOW CHEEESE!!!!!