MellowDrama

What do you write when you want to write? When there are precious moments of solitude And no distractions When there is a story bubbling inside of you And the ending lures you into reading those of others When days have passed without having had a conversation Though there are plenty of subjects But there is a dearth of subjects that  matter What do you write when your memory fails And you can't recall exactly whether it was the month of June or July The 20th or the 22nd The tale of which you want to relate What do you write when you want to write About the burning desires And glorious goals Of which you have little knowledge left What do you write when there is stillness all around you But you yearn for some noise

Whenever people, especially us north Indians and those not from the IT industry, think of moving up in the work ladder and look at cities we might have to relocate you can be sure that it would either be Delhi or Mumbai. I could have even forgotten that there was a city named Kolkata. And while we were leading a comfortable life in the country's most planned city, the city of gardens aka Chandigarh, Calcutta made way in to our lives and today after four years I wonder if it would be wrong to say that all hell broke lose. So it happened and within fifteen days we went from living in the most planned city to probably the most chaotic city. Relocation is a real bummer. You are more alone than you could have bargained for, for many reasons. Initially when the stuff is in transit and there is no house to clean, co-ordinate and run, you are wowed but the wow soon turns in to a painful aoowwww. The spouse is busy, more busy than usual in getting acquainted with the work place and tak

There is no structure to the days. Was there one ever, I ask myself? I have never been the one for structure, a time table, a way of doing things. This has been a source of joy and distress at one and the same time.

Dard. Pain. This word in English language doesn't probably deliver the force which a parent feels when the child is hurt. Moving on. Physical pain goes away but the memory of many such physical episodes lingers. There are times when this memory hits you with a surprising ferocity like the way I just now remembered Netra's ear incident wherein the lock part of her earring had lodged itself in the pierced part of the ear, stretching the skin and how she screamed when the doctor had to make an incision and took it out with tweezers.

Dard. Pain. This word in English language doesn't probably deliver the force which a parent feels when the child is hurt. Moving on. Physical pain goes away but the memory of many such physical episodes lingers. There are times when this memory hits you with a surprising ferocity like the way I just now remembered Netra's ear incident wherein the lock part of her earring had lodged itself in the pierced part of the ear, stretching the skin and how she screamed when the doctor had to make an incision and took it out with tweezers.

To begin to like your own cooking is also a way of evolving. You are your own best judge and you are very well conversant with your graph. The ups and the downs. The highs and the burnt lows. Acceptance from family members is definitely a bonus but not an assured one. So I cook for myself now and the others in the house have to go along with it. I am liking what I am making more and more (like yesterday night's paneer paranthas) and that is quite a happy place to be in. ******* I went to the loo. Before I sat down on the pot Abir followed me in with 2 Peppa Pig books and sat down on the floor. Rather settled down comfortably in his striped pajamas. Then he gave me one book and asked me to read it to him. He never tires of these. So again we did Peppa's family loves different things. And we did them again in the morning when he was following me incessantly with those two again while I had to do Netra's tiffin and lunch and breakfast related cooking. 

Death is a stranger to me. I haven't really had much to do with it. But now at the age of 34 I realise that soon enough we will be seeing more of each other. In the past three years or so I have lost a younger cousin brother, a dear uncle and my grandfather- Bauji. Perhaps his is the only death that can be called timely i.e. if there is a thing like that, calling a death 'timely'. He hadn't been keeping well for years now the past couple of years being the worst. he had lost his hearing and appetite. In the last year or so I think he even lost the will to live. It was I think my nani's efforts that managed to keep his body function to the best of its abilities as much as it could. I think all of us in the family were waiting to hear the news of his death. When Shaurya passed away in a car mishap, and my father called me up about his death, I couldn't hear his name in that one sentence that my father had to repeat over and over again. I think he became exasp

I loved writing this piece. Loved it. Yeah. I said it again. Oops! Abso-the-lutely loved loved writing this piece. ------------------ Before embarking on this article I have a few confessions to make. For beginners let me acknowledge the fact that I haven’t worked so hard on an article before this. I don’t mean to boast but writing comes a wee bit easily to me then other numerous things. This one article took all my strength and by the end of it I was exhausted, bleary eyed and breathless. Also I must include that I was very close to being internet-broke. Before your imagination takes off on wings and you imagine me running on a treadmill writing this piece, let me tell you why. I was exhausted by the rush of the numerous songs that filled my mind space gushing out like a river which is suddenly allowed to flow after its path had been obstructed by a big rock. I was bleary eyed from seeing one video after the other on Youtube (which kind of left me internet-broke). I star

I am staring at this screen. Some time has gone by. I meant to restart the writing process. Often during the day I have these amazing thoughts that I have left unattended for a long time. Now I want to take charge and start gathering them.  This happened after I read a quote somewhere. Isabel Allende's. Write what should not be forgotten. Now when I am trying to write that which must not be forgotten I forget already what it was to be. Some gyaan. That I am sure of.  Some random thought that I have been cud chewing. Some which take a shape. Gather weight. Form. See the light of the day or evening via a conversation.  It could be that or some guilt pang looking for an escape of a expression about the way I am raising my child. Or how she is turning out to be without my assistance.

We were at a friend's house when a tiff broke between the two siblings. I offered the younger one, my daughter's friend, to hop in the car with us for a sleepover. She did that delighted to get away from the bigger sister. My friend gulped hard. She asked her over and over again if she was sure she wanted to go away for the night. She cajoled her then threatened her then tried bit bribing and lastly entreated her to change her mind. But she wouldn't be cajoled, threatened, bribed or entreated. Her mind was made up and she came with us. I don't think my friend slept a wink that night. Whereas the child played to her heart's content and fell soundly asleep having tired all her faculties nicely. And this is what brought home a fact that life looks ahead. It knows only to move in forward gear. The woman might have worried about x number if things concerning her daughter but the child wasn't about one.

If you are the child of the 80s and if you can hum Doordarshan’s signature tune and recall the colours of the montage; if you remember the Ek chidiya song and sing it too ( to probably your kids now!); if you can recall the yellow sari of the Maggi mummy and Lalita ji of Surf fame then you most definitely remember the Buland Bharat ki Buland Tasveer. Yes! Hamara Bajaj. Bajaj Chetak- the two-wheeler that was a defining characteristic of our childhood and an imminent part of our teen years. Many of us have fond memories of riding the scooter to markets and may be to tuitions. Unfortunately, out of production for a while and not a frequent sight on the Inidan road yet the sight of the beloved two-wheeler on the set of Comedy Nights with Kapil Sharma brought back the nostalgia. I have very clear memories of roaming about the town on the grey Bajaj Chetak that my father owned. The grey scooter was recently sold off but I can still recall the ‘vrooooommmmm’ sound of the scooter a

February 1873 was a monumental year for Kolkata, then known as Kalikatta. Commerce had compelled the British rulers to look for cost effective and efficient ways to carry merchandise from Sealdah railway station to the Armenian Ghats of the river Hooghly. Unfortunately the horse trams did not find many takers and had to shut down the same year. But in the mean time something of an affair had been heralded that would go on to add to the uniqueness of the city Kalikatta. Think of trams and you can imagine life slowing down a pace or two. When I first set eyes on a tram in the middle of a main road in the South of the city, all the other noises seemed to recede away and a Mantovani melody started to play in the background instead. I was so mesmerised by the way it snaked on the road, leisurely at its own pace, not bothered by the honking cars, autos and taxis that I forgot to board the bus my palm had brought to halt. Kolkata is a metropolis like none other. It is large. It

The new year is already 6 days old. I haven't made a list of resolutions or I haven't done anything else yet that would have set these other 5 gone by days from the rest of the years since maybe 2007 or 08. The year that has gone by was spent waiting for the baby. In the meantime I came across gratitude as something of a magical force that could change lives. I was tagged in posts on FB to express gratitude, I got my sister to write a column in place and guess what was the chosen subject- gratitude and so on and so forth. So because gratitude has been making an appearance over and over again I decided to make a list of things I am grateful for. Mind you, I am not an ungrateful person, but this is taking things a plane higher. So without much ado, here are a few things for which I am immensely grateful. 1. I am grateful that little kids have a short memory span. In the last seven years that she has been around I too have had many a rough patches. I have often taken out