I finished Paul’s book “When breath becomes air” an hour before mid-night not knowing that the next few hours to dawn would be a struggle in itself for me. I couldn’t but remain awake as Paul’s struggle, Lucy’s love and the decision to have Cady in their lives revolved in my thoughts.

How would you react to the terminal illness which would definitely change the course of life itself making it shorter every moment?

As you watch life slip away faster than it does for the ones around you, knowing that time is the only factor that constricts your capabilities from making a difference, frequently feeling your absence in the lives of your beloved ones, feeling helpless; would you surrender?

Paul paces himself against time and circumstances to create meaning for the life he created with Lucy. He convinces life to surrender, triggers another life so lovely and beautiful - Cady.

He writes – “Words have a longevity I do not.” before his message for his new born daughter, Cady – “When you come to one of the many moments in life where you must give an account of yourself, provide a ledger of what you have been, and done, and meant to the world, do not, I pray, discount that you filled a dying man’s days with a sated joy, a joy unknown to me in all my prior years, a joy that does not hunger for more and more but rests, satisfied. In this time, right now, that is an enormous thing.”.

More than his note, this book, I discovered, is a memoir of Paul’s journey intertwined between the deep uncertainties and certainties created from an unending desire to create a meaning of life.

"Time is- just is what it is" - Paul.

Pondered upon a paragraph from John William Draper's "History of the intellectual development of Europe" and was impressed by the way he has described the journey of mind and its thoughts over a passage of ones life.

"Some have asserted that human affairs are altogether determined by the voluntary action of men, some that the Providence of God directs us in every step, some that all events are fixed by Destiny. It is for us to ascertain how far each of these affirmations is true.

The life of individual man is of a mixed nature. In part he submits to the free-will impulses of himself and others, in part he is under the inexorable dominion of law. He insensibly changes his estimate of the relative power of each of these influences as he passes through successive stages. In the confidence of youth he imagines that very much is under his control, in the disappointment of old age very little. As time wears on, and the delusions of early imagination vanish away, he learns to correct his sanguine views, and prescribes a narrower boundary for the things he expects to obtain.

The realities of life undeceive him at last, and there steals over the evening of his days an unwelcome conviction of the vanity of human hopes. The things he has secured are not the things he expected. He sees that a Supreme Power has been using him for unknown ends, that he was brought into the world without his own knowledge and is departing from it against his own will.

Whoever has made the physical and intellectual history of individual man his study will be prepared to admit in what a surprising manner it foreshadows social history. The equilibrium and movement of humanity are altogether physiological phenomena. Yet not without hesitation may such an opinion be frankly avowed, since it is offensive to the pride, and to many of the prejudices and interests of our age. An author who has been disposed to devote many years to the labor of illustrating this topic has need of the earnest support of all who prize the truth; and, considering the extent and profundity of his subject, his work, at the best, must be very imperfect, requiring all the forbearance and even the generosity of criticism."

Intriguing and revealing it is as you watch your ideas change. On how your perspectives change from what you had once to what it is now for the same thing. In my case my ideas of the pot and the potter. The change which happened overtime.

Two years since I have written anything to fill any space on this blog. It isn’t that I had no time nor had I fallen short of the life’s occurrences and stories but what made me silent was the times I watched this pot which once scented, had begun to stink and was son the verge of losing its own fragrance over time.

There was this pot thrown into the gutter as it hid itself with shit; the shit, leaving very little space for the positive rays to reach its body. There wasn’t shit all over when the pot was new. Perhaps it was covered with shit slowly over six years before it was finally dumped; made to believe that’s its destiny is to stink and that its origins contributed significantly to its strong bond with the gutter. The pot was silenced overtime with irrational arguments which rarely led into any constructive conversations. The pot started believing that all that was happening was meant to be and perhaps it had no right of its own, constrained by origins, to remain in shit and that any fragrance it thought it had was perhaps false. This was until, one day, one little potter discovered, pulled and tossed the pot so high, the pot could do nothing but realize its own potential and use it to mesmerize its surroundings once again the way he did years ago.

That evening.

As my potter approached me in one of the premium spots  in the financial hub of the nation, I sat watching her energy and the freedom in her smile. Sometimes you can be completely fooled by your impressions of a person. In my case, it happened so. I thought she was free and she had a very supportive environment to be so joyful. She had no problems with life, I thought! Little did I know that this professional conversation, and the lady behind what I saw, would have a story so large that it would to pull me out of shit and question me to rethink on what I am. I never knew that my thoughts of being in the most disastrous phase of my life would disappear and become so insignificant.

For me the issue was the questions on my origins, rationale of the so called socially upward class and the intriguing laws of religions which somehow failed to fit each other in the same system. I realize it today; perhaps it was not just me but people around as well shared the same feeling. The movie PK made it more apparent when Aamir tries to discover God and the same laws in different religions work very differently for the same God! The question does remain, how does one deal with it? Perhaps most of the population succumbs to the illogical laws for they are too feeble to secure their position of being just. And the story, no matter how illogical; of our nation, tied hard in the web of religion and ethics would continue to create unjust circumstances which will go untreated and unnoticed. The hypocrisy shall prevail for in some way its fundamental to our survival as a nation; for it helps us convince our acts of being right while being untrue.

Nevertheless, as she spoke and I knew more, I discovered how this lady, alone, from the highest religious sect,  defied the questions which had trapped me for long. Her journey of moving from one of the orthodox mind-sets to her free world wasn’t all easy, but was strong enough to question the basis of my assumptions. A child turned into a parent defying childhood due to the demanding circumstances, the child who grew up to beat the orthodox views of marriage religion and caste; the child who turned into the inspiring blonde, who not only took care of her ageing parents but also travelled that extra mile with least support to make an impression in her professional circle. The struggle of this child who once had several servants to take care of her had none at one point. The journey which she started  when she was 15 asked me strong questions. The questions which needed to be answered.

I could no longer but drive away from and start cleaning the shit most of which; the result of forced beliefs had covered me. She asked, how good is a car which stays in the garage? Car is meant for the road and the accelerator for speed. The road is to take risk. Drive and drive as fast as you can. From 3000 kms (in 6months)  in my new car to over 20000 kms on the fastest lanes of this city within a span of 5 months was what I drove. From the hills to the expressways. It’s not the numbers that talk but what I learnt. Once, scared of speed and the traffic of this city, I was able to go beyond 170! And then it just continued. Pushed up in the air on the scariest roller coaster rides in Imagica, with her beside, on my birthday; I took another birth I guess. As my limbs kissed the air and my mind was terrified with the fall; I felt my own self. She embraced my very own people, otherwise from whom I had distanced away in pursuit of the pot, the two people who created me. The mango groove in my garden whose shade I hated had become much dearer by the time she was half way in her story.

All I can say as I think of what happened; I came home to myself. I stopped wandering. Although I am still on the 12th floor writing again, there’s a difference. There’s snow outside.

I am this pot far away from where I was born, where my customers spare no time in looking at me in awe and that’s what is not me but what she has created, my potter, over a year now.  My potter with 3 of her beliefs; a. human being is beyond caste/creed/religion b. you are a reflection of your upbringing, stop questioning them c. I am a Rig Vedic myself and I know my pot. She took over me on her birthday and pushed me on a journey as the definitions changed; I became the pot myself instead of running behind another pot. Where devotion is not demanded but it sprouts from within; I wander no long to live for those unfortunate but wonder on my abilities to create awe in my surroundings, for I startle a few beings; defying questions once raised. Stinking no more. Constantly awed by my potters energy wondering how much she has and where does she get it from; and as days pass by realizing the difference one right person can make. One wrong person can perhaps push you into that black hole from where there’s no return and you start feeling that its night; and dark is the only truth. The right one on the contrary, would take you close to the sun, where you will burn and start emitting light and be amazed and say “well, it’s interesting, I didn’t know I had some light within until you held me;”

My ideas of the potter who created a wrong pot that convinced me to run into the darkness, have not changed. But what has become of me as I became the pot of my potter; has made me to believe that the outcome – the pot; is a feat of the potter and the potters selfless strong determination gives rise to what the pot can become; whether weak or strong; right or wrong. For now, I not only see but experience what my potter has made of me; a force so strong to uncover the dark shit covering me. Who knows, the stranger who ran relentlessly behind a pot with a hole, would itself become one of the most sought after pots in the times to come. It’s the potter that makes all difference. And as always, I get a little lucky every time, this time, on my longest journey with my potter who is determined to be beside.

Two years from now I was in this place with a bag on my back facing the sunset as its right before me now. The only difference was the bag pack (now I don’t carry one) and perhaps the thoughts I had then and now. I do not know what to call it, transformation or evolution. Times when the blogs started small and grew so large and frequent and this day, I find only one thing to write of many. Off the many thoughts that fail to attract me. The one that remains parallel to me.

What?
Nothing.
What?

Sometimes we find ourselves caught in questions without any well-defined answers for perhaps the answers don’t exist or the answers are so large to be described. An excerpt of a real conversation I overheard. An expression so well expressed without words.

I have been away for a while on over a few months wading through various forms of waves my lifetime had. Some so large to drown me for a little longer time than usual in deep silence. And some just enough to let my head above the surface allowing me to breathe the fresh air. Nevertheless I find myself to have managed to juggle over these turbulent waves surviving to watch the still sea. No wonder on interesting waves that lie ahead of me.

The point is neither the waves nor the times. Neither the turbulence.  But to that realization which calms within. I am awed and constantly amazed by what I see.  Beyond the naked skin and the half covered bosom, the man's picture of a woman, there lies a tender strong soul less described in human terms. The former description I guess is the one the artists paint and the poets write about but for the latter I find no description. Well, I am no less of a man who isn’t attracted by the curves and the skin, but somehow these fail to capture me for long. For me that which attracts beyond the skin drags my thoughts longer than I could imagine, perhaps engulfs all of me into its very existence. The element.

A tower of confusion, which itself is a creation of the circumstances germinating from the deep urge of the being to see things in harmony. An urge of being in a point where everything around her is in  harmony, harmony being the state of happiness. Crushed between the expectations of the loved ones and her own little wishes, she sits and waits. Perhaps waits for something I wouldn’t know but guess... A moment of peace and happiness where everyone related to is perhaps satisfied and happy on the actions... I do not know.

As I pass by the potters ally, I see a striking similarity. She being the pot, the potter has created over years with a lot of care, has to look at the interests of the potter. Perhaps being sold to the customer the potter desires. She waits in the sun praying and perhaps waiting for the customer that her heart seeks.  Dare she choose a customer which isn’t as profitable for the potter? Yet she gathers the courage to nod back and forth denying every little instance, resisting beyond circumstances, battling each day with time, her needs and that of the obligations she has for the potter, her creator. The customer her heart seeks, watches her juggle it all from a distance knows everything yet. She wipes her tears, smiles through the pain because she knows even though she is breaking inside, he is watching.

What more do I write and what more can I say but see the pot dry up in the sun as my chin dries with her. The fear of the bonding being damped in due course, the truth being hidden the web of rationality, apprehensions that suppress life. Life, like a log that floats in water giving up its decisions to the current of the stream, has become the way perhaps. Nevertheless, she puts a smile on her face, acts like everything is fine. When in reality, the world is on her shoulder and her life is slipping through the cracks of her fingers as one could describe. I like the wanderer gazing at the setting sun, seeing nothing but the horizon as far as wide. Hoping for a shower of rain for the summer has been so long...

What?
Nothing.
What?
No one does like this…
Silence.
What?
Nothing...

The rectangular block of cloth with stuffed cotton blocks the view... what remains is but the conversation and the glimpse of the eyes looking into me... the slipping seconds that makes the sand hour glass of our life.

What answer do I give you dear for your question "what?" I guess my answer remains "nothing" that I can perhaps say even if there’s an answer that lingers deep within. I continue to remain awed by the tiny strong soul that knocks me to silence. The picture which is remarkably beautiful than the ones I have seen in those galleries. Perhaps making an effort to collect the times so that they surpass the missed moments nullifying the existence of the missed ones… 

What? 

Nothing!!!

For a few days now I haven’t missed the sunrise. I guess there are times when the night just fades into the bright morning not otherwise. Perhaps if that would be for all where all our deepest agonies and sorrows fade into joy. At times they do I guess, its just that that you don’t know when. What surprise’s me since my last article is the things around us. Despite the understanding of the noble truths that man is here to suffer and reach a point where it all ends, mans urge to fight it all amazes me. Perhaps that’s one of the commendable things about HIS creation. Guess more than HE enjoys in making us play on the stage if Shakespeare was right, we enjoy being actors trying to be the best of ourselves. Some try to the play the role of the of the good ones acting the role of Givers and others the Takers. What perhaps constant is both the parties try hard to fill in...

This guy I stumble upon this morning would be barely 7 years of age. Perhaps wouldn’t know who the parents were, nor the place he was born. A few of you feel happy of your origins, and for a few the origin itself becomes a curse overtime. Of course the curse is a creation of indifference one cant but live with. A few are lucky to have known none. A lot like this child struggling to rise up on pavement of the platform in one of the busiest cities. I envy him of his ignorance of his origin of course that stands apart. What is more intriguing is the effort this guy puts into getting up. It would be easy anyways for people like us :)

Fragile legs like those of a lark, underfed for days, hair uncombed. The scar where both arms end, is too deep to be a natural cut. Perhaps they were severed off forcibly. Now I guess that explains the difficulty in getting up. Would he be any different in case he had those hands. Perhaps no. He would have been a commoner like me who fails to realize the value of my own hands. Today he is. He knows, is aware of the pain that would be caused if he tries to thrust his head on the ground to lift his body. He knows it might bleed. He knows he might fall flat in case the forehead doesn’t resist. He is aware of the humiliation he would perhaps go through as people watch with pitiful eyes wondering how bad fate is to him yet doing nothing to help him rise. He is perhaps aware that after so much of an effort the only outcome would be, that he would sit up which is something we do everyday and fail to realize what sitting up and breathing is! That would be a simple outcome of the enormous effort this guy made through all this time.

For a few of us it would make little sense for we believe that what is there in sitting up if we are to meet an end one day! Life’s impermanent anyways. What is the difference if I continue lying, if I am to get up and that’s in my destiny someone will come and pick me up. For a few of us, the effort desired and the related outcome doesn’t make sense. For we feel its not equated properly. For a few, the fear takes over as they think, what if I bleed, what if my head cant resist my body, what if I fall down again and hit my eyes, rationalizing every bit of a possibility to an extent that the desire to rise and breathe itself is nullified. Perhaps...

For me, I stand in awe of things contemplating on what is the right approach and what is wrong as I see this guy struggle, fall and finally rise up in 30 long minutes ready to ask for alms which would probably make his day! I have been thinking all the while with no difference in the feeling, yet for this guy I think he’s won a few feelings, the feeling of being down, the feeing of breathing fresh air, and the feeling of happiness on the alm he earned for the day! In a life that’s definitely going to end I guess hes made something into his moments pocket that would stay permanent as long as he lives. Beyond that, well do we know for certain what is beyond?

The imprints of moments that touch us become more permanent than those sea waves. The lives of those who have touched us irrespective of how continues to make noise. Even in the impermanent world as ours, we live with the permanent moments we have made so far unless we had a pill to forget them. I wonder on the ways of living in an impermanent world that contains within itself the deep permanency of those moments... the perm within the imperm, perm-imperm, Perhaps...

Wonderful it is the mind, one of the most intriguing components of the human body. Perhaps there’s a lil less explanation of how it works yet this is what controls and directs it all. Like the dark matter which remains a secret that occupies most of the universe. Interesting it is to see how it works, fundamental outcome being a thought. Thoughts that have been a reason of my fascination. A new born is relatively free for the thoughts are free and limited in dimension. For perhaps the mind is only tamed by the extent it has seen. For the child the extent is the few lil things its originator shares. Be it the doll or the stars of the night. It can only imagine it half way.

There used to be a time when I looked up at the stars every night in the clear sky above the terrace. I could hardly make out what they would be as a child. Exciting they were these little sparkling white diamonds in the dark sky with an embedded large circle, the moon. That was before I could ask or express my anxiety to know what these so called stars actually were. I met this guy, and i think he was my only friend then. A lot large than me, so large to fit myself in his arms. This guy I admired perhaps had an answer to all my questions. An intelligent guy he was. He had an explanation for everything, be it rains or how is a rainbow caused! I remember how he used to create rainbows on the terrace by blowing a mouth full of water in the direction of sun rays creating a rainbow as he caught hold of me to bathe.

This guy, once told me as he was trying to make me sleep "can you see up there, the seven bright stars in the shape of a pan, these are the seven sages. when we grow old we leave everyone and become a star. my mother, your grandmother is out there somewhere. one day when you wont find me, remember to look up I will be watching you". It didnt make much sense to me then for I was happy that he would be there anyways alltime. What difference would it make if hes there beside me or up there as a star if all that was true. I told him "I am not as bright, i wish i were, i would have been a star then..."


A child I guess is the purest form of man and with time it evolves wading through circumstances sometimes successful in protecting the deep innocence somewhere, and at times in due course of an attempt for survival turns into an actor faking every little expression. Growing up I understood that these stars are perhaps forms of larger astronomical bodies like the sun million light years away. Today as i look up its not the stars of his definition but of the real perhaps. Yet this mind finds comfort in his rationale. Who knows perhaps one day I will become a star!

Its not about the stars or how the mind works or the thoughts, perhaps its more of a belief, state and transformation we all go through in the span that governs us. We wake up one morning so bright and there’s a lil voice somewhere deep within knocking the heart and eventually the mind saying perhaps that’s what I have been waiting for. The wish! Overtime this wish turns into a deep desire we start talking about. The desire moves through a roller coaster ride driven by the circumstances never seen before some creating joy, passion and others creating sorrow. Circumstance and the so called rules created by man to rule man, dampen the smaller truth. Falsifying its very own existence. Pushing you through the various stages man calls the stages of loss, being denial anger… whatever. The child within dies a slow death being engulfed into the rules marching each day to an unknown end accepting the way it is. Pacifying itself of its own actions to be a part of its destiny never knowing if that were the destiny. A heart which once spoke, made a noise about its wants being silenced to death. Wants cease to exist. Life but adapts and moves.

Life they call it. And evolution it is from a child to a man. Successful he is who survives the transformation. Salvated they are who perform the righteous. Right is something they have been told. Right rules are what man makes. Good and bad is defined by man’s own thought. Society it is which they make which governs them. Indifference, is created by the origin on which man has no control. Looking closely, I wonder if there’s a meaning to all this. Life itself! YOU create man, man is made to suffer, you play with him, man dies yet man seeks you. The question remains as to why you create man at the first place? Just because you have a selfish reason that man by suffering should understand and accept your power and feel how helpless you make him. Crawl back to you as you place him back on the earth because hes probably done a mistake he knows not. Is it that you like playing with us? They ask me not to deny life for it turns to be a sin. Who defines a sin? Isn’t living life itself which is nothing but an outcome of the responses that we receive to give to our environment, by the so called deep interactions of this mind, heart and soul a sin where everything is in a state of spar?

I don’t know if YOU are true or you are a mere creation of the human mind. I don’t know if there is any rationale to all this. What I do know is perhaps it’s the way it is. Perhaps something’s are beyond all reason. What I do know is perhaps all this would have no answer and like every other question and voice it will be a whisper that would mingle off into space without a response. Span being in a state of wait as they say hope is sometimes the best thing. Same goes for a few things, I wonder if any of this makes sense. Man loves, the feelings come, man denies the feeling, man accommodates for a few can and the other waits for an infinite time seeking a definitive end. Perhaps an end to its very own existence. For the mind seeks and shouts and screams where all of this mingles into the darkness of the night seeking a response…A child which was true once is damped and silenced overtime turning him into a living-being that lives with a life it wants not. A voice turning whisper eventually mingling into the space known by none. Perhaps… death is a gift as he rightly says, you know not, where life becomes a sudden whisper that fades into the space...

Its been hours now so discrete and separate, probably coupling to make it days which I have stopped counting, which i have spent in staring at the walls and mirrors everywhere I go. Waiting for a digital response, perhaps.Some noise from deep silence; perhaps. Sometimes in our span the silence takes us into her arms like a mother and at times like your beloved you possibly can be with forever. Times I guess...

The white walls of the well lit room coupled with the white bedsheet and pillows, the white crane that’s born out of the silent drive, the silence within the noise of the city celebrating the festival of colors. The green walls of the so called home. The multicolored ones of largely decorated corporate buildings.Walls they are that have captivated every bit of imagination making a less turbulent noise deep within. Augmented by the panes of glass some transparent and others being opaque which reflect back what you show them, mirrors. The glass panes that power the window panes of aircraft, from where you see the water joining the two banks as you fly down over the busiest economic capital, once silent, starts making a bit of noise not as turbulent.  

Perhaps trying to tell the story of how in one life one is bound between the two edges; one being the past and one being the future with both of them being distant apart, like the river bank. The water being patient enough to connect and hold on to the two sides, similar to the being I have known for years now. The element.

I thought it would stop there perhaps, but no. It does continue; every piece of object specifically material ones, which science terms non-living, has started creating some noise. The closed car window, I have been staring for a while now as i sit beside the flyover watching the sun set right in front of me in one of the busiest cites spawns a hundred thoughts. I see the vehicles speeding fast, on the one way track and I wonder what drives them home, for it’s a little strange for me. Why are they pacing fast and where I ask? This glass window piece of the car window which protects me from the cool breeze outside leaving me to sweat all the while whispers the rationale. Perhaps they are speeding home. A home they call their own. A home of people waiting for you, unlike yours. The drops roll down and dry as they create a cold sensation on this chin. Perhaps the home, my home is what i am waiting for and unlike them who are racing fast I have to be still, the thought strikes this mind as the lips widen with relief...

There comes a point in life I guess, when your silence coupled by your longing that gives rise to the expectation leading you to wait, takes you closer to those objects which were once dead. The walls and the mirrors which become alive and respond... perhaps. I don’t know may be one of my experiences unique to me not yours, or may be...

So what? What are we talking about? Living with the walls and mirrors? Or it’s just another random piece of article that mushrooms out of an expression that was deliberately trying to escape thus making space for another thought. Perhaps not!

Overtime, as I ponder upon these walls and mirrors my close friends now, I discover a striking similarity in the ways we respond. Walls being silent and mirrors made to reflect what’s in frontof it. This makes rare sense if thought of as separate entity, however what’s more interesting is the story these two objects have to tell when looked at the response of living beings. I don’t know but perhaps your experience could be a bit similar to mine, the experience of silence. There might have been a time when you perhaps wait and expect a response, a word, a thought or simply some noise. Like the farmer who tills the land and waits for the rain to come to see the green leaves emerge from the damp land. Waiting each day, sitting alongside the land hoping that perhaps this would be the day when he could see something green; as the time passes on. On days there’s nothing green that comes and the sunshine is no longer blocked by the clouds. He waits and wonders, and for him its the story of the wall or the mirror. Would he choose to be the mirror, reflecting back all actions with in the same way that nature does on it, leaving the land and abandoning the harvest? Or would he choose to be like the wall, which again reflects the actions of nature in a more positive way, cuz when you are trying to hit the ball on the wall you do get the ball back but with the mirror it breaks off. I wonder about the state of the farmer and the numerous nights and days that pass in silence coupled with the less turbulent noise of the dead objects; now living, and on his decision to be a wall or the mirror. 

Perhaps its easy with him for its the nature that does the action on the farmer on which he has no control. He has no choice but to be the wall. I wonder about human beings. Would we be mirrors to their actions, or stand like a wall letting them play with their ball and waiting for a possible time when the being would perhaps feel that the force caused by the ball and suddenly leave the ball and come to the wall? I sit and think as the wall above me whispers, perhaps a day will come... A day when the one playing with the ball would contemplate for a while on what the wall goes through and may be leave the ball, run towards the wall to embrace creating an experience inexpressible... The glass pane of the cell, whispers about the possibility of the one, with the ball getting bored of this wall eventually looking out for a better one... who knows... the questions beyond an answer perhaps left to time... as this mind calms down for a while if not much... What continues is the swinging pendulum with two ends one being the wall, the other being mirror and the amusing thing. The thing of how we become walls parallel, at one point becoming a wall ourselves to some and at the same time becoming a player to another who becomes a wall for us... Wall taking precedence somehow, even with the force with which the ball hits for the faith on cranes overpower it... for the glimpse of that bright morning… walmir.

Like every morning, this one is a great one. Tomorrow's sun will bring great excitement as love is in the air. From Newspapers, fm's, tv channels to the archies and roadside rose hawkers everyone excited about the coming day! So am I :) This guy a close friend, i have known for 6 years now, as I walk tells me a story of the one far away. I dont know much. But... somehow... i am trapped into the conversation of 45 mins before dawn. His quest to answer questions, her quest to overcome her challenges and their quest to be together...

"A million seconds have passed by and the seconds keep ticking with your thought staying constant; relative to the movement of the ticker on your hand. I cant but let these thoughts leave me. May be I dont want to or may be I just failed doing it so...

However, its about the question I once asked to the one whos half a reason for whom I was born. The other half rarely answered any eventually leaving no questions in my bucket. This guy, took me around to all places he possibly could with his age old humber, showed me things and trained me how to call them by names. The train, bridge, dog, horse and off course what should I call him too :P Initial days were not as funny for I could hardly realize the entire thing. These were too large for my eyes and mind. I remember once when he bought my first tractor, the pink one, i was least interested in it and more interested in the horse which came across the way. He had an answer as to why we couldnt take that horse home and why this tractor is safe for me. Rationality being the horse could throw me away and I would be hurt and the tractor will never do so ;P For every question, be it an equation or what I should be eating or a question from the english poems or the story of inchcape rock, this guy had a way of explaining it all. Both of us were younger than we are now, then.

The people I knew grew as he pushed me to the places like school and college which I wonder if he ever had the advantage to be in. In the beginning of 1989, this guy I remember taking me to a park beside the school, Its as fresh as can be, I had never seen such a childrens park, four swings, two see-saw, two merry-go-round, and a lot more. The best school it was then. I thanked him only to watch him smile and not react. It was all great, till the time when I realised the growing distance between us for my questions remained in his bucket for long long time without an answer. Be it seeking a bicycle or a question as to why hes doing what he did. To an extent, when I was all out of faith. Had possibly stopped believing. Only words I can remember is "a day will come when you will understand"

Today, as I stand in the awe of things and ponder upon the times passed, it feels good. For a few years now, dear, the way it all started, i think we started off with a barren land. A land where nothing was ever grown. In the initial years the farmer goes down and across the land to feel its properties. He waits for the seasons to come and go. He looks around at the adjacent cultivated lands, some with a great harvest, some with little and a few lying barren. He thinks, observes and learns the art of cultivating. Decides on what should be grown. He experiments. Perhaps the way we did.

Small meetings, a few interactions, a few times which I am sure you would have spend in thinking about me the way I would have. Never saying how much pain you took for I can feel it. We went down and across the plane of love. We started cultivating it. Eventually realising that loves not easy. It shouldn’t be. For as every beautiful thing has a price and in love, I think pain is the price one has to pay. If thats the most beauiful thing and you would wish to experience it, dont you think you got to pay for it. You ought to. Times passed, sir as we walked.

I stood once outside the glass window pane with my barbie on the other side on the verge of an auction. Something happened. Perhaps the intensity of the force that binds us together grew a lot larger than the force of auction itself. Luckily the barbie at the other side of the window pane did look at me. It was that night.

What would you do when one night, the one whom you have liked so much for long confesses about the liking the other person has for you and that its identical? Cry? Scream? Ask yourself what next? Probably scream your heart out at the top of your voice in the roof of one of those tallest buildings... getting back to normal. Stand for a while facing the deep ridges, open arms, contemplating about the times to come, being afraid of loosing it ... and smiling within, for the invisible force emerging from the sheer pursuit to reach the other being is rising...

That land sir, we have started cultivating years ago. For you it may not make sense for you dont see the quantity of harvest. For you its still the same barren land. So is for every other person, who looks at the land. For us its different. Its just that the we believe, the seasons would change, the summer would go, the rains will come and so will the spring. A day will come when it will be ready for the harvest and harvest as we saw. Yes sometimes it’s difficult, for I go down on energies for I get tired of seeing the barren land. She does sometimes, for she’s scared of draught may be. The risks that lie if the rain turns into flood. Risk of the summer becoming harder to dry up the entire land. Risk of pests.

That’s always there with everything and that shall remain so. I cant answer the questions on risks if you ask me. For I also understand they are there and they shall always be. However I can possibly, in fact we together can work out on mitigating controls to contain the risks. Life’s uncertain so is everything. Yet for the fear of uncertainty do we ignore something which is so certain. The questions I had once for which he smiled and told me that I would understand overtime, I think for her questions i can but share the same. Eventually with time, I am sure a day would come when the land would be ready for harvest for the work over years will not go in vain. It doesn’t.

The phases of being young, being intimate and eventually preparing to face the sunset of life. I am certain on one thing, change is inevitable for a few things I guess its constant. The pursuit is. The longing to be with you. The feeling. Tomorrow will be a great day for everyone, so shall it be for both of us too. We know we are distant away. So what? The sunflower is distant away from the sun always but follows the sun. The sun is far away but we feel the heat. God is never seen yet we believe. Shes not there yet I feel. I am not there yet she seeks."

Coming from the school of rationality, where my day begins and ends with reasons attached to the material world, this guys words, knocks me somewhere. I dont know if what he said makes any sense or is there any reason in her conviction. What I do know is it can’t be just like that. Perhaps I got to go down, till the land with my own hands, wait for the seasons, wait like them and may be beyond that I shall feel what they feel like. If only I had someone like the barbie this guy had and if only my barbie looked at me ;)…

Never mind, assuming that my barbie is somewhere, I don’t know where,  and assuming that this guys belief is all true, I cant but wish, a happy valentine day to her wherever she is… waiting for time to take me to her and her to me…

Times are those when we impose and then at moments we are imposed upon. My story… Your story… Our story… keeps on building as we live each day. Sometimes we become part of the stories of people around, without any defined role though. Something similar to that of being a guest actor for a while. I have had the advantage of being one. And this movie would probably end in the next 18 hours with my guest appearance. Doctors confirmed it this morning!

Days back uncertain things never used to be interesting, until the element made me realize the beauty that this uncertainty beholds. Day is this when the certainty which I loved so much stands so close, yet it hurts. I am certain, so is everyone, so is he, for he knows its 18 hours of life remaining. How would you feel if you ever were in that state? The seconds don’t pause. The fact that I cant talk to him anymore nor can he have a another conversation again, aint convincing enough even if that is so certain.

Never thought we would be close, the day I first saw him, for he had rarely acknowledged my presence. Yet I had the privilege of being acknowledged by his sweetheart :) ..

"Well, we had a wish to go on a trip to visit all the pious places when we grow old. I worked as a head mistress for a school, we built. That was interesting. Cooking had been a past time always, and he liked it too! His days were all embedded with drugs, patients, hospital. He’s been a doctor for 30 odd years. Poor only if he could use his knowledge to treat himself ... We are having a beautiful life. It was never without pains though, yet combating the pains has a charm of its own.

I am not a born Tamilian but my birthplace was ... hence the Tamil language became a sort of mother tongue. So did the Tamil appetite and the Tamil dishes. In my times, we used to get married at a really early age. When I was your age I had a family" ... .. .

The story goes on as we talk and unconsciously this guy becomes a part of their story.

I was married away to him 37 years ago. Never got the chance to move back to my home for I had none behind me. Everything was new for me. Little did I know the etiquettes of life, or for that matter living with a man I have never known. We had moved into a big house in a small place, a remote village located in the interiors of a south Indian state after my marriage. There were green paddy fields, un-tarred muddy roads unlike the ones we had in Bangalore. He was the eldest of 5 children. 3 sisters and a brother. His brother was a lot younger than I was. But sisters were more of my age with a little difference!

We all were kids of the fairly same age but for me, my roles increased a bit more. Everyone seemed to be close, yet there remained an empty inside always seeking for something else. Its not that I had married him beyond my own choice or marriage was imposed on me but something, I don’t know what always made me feel lonely.

Perhaps time had to play its game.

Being a daughter of not so rich parents, earning tits and bits to support my learning, fate had pushed me hard enough to see different stages of life. I had made a wish when I was young! Hehe something similar to a nice prince coming up to me and taking me away with him for ever. You know the Dream Prince! ..

Somehow it didn’t happen. But the other part of the wish which said, let me be a part of someone who needs me and that I do something for him did happen. I used to ask God to give me a chance to serve some one in my life for I had lost the chance to serve my own parents. God does play games, and now when I look back I realize HE had indeed given me the chance!

I lost my parents, but when I came over here, I got replacements. My mom-in-law didn’t like me much though, yet in my father-in-law I saw a caring father who cared for me even more than my own dad. Sailing through life aint easy for a girl always. I had to quickly transform my self into someone who had the traits of a mom, daughter and a wife. I remember of being of the same age as his younger brother, perhaps a little older ;) but had to take care of him. I had to feed him, carry him in my arms, for without this he never ate. Crazy he was, and at times when there was nothing, I kept thinking and wishing if someone had taken me into her laps and fed. That’s how you tend to feel good! Quite often dreaming and visualizing about the places you could have been lets you go far away from the present. You feel better and recharged.

That was the only way I could pull on probably. Well there were times when my mom-in-law was as rude, but it was this mans love which made me live on. Well you must be surprised to know that he did love me before we got married but never said it until we were married. He knew my brother, who was next to my father and before he expired my yet to be husband had promised to take care of me for the rest of his life. That wasn’t liked by my mother-in-law I guess. He could have married any girl, for he was a Doctor, and had a big family. I was just nothing. Had no family. Yet he embraced me, fighting all the resistive forces when there was none, by me. Never said a word. And that unspoken love has been driving me since.

He was there at all times with anything I ever did. I remember a particular instance. We were in Karnataka for a medical checkup, when the doctors said that going further we couldn’t have kids. That could have been a shock for the couple, but that day he held me tight as we were moving back home in the bus. He said, "... my dear, there should be a reason why we didn’t have kids, may be HE wants us to become parent to an orphan. If you don’t mind we can probably adopt someone. It’s just the time which would pass." That was my boyfriend.

Yeah, sometimes you don’t like the boyfriend to be too sweet though, and you make your own decisions. Heheh I did. In fact we both did. We decided to build a school, be parents not to one but to many, to all those who needed us. He was there too!

Support! Well he pushed himself harder each day to collect money for the school. I saw him pushing his luxuries down the priority list, for the sake of buying Black boards, benches and dusters for our school. He had handed me something which has taken over both of our lives...

I don’t have any regrets, it just that I have seen him serve people all time, and today the doctor himself doesn’t have a treatment for his own disease. His doctor friends have started failing. Post the accident on our trip to visit the temple in Southern India, there was a small injury on his leg which got gangrene. They severed it off. He smiled .. His kidney stopped functioning and they kept him on dialysis. Ears gave up and hes using this white device yet paying strong attention to your lip movements for all times you speak to comprehend what you are saying. Memory has started giving up... Food doesn’t go in ... He hasn’t been sleeping for a week.

I question isnt this suffering enough? Why doesn’t HE take him? What is pulling him back? Perhaps me.

"I loved you for 37 years, and i shall keep loving you hereafter and ever post my own extinction. I wish I could tell you this. I know I cant, I can’t hold you or go near you even if that is something you wish in your last breath, for I can’t see you living dead, for the moment I come to see you the love re-kindles your desire to stay back. You can’t leave this place with an unfulfilled desire. You think about how I would live post your departure, how selfish, can’t you for a while think that i shall not be able to die, leaving you helpless. Go, leave this world, I don’t love you, I cant see you dying each moment....." those were my last words to him.

And post that I never saw him for the next 18 hours. He woke up at the 18th hour searching, looked at everyone, perhaps searching for me. He realized I was not there ... and that he had to be gone. Breathed his last....

How do I tell you what it feels. I was so strong, never did a drop of tear flow down my eyes when he was there, and when he left. But now I feel so lonely. I feel guilty of myself to have deprived him of my love. He is there somewhere and is probably smiling, watching me cry and be lone .. waiting for him. Yet can i live like this? Can I? Perhaps that wouldn’t be just ....

This day, i decide to be reborn again as a child of eight and let go of the feeling which has been pushing me to leave this world. Travel back to the place i left 37 years ago, to Madanapalli, my birthplace, to the school i built, we built, where his memory remains... trying to fulfill our wish, the wish of a dead man and his alive wife.

What are you thinking dear? What is this love? What is this attachment? Why is there pain? And what did this man tell me? How did I become a guest?

Dear even I betrayed him in some sense, He wanted me to stay back from work, I consoled that if all would be fine and I would see him back in the evening … I knew it was the last time was touching him alive. “the doctors are experimenting on me, touch my heart, its hurting .. don’t go …” that was me hearing him and seeing him move to the certain.

I know I haven’t been able to do justice to the article not their story, expressions limited I guess. But then, every time I ponder upon the house, his memories and her words I think probably someone was right when this someone said "Entre lo que existe y lo que no existe, el espacio es el amor."

It means “Between that which exists and that which does not is the space called Love.”

37 years and moving :) ..... .... ... .. .