If I Only Had A Brain
The Wizard of Oz is wonderful in so many ways. Makes me smile everty time! Dorothy wants to go to Kansas - her home, the scarecrow wants a brain, the tin-man, a heart and the cowardly lion - courage*. And they all travel together in search of the Wizard, the wonderful Wizard of Oz who is going to help them in their pursuit.
I want to meet him too. I need a new brain as well, you see. This one is obsolete, has stopped working and stimulates the entire oral system to talk non-stop for 20 minutes, in incorrect grammar about, oh no, oh well, orgasms. *Gulp* I said it. I don't mean the physical kind. (There, the audience has got up and left). I mean the mental kind. I am done. I am done with shopping for now. I am done with "dangling conversations and superficial smiles." Sometimes you do fake the smile. Ha! I am done with pittances as salary irrespective of how exciting my job is. I am done with all the criticism that is dished out as "said for my good." Others fake it too:-) Ha! I am done with putting on a look of concern, when I don't feel it (if I don't feel it, you haven't earned it, hello?) . I am done with blogging. Retarded whining this really, can't say it enough.
So people, so long, farewell, I hate to say goodbye.... (Thanks to Y for this).
I would not be just a nuffin'
My head all full of stuffin'
My heart all full of pain
I would dance and be merry
Life would be a ding-a-derry
If I only had a brain
And perhaps I'd deserve youAnd be even worthy of youIf I only had a brain:-)
-If I only Had a Brain from The Wizard of Oz
So Help Me God...
*P.S I can't get enough of the Wizard of Oz so here is one more - The cowardly lion's speech on courage!
What makes a King out of a slave? Courage.
What makes the flag on the mast to wave? Courage.
What makes the elephant charge his tusk in the misty mist or the dusky dusk?
What makes the muskrat guard his musk? Courage.
What makes the Sphinx the 7th Wonder? Courage.
What makes the dawn come up like THUNDER?! Courage.
What makes the Hottentot so hot?
What puts the "ape" in ape-ricot?
Whatta they got that I ain't got?
Dorothy & Friends: Courage!
Labels: So Help Me God
Wish List
There are some people who disgust with their abilities and there are some others who please with their faults. I, as always, am not the author of this. I do not recollect the last instance when I said something intellectually stimulating, intelligent and witty. However I hope to be and wish to be someone who can please with my abilities. Secret option No. 3, if you please. I realize that I do have a small repetoire of abilities but no courage.
Another thing that I would like to do, is formulate only win-win situations with all whom I encounter. No "unpleasantries" please. No prgenant pauses and awkward silences. No outstaying nobody's welcome. Mine or Yours. Only situations where you nonchalantly say, "I'm extroverted, but private." I make friends, I'm a good listener, good conversationalist, full of insightful anecdotes but this is the line and this is as much as I will cross. We all cross lines all the time don't we? Speaking for myself, I do. And there are days when the world has an abundant amount of tolerance. Each line I cross, each time I do it. And there are days when you have a snowball's chance in hell to get any bit of concern. The forward march of the credentials. You have none, stay put, till you acquire some. That's on my wish list too.
I am back home in Chennai after a hiatus of almost 10 months and as I type away (while I sip piping hot filter coffee ofcourse, while A bonds with his father-in-law, while Dennis is on his nocturnal jaunty, while my sis pets the cat) on a swank new machine (it's a flat screen Dell PC with a "soft" keyboard and this is as good as it gets and I am happy to be here right now), I realize that I may not get a single thing that I truly want, with all of my heart, but that should not stop me from finding happiness and being at peace with myself. This is me, with all of my inadequacies and insecurities. This is me on my own private pursuit of learning to please with my abilities. This is juvenile, immature me, trying to grow up.
And do I miss home? The neighbours ask. Home, this place will always be. The city of dreams is life's road ahead. The road travelled upon is as beautiful still. Not that I loved Caesar less but that I loved Rome more....
Labels: Musings, So Help Me God
On Behalf Of Me
Why have you taken away
what is rightly mine?
Why have you left
nothing of yours behind?
For remembrance, for memory
for the world to see..
Would you also please breathe on behalf of me?
Labels: Moments of Weakness, poetry, Quote-Unquote
The Best is Yet to Come...
Happy New Year! Yeah, it's been 5 days into the new year and I'm late - again. Nothing new there. A is gifting me a T-shirt that says, "Always late, but worth the wait." How cool is that? And me, in return, am gifting him a T-shirt that says, "I swear to drunk that I'm not God." This is in honour of the kind of drinking he did for New Year's. 2009 has brought with it a surprising need to be organized. I have never felt the need to be organized. 2009 has brought with it a need to list down top ten things that I did/started last year, the ones where I am still doing the stuff I started out, the changes over the last one year, the clichéd "learning" which I claim to experience and write about oh-so-often....
10. Watching my English: I've made this new friend who has to correct every English sentence I utter. My grammar is suspect, he says. So I watch my prepositions the most. "On", "over", "under", "in", "beside", "beneath." "Everybody is", "whom not who", "to", "with" whew!. "Advice vs Advise." You get the drift... " The good news is it really has helped (please don't go by this post:-)).
9. Spaces vs Distances: I've been confusing the need for "my space" with "keeping a distance" to such an extent that in a bid for just my space I have created distances. A hell a lot of them. I am out to correct that. In 2009.
8. Humour: From the slapstick and goofy comedy that I used to enjoy, humour today for me has become sarcasm laced with cynicism. The laughing out loud has stoppped.
It's a smirk. A smile at the most. Is this just part of growing up? Sarcasm as Y says is the lowest form of wit.
7. I've realized that atleast in my case, sensibility is letting the head win in a mind vs heart conflict.
6. 3 is crowd, 4 is fun: I just realize that everywhere I went I've found myself to be a part of a 4- girl-gang. School: SS, SK, CS and I. College: HK, SS, AS and I. Ex-office: NA, ST, SS and I. I seem to meet a SS everywhere I go. My current boss is also SS.
5.Grow up Baby: A thinks I have a lot more growing up to do. Me alone and us together before we can have a baby that's going to be growing up along with us. He thinks that I'm irresponsible, disorganzied, naive and stupid. I think, I need to have twin babies. There's an obvious clash...
4. Shrink: I need an appointment with a shrink so that I may understand for myself, what it is that I seem to love about chaos. Life doesn't seem normal without it. I hate rules. I hate being told what to do. The rebellious streak in me is always at the surface ready to explode to the point of verbose swearing in the most unparliamentary of language. I don't do it. I leave the room. But I'm trying to adhere to the "rules laid out." So Help Me God...
3. Guitar: I'm learning to play this fascinating instrument. It really sharpens your mind
. You need to "read the music," i.e, identify the note, figure out the finger positions on the instrument, figure out if you've got to play it with an "up stroke" or "down stroke," figure out how many counts you've got to hold the note for and strike it- all in less than a second. Because (I know you cannot start a sentence with a coordinating conjunction but what the hell?!) if you need to play one piece, which is a series of notes you can't take a million years... I'm lovin' it!
2. Coffee: My oxygen. Behind every woman, successful or otherwise, there is a substantial amount of coffee. "Hey, you're new here aren't you? Can I get you a cup of coffee? I was gonna get a coffee myself, you need one?"
1. It's going to be a year of simple needs - friends, family, 12 good books, one moment of glory, endless coffee, never ending poetry, minimum expectations, a cheese sandwich, endless music, love and laughter...
So Help Me God...
Labels: Courage, Life Beyond work, Sense and Sensibility, So Help Me God
Auto-Pilot Mode
I've set my life to auto-pilot mode. Set routines. Set responses. Switch off. You can't even provoke a response out of me these days. I'd probably just agree with the allegation and ask you to deal with it.
13 people I know have lost their jobs on account of bad decision-making made by somebody else. That's the story world over. The number varies from company to company. What do I tell them? That it will be ok? The banks would wait for them to take their time to pay back their mortgage installments? That things will fall in place? Now, wait a minute. Selfless as I might sound, I am worried sick about me. Now tell me:
Can I really be a vendor of hope? Can we insure happiness? Can we atleast stock it in our back-yards? As a reserve. For a rainy day of the mind. So that we may use it for ourselves. And lend it to the needy and restore buoyancy of our collective hearts that lies low below the gravels and debris of the unknown?
If I can't say something good. I choose to not say it at all.
No? Is it wise to be on auto-pilot mode in the midst of turbulence? No?
As an old Chinese proverb goes: You cannot prevent the birds of sorrow from flying over your head but you can prevent them from building nests in your hair. While you have some of it left.
So Help Me God...
Labels: Questions, Quote-Unquote, Sense and Sensibility, So Help Me God
In Recession
Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high;
Where knowledge is free;
Where the world has not been broken up into fragments by narrow domestic walls;
Where words come out from the depth of truth;
Where the tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection;
Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way into the dreary desert sand of dead habit;
Where the mind is led forward by thee into ever-widening thought and action-
Into that haven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake
-Extract from The Geetanjali by Rabindranath Tagore
These Nobel prize winning words have just been reduced to an obscure piece of literature, buried in history. These lines are for those high and mighty men who think they rise above the lesser mortals of a lesser God who sit high in their golden thrones far away from the blood lust, war cries and battlefields....
We really are in recession aren't we? I've been saying it way too many times over the last few days now. We really are in recession. All sorts of recession.
Doesn't living in constant fear of the unknown qualify as recession?
Doesn't the knowledge that 10 people who want to die can hold to ransom a billion people who want to live, who want to progress, qualify as recession?
Doesn't the fact that 21 year olds can be indoctrinated into committing atrocities in cold blood and still think they are going to heaven, qualify as recession?
Doesn't the truth that those we elect to government sleep safely in their beds with Z plus security while those who had them elected are being swatted like flies owing to serious security lapses, qualify as recession?
Doesn't the painful reality that it takes 10 hours for help to arrive, from another city, since there is no crisis management system in place, qualify as recession?
Doesn't the certainity that over an above a 4000 crore loss arising from loss of property and business interuption of an entire nation there is a loss of irreplaceable lives and morale, qualify as recession?
Doesn't the fact that peace now after 5 decades and more is still a far cry between two feuding neighbours, qualify as recession?
When and most importantly how are we going to fight back? When are we going to live without fear and with our heads held high? When are we going to share resources and knowledge and live as a citizen of the world in a quest for peace? When are we going to seek only the truth and strech ourselves untill we as a nation strive tirelessly to attain unity amidst adversity if not diversity? When are we going to reason out and not be compelled to move forward by mere habit? When are we going to think and do? When will we as a nation arise?
If not here, then where? If not you and me, then who? If not now, then when?
So Help Us God...
Labels: Lessons learned and how, Sense and Sensibility, So Help Me God
After a While
My friend Aparajitha, who is blissfully married and settled in the US wrote this in my autograph book 9 years ago. Although I have come across it before, something about old fading ruled paper, an ink pen and beautiful slanting writing make the words even more meaningful.
And I saw this today, after so many years. And every word is relevant to me today. Now. As I read this, the resounding effect is tremendous. This was written for me! Wonder why I had to see this today, at this time, after all these years?
After a while you learn
the subtle difference between holding a hand and chaining a soul
and you learn that love doesn't mean leaning
and company doesn't always mean security.
And you begin to learn that kisses aren't contracts and presents aren't promises
and you begin to accept your defeats with your head up and your eyes ahead
with the grace of woman, not the grief of a child
and you learn to build all your roads on today because tomorrow's ground is too uncertain for plans
and futures have a way of falling down in mid-flight.
After a while you learn that even sunshine burns if you get too much
so you plant your own garden and decorate your own soul
instead of waiting for someone to bring you flowers.
And you learn that you really can endure
you really are strong
you really do have worth
and you learn
and you learn
with every goodbye, you learn...
- By Veronica A Shoffstall
Labels: Lessons learned and how, Life Beyond work, poetry, Sense and Sensibility
