Home

Home is not a place.

Home is a feeling you get when you stand in your balcony, and you look out the window, and you are consumed with a contentedness, because you know everything will be alright.

You know that you can go down to the street, and you know where everything is and how to get there and where to get what you need, and I don't mean just groceries.

You know your friends are just down the road, and you want to see them, and you know they want to see you too.

Home is where the sunset is always beautiful.

Home is where every season is beautiful.

Home is where the July skies are torn with grey clouds and the earth is teeming with new life as the cold waters from the sea wash over you. Where December mornings are chilly, but you feel warm. Where April means a breath of fresh air and freedom, and playing all day. Where September evening skies are burned golden and the whole world is engulfed in that gorgeous sheen.

Home is where there is no nostalgia, because everything that was good then is still good now.

Home is where you feel this unexplained love. It is not for anyone or any one thing, but it is just inexplicably there, like a wraith that you can't touch.

Home is a feeling that takes care of all those things that you don't have, or that you think you need, but probably don't, but it doesn't matter anyway, because they are just things.

Home is where you see this one thing, and you can't explain it, but it touches you in a way you can't understand. You can't fathom why the thing makes you feel the way it does, when its just an object, why you get that feeling in the pit of your stomach that radiates all the way to your skin follicles, leaving you tingling.

Home is where the moon sits in the twilight, pale and coy, playfully hiding behind clouds, leaving you struck dumb, and you can always see your favorite star.

Home is where you are filled with hope, and you are always comforted, because no matter what, no matter what, you know that everything will be OK.

Home is where you stand in your balcony and look out, and you don't even know why but you are absolutely overwhelemed with a contentedness, that is so lovely that it drives you mad, and it is the sweetest insanity you can ever know, so powerful it may even move you to tears.

That's Home.

Power To Love

You ever heard that Jimi Hendrix song, "Power To Love"? Damn good song. It has sexy base, a very funky, spacey lead, with abstract, psychadelic lyrics delivered to us in Jimi's ethereal, smooth voice. Funkaelic.

Now, the lyrics are way out there. You have to sit down to understand them. I'm not sure if they are intended to have any meaning, or you are just supposed to light up a joint and enjoy the flight. Its not that that I'm concerned with right now.

Its the title of the song itself. It really got me thinking: it really is a power to love. And a great power it is. The times are wild. Now, more than ever, does one require an almost unnatural strength to love.

I was speaking with a certain someone the other day about "loving with abandon". Ah, that sweet, innocent feeling. That naivety and foolishness, that sweetest of arrogance. Unfortunately, in most people it seems to be a thing had only once when young and impressionable, and then generally lost forever.

Loving with abandon comes naturally to me, I think. It is my great misfortune. And its a good thing. It is a great feeling to have, to feel like that, to love selflessly and with no regard for anything, least of all one's self. Such a beautiful high can only be maintained for so long, if not returned. For it will take you to the greatest heights, and send you to the lowest pits. The Lowest of Lows is a terrible place, where the wind blows forlornly and the sun doesn't shine through the dull gray clouds. Its a place that is so cold and miserable that you are glad when it is replaced with the emptiness of nothing. A void, a black hole. Ah, what a pleasant change. I love plateaus. At least you can breathe up there.

And then there are some days when I don't even want the power to love. Can I do that? Can I choose when I want it, and then to discard it when I see fit? I guess its not fair to call it natural or instinctual then. But the hell with what is right and what isn't. There are times when I just forsake it all, leave it where I stand and move somewhere else. Just dump it so I don't have to carry that weight, and maybe, just maybe I can try to climb up to some place with a nice view and at least camp for a while. (But there is no place higher up on a plateau, is there)?

There is this anonymous quote I once read: "Approach cooking and love with reckless abandon". I fully agree with it (for some reason I think I would have made a great chef). No matter where I drop whatever I dropped, it manages to follow and catch up with me. So I guess loving with abandon is natural to me after all.

What can I say? I'm a child.

And as such, I should be treated as a child. Though my descisions may seem that of a mature person, though I am forced to make choices on "grown up" issues, though I may have all the abilities and responsibilities of an adult, the fact remains that I am, if not in mind then at least in heart, a child. I guess I'm a little book-smart. And I know my multiplication tables and stuff like that. I can drive and I can tie my shoe. But I have zero street-smarts and common sense. I'm the kid who has to touch the stove to find out its hot. No, I can't be expected to take responsibility for my actions and face the consequences. God forbid that I should commit a felony, because they'd try me as an adult. But no, I need to be forgiven as a child and told again and again what is right. I try to learn, but I need your guidance, and your grace.

Maybe only a child can love with abandon. So, can I? The answer, unfortunately, and I suppose, fortunately, is yes. And all I can do is smile sheepishly, and walk on. It is my gift... and it is so totally my curse.

And maybe that makes me the most powerful of all. Maybe, given the chance, I can do anything with it.

After all, in Jimi's words, "with the power of soul anything is possible".

Left My Heart In Goa

And I'm back. From the trip to Goa that would change everything. Or so I thought. And correctly. Well, sort of.

It's all rather complicated.

Ah, how I do love ambiguous answers, I love the sweet simplicity of vagueness and the loving shield provided by plausible deniability, like a mother dove's wings protecting her children.

But I digress. With all due respect to ambiguity, the thing is, it is not actually complicated, but at the same time it would be chasing a lie to say it was simple.

I find it odd that mankind would attribute this madness to the heart. The heart is simply an organ that pumps blood. And occasionally, depending on diet and stress and build up of disgusting plaque in one's arteries, stops working, and causes its host to experience myocardial infarction, which is nothing but the scientific name for a "heart attack" (praise Google, now even I can sound smart at the click of a button).

Right, so the heart is simply an organ that pumps blood. The rest is all in your head.

So in essence, when I say I left my heart in Goa, its just a metaphor for a change in my thought process that I conciously brought about. But of course, you knew that.

The question is, why?

Ah, its been a long time since I've been "free". I have long been shackled under an intangible yoke, the guilt I feel being the cross I must bear for my sins and foolishness. Lets put it this way; to quote Crosby, Stills, and Nash, "its getting to the point where I'm no fun anymore". Or rather it was so.

And its a pain in the ass to feel that way. All the time. I mean its excrutiating as it is, but to be under that stress every second of every day? To not be able to enjoy a single thing... and on top of it all, to be powerless to do anything about it? Is that any way to live?

I don't know about you, but I can't do that. Not anymore. So I did what I had to... and then I left my heart behind. Cut it out, and left it. And hey, maybe one day I'll be able to reclaim it. But until then, perhaps I can have a life pattern that bears a semblance to something normal.

Just call me Davy Jones.

A Surprise Rain

Very odd. November rain.

The morning was beautiful. It was cloudy and lovely all day. It got uncharacteristically dark and quiet for an early November day. Then in the afternoon, the rain came. Thick, cold drops. A vestige of the monsoon, long gone.

I have always had something of a fondness for the rain, though after coming to Pune, it has kind of worn off. If you have not seen a monsoon in Goa, you don't know what you're missing. Here, now especially, its just a burden to try to get to work dry. But watching it from my room, which does indeed have a lovely view, it still stirs some emotion in me.

For me, rain has always signified prosperity, or a boon. Its always beautiful, really. It replenishes the earth, and brings with it a dark, solemn beauty. The foreboding gray and violent calm before the storm breaks; then the restless, angry blowing wind will pick up dust, and finally the torrent of rain, sheets of needles coming down and feeding the thirsty earth below.

So I'll take it as a good sign of things ahead. And the sunset at the end was magnificent. The sky was ragged with clouds, but off at the horizon, it kind of opened up a bit, and it burned with a sheer golden fire, as if the sky was winking out at us, just as the sun set past that little gap. Glorious.

Here comes the rain baby, here comes the rain...

Diwali

So I've finally seriously started a blog. And what better day to start it than on Diwali. The day when good overcomes evil. Supposedly. Well, historically. Er, mythically anyway.

I wonder who is actually going to read this, if anyone. I wonder if I'm going to keep this is up or its just going to melt into the ignomy of oblivion like everything else I start. I guess we'll see.

So like I said, its Diwali. I have always loved Diwali, it has always been a fantastic and lovely time of year. The monsoon is over, and the air is getting chilly, and I think its something about the angle of the sun at this latitude at this time of the year that makes evenings absolutely golden. Its incredibly beautiful, and warming. Then there is the atmosphere of the festival of lights. The quaint little flame-light of diyas, the smell of things frying, and little fingers sticky with sugar from all the fattening sweets. Ah, hell with the fat. If you can't indulge during the holidays, then when can you indulge?

That being said, I think I'm starting to hate holidays. Blah. Diwali, Christmas, my favorites. And then there's New Years, Ganesh, Dussera, and birthdays. I hate birthdays. Especially my own. I hate that the most. I don't know why. I guess it is because these days are traditionally supposed to be happy, and pleasant, and altogther lovely days. But on more than one occasion, something seems to fuck up. Oh, I've had birthdays, Christmases, New Years ruined. And more. So I came to the conclusion a long time ago that these are merely days, and I should not have any expectations of anything special.

You call me a cynic.
I call me a pragamatist. If that's even a word. And no, I'm not going to look it up.

Oh feck it. Maybe I am a cynic. Maybe I'm an optimist; because every time, I can't help but get into the spirit. How heart-warming is it to see those aakash-diyas and rangoli. Who can deny winter's cold bite and the rush of the holiday season as Christmas approaches. And who can help but begin to hope for better on New Years Eve.

Sigh.

Okay, so this year, I am going to Goa, much to the consternation of my parents. However, I have to go to Goa this time, it is very important that I do. Now on the subject of Goa, I don't know what to say. I miraculously and very luckily moved to Goa from half the world over. It was a sheer stroke of brilliant fortune. My dad could have taken us anywhere in India, but we ended up in Goa. I'll admit, I didn't take a shine to it at once. Hell, I was a kid. Even moreso than I am now. But the realization dawned on me later. Slowly but surely, I was falling in love with Goa, and one day, it hit me: I loved that place. There is much detail to be gone into, but at a later time. Suffice to say that I even wanted to be buried in Goa.

But alas, such things were not meant to last. I left Goa over 5 years ago. And since then, things have changed. One day, I finally realized that I can no longer find a home in goa. It was one of the great heartbreaks of my life. I was shattered, and yet at the same time I felt nothing. I do feel a vestige of some feeling, some longing still in my blood. I still feel like I want to rush and see the beach. But I don't know. It is not only that I have grown apart from Goa, but that Goa herself has changed so much. I would sum up how I feel about it by a verse from an Audioslave song:

          "The open mouth of the city swallowed up the town

          On that same old concrete that I still walk down

          And it seems they put a shine on this place when I was young

         Well maybe I just don't see it now"

Ah, Audioslave. Why did they break up? And what nonsense is Chris Cornell upto now?

Anyway, I've had a 2 day holiday from work. Holidays now seem like godsends. Good Lord, I do need them. Not that I am overburdened at work or anything. But I needed this one specially. 

It's an exciting time. And a perplexing time. And an anxious time. Change always is. That last day of work before the long weekend felt really weird. I was on a high. I felt like I was going away for a long time. Or that I was leaving the company. I felt, in fact, like a kid on the verge of summer vacation, just counting down the minutes on the last day of school, waiting to be released. Walking out of there late in the evening, the place seemed deserted. A lot of people had already left early. And everything felt so different, so alien, like I had never been there before. The atmosphere of the flagging year had some influence on it. But also, in a way, I felt like I was not coming back. Not as the same person anyway.

No, this trip to Goa would change many things, I feel. I will find out where I stand. There will be Redemption, or there will be Finality. And why should it be a choice between these two things? Why should it have had to come down to this? Paritally, or rather mostly, it has been my fault. But fuck it, I'm a child. I mean, I could have used some guidance. But now is not the time to make excuses. And why have I set these two things before me, if I myself cannot even choose which one I shall recieve? I don't know. I guess I want all the colors of life or black and white. But I'm tired of the gray between. Oh, the way I've lived, the torrent of emotional turmoil, that's no way to live. I don't think I can do it anymore. And its all so fucking hysterical.

So this is it. I'm anxious, yet I'm calm. What the hell... I don't know what I am. But I will know in just a few days. The triumph of good over evil? We'll see. I just hope, as always, I have a lot of fun.

Hmmm... Cynic? Pragmatist? Optimist? Or........... Hedonist?