No More Counting Dollars, We'll Be Counting Stars.

I haven't written anything in such a long time. But while I sit, mesmerizing myself with OneRepublic's amazing music, I can't help wonder.... what would it be like to actually skip that ambitious desire for money and for once just lie back and count those sparkling stars?

The rush of infinite - a magnitude greater than all magnitudes. So immense, that your whole existence seems irrelevant to the universe. And maybe it really is that insignificant.


                              



Anyways, the purpose of this random blog post was to update my dear readers about what has been up lately. So first of all, too many things are happening at the same time. And what I'd like to write about explicitly in this post is a concept I came up with. It was more like a thought that struck me while I was walking down to my Residence at one in the morning.

The entire complex was quiet. But not quiet in the eerie or unusual way. Quiet in a beautiful, calm way. The buildings rose like gigantic pillars of light, soft diffused golden light exploding in ample amounts at every level. In every column of glassy kitchens, in the silent floating corridors and the rippling curtains of every room. Not a single movement. The ghost of happy carefree laughter lingered around the foyer and the wind blew so peacefully, you could have almost heard it touch the grass. Somewhere in the background I could hear the gushing sound of fountains, or just running water, or maybe it was the graceful movement of fish in the pond back at Residence One. I don't know, I didn't want to know.

For that one moment as I walked slowly, an unavoidable thought struck me. What if everything just stopped? What if time just froze? This element of our life which is in an evergreen state of motion. This time which controls every part of us, everything we do or say. Just now, just then. Just stopped.


I wanted to be caught in that frame of life forever. That lovely moment where the world is at peace. It is not too late for everyone to be asleep, it's not too early for everyone to be awake. It's just perfect and the world is just still and quiet. The lights will be dim and pretty like in the movies and The Rocks will still be the most romantic spot for couples. The Foyer will be alive with incoming visitors, maybe people who just landed from long tiring flights. The dark building rising in one corner was once a Restaurant and is now a Supermarket and we will all keep wondering what else they would set up in there for days to come. The Back Gate will have this haunting aura of stolen delights; young men smoking on the stairs, completely oblivious to everything else. The Fast Food outlet, which was bursting with life just about an hour back will be subdued and silent as the student helpers retire from the day's work.

But my friends, what would my friends be doing now? And I run through that list of all my precious family members away from home and I realize that I just know who will be where. I know some of them will be "chilling" in a room which has an AC, because well who wouldn't flock to an AC anyways? I know that some will be back at Residence 6 playing an extremely entertaining round of Head's Up! Someone will be cooking themselves a nice midnight snack and someone will be busy studying like there is no tomorrow. Someone will be thrashing another person's avatar in a fierce video game. Someone will be enjoying a late night drink from a bottle they bought right before they bring down the blinds at 7/11. And someone, maybe someone, will be thinking about all kinds of crazy thoughts like I do and penning them down too. :)


I could travel to every single person and back. Because I just know where they will be, I just know that I will always find my way back to them. The only regret I had at that very moment was that I was not with them all. I was alone, just me and my thoughts.


However, the sudden realization that all these events will stop forever in another two years, is shocking. That we will never "chill" together the way we do now because as time goes by, lives will entangle and break apart, and everything will change. In this crazy race for money, success and happiness we will forget these little tiny moments that brought us bursts of joy. Or maybe we won't. Maybe we will actually give up on the big picture of life and embrace these little moments. Maybe we will always meet and keep meeting and keep collecting these memories until they are so infinite, that they will become like those eternal stars. Imprinted in the mind which is a dark, gloriously black night sky. And some day we will realize that the big picture in life is after all, not the dollars and the praises and the work. It's a huge photo frame full of small pictures of the times we spent with our loved ones. And it's a frame worth keeping.


These thoughts had simply blended into my sub-conscious. And as soon as I reached Residence 4, I had formed one tiny resolution. I would (for a change) live every moment in the present. Really, truly absorb every second spent with people. Because after all, obstacles are meant to come and go, bonds are meant to break and mend, but if you want to soar like a blissful phoenix, then you have to die to be reborn again.

Because to live is to capture every frame of life like a screenshot on your phone.
Because to fly, you need wings and every memory is like a magical feather.

Because it's time to sign off but I really, really can't do that without quoting OneRepublic; so:

I see this life like a swinging vine

Swing my heart across the line....

.....Everything that kills me makes me feel alive.  

The Strawberry Drink

                                                 

I woke up this morning with a hangover quite unlike the ones I am used to. This was a sweet feeling, sweeter than the fleeting strawberry scent in my mouth. It must have been the drink. Well, I don't know. I didn't feel dizzy, I didn't feel tired. The truth is I didn't feel awake at all. It must be a dream, this faint sensation of memory-loss. It's like I don't remember what happened last night, or the night before, or what happened many, many nights before.

I turn my head to the side, still lying on the bed. I catch a glimpse of the mirror and I see the hazy surface. The misty droplets of water condensing on the silver. It was incredibly hot since the past few days, I do remember the crazy heat driving me to the river. There's nothing like the river for a cold treat. Maybe it had rained last night, the world has been such a blur I wouldn't even know. Maybe there had been a storm, a hurricane, even if the universe had come to a still, I wouldn't have known.

I spy my face in between the glass, an expression caught in the mirror like a wet photograph. There's smudged mascara, my eyes look hideous. Except they don't. They have always looked hideous but not today. Today they looked like someone who had won a losing battle. Like crushed coal on hot tar. Still gleaming, a wondrous fiery black unlike any other. Hair, tangled into curls, looking like dark silken ribbons, except they were not as beautiful. They were untidy, unkempt, the way you look when you wake up after a long night, and you have no idea how or why you can't remember anything at all.

You are so unbelievably love drunk. In love with everything and everyone. In love with life and in love with love. In love with the great big yellow sun and in love with the wide blue ocean. How can you not love all these creations of God? He who sat and made all these little things, like a baby would make his clay toys. So imperfect, but you would love them anyways. So innocently exotic are his creations. Even the plainest of human beings are worth admiring and even the most evil of characters are worth applauding.

I sit up on my bed, and I feel the world moving in a kind of fast motion beneath me. It's like the floor
is slipping away. I'm not even drunk. The alcohol never even reached my lips, I had been asleep since I don't know when. It wasn't the weather that lulled me to sleep, it wasn't even the fragrance of those tropical leaves on my desk, flying in with the wind and floating about my room. Maybe it was that voice in the phone, a deep, sweetening voice. Or maybe , just maybe I don't know what happened last night. Maybe I slept off, without meaning to and Peter Pan flew in and took me to Neverland.

How would I know? If fairy dust could be seen, then my hands and feet would be sparkling. But Peter doesn't take women who are old. He takes young girls and I am no longer Wendy. I was once upon a time, a very dedicated little Wendy. But I grew up, I left those castles behind in my nursery and I rose like a phoenix and flew every new day and remembered everything when I woke up. Except today, today I could not remember a thing.

I thought of what I wanted. I wanted happiness in every form. And I had a sublime happiness in everything. Except I knew I was impulsive enough to be a brat at times. An annoying one that too. I thought about my impulsiveness quite often. And I scolded myself often.

The mirror looked like it would crack, the mist had gripped it very tightly. I walked up to the glass and blew away the fogginess. My face was unimaginably blank for a person who had just had an adventure. So many wonderful things happened with me all the time. I studied my lips for a little longer than always, they were artificially red. A kind of bright scarlet which I did not like.

My feet ached, around the ankle where the heels had piercingly dealt a painful pressure. Don't move, I thought. But standing still was not an option. I glided to the desk, as if in a dream and my phone, lay sprawled, with a dead screen. So disconnected from everything. Did I lose my memory? Did some one hit me on my head with something very heavy? I would never know. I didn't know if someone was there with me last night. I just knew that I was sleeping.

The sweet deadening sleep, which coursed through my veins like the strawberry drink which laced my lips. The day was cloudy, the mist was floating in and despite all the light headed thoughts that bubbled in my brain, I felt detached from reality.

And for the first time I looked out of the window. A world of clouds and filtering sunshine and reminiscent greenery. It struck me like a dart through the mist. Quite caught by surprise. The memory loss, the rain, the hangover which did not quite fit.

The view outside the window was wonderfully pleasant. If I were not already dead, I would have been delighted. Heaven would have been a great story to tell my friends. Magnificent, simple, glorious heaven.
Oh, yes.

                                   

For Ramya :)

I don't know if people actually do this. Do they write blog posts for people on their birthdays? I've never done this for anyone else. But then again you are not just anyone else :)

Okay, so what I really, really want to articulate in words, but I cannot (because for some reason I am suddenly out of words) is that whatever I say in this blog post is not even half of what I really want to say. 

OKAY, now that came out in a really confused manner, but whatever.

Ramyaaaaa!!!

 (And I know half of my readers will probably be like, 

"Ramya? The famous singer who released a music video across the nation? Oh my god, lucky you! I'm a big fan!" 

BUT don't worry I won't tell them where you live. I won't give them your phone number. Or your autograph. Heck, I won't even let them TRY to see you. I don't want you to feel AWKWARD about it. )

So where was I? Yeah, Ramya, I remember exactly where I met you. At the foyer in Prince George's Park Residence on this slightly sunny afternoon at the begin of Semester One. 

AND I thought you were the most peaceful, saintly thing on this planet. Boy was I wrong. 

By the next time I met you (and you had cracked quite a few gross, incomprehensible jokes by then. Mind you, I was innocent those days) my brain was finding it hard to digest how INSANE you were. 

AND I remember Srishti (hereby known as The Horse) telling me how scared she was that we may end up not liking each other. OH, SHE HAD NO IDEA. I think we sidestepped liking each other. Because from that very moment when you woke up in the middle of the night (at 3AM remember?) just to talk to the poor blundering fool (that was me) I JUST KNEW IT. Let me put it in a very CHEESY way : I just knew that we were meant to be :'). 

And how do I put all the time we spent together in words? Let's see. By the end of the first month in NUS, we had successfully managed to inject enough insanity into each others' minds. But that's what friends do don't they? Driving each other nuts and all?

There was all that ridiculous amount of shopping (let's not forget the amazing bargain you got me by just being famous). Then all the dressing up before occasions and when I say occasions.... *cough*. 

All the crazy photos and the videos and the rolling about on the ground during those sleepovers. With your thermal blanket and my comforter. (Damn, I miss sleepovers. I wish I didn't have so much work this year, we should have those more often AGAIN.) Except we did have one after watching Insidious and I slept like a log while you and The Horse were going hyper. 

All the time we spent being hopelessly romantic while you were like too cool and all. All the time we both stumbled and you were there to lift us. All those lengthy discourses about life and love and hope and happiness. If there is one person I can credit for teaching me to be happy, it is you and you know why. 

All those horror movies and romcoms and old Hindi films that we watched together. Every time we both felt insecure and unhappy, I don't remember a single time when we haven't rushed to each other to clear it out. Anytime. Even if that means leaving your bed in the middle of the night. AND I would still do that for you, over and over again, until the end of time.

AND I almost have tears of happiness in my eyes now and I'm going all 'awwww' in my head now because I just realized how precious you are to me. And I think I should send you a message right now saying "I Love You :')". 

AND....you just replied.

"Love you tooo bitch". 

Who needs a better half when you have a friend you can go up to and say this to anytime?

Remember, the bucket list you made? The "before you turn 20" one? I know everything there hasn't been completed. But really Ramya, you don't need it to be completed at all. You don't need a tattoo or hair dye or anything else to make your years before 20 special. You have us :) And we have you. And whatever you do or say, nothing and no one can replace you in my life.

There is one other thing I remember that cannot be forgotten. The time when we both lost someone who was close to us. Loss is a painful emotion. But there you were and once I spoke to you, loss became a different feeling. Speaking to you about something, anything gives me so much hope. You fill me with so much of positivism. I don't think there is anyone, ANYONE in this world I can speak to about these things apart from you.  

Before I end this blog post I want to tell you about ALLLLLL those things I love about you. 

I love your AWKWARDNESS. Because let's face it, it is unique. I don't have anyone else who goes awkward when faced with a totally non-awkward scenario. 

I love the way you SMILE when you speak about something sweet that happened ( in reality or in dreams eh both) and that makes me double triple multiple times more happy than you are. I mean, you have no idea how contagious your happiness is.

I love your jokes. :P Sorry, but you are kind of a joke yourself sometimes and I can't help it if I don't know someone else who is a walking-talking joke by themselves.

I LOVE how you can make me laugh. I mean look at those noises you make sometimes. And seriously, "glam" stuff aside, I don't know anyone else you grunts when they laugh. And then you trigger my hiccups. Let's not even go there. 

Dude, you should like change bodies with some one,  some day and just watch yourself. You're a masterpiece. 

Okay, I really can't go on and on about this 'what-I-love-about-you' thing. It will never end!

Okay, but really Ramya, the whole point of this blog post was to shout out a big 

HAPPY BIRTHDAY !!!!!!

to my favorite cow/buffalo/sea cucumber friend. Bitch, you are PROBABLY wondering why I am spilling all the love only before your birthday (You JUST pointed that out on chat, wow, you read my mind o.o). 

But on birthdays you realize one thing. That if this person were not in your life, there would be a big void and so many moments would be meaningless. 

IF this semester was not draining the life out of me, I would write a blog post for you every single day and I know you would read everything I write. But despite all that, you know better than anyone that I am only a call away from you.  It's one thing about spending time away in work and studies, but it's one thing about coming home to someone who loves you. I know you'll always be there for me.  

I love you to bits. :*

Stay beautiful, stay happy, and most of all stay just the way you are.

And yes what you see below, is wholly intentional. 

                                     

Lots and lots of love <3

Being Nothing

I can't begin to describe the state of mind I have been in, for the past one month. It is almost like the usual feelings of joy and grief have slipped out of my brain's chambers. Not sad, not happy.

There was a time once when I was simply devoted to being as happy as I could be. I trained myself to accept Life as it came. In packages of sublime happiness. In vessels of knotted misery. In excitement and in pain, in solace and in fear. There was a time when nothing really mattered but having so much fun that I wouldn't have to regret a single moment.

When I stepped into college, this semester, I was beyond just happy. I was enthralled, curious and most of all, undeniably spontaneous in every possible manner. It's as if I was waiting for something that was heading my way at the speed of light. I don't know what kind of castle I was building in the air, what kind of expectation I was painting for myself. But I think whatever it was, has either eluded me cunningly or simply sidestepped and raced ahead while I was busy searching for it. Or maybe, it was never there to begin with.

In what seemed like a torrent of flashbacks, I espied that one time when I had felt genuinely about anything in Life at all.Love, pity, any emotion. I recalled the time when I helped my mother sit up in bed, while she struggled, a cloudy illness grasping her. I recalled the time when I fiercely stood up for my sister when any other kid tried to bully her. I recalled the time when I missed my best friends so much after moving away from town. I recalled the very first time when I thought of someone I loved and smiled shamelessly.

And now all of a sudden, it seems like all that is gone. Gone with the effortless, gusty and strong wind. This wind which is nameless, faceless and fearless. I try to remember exactly when I stopped reacting to anything that happened around me and I really can't remember when. I feel NOTHING but a clammy mist of emptiness that has no meaning. There are people around me, people whom I love to death and people whom I would do anything for. And yet, there is nothing but a huge void within me.

I finally know what it is to be able to meet people yet feel lonely. To want to laugh but not be able to. To want to cry but not be able to. I've become a stranger to myself and to everyone else around me. It would make sense if I was depressed or simply a manic, but the truth is my mind is a blank slate. There is a pent up bucket of love and tenderness that I want to distribute, but I am not able to.

But maybe sometimes it is just not enough to share all the love and care. Sometimes you need to take from others. Now I really know what people meant when they told me, "...you need to be taken care of."
Because sometimes all you really want to hear is a "It's OK, I'm there with you."

But the world doesn't work that way. People throw stones at you. They whip the happiness out of you. They carve you into a cold statue not worth it's space on the planet. Is that why people commit suicide? Is it because they don't know themselves anymore?

It's a fearful thought. But then why again would people be afraid to die ? They make their own choices. Death isn't an enemy, it's an old Friend you met in your previous life and met again in all the million lives you have lived in this Universe.

I spend every night drawing lines of destiny for myself. None of them seem to be heading the right way. None of them seem to be heading any way at all. What if I were some place far far away from here? What if I were still a child? What if I had never met these people around me? What if? What if!

In my distant mind palace, I have devised methods to run away from this morose emotionless state of mind by simply being a pathetic coward. But in another zone, my brain has come up with a default mechanism to lie on the cold hard ground and contemplate about everything twice and thrice and until I scream myself to sleep.

Maybe, just maybe, this isn't going right. I want to be able to stop this nothingness by filling my days up with warmth and sunshine. But that's like in the fairy tales and although I dreamed of being a princess when I was a child, those dreams have locked themselves up in a secure chest. Reality tossed the chest into the sea when I grew up.

I want to be able to know that I am fine. But it's so difficult. I keep my schedule occupied and intact. So that I have to never THINK again, but thoughts are thoughts and they keep crawling back. And while friends keep repeating the same mantra again and again ("Go out, have fun, watch movies, fall in love again"), it's a nightmare trying to implement them.

The light is visible at the end of the tunnel. But the journey is so empty, so lifeless. If only I knew the remedy.
Life would be a huge cheery slice of pie and any problem would be a piece of cake.