A Mere Interlude

In close friend circles I am called a blogger. Not that it has got anything to do with my writing, they feel  I spend a considerable amount of time blogging.

Yes I am a blogger. I really enjoy doing it and feel really happy being associated with such a tag. But then I have to correct it, I used to be one.

 I guess  it is relatively easy to start something, but more difficult part is to keep up with the start. All this time I have tried to  write but was never able to take it further.


I have no such worries this time. I am writing this post just  to make myself believe that this particular phase is a mere interlude and I will get back to what I love 

BLOGGING

Getting back to the basics

® Something made me go back to my old biology classes and  remember Use and Disuse theory by Lamarck that I have learned somewhere there. It is certainly happening with our Brain cells. With the advent of technology and our over dependency on electronic gadgets, brain cells are becoming inactive.

Our life has become more or less mechanical. Even for simple tasks we are relying on electronic gadgets, in a way taking our ability to do it ourselves. Even for doing simple calculations we prefer calculator rather than doing a mental math, which limits the brain activity to a mere task of creating an image of calculator when we see numbers. Mobile phones have a greater role in putting us where we are now. Phone memory and features are improving each day and in the same level our brain activities are diminishing.

There is now a considerable body of evidence proving that microwave radiation from mobile phones and cordless phones causes brain tumors, disturbed brain function and other health disturbances. It doesn't matter if Hrithik Roshan listens to a movie script over his cell phone or Aamir Khan chats with his girlfriend through the night, the electromagnetic radiation that our fancy gadget emits can cause what simply put is a short circuit in the neuro-circuitry of our brain. The WHO's Interphone report indicates how heavy mobile phone usage can leave us at risk of developing glioma tumors.

Do you have any idea why I am saying all these things?

My reasons are quite simple.

It is quite hard for me these days to remember numbers especially phone numbers. But since my aid for the past three years (nokia 6233) remains dead, I prefer to say inactive, more than the time it is active. I am deprived of all the contact with the external world and all sorts of benefits you can associate with a mobile these days. So I am forced to remember important numbers, birthdays and all. 6233 has been my pride in it’s hey days with dual speakers and high quality sound it gave, getting rid of it is quite painful. For the time being I can do nothing but go back to basics and start from square one.

I can easily think of all the benefits of not having a mobile: D

A Call from the past

# Story


My phone kept ringing. I checked my watch, thirty minutes past ten. Lights were still on. I might have fallen asleep reading. After two or three long rings I took the phone. I checked the number, not a known one.
 

Swearing at the caller under my breath, I answered.

 

X: Hello

 

 I couldn’t recognize the voice on the other end. But it sounded quite familiar, someone I knew 

from the past.

 

X: Hello

 

Me: Hello

 

X:  Hey this is me Sreejith. It has been so long, right? How are you?

 

Me: I am fine. Where have you been? How come you called?

There was every bit of irony in that. I was the one who had escaped from the past, not him. I still couldn’t completely make sense of why I said that.

Why is he calling me now? I had no idea.

 

Sreejith: Do you remember Gayatri?

 

Me: Who??

 

Sreejith: She was our classmate, she used to be a good singer.

 

Me: Mmm. Yes. 

 

Sreejith: She is getting married.

Silence

X: This weekend.

X: She was asking for your number. I didn’t have it then, got it from...... He said he will be coming…..

I didn’t say anything.

X: Won’t you come?

Me: mmm.

X: Aren’t you coming??

Me: mmm. I will try.

I just wanted to hang up and go back to sleep. But he kept talking…

X: You are a hard man to reach. Where have you been all this time?

Me: Man, I’ve just come back from a really long day at the office. Bit tired. This is your number, right?

I hope I didn’t sound irritated.

X: Yes

Me: I will call you tomorrow. Good Night

May be I had hung up the phone little too soon without even waiting for him to say a good night.

I went back to bed. Even after many long hours I found myself staring at the ceiling hardly finding any sleep. Many attempts went futile turning around in frustration trying to find some sleep.

Why is mentioning of her name giving me a sleepless night. I couldn’t ignore and let it go as I used to.

I walked to the balcony to have a smoke. In the darkness and prevailing silence, looking at the tall buildings all around without a sign of life anywhere, suddenly made me feel quite alone. It felt like I was staring at my past. In a rush to build a life of your own you tend to forget people who were with you. Does it happen with all the others or is it just with me? I don’t know.

Where do I start telling about her, Gayatri. If I am pressed to say why I loved her, I feel it can only be explained by replying Because it was her; because it was me. I didn’t have a reason not to love her. She was adorable in all possible ways. I admired her, worshiped her, cherished her in my dreams but never mustered courage to go and tell her. Many a time after that I resented over my lack of courage.

We were good friends back then, in-fact great friends, talking for great lengths over the phone sharing stories gossips and secrets, but never had the courage to reveal the sacred one. I just didn’t want to put our friendship at stake, but eventually lost both of that. If I had proposed her would she have said a yes? I don’t know. I will never know. Slowly it got added with many other 'what if I had done that' which occurred in my life. Though it was selfish I was in a way happy that even after such a long time I had some love left in me for her.

A lovely quote by Washington Irving went through my mind, "Love is never lost. If not reciprocated, it will flow back and soften and purify the heart".

The rain started to drizzle down. I watched it come down slowly in tiny droplets. May be I was searching for someone's face in the drizzle. I wish I could stand in the rain and let it wash all the pain away from my heart letting me start again.

I took another smoke. Why didn’t she marry yet? Though she is a year younger to me, it’s a bit late for a girl to get married. She was ambitious even then, used to say that she would marry only after achieving something in life. 

 

Many unanswered questions kept poking me hard. Should I go and see her for one last time. I decided against that, if anything is left behind let that be her smiling face. I can find some excuse to tell him. Like always I will get back to the blissful comfort of forgetfulness.

I was half aware of burning cigarette pressing against my skin. I wish I could burn away all these memories as easily as that.

I must have been standing there for quite long. I slowly walked back to my room. I watched my wife having a sound sleep, couldn’t stop myself feeling little jealous. I silently slid to my side of the bed with a hope of finding some sleep. The past had come calling, and I wasn’t sure whether I had the strength to face it again—or the will to let it go.

 

Lucky Number Six

I have been of the belief till yesterday that six is quite lucky for me. I am not so confident about it now.

These days every particular day starts with the question, what trouble am I going to make today?? . One way or another I jump into one.

We were celebrating most sought after festival for the people in Kerala, Hartal the only difference is that it doesn’t come on a fixed date unlike most other festivals.

It was yet another day in office, but with a festive atmosphere. You could do what ever that pleases you, no pressure just leisure.

The day was progressing with occasional bug fixing for the sake of doing something that can be passed on as work, reading and listening to music being set as the major priorities.

As the office hour was about to end, I had an urge to set my password in our website to Six. My user login in the site is used for testing purposes and the password was changed much too often as a part of that. I didn't know the present password, so couldn't login to the site. I didn’t have any intention of retrieving the password from front end by using ‘forgot password’(Ego of a Coder,even if you are not much into coding ). Yep, I was adamant enough to try resetting the password directly in the database.

I did reset my password and set it to six (IT IS NO LONGER SIX!!), so did for every other users of our site. Every user now had my lucky number password. Users couldn’t login to the site and it was an hour of panic, crisis or what ever. In client’s words that was much like Sinking the Ship. But luckily with the available database backup data was restored and I got out of the dilemma.

I don’t quite know what to make out of the end result.Was that number lucky?? Part of me wants to believe it even now.

Six still is lucky for me.

Girls from Venus

Among the hundreds of forward mails that pile up in our inbox which we even don’t care to have a second look, only some stand out. This particular mail I’m talking about also comes in the likes of this stand out class which makes us roll on the floor and laugh with out even caring about the damn surrounding, at least I felt so.

I don’t know where this came from and who sired it, But I feel like posting it.

A story I stumbled upon.....

"I never quite figured out why the sexual urge of men and women differ so much. And I never have figured out the whole Venus and Mars thing. I have never figured out why men think with their head and women with their heart.

FOR EXAMPLE:
One evening last week, my girlfriend and I were getting into bed. Well, the passion starts to heat up, and she eventually says, I don't feel like it, I just want you to hold me.

I said, WHAT??!! What was that?!

So she says the words that every boyfriend on the planet dreads to hear…
You are just not in touch with my emotional needs as a woman enough for me to satisfy your physical needs as a man.

She responded to my puzzled look by saying, Cant you just love me for who I am and not what I do for you in the bedroom?

Realizing that nothing was going to happen that night, I went to sleep.
The very next day I opted to take the day off of work to spend time with her. We went out to a nice lunch and then went shopping at a big, big unnamed department store. I walked around with her while she tried on several different very expensive outfits. She couldn't decide which one to take, so I told her wed just buy them all. She wanted new shoes to compliment her new clothes, so I said,
Lets get a pair for each outfit.
We went on to the jewelry department where she picked out a pair of diamond earrings. Let me tell you… she was so excited. She must have thought I was one wave short of a shipwreck. I started to think she was testing me because she asked for a tennis bracelet when she doesn't even know how to play tennis
I think I threw her for a loop when I said, That's fine, honey. She was almost nearing sexual satisfaction from all of the excitement. Smiling with excited anticipation, she finally said,

I think this is all dear, lets go to the cashier.

I could hardly contain myself when I blurted out, No honey, I don't feel like it.
Her face just went completely blank as her jaw dropped with a baffled, WHAT?

I then said, Honey! I just want you to HOLD this stuff for a while. Youre just not in touch with my financial needs as a man enough for me to satisfy your shopping needs as a woman.

And just when she had this look like she was going to kill me, I added, Why cant you just love me for who I am and not for the things I buy you?

Apparently I'm not having sex tonight either….but at least that bitch knows I'm smarter than her"


Courtesy to the unknown author.

This is life dear

STORY#




Tenth of February, It was a pleasant day for me. I made a new start, out from the curious eyes of all those who knew me well. I joined a new company. My plan wasn't to survive but just to have some happy moments to cherish before death can have its firm grip over me.

Now a days I prefer meeting new people, fed up with the way people look at me so full of sympathy in their eyes. When they finally realized nothing could be done to extend my tenure here I was left on my own to have a little happiness that the life has denied me so far.

What I am being paid is a meager salary in here, I don't care. Why should I ? It isn't any more about the money, though it gave me immense happiness to earn my own living. I made new friends here. They are treating me as one of their own, very first time for me. It is odd, but I didn't want to be sincere in friendship that will make me desperately wish for a longer life. So kept a safe distance from all. But even then destiny had its upper hand in making decisions for my life and I got a new friend. I was very selfish in thinking, to have an uptake of only good things that happen around me. But I had to act as a diary for her, listen to her sorrows which I happily did. It was very pleasant thing to be in someone else mind, to think for them. I was not thinking about myself for the first time.

I didn't know when I first met her, a bold and cool girl like her could be so depressed underneath. She is going to be married soon, which she doesn't like. She loved someone else and he didn't have guts to take the relation further. She is so sincere in her love, she said she could give her life for him and she actually tried doing it. It was a shocker for me when she said it.

I didn't love anyone so far, so don't know the pain of losing the loved ones. May be someone will have pain when I'm gone. But they will certainly forget me with time. I don't have any problem with that, I certainly want it to be so. She calls me when she is sad, she couldn't recover from her loss and is still adamant that she doesn't have a life with out him. When I see the way she gives less importance to her life I feel a chill, more or less a pain, running through my body. Till now I couldn't gather my courage to tell her what my fate is, the way I'm waiting for an imminent cold death which is completely out of my hands.
But I feel I have to tell her now, to her only. It is time she got to view things in a different perspective. That is the only thing I can do, may be that's my destiny.

Bucketlist

Ten things I want to do, given that my time here is limited. This is giving me a feel of someone who is going to die soon, not so inspiring. Hmmm. so let me cut short everyone’s life here. So some terror is awaiting and I’m the only one who is aware of it. But certainly there is nothing I could do apart from making most of the time that is available.

When Nikhil asked me to make a note on things I would I like to do, I thought it would be easy. But the fact is sickening, I couldn’t come up with something that I’m thriving to do as easily as I expected it to be. Pondering for a while, I came up with a few.

So let me add, this list is susceptible to change with the course of time. In a rush to make a list I might have missed a few assuming I haven’t completely got into such frame of mind.


So for now, here is the list irrespective of its possibility of occurring.

Bucket list.

Live like a Nomad even if it is for a while.

Travel all around the world, see wonderful things which I have just heard off.

Unbridled sex

Go for a date with a gorgeous looking girl (a candle light dinner followed by passionate sex)

Publish my book. (Don’t have to worry about its success and if I get any fame that is an added bonus )

Spend some quality time with friends and family.

Own a luxury vehicle like BMW 7 series sedan, a Benz S class or a SUV (atleast a drive being realistic).

Have a full fledged bar at home!!!

Attend Rave Parties.

I don’t mind tasting hashish, cocaine ganja what ever be the name.

Sailing Alone Around the World

May be many of them are pipe dreams, I don’t really care, more over I would like to dream more and make further additions to the list, I heard Dreams are for free.

Somewhere over the rainbow, skies are blue, and the dreams that you dare to dream really do come true

Akathalam

One of the highlighting feature of a reunion with your old friends is the opportunity for boozing that is coupled with it. If you are lucky enough to be a part of a drinking company you will have enjoyed the very moments and will be cherishing it even now provided you are in a state to remember something. As per virtuosos in this field, Booze Company lasts for ever (I’m counting on that!!!). Hope you do follow. What make this drinking company so enjoyable are the talks, booze gives one confidence to talk, more that that it makes you feel free, to talk about anything and everything. I don’t know why the police are still relying on their infamous methods of questioning. They should just get the accused drunk and they will disclose everything they did. It is not even expensive, cheaper the better.

Right from the moment I and Narayan set foot in Trivandrum there has been a single word in our lips ‘Akathalam’. It is a bar located in Sreekaryam near our college. Akathalam can’t just be said as a bar, it is more than that for CETians. Any sort of celebration we had then always ended either in ZAM ZAM or Akathalam one way or another. Zam Zam is known for its sumptuous Shawai and the latter often connotes hospitality, warm comfort and ambience. Akathalam is one of the most prominent things we have missed after leaving the college. Most of us had gone to Trivandrum many a time after leaving the college for different reasons, be it for a tryst with your girlfriend or the everlasting commitment with university. But we didn’t make it to Akathalam. Without a company to hangout even Akathalam doesn’t sound enticing.


Even after having an earnest desire to hang out in Akathalam the plan didn’t work out as we expected.We didn’t get ample time for such a process since many of the members of the team [Me Junu Naru and Renji] were busy with tryst. And the team got bigger, much bigger, with addition of some of our college mates who were staying in Trivandrum. The problem of having a bigger team is that the planning part consumes great chunk of time, more often taking the action part out of the picture . Needless to say the same happened with us. Going to Veli, Kovalam, Sankumukham and many other tourist points came into consideration. What really happened in the end was, made fabulous plans stared each others faces with frustration most of the time and finally went to see a fort for the sake of doing something. After that we, the initial team were left on our own.

We excluding Renji (he left for Calicut) set forth to Akathalam. Sreekaryam, the town was almost silent apart from the sound of a loud speaker. Akathalam is at a walkable distance from Sreekaryam junction. There is a huge gate leading to local bar and our elite Akathalam. The gate was locked. We couldn’t muster any sensible reason for its untimely closure, brain wasn’t fully cooperating. Then the sound from loudspeaker, much the shrieks, became more audible though we were standing at a good distance from it. They were giving accounts of good deeds of Sree Narayana Guru. The day we chose happened to be his Jayanthi or Samadhi what ever.

This is the problem with amateur drinkers. Unlike regular drinkers novices never foresee things. A holiday like Gandhi Jayanthi or Guru Samadhi ain't a normal one for accustomed drinkers. Even if they forget any other eventful day they will keep track of these alcohol non available days.

Frustrated and desperate, we walked back to where we were staying ( our college mate Naushad's house in Chavadymukku). It wasn’t anymore about Akathalam and its warmth or ambience, it was just about getting drunk and having some kind of revenge no matter on whom.
The path leading to the house was an open air hangout for the locals there. There was a wry smile on our faces when we saw three locals getting drunk. One of them noticed it.

X : Entharadei chirickkanathu? (Why the hell are you laughing?)

Messing with Trivandrum locals is the last thing you want to do, certainly not when they are drunk.

I shrugged my shoulders to suggest a 'nothing' . And it did nothing.

Narayan addressed him as Anna and narrated the incident. May be the way he addressed him or the realization that we were younger brothers in the trade, mellowed him. He had a pleasant chat with us and offered us little rum they were having. We weren’t drinkers enough to try Rum, so we humbly denied it.

Our Annan looked at me.

Ninne kandal ariyam vellamadikkum ennu..(You certainly look like a drunkard!!)

Was that a compliment? It was pretty big one considering the fact that it came from a person who is a virtuoso in the field, but I didn’t know if I had to be thankful or not.

Anyways I wasn’t ready to accept it, not yet. So I humbly denied it.

Anna, satyamayittum look undanne ullu. (though I may be have the looks of a drinker, I'm still a novice)

I would have certainly taken it, if he asked me for the second time. I was standing there with a face wearing an expression which might have said ‘Annan Nirbandhikkukayanengil Kazhikkam’, so were the others.

Your face says it all. He invited us again and none of the objections were strong enough. We had drinks.

Like I said earlier the booze company lasts for ever, when ever we met him after that our Annan smiles and shares a few words with us.

Akathalam still beckons. But I can only say or rather hope: As soon As Possible