Eye to eye

You dwell in the past.
I live in the present.
The past you talk about is irrelevant to me.
This present I live in means nothing to you.
You expect me to go back in time and undo things already done.
I expect you to move forward and accept them as they are right now.
And unless time collides,
we'll just never see eye to eye.


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~vagabond~ © 2008

My happy place

I want to move to New Mexico. Well, actually I'd like to move to Mexico. But since that isnt even a realistic option right now, for now New Mexico will do. Ever since I visited it a year ago, and then again this year, the place keeps calling me back. It's this strong urge to want to live there, this strong feeling of belonging, almost as if "that desire originated in the soul of the universe". You'd have to have read the Alchemist to get that last part (if you havent read this book, forget this blog, rush over to the nearest bookstore right now and start reading it NOW! I am not exaggerating when I say your life will never be the same again).

You know how when things get really, really stressful, your mind takes off and finds comfort in its happy place? Well, my happy place is the memory of this one morning in New Mexico last year when we were driving through the Jemez Mountains - just Joe and I. We had spent the night camping literally in the middle of thick forest because we got lost. We had tried to take a short cut through the mountains and lost the road we were supposed to be on. Sounds a little filmy, doesnt it? But no, there was no dancing around the trees bursting into a Bollywood song. And it really did happen that way. And it was getting dark and if you've ever driven through the Jemez Mountains, you'll know that the smart thing to do is just stop, sleep and wait for the morning to see your way. Because the narrow road winds up and down around the mountain and it's easy to drive off the cliff in the dark. So we camped in the middle of a ponderosa pine forest and waited for morning.

My memory is of that early hour of the morning when we had set off again to drive. After talking to some construction workers we encountered along the way, we realized that the road we were meant to take was under construction and we would have to make do with a dirt road that led out of the mountains. And so there we were, driving through the heart of the mountain, on a bumpy dirt road, building up a dust storm behind us as we drove on. The only car along the road for miles on. Literally in the middle of nowhere. The sun's rays filtering in through the thick canopy, lighting up the path ahead of us. And it was driving along that forgotten dirt road to nowhere, that for the first time in months, I felt unburdened and carefree. The stress of all I had gone through in the past months seemed trivial, and nothing in the universe felt as important as being there, right there in that moment, savoring what life had brought along my way. What lay ahead of me was not important, and what I had been through was temporarily forgotten. I was content with the tranquility of that moment in itself, just simply driving along that endless road, warming up under the early morning sun rays, looking out of the window. Life was simple, right then.

The trees soon cleared up and we got a glimpse of the luscious green valley, dotted occasionally with small spanish style houses or pueblos as they are called, that are the trademark of New Mexico. Clay red houses with little bancos built into them. Hand painted tiles sometimes plastered into the walls. Bright red chile ristras dangling from the roof. A horse or two grazing free in the backyard of the valley.

It was at that moment that my soul decided this is where I belonged. I had found my spirituality. It wasn't buried in some church or temple. It was right here, in this little corner of the world where I felt happiest and lightest at heart.





~vagabond~ © 2008

Coach bags, Manolo Blahnik shoes and New York City

Warning: A large portion of this post is going to be mindless rambling, but I need to vent and I rarely need an audience for that. And if you love Coach bags, or Manolo Blahnik shoes or New York City, and you're still reading this, my apologies.
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Recently I had the misfortune of encountering a relative I simply just dont like. We're as different as chalk and cheese, me and her. The trouble is, while I make my dislike for her obvious and she knows it and the whole world knows it, she insists on playing mind games instead. Pretending we get along. Pretending we're similar after all. To her own convenience. Even though we're not. Not in the slightest bit. Dont you hate it when people do that? Pretend to be diplomatic and polite and hypocritically, sugary sweet when all you want from them is to be real? The only good that comes out of this extremely disastrous relationship is the fact that she makes me appreciate my own life a little more every time I encounter hers. I know, I know, I sound a little bitchy but she does have that effect on me.

So in a sickeningly saccharine display of her fake affections toward me, Ms. Snobby-two-shoes gifted me a sickeningly pink 'Coach' bag. For anyone who hasn't been living under a rock for the past decade, a 'Coach' bag, right along with Manolo Blahnik shoes, represents the epitome of having made it to Carrie Bradshaw status in Sex and the City. Think snotty looking purses and shoes that cost hundreds of dollars. And she is a Carrie Bradshaw of sorts. Because the concept of success in her head is analogous to how many Coach bags you own, and whether the clothes in your wardrobe are true designer wear, and whether or not you live in New York City, the mecca of all Carrie Bradshaw wanna-bes.

I dont own a Coach bag. I dont care for designer clothes. And I dont want to live in New York City. Mighty unsuccessful, huh? And I'm okay with it.

Because what I do want is a life full of experiences. In the end, stuff is just stuff. It sits in your wardrobe, you staring at it, it staring back at you. And while it tries really hard to dress you and give you an image, in the end it doesnt have any say in who you are. But the experiences you live, those are what truly define you. I want to live my life to the fullest. Travel new places. Experience new experiences. Be enveloped in new cultures. Have no regrets over what I didn't get to do. And when I'm 90, I know I will remember the day I went white water rafting down the Colorado River or went camel riding in the Rajasthan. What I will not remember is the hideous color of the Coach bag I owned in 2008.

PS. Any bets on how long it will take before I sell the Coach bag on ebay?

PSS. I do not hate New York City. I do want to see New York City, but only for its architectural beauty, its cultural diversity. Not for a shopping extravaganza. And not to live in it.

Epiphany

There's a simple solution to my complex problems. Just let go.

For a while now, I've been dissecting my misfortunes, placing them under a microscope and picking at them with dissecting needles, teasing them apart, trying to figure out where I went wrong, what I did wrong, how I could possibly have avoided the situation I am in, and on and on. No I'm not a masochist. But my analytical little head needs a reason. The fact that shit happens is just not a good enough answer for it. The voices in my head demand to know why the shit happened in the first place. It's what years of being a scientist does to you.

So I tried assigning blame. Just so that I would have a reason. Just to make the voices in my head shut up. I blamed myself. I blamed people I love. I blamed random strangers that had nothing to do with my problems in the first place. I blamed God. And the universe in general for conspiring against me and making me so miserable. And the voices in my head finally shut up. Because I'd given them the good, solid, analytical reasons they needed. But I was still miserable and unhappy inside.

So I figured miserable and unhappy was the way things were meant to be. And I moped in it. I whined. I grumbled. And I blogged about it. And when things went from bad to worse, I allowed for them to be. Because that was how things were meant to be. I played the destiny card. Things were the way they were because that's how they were meant to be. Unhappy is how I was meant to be. I was going through a bad phase, I reasoned. And that gave me permission to be miserable, mopey and grumpy.

So mopey, grumpy and I went to the park with the dogs yesterday. And I was playing tug-on-a-rope with Charlie, my german shepherd, when the great big epiphany hit me. Okay, so bear with me here. I know it's not like I discovered a new law in physics, but still when it hit me, it seemed pretty huge. And for all you so-wise-and-philosophical ones, if you've known this all along, play along with me here, this is MY moment under the sun.

It suddenly struck me how this tug-on-a-rope game that I was playing with Charlie was so similar to what life and me had been playing all along. I pull in one direction, and life pulls harder in the opposite direction. I want it to go one way. It wants me to go completely in the opposite direction. We both hold our ground and pull the rope, struggling with all our might. In the end going nowhere. I get frustrated and angry and tug harder on the rope, and then suddenly it dawns on me. That all I have to do to make this sick, frustrating game end is to let go.

Perhaps the reason it took so long for this epiphany to dawn on me is the fact that I am such a control freak. Letting go simply wasnt an option I had considered. Because letting go meant letting someone else or something else take charge. And that scares the daylights out of me. I mean, I cant even trust someone else to drop the mail in the post office for me, because they wont do it right, and I'm talking letting go. This is huge.

But I'm finally ready to do it. I'm ready to stop being such a control freak and just let go and let things be the way they are. Sure, it'll drive me crazy when things dont go my way. But I'm not going to tug and pull and fret over them anymore. I'm going to go with the flow. And not struggle so much to make things go my way. Who knows, perhaps I'll even like the new direction that life pulls me in. And if I dont, it's not the end of the world. I'll just pick myself up and walk away. Life and I arent going to tug-on-a-rope anymore. Because I simply let go. And I'm ready to move on.

So here's to letting go. Letting go of situations I cant avoid, people I cant change, things that are clearly beyond my control. I refuse to let them bother me. And turns out, shit happens is now a good enough answer for me.


~vagabond~ © 2008

Frustrations

Lately I think I've lost the will to fight. Things just seem to be spinning out of control. Life is hellbent on proving to me just who's in charge. It shuts doors, I open windows. It shuts windows, I bang really hard on the walls and open up a hole. It seals up the hole and I'm just about ready blast the whole damn place up and for once make life happen on my terms. And yet, I cant remember the last time that that happened.

I am tired of struggling so hard. Of making big sacrifices to attain every small thing I want. Of paying big prices to earn small rewards. I am tired of constantly falling. And even more tired of picking myself up when I fall. I am tired of saying "it's going to be okay" or pretending it's going to get better, and giving myself false hope. I am tired of pretending to be okay when I call home. Of acting big, bad and brave. When all I really want to do is cry and sob. I'm not strong. And I'm not courageous. And I'm tired of fighting it all the time. I'm perfectly content to lose and let go.

I hate it when my sis calls and asks for advice. And I hate it worse when I have nothing but false hope to give back. I'm tired of being depended on. I am fed up of being looked up to. And I dont want anyone to count on me anymore. I'm not perfect. And I hate it when you all shower your high expectations on me. I'm tired of trying to make things happen. Of trying to change the way things are. Of trying to make miracles happen.

A huge part of me just doesnt care anymore. And yet, I care. Enough to feel embarassed that I feel this way. And I worry. And I wonder what you would say if you knew just how frustrated I feel...if you knew just how tired I really am.

The gypsy

A free spirited gypsy from a previous life lives on within me. Ever restless, she beckons me toward change. Fiercely rebellious, she craves freedom. The constraints of my caged life torment her. Rambling clouds, soaring eagles, unbridled horses, she shows me, all roam free. The shackles on my feet turn to glistening anklets as she dances through my life watching the red, blue, yellow caravans of life pass us by. Breathing in the now, living in this moment. The sunshine on her face, the breeze through her hair, all awaken her soul and light up her smile. She loves the open road with its endless possibilities. My life with its one destination scares her. I envy her careless freedom, her reckless spirit. If just for one lifetime, I long to be her.

~vagabond~ © 2008

The Meeting

Would he still recognize me? Will he have changed? Would he be a different person now than he was before? The last time I had seen him I was an awkward teenager. A shy fourteen year old. And I was with my parents. That makes all the difference. Because back then, they did all the talking to him and I just filled in the gaps. Even so, he always knew how to bring me out of my shell. He has always been a vibrant man. Full of energy, the life of the party. When he was in a room, you heard his loud laughter before you even entered the room.

My mum has four brothers, I have four uncles, each with a personality completely different from the other. If you met them separately, you would never guess they are brothers. But for me, my Dineshmama was always the one who knew me best.

Riding along in the car, waiting for the moment of reunion after fifteen years, all sorts of memories swarmed through my head. It's funny how the most inane memories that lay buried and forgotten over the years suddenly resurface when a familiar name comes to mind. I try to tell people about him and the first image that comes to my mind is of him holding a rat by its tail chasing my cousin brother and I around the house with a mischevious glint in his eyes while we kids shrieked loudly, running around the house. I had come across the rat quite by surprise, fumbling around for my slippers under the stairwell in my grandma's house and shouted loudly for mama to come get rid of it. And then there's the day he saw us feeding a goat with vegetable peelings, and dared us to go pull on its tail. Yup. Only my Dineshmama would come up with silly pranks like that. And yet, he was gentle and kind too. Like the day I got scolded by mum and he saw me crying and took me out for a motorbike ride and some icecream. Or the day he sneaked in a stray puppy into the house just because us kids wanted him to. My grandma would be horrified if she knew.

Over the years, we grew distant. My trips to India became fewer and far in between. Other things in my life took precedence. Studies. Career. Friends. Other relationships. In a quiet unassuming way, our worlds grew apart. The relationship that could have been grew silent. Until yesterday. When I got the phone call to come see him in Chicago.

The bizarreness of it all wouldnt leave me. It felt strange and awkward to be meeting the ghost of a man that I remembered only through memories. And here in America of all places, when all I had known of him was in India. It felt disorienting and bizarre. And yet, I was excited to see him after all these years. And nervous.

What would I say to him? What would we talk about? I havent seen him in years. I have nothing to say to him. Ofcourse, we'd talk about my aunt and my cousins. He would ask about my parents and I would ask about my grandma. But what else was there to say? He doesnt know anything about my life here. And I know even less about his. He doesnt know me. And I dont know him.

I saw him before he saw me. Time always stands still in our memories. We expect the people in our memories to stay the same, to dress as they did before, to look as they did years ago. When I saw him look so old and tired and frail, I couldnt believe it was him. The years have been harsh to him. His health hasnt been keeping up well, so I've heard. I wondered if I should even have come. Time changes people. Or rather people change over time. Would he be cold and formal? Would this be awkward? I shouldnt even have come.

He rushed over toward me when he saw me. His eyes welled up with tears as he embraced me. "You look just like your mother", he said. He placed a paternal hand over my head and asked me softly, "Everything okay, beta?". And in that one gentle moment of care and concern, I knew it was going to be okay. I was glad I had come to see him. I knew it wasnt going to be cold and formal. I knew it wouldnt be awkward. Because two alienated strangers had once again become family.

~vagabond~ © 2008