Refining the art of doing nothing!!!

Do you work long hours? Do you have so much to do that you never find the time to do it all? Are you convinced you are doing too many things at the same time? If you are telling yourself you need a break and you wish that you could just do nothing, well, be CAREFUL what you wish for because it might just come true.
Contrary to popular opinion, doing nothing, is NOT an easy job. It takes a lot of effort and time and risks being painstaking. Its an art. All you are allowed to do is nothing. Even the occasional activities to get away from nothingness become less alluring. Its a state of existence that leaves you alone with yourself, your thoughts and your deepest darkest desires. So it is full of surprises too ( provided you are slightly more interesting than the average television show). It is the perfect platform to start with obsessive compulsive disorders, impulsive tendencies and really bad eating habits. Coupled with sleeping too much or too little, you are all set for becoming the curiously wise character on the sit com of your choice. Try spending a Sunday without ever stepping out of the house or talking to anyone with not more than 2 sentences, no texting or telephoning either and to still be humane, you of course have internet and can rejoice in reading random blogs!!!
Its bizarre how even your favorite author cannot make you read, how easy it is to think that staring at the ceiling, stretched out on your back can some how kill time faster!!!
To resist this dark side teeming with regression something that an easily amused friend of mine said....look at the sun, the moon and the stars and tell yourselves that your friends are looking at the same thing....
Statutory warning: Doing nothing can be extremely dangerous to physical and mental health, to be consumed in moderation.

Divine providence? Pah!

Is there anyone at all that is indispensable? Irreplaceable? What? Will you just drop down and die, or will the world stop turning, will you not see the purpose in life anymore, if you lose a certain person?

The blunt but brilliant truth is that no one and nothing is that central to your existence. You will survive any kind of loss, material or otherwise. We end up getting used to almost anything! Look at our PTD ( public transport dpt ) So we really do make peace with whatever the Gods put in our way. It all comes down to the singular question of time and with good old time we accept and assimilate whatever loss or grievance and survive sufferance.

So do the ambitious fair better at all of this than the "ordinary man"? Do the great characters of history from Budha to The big B constitute exceptions to this theory? Think about it! The world would not have ended without them. Other people would have probably raised to the occasion to do the necessary! And I mean all this in the most grateful way.....

You lose parents, lovers, siblings, children they certainly are irreplaceable in their unique way but they do not take your breath of life ... THAT is one of the billion grains of truth that I think forms the Indian philosophy/spirituality/religion.....


If you were looking for something coherent, this was not really for you.

What will happen this May??

In love with a memory

Some three seasons have rolled by,

Almost back to that fateful summer,

Just one harsh winter to go....

Even now my memory is changed,

it is not the same idea it was last may.

Then when this may will come knocking

the earth would have gone around the sun a full round,

But I would probably stay still on the same but foreign ground.

Steady even though the ground feels like it would give away,

The memory is but a shadow, a long gone reflection,

Gone with the light leqving a ray inert.....

Cannot follow they ray cannot escape the memory...

SO MUCH for candid shots.
Warning: DO NOT TRY AT HOME.















YES we are being rather DAFT, SO?

The rain in Spain stays mainly in the Plains

That is the ROYAL communication palace for you!

Three's company too.....

Photos!

Le Havre Romorantin

Un mois et demi dans un trou français....

En plein novembre l'automne se dévoile petit à petit, résistant à changer de robe et de couleur. Alors l'automne est en retard, ce qui fait qu'il ne fait pas aussi froid que ce qu'on attend en novembre. Alors à 6 dégrées, il fait "doux"! Je ne veux même pas penser à l'hiver......

Un ami avait baptisé la ville où j'habite, " un trou " même avant que je l'ais découverte. Il n'a pas du tout tort! la ville se ferme à 19h00. Le weekend, surtout le dimanche c'est abandonné.... J'ai eu l'idée géniale de se promener en ville un dimanche après midi ensoleillé avec Katie. La plus part du temps il n'y avait que nous deux dans les rues vides! On dirait une photo! Rien ne bougeait! Même les oiseaux avaient perdu la volonté de s'envoler.... On dirait une ville fantôme!!!!

Souvent j'ai l'impression d'être en exile ici. Peut être que j'étais trop fière d'habiter une grande ville et que je ne comprenais vraiment pas l'intérêt d'habiter à la campagne. Alors me voilà en province, pleine campagne, loin des foules que j'adorais...

Heureusement, il y a les enfants!!!! Leur enthousiasme est contagieuse! les 3 jours de la semaine quand je les vois, c'est du bonheur, probablement le seul bonheur que j'ai ici....

Et la drame politique!!!! Même si c'est à la française c'est bien de la drame!!! les discours dramatiques, les débats, les sondages..... Sans cette scène politique je m'ennuierais trop ici!!!
Alors je suis contente d'être dans mon trou pour vivre les élections présidentielles de 2007.... Je suis sure que ça serait très très amusant!!!
Séquestrée , j'attends non pas un cavalier en cheval blanc, mais un train de sncf qui m'amènera ailleurs....

The best laid plans......

The future is unwritten; Destiny is not absolute, coming to think of it, it seems to be a set of possibilities like perhaps in a mathematical formula... It is of course prudent to plan, forsee, anticipate, and set goals for the future but even the best laid plans cannot forsee it in all its splendour and details... This is maybe what makes us get up every single morning, knowing that even if the day ahead could be the usual routine, we never know what the mundane day brings with it!!! The perks of the unforseen....
The next time someone says " I LOVE to travel" do not roll your eyes even if it sounds like a rwell known cliché..... I know I will not!!!! Travel brings such richeness that it leaves its impressions in you forver! It's first of all a feast for all your senses. The visuals that leave you mezmerised, the smells that tell you that you really are in another place, the weather that constantly envelopes you, the sounds that play a whole other tune, the exotic food that surprises you and above all the people that you meet make it all a grand spectacle. The more people you meet, the more minds you explore, their ideas, their passions, desires, happiness and sorrow puts your own into perspective. The conversations, be it pleasant or otherwise enriches and always leaves you craving for more!!!
..... The Indian philosophy of renouncing desires seemed a bit brutal, a life time's work to achieve, of course, but its rather practical really because when you expect , for example a little joy, you are dissapointed when you do not get it but when you expect nothing and the joy comes along it seems much more precious than it is. If nothing happens, you were not expecting anything anyway ...so.....
Here is wishing everyone a lot of joy and love,
Cheers!

I'm safe?

My eyes are blood shot, there is a blunt throbbing pain at the back of my head, a million thoughts running across my mind, quite some emotions run loose and demonic heads of fears and doubts rise….. There is so much chaos that I don’t remember how I got here. In spite of all this disarray, I can go to bed knowing my soul is safe. Why safe? Because I know I would never want to, in even the least bit, hurt another person. Would you, knowing that your words and actions could injure someone in the smallest way go ahead, do or say that something? What purpose does it serve?
If abstaining from causing such hurt and in the process being injured is weakness, then I proudly embrace it! Whatever happens, I know that I am capable of love, such love that liberates, mends and beautifies.... To do everything with love, no matter what the outcome, to learn that will be an awfully big adventure and looks like to me that this is what perhaps is called life...

Extraordinary moments......

Extraordinary moments.
Some times it’s the briefest of moments in our life that matter more than anything else, the tiny seconds amongst the endless days that bring us true joy.
Have you ever looked into the mirror and been amazed? Amazed that you are real, that you exist, that you are a person…. That moment you fully feel yourself.
Like a bolt from a clear sky when you suddenly look at your parents or sisters or brothers and feel that they truly love you like you love them, that moment, even if its no more than the shortest of moments, it feels like heaven.
When you look up into the starry sky and realize that you are a part of that wonder, you are a product of the same power, which is at work inside the stars, that moment fills you with overwhelming awe.
Looking outside your bedroom window, the thirst to just go outside, like the world is calling you to travel and see places, this moment can lead to a thousand dreams.
When you go inside after staying outside in the bright sun for sometime the brief blinding effect on the eyes can sometimes be scary, a rude interruption to the seeming reality, that moment can sometimes be seriously disturbing.
Then, there are these moments of amazing clarity when everything seems to make sense and you seem to have figured out everything in life, these are rare moments, which seem to have the shortest life span. When such a moment passes us, we seem to want to cling to it and never let it go.
Are all these moments just random happenings in the infinity of time and space or are they all building up towards a predetermined destiny or is our destiny formed by these moments? Whatever they may be, time is speeding towards the invisible horizon and these moments allow us to cherish the special times. After all time does pass in moments, each one leading to the next and when such a moment passes us next time, maybe we will take another moment to think about it and enjoy it.

once more...

B: "A circle is the only geometric shape defined by its centre. No chicken and egg bout it, the centre came first, the circumference follows. The earth, by definition has a centre. And only the fool that knows it can go wherever he pleases, knowing the centre will hold him down, stop him flying out of orbit. But when your sense of centre shifts, comes whizzing to the surface, the balance has gone. The balance has gone. The balance my baby has gone"This was the first ( and the only thing that I most related to) thing that made a lot of sense to me when I read Sarah Kane's crave. I was "c" in the play and even though she has a lot of things to say it is this that hits me the most....(first impression?)Somebody suddenly mentioned the importance of such a centre in life without which, according to them we just might be floating around......Floating around looking for it perhaps.Well this concept of THE CENTRE or perhaps a lack of one in my life is what fueled the Blog project. Suddenly I no longer think of blogs as a vain thing people do, or a desperate plea to make oneself interesting or a sign of inadequacy of meeting real people......and caressing pretention in some vague way.......I do not yet know how I perceive it but somehow I have a feeling this is going to do a world of good to my confused state of mind, (with the risk of sounding corny) and heart.Well now it seems that there are a good number of centers, with varying gravitational pulls as if they are competing for attention....the ones that are well established are I think afraid of becoming obsolete and waiting for a chance to grow and evolve ( My mom, My French and theatre for example) the others, floating, seem to have minds of their own, morphing and mutating, incomprehensibly sometimes that they become scary and risk becoming obsessions or deceptive illusions of something else.......( TV, people...Books? Etc ----to stay away from scandalous examples.)Even though a blissful obliteration of the present state of circumstances is very desirable, the effort and process to get to its roots are a tad bit more tempting.Again, at the risk of sounding corny, perhaps the grand questions on life, death and purpose should be asked...... just to repair my centers and also hopefully add a new, significant one.

St Francis' prayer for peace.

Prayer for peace
Lord, make me an instrument of your peace.
Where there is hatred, let me sow love,
Where there is injury, pardon,
Where there is despair, hope,
Where there is doubt, faith,
Where there is darkness, light,
and where there is sadness, joy.

Lord grant me that I might not so much seek
To be consoled as to console,
To be understood as to understand,
To be loved as to love,
For it is in giving that we receive,
It is in pardoning that we are pardoned
And it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.

Farewell photos

The class!















Michelle and I!




















Jeni and I....
















The day after.....

More photos. Will write when I get really bored! So here is the AND I series!

Sarah and I

















Kevin and I



















Jenny and I

Photos!!! Yay!

My Amma!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Seema, January 1st 2006. Nice shot Aparnakka!




At dinner with Bhavani maami and co!




Bhavani, Seema and Aparna at Aiyappan poojai.


Peripa at the poojai.

Why weddings are a good place for girls to flirt

Weddings are a good place for girls to flirt because they are in a more advantageous position than men.
1. The men or boys are either sulking or embarrassed, being dragged there by their mother and can be caught when they are not at their ideal environment so they cannot ruin the whole flirtation, inspite of themselves, with their macho ego trips.
2. They are at a friend's/brother's/cousin's wedding and the usual commitment, finding their ideal hot babe (that would also please mamma) issues are running through their mind so you can catch them off their guard and spare yourself the usual teasing that they do as a pathetic excuse to flirting.
3. The girls are in charge of the game because they are all decked up and hence are prone to be more self confident and all the attention they get from the older woman folk as prospective brides (even though embarrassing) and all the compliments (although not too genuine) gives them a kind of a kick.

Weddings are however not the ideal place to flirt for shy girls and the rest of it.

"....One moment leads to another as time moves on" ...( quite seamlessly till now) ... and then you realize you are now soon going to be capable of saying phrases that start with " 19 years back I was..." It is after all time over which we have no control but having seen twenty summers must be quite important if not a big transitional point.

Got to go dancing.

I have forgoten to dance. That was I think officially the last dance I have been to! Ok YOU! (you know who you are. I don't have that many readers yet....the fan club can wait) We have to go dancing! Not so easy in this Grand city of mine, is it? Need to work for it ie start bothering and convincing some lame friends to go dancing!

Don't exactly want to sing in THIS rain!

This rain is really depressing. There, its a statement. I have no intention of describing it or explaining why it is depressing. Its cold and wet, you do the math.
Well inspite of the depressing state of affairs I managed to watch "Harry potter and the goblet of fire", it was a mother-daughter date. Yes, I know "awwwww how cute". yeah yeah....
Getting to the point, this is the best potter movie yet. BLOODY brilliant. Does justice to the book and is magnificent on screen.
And? you would think that after yesterday's classy article on lethargy today would have dawned with a new found enthusiasm to catch up and repent for the past indulgences. Well, NO! Apparently its quite complicated to get out of the club. It is after all deluxe. It just needs some phasing out. :)

The lazy-ass deluxe club

Many are no doubt a part of the lazy ass club....bumming off from work, procastinating, finding lame excuses to justify it all ....but when you are in the lazy-ass Deluxe club the special package is that you can do all this undetected. Yes, to the outside world you are doing your things, hard at work (well...at least AT work), ...doing credible things. And the added attraction of the membership of this club is that you will breeze through all your work. Your bumming off is not only undetected but there is also a protection clause, thanks to which you also get due credit and quite often some laurels also. Wait now...this cannot be fair, can it? There is ALWAYS a catch. Now if you read the small letters in the membership form carefully you will find the catch. Which is that you will have to stay put in the place where you are.....just breeze through your work and a million other activities from Yoga to charity work ...but you can never excel.
Not such a pretty picture anymore, is it? Time to air some dirty laundry.......and move ass...BIG TIME......