The rubber band that I held between the index and middle finger of my right hand brought in a thought. Can marriages be made stronger if gold rings are replaced with rubber rings? Gold is hard. To get it into a shape of one's choice, one has to put it through fire and hammer. On the other hand, the application of a light force changes the shape of a rubber band. Isn't flexibility the key for longevity of marriages. Rubber bands possess flexibility in ample quantities. So, people should throw away those gold rings and get some rubber bands. Let the thought of littering not worry you when you throw away the gold rings. I will take care of collecting the gold rings and disposing them efficiently.
I don't like to sit through meetings. I used to start meddling with my mobile when the meeting got tiresome. But now, I have been able to control my urge to … No! That's not true. Now, I have no choice but to keep my mobile away during meetings. But I am allowed to keep a notebook and pen with me. So I indulge in poetry when a meeting gets tiresome. The following lines emerged during one such tiresome moment.
To travel to the moon
One has to start from the earth
Getting out of the planet is a challenge
What with the planet grabbing you
And pulling you down to it
But if you let a rocket
Push out fire and smoke
From its hot butt
You might be able to get off
So, I let the rocket
That contained me
Push fire and smoke
From its fiery bottom
Sure enough
We started our journey heavenwards
As the rocket and I got to the atmosphere's edge
I started chanting
"Escape, escape, escape, escape"
My humble attempt at encouraging
The Rocket to achieve its escape velocity
As it fought the gravitational force
It shuddered and struggled
My worried mind turned spiritual and prayed
I was worried by the possibility
Of the rocket breaking into bits
Too small for even bacteria to byte into
But today was not that day
For the force was with me
We were now floating through space
The rocket and I were now
En route to the Moon
The car sped towards the school. Queensryche's Operation Mindcrime gave us good company. Suddenly, I heard my son laugh. I asked "what?" He said "this is a good song to play today." I did not understand his words. Once again, I asked "what" but this time I followed it with a "why". He responded "Today's Valentine's day but listen to the lyrics of song." I did not fail to notice the sarcasm that laced his words. I listened to Geoff Tate sing and wail passionately for a few minutes before he came back to the lines under the scanner.
I don't believe in love
I never have, I never will
I don't believe in love
It's never worth the pain that you feel
He asked if I had planned this occurrence. I assured him that it was only a coincidence.
Later, as I was having my breakfast, I was shocked to find two small blobs of pongal fly past my ears. They fell on the table close to my plate. I looked up and saw the boy who possessed the name of an ancient sage walk by. He was walking towards the wash area of the dining hall. The plate he had used to have the breakfast was swinging in his left hand. I called out his name but he did not respond. The boy was lost in his thoughts and there was no point in trying to drag him out of his train of thought. Later that day, I was walking through the campus when I found the same boy walking with another boy towards me. He was deeply involved in a monologue and the other boy shook his head at intervals. As I approached the duo I was distracted by a noise. It turned out to be the noise made by a geometry box striking the ground. When I turned my attention back to the way ahead, I found the boy with the sage's name directly in front of me. I was only a few feet away from crashing into him. He was oblivious of my existence and continued his monologue with the other boy. To avoid an embarrassing situation, I jumped out of the way. The boy took no notice of me as he walked past me. I patted on my body to ensure that I had not become a blade of grass. I stared at the receding figures of the two boys for a few seconds before shaking my head and moving on.
The busy weekend arrived finally. Unlike the other busy weekends, the busy-ness of weekends was not related to business. So, I looked forward to it. But work had the nasty habit of getting into one's life uninvited. So, a few hours of my Saturday evening was snatched by Excel sheets. Early next morning, I converted the sheets into a pdf file and sent it to the person who controlled the official id of the organization. Usually, I would send her through WhatsApp that I had sent her a mail that she had to send out through the official id. But that day was not for work and so I forgot to ping her on WhatsApp. The day passed pleasantly. I forgot to carry my laptop and as a result I had to limit work to typing out a few lines on Google Keep on my mobile. I got back home at 7 PM and at 7:30 PM I realized that I had not informed my colleague about the mail. I called her. She said she was outside the whole day and had not checked the mail. I requested her to send the mail and ended the call. Two minutes later, she called back and said "Thanks for calling. I was stuck with an who has been talking non-stop for the last 15 minutes. Usually, my mother-in-law comes to my rescue but today even she did not come to help. Your official call turned out to be a good reason for me to leave. I will send out the mail in five minutes".
2/2/22, 22:24: Missed the momentous minute of the century by 2 minutes. My son tells me that the minute was truly momentous as 2/2/22 is a 2sday.
The history teacher was talking about the wonders of Mahabalipuram. He started off by saying that the place should not be referred to as Mahabalipuram but should be called Mamallapuram. He was talking about one of the kings, Narasimhavarman II, who contributed greatly to the construction of the structures in Mamallapuram. The teacher said that Narasimhavarman II was also known by the name Raja Simha. He went on to translate this name to English "Raja stands for king and Simha means Lion". Almost immediately one of the voices from the class quipped "Oh! Lion King".
I rolled a piece of idli in the sambar on my plate and placed it on my tongue. I did not feel entirely satisfied with the taste of the combination. I attempted to distract myself by looking around. At the far end of the room, I saw three girls walking towards a table holding their plates of idle and sambar in their hand. As they passed a window, their silhouette reminded me of a scene from my past. I searched the alleys of my memory to identify it. I found it in a few seconds. It was the scene from Lion King wherein Simba, Timon and Pumbaa walked with the moon behind them singing "Hakuna Matata".
I am obsessed with King Buffalo's The Burden of Restlessness. Every morning, I wake up wishing I had slept for a few more hours. Only a spin of the album helps settle my nerves for the day. I spend the rest of the day humming the tunes. The album is definitely one of the best I have heard in a long time. The song structures are great. The musicianship is trance-worthy. The lyrics stay in my head long after I have stopped listening to the song. The brilliant opener 'Burning' has the lines.
Another year lost in the wasteland
Another day drowns in dust
Another one dead in the wasteland
Those lines could describe almost anyone's life, especially those who have crossed the golden age of thirty. The next song, Hebatation, contains another set of inspiring line.
25 and all I find are clever ways to hide
Every night I dream a million different ways for me to die
Every night I close my eyes
I lie awake and try to pacify a listless mind
Nothing's changed at 35
Still every night I dream a million different ways for me to die
She sat on the other side of the table looking at her mobile. As is the case with smart phone users, her index finger moved up and down the screen. Suddenly she looked up and asked "Does this Feb have 28 days?" I did not understand her question and could only respond "What?" She repeated her question "Does this February have 28 days?" I felt confused and stuttered "Doesn't all the Februaries have 28 days?" It was her turn to be confused. She stared at me for a moment before going back to meddling with her phone.
As I write these lines, a colleague walks in announcing loudly "Basheer says that time is only in Allah's hands". I had a clever response which could not escape the tip of my tongue as another colleague on a call sush-ed us menacingly. Now I have no choice but to write those words here.
Basheer says that time is only in Allah's hands
Maybe true but I don't agree completely
For I believe that time is only in our hands
Especially when one wears a wrist watch
I heard someone say that someone else wanted to learn the violin. I was never interested in learning to play the violin for I prefer peace and would like to maintain a good distance from violins.
She intended to meddle with the fiddle
The thought struck her the day she bought a kettle
And placed it on the burner to check its mettle
When the water was hot enough, bubble rose in its middle
That's when she announced "I shall buy a fiddle
And fiddle with it a little"
So she ran to the shop with a golden apple
The fiddle seller fingered the apple and let out a whistle
He inquired "Where did you find this fine sample"
She ignored him. Instead, picked a fiddle and asked "Is this brittle?"
"No, no! Its fit as a fiddle".
"Obviously! Is this not a fiddle?"
"Obviously! It is a fiddle. A fiddle that is fit as a fiddle."
She walked out of the shop with the fiddle.
Leaving the shopkeeper inspecting the golden apple.
She let the sun shine of the fiddle
And wondered "Will playing a fiddle be diffle?"
Sleep continues to elude me. I went to bed by 10:15 PM and slept almost immediately. When I woke up I was surrounded by darkness. I tried to go back to sleep but could not. I got up and checked the time. It was 1 AM. I felt frustration shoot through me. I had only slept for two and a half hours. I went back to bed and tried to go to sleep. At 4 AM, I gave up. I got up, put on my headphone and started listening to 'The Burden of Restlessness'. An hour later, I sat in front of the laptop. I have plenty of shit to work on and these lines to write.
I hate the ringing of my mobile phone. It startles me off my train of thoughts and at most times, I don't even know the caller. I find it difficult to converse with people I know over the phone. So, why would I even bother to accept calls from unknown persons? Truecaller's identification of the caller has helped me decide if I should pick a call or not. It announces the name of the caller and most times, the name is announced in a red box with the helpful words 'spam' or 'junk' written underneath. So, I keep my mobile on silent and let Truecaller inform me who the caller is when I switch on the phone, which happens once every 3.5 minutes.
Last evening, I missed a call from a person whose name was within the Truecaller blue box. So I realized it might not be a spam caller. The name seemed to have been picked from the person's Aadhar card. It had a first name and last name too. The first name was a long one and the second was even longer. The first name gave away the person's ethnicity and the second sealed it. I realized that this could be a call from one of those distant relatives who suddenly realizing my existence would call me. I wondered if I should call him back but decided not to. Calls from distant relatives were problematic. I would have probably met them twice a few decades back and yet they would expect me to remember them. I would have found it difficult to recognize them visually; recognizing their voice heard from a mobile phone was impossible. During such call I end up spending the first few minutes of the call trying to decipher the owner of the voice at the other end. Sometimes they drop in a clue but there have been a few instances when I have gone through a whole five minute call without identifying the person. So I decided to not call back.
An hour later, I realized the person had called me back. Now, I had no choice but to call him back. The person answered the call. The next 30 seconds were spent in both of us saying "hello", "can you hear me?" and "yes, I can hear you". Finally, when both of us settled on the code 'yes, I can hear you' he continued by introducing himself. His name was the same as the one Truecaller displayed. He continued by saying that he is from my hometown. Immediately, I searched the names database in my head for the name. I found fifteen matches. The name was a favorite for Malayelees. I had no choice but to say "Oh! Is it?" Though I had no idea what my response meant, he was satisfied by it and continued. "I saw you at your workplace and thought you look like _______ etta. I checked and found that your last name is etta's name. So, I got your number." I did not know how to respond and so said "Oh! Is it?" As I have aged, I have started looking like my father. This has become a big discomfort for the following reason. I have an image of my father but my actions at most times does not fit into that image. So I find it odd when I see someone who looks like my father behaving like me, especially when I see my video feed during Google Meet and Zoom calls. This incident has taken this similarity from the disturbing level to the eerie level. People are able to track me just by looking at me. I think I have to visit a plastic surgeon.
