Diary - Day 41

There's an insect crawling on my desk
It could be one of those outcasts from its sect
For only idiotic ones set out at a winter's dusk
It nevertheless is slithering into the warm of my monitor's shadow

It must have known different fabrics of warmth.
One could be stifling, another cuddly.
Only the penchant for an unknown warmth
must have gnawed its brain to set out early.

As absurd it is as to think of the insect as smart
but knowing a different level of smartness exists out there
makes it smart indeed. For an insect seeking a
new height of smartness, the warmth it left behind with the peers is surely a tether. 

Diary - Day 39

The entire essence, and hence effort of this diary project has been to keep it as impersonal with respect to my daily happenings as possible. But what has proved difficult is to try and squeeze in time consistently, day after day, to think about the abstract and give it the shape of an entry here. Or maybe, this is what I actually wanted when I dreamt of running a diary project. To delve into the daily torrent of thoughts, think about why I am thinking what I am thinking/feeling and understand myself better. This's just a tool that's expected to help me (as I explained to Sandeep) to make mistakes, put tongue in cheek whenever I realize I made mistakes, learn from them and hone my craft.

This thought of evading the price of staying in IT has become recurrent now. Perhaps, it'd be appropriate to say that it's a 'daily occurrence' now. I dream of things I could do, decently enough, to vouch myself a day job at doing them. I could think of nothing other than speaking and writing. My immediate and direct senior in the Vemuganti's lineage has been a salesman for more than 3 decades now. I may have inadvertently rubbed off some persuasive skills from looking at him persuading people do what they don't actually want to do. Now the very same persuasiveness wins my bread and beer.

Another thing I can (dare I say) consider to hunt a day job for in is Writing. This stint at IT is like a flower pot cracker for me. It's dazzlingly bright for as long as it can go on - so bright that it almost blinds my vision. But we all do know that it has a short life, don't we? So before the flower pot goes off in a disappointing fashion, I should figure out how I could make writing a long-lasting and also a sufficiently bright cracker for me so that I'd while away my time here in its just-enough brightness but for long enough.

Diary - Day 36

I have not really been a lucky person. At least I don't consider myself so. But I've been lucky in one aspect. At every juncture of my life, things have asserted themselves so that I don't lose sight of what's needed of me.

I am writing this today - Friday at 2.30 pm. 3 hours to call it a week. This week has been a bitter one comparatively. Got into a few tiffs (very unlike me), felt pangs of anxiety for a day like I used to feel back in 2014 and got to see the weak side of my father.

Myself and Vikranth have agreed on one thing recently about Indian fathers and the dominantly patriarchal society Indians live in and perpetuate. Coming to think of it, I have had a feeling that I always have my father as my support system when I weather through rocky times.  Maybe, it's about time my father saw me as a grownup compatriot of the Vemugantis, not merely as a son. And he's seeing it that way. This perhaps has urged him to talk to me about his fears, last night over phone.

I played it cool when I was listening to him but it sent shivers down my spine. Those are fears every man would have but like I said somewhere up there, it's my father and it's me thinking he is too brave to feel fear. It has only been recently that I made peace with seeing my parents as not just my parents but distinct individuals with their own sets of weaknesses, fears, strengths, desires and delusions. That is me coming to realize their individual existence. But my father allowing me a glimpse into his fears totally caught me unprepared.

I (or rather we, the Indian kids) am not really used to see the weak side of the father. For me, he has always been a rock solid anchor to whom I could turn, in times of chaos and indecisiveness.

What's undeniable is he's ageing, he's ageing fast and he's ageing right in front of my eyes. And like ageing naturally does, it is weakening him - physically and mentally.

And it's for me to man up and accept it. To view him as a middle-aged man who's made his fair share of cabbage in his day. 

Diary - Day 35

There was a strange truancy of nervousness when I took the stairs to reach home last night around 1 AM. It didn't take me long enough to realize that the comfort was because of knowing I'd open the door to no one. Mom has gone away to be part of a distant cousin's wedding festivities. What is it I've got with being around people and feeling irked? Is it because of the constant let-down they are capable of or is it plain intolerance for discord between my self and theirs?

I must admit I have a thing for women of astounding beauty. Okay, let me say, Elegance. No amount of reading, or discourse or growing up can completely rid me off the feeling that beautiful is good. It's not wrong but it ain't right either. Okay, it's wrong. I guess it's one of my idiosyncrasies. Probably this is what is forgiving thyself. I am coming to grips with the fact that I can't help but relish the elegance from afar. She doesn't need to be in flesh and bone. I can equally take delight in a beautiful woman's portrait. I said beautiful - doesn't necessarily imply succulent or voluptuous or something of that sorts (Hey you New Age Feminazis, you got me there!). It is some sight to watch a woman who can carry herself effortlessly.

So this is about my hatred for keeping company and liking for things of beauty, err..elegance.  

Diary - Day 34

I tasted a bite of New Age Feminism yesterday in the gym.

There were 5 treadmills among which one was unoccupied when I entered the gym. I stepped in, walked towards the one treadmill. A middle-aged, visibly capricious lady sprang up from behind a Pilates ball and asked that she'd take the treadmill instead (it works on a first-come-first-serve basis with treadmills at the gym).

I said okay but pointed out the she'd spend more than permissible time on treadmill (which is 15-20 minutes) during peak hours. She retorted by dragging a friend of hers into the argument by a seeking a validation from her friend that she never overran on a treadmill. I tried to play down the altercation by saying, "I don't have to lie to you, madam. I've seen you going on about 45 minutes and over, many a time" and walked into the weights section.

Some good 30-35 minutes passed and this lady got off the treadmill. Mind you, 30-35 minutes. She walked up to the farthermost corner of the gym where I was working out. She wagged her right hand index finger at me threateningly and said,"Learn how to talk to women first."

This was after I kept addressing her as madam all the while. I spoke only in English - not to give scope for any possible misinterpretations.

I shot back saying,"madam, maybe you need to know how to talk to human beings first before you advise me on learning how to talk to women," and went ahead with my workout.

My back could feel the piercing of virtual arrows she shot while she stood there fuming (probably plotting another gibe at me) as I went on with my workout.

Diary - Day 32

21st November, 2016. 11.46 pm. At work station. If I am fortunate to be alive and sound in mind for few decades from now, I will surely look back at this time, reminiscing these grim days and nights spent in this oddly spacious cubicle with a queer sense of nostalgia.

I get this feeling once in a while. It strikes me when I find myself gazing through the things around me and reel back in reverie. It feels like every travel I make in my life, I leave something behind. Although how much I may hate being in a place during my stay there, I guess I develop a sense of familiarity. That familiarity is more often than not irksome - but only when people are involved (aren't they involved almost always?).

A sense of being in a physical location, devoid of human intervention, allows me to absorb its setting & the associated ambience. I make up stories in my head wherein I imagine montages of events that could be set aptly against such ambiences and so forth. That's all just fantasising parts of stories I wish to write if I ever turn to be a novelist one day.

So some interesting thoughts I get during such times, I jot down and I move on - from such places - further in my life. Literally and figuratively. But what intrigues me is the slow kicking-in of that queer nostalgia when I reminisce about the places left behind.

For instance, I don't like being here right now; with a designation and the attached nonsense of it. But the pensiveness I indulge in while I am here will trigger a later day's nostalgia. 

Diary - Day 29

We live in a time of indifference, apathy and self-indulgence. The ethos of our times has been driven home, quite strikingly, every now & then through thoughtful art, artists, thinkers and other eminent people of the world. It has only been in such point-making instances the increasing indifference of our times glare into my face. As the time passes, its radiance slowly diminishes and settles into an unremarkable doctrine we all quite sporadically grapple with.

There was a human moment this morning, which put me to shame for my shard of indifference and self-indulgence. I went to the cafe after the morning workout. I order my regular, medium-khadak chai (see, obsessed with details of what I did; you're welcome) and opened a QoA based social networking site on the phone.

Charging myself guilty of nasty, pre-defecation reading material, I was reading about a man's sexual encounters he's had through a dating app. Slurping my tea and sucking pleasure from reading a stranger's sexual escapades. That's when a destitute widow walked into the cafe with her under-provided children. Them entering the cafe was registered in my head, only semi-consciously though. Because, consciously I was busy devouring some early morning erotic literature.

There, within a distance of mere 1.5 meters, were two existences - one, falling short of means to provide for her children, counting the coins she has and comparing the prices of stale snacks put up on display; and another, me, feeding on something that's a supply for my free time and thought.

And the misery is, all this didn't strike me for as long as 20 minutes. Only a rerun of happenings in the head and adding a pinch of perspective here and there, revealed to me my abominable indulgence.

I could have bought her something to feed her children - but the pessimist inside me questions about the inadequacy of my service, wondering about their lunch, dinner and rest of the meals until they find some means to be self-sufficient or until they cease to exist. But I can't forgive myself showing this as an excuse to not by them the breakfast I should have bought.

Sure, there are people who are trying within their own rights to defeat and keep the three demonic nouns (ones I mentioned in the beginning) confined to dictionary. Salute to them for trying to do something for which I am plainly not human enough to try doing. But the times we live in are pernicious and sorry but are we doomed.  

Diary - Day 28

Most of the times, I have consciously refrained from writing about any societal happenings on this blog. There have been exceptions, but very few. I too have been the victim of restlessness as currency began eluding common man's reach on November 8th.

Demonetisation

Intents of policies are always noble. Execution is the game spoiler usually. Without much rhetoric, I will talk about my take on the recent demonetisation carried out by GoI.

India has less than 5% of its people who declare their incomes and hence, pay taxes for the same. Being an agricultural country predominantly and farmers & allied workers constituting as much as 56% of the entire country's population, India holds 2nd rank in the global contribution to agricultural output. All these numbers are just to bring in a perspective that agricultural income is not taxed in the country and so is its workforce (largely).

It's no rocket science that more the cashless transactions (if and wherever possible), less the unaccountable money (we call it 'black money' dearly). Use of cashless transactions is as high as 93% , quite predictably, in Belgium, followed by other developed nations like France, Canada, UK, Sweden and Australia, in that order (with difference in percentage between no two countries going over 2%). Coming to India, unsurprisingly, it is as low as 11%. The penetration of cashless transactions isn't going at a great rate either - merely at 0.43% (approx).

As I am scribbling this down, I coincidentally receive a text that goes like "Go Cash-free. Use code XYZ123 to get Rs. 100 cashback before Nov 25th. T&C Apply" from a wallet services provider whose services I use quite infrequently.

Now if mere 11% of the entire populace are going cashless, and in good faither, let's assume the 11% are alleviated from the perils of the cash crunch since Nov 8th - what about the 89% rest? They go all cash for their daily tenders and kaboom! their lives have come to a standstill. Filled with dead air.

I am not questioning the govt's intent behind the alleged masterstroke-ish move. Execution should have been more farsighted, thoughtful and planned.

Now when I say thoughtful, I've got a thing or two to add to the above lines. To drive the country's cash-based-people aka the socioeconomically & technologically naivete masses on the path of cashless transactions, it comes back to educating them, empowering them with tools, leveraging technology to help them go cashless. It's important to drive increasing number of people in the direction of going cashless while the transition is not uncalled for, smooth and does not create the chaos as we experience today. I am saying this because only a small fragment of people who are socioeconomically nurtured enough to receive texts like the one I just received are able to go cashless.

Demonetising bigger bills may hinder currency counterfeiting but if it is handicapping the hapless lot of the country on the other side, I am not sure which side must the weighing scale sway towards.

Diary - Day 27

For as long as my memory can take me back in time, I have always longed to be in a place, far from any place I've ever been in all these years. This elusive place has always been in the back of my head, stoked when I read a piece of fiction or watch a movie - wherein one of the characters seems to be in a similar kind of place which could come fairly close to my fancy.

What's interesting is when I look in retrospect, I've actually walked past such places of etherealness but could barely recognise them, for all their etherealness only exists in my head. That could be an unassuming lane with a scenic tea shop at the end of it in a normal, tier-2 city like Jamshedpur or Darjeeling. Maybe, the whole idea behind such dream is to be in such a place that offers an escape from familiarity. To be somewhere where I could just slip a bag on my shoulder and saunter around. Rid of any obligations to be somewhere else and do something that I'd dread to do.

I started watching Black Mirror yesterday and 3rd episode in the 1st season held my breath. For as sweet as memories seem when they are ephemeral in their flashing, their outlasted lingering in our heads will only welcome their twin sister that goes by the name Chaos. This point was exquisitely dealt in that episode. After a point, one desires memories to be erased - like cleansing roads of snow so that the bogey called life could resume its journey.

The next time I pass thru one of such places, I'd stop, fill my lunges with its air and go on. 

Diary - Day 26

Another week has just kicked in, bringing with it newer challenges at work to which I am not really looking forward. But like it happened so far, will happen so forth.

The queerness of my dreams in alarming nowadays. The more I'm coming to grips with reality in full consciousness, the queerer my dreams are getting. It has taken me good days of rational thinking and pathetic days of paranoia to accept the few unassailable things in my life. But equally oddly, my brain acts quite weirdly in formulating my dreams. When I wake up, I feel I am in my body with someone else's brain - which makes me upper lip quiver in cold, terrifying sweat. This feeling almost puts in jeopardy the torrent of experiences and so the learning milked out of them. Only as minutes pass by into the day, the naughty subconscious part of my brain retires into its lobe and the consciousness reappears on the foreground.

I am still thinking on the lines of whether such stark contrast in the functioning of brain's conscious and subconscious is normal or is there a problem that has to be identified and to be dealt with.   

Diary - Day 24

Ate some chocolate cookies. Watched some new TV series. Read some comic strips in the dailies. Working out right now as I'm typing this. Will prolly catch few pints of beer after this.

See you tomorrow. 

Diary - Day 23

Two days of absence again. It's funny how nothing notifiable happens in as many as 50 hours. Or maybe the entire struggle is to keep it as is. Just to keep up is also hard work. Weekend is here and this one's going to be very boring. The old boys of neighbourhood are busy getting their shit together at 200 km from where they belong to. Trips to the cafe will only end in one cup if chai; or maybe two, given the break time takes before we call it another Monday.

A good friend is tying the knot this Sunday and I wish her all the luck on the new ballgame that awaits her debut. On a parting note, she wished I get a good woman to call mine and I wished her wish come true.

I was talking to another person of interest last night. We mused about the chronology of events that we partook in and it was only epiphanic how I always have managed to be at the wrong place at the wrong time. Some call it hard luck. I prefer Irony.

As more number of days being ladled into my bowl of life, I am beginning to see how humanly flawed the people I call my parents are. I stress humanly flawed. My father's a conservative and only time has taught me that. But he only tried to outdo the definition of a father in every way possible for us kids. My mother's just any other mother, who's always got a pinch of suspicion towards any new friends of her children but her eagerness to feed the hungry us trumps all her other worries.

Only it's getting increasingly difficult to be a homeboy at this age. 2016 has been kind to me. Hope 2017 carries the lineage and lands me up in a place that cures my domestic anxieties. 

Diary - Day 20

There are a few timeless gems Fight Club has given us - long after we disregard it as a cult film that only meant something to all of us during growing-up phase. One of them is the "you are not our job,....." one. Only it is getting tough to keep relating to it.

If me saying that 'what I now make is approximately 8 times of what I first made' sounds cocky, I would encourage you to abort reading this. But if you wish to read further, I have a bit of ranting to do.

Money. It is difficult to resist its allure. The more money you make, more steps you climb up on the mountain called Lifestyle and I am afraid it is one of the only few mountains on which descending is tougher than ascending.

You sit in a bar and happen to overhear quite a lot of things the loudmouthed fellas yap on your adjacent table. You realize they live in a different world - one that's way different from yours. If you are a judgmental person like I once was, you'd judge them by their choices, tastes and interests. But every now and then, one of the loudmouthed says a thing that you can totally resonate with. 6 or 7 times out of 10, such things of concord will be about ubiquitous elements like money, greed, recognition and other humanly universal needs and wants.

Probably that is the elixir on which money has thrived. Probably that's what makes it ubiquitous. What I'd choose to do if handed over a bag of million dollars may radically vary from what you would do but you and me are tied together with the wish of being thrown at, a bag of million dollars.

All this rant is more of a prologue to a short I am working on to put up here shortly. Also serves as my daily feed to the diary project for today. 

Diary - Day 19

Guilty yet again, for 2 days of not showing up. Same excuse - work. But what I'm beginning to like is feeling the need to come back here to type out. Day after day. Okay, day after every two days.

I've learnt that a 19 year old girl who happens to be my apartment watchman's cousin from his village died less than a week ago. I remember her as a maid working for our neighbour whose broomstick was nonchalantly generous to go beyond the neighbour's and swept a part of our house's frontal area too.

I've heard some rueful tales about her sorry state, her increasing illness and her losing battle against a bigger disease she had been fighting since birth - poverty. She had moved to Hyderabad in pursuit of moderate education while her stay was guaranteed at the watchman's & she worked in few houses during the evenings to earn some money - from which she had to send some back to her parents in the village. It was probably her way of contributing to her dysfunctional family - damaged because of a farmer being its breadwinner.

Apparently she had battled TB before she lost to it. But the regular intervention of money, or its dearth, had her treatment ineffective because of irregular visits paid to doctors and pharma stores. And she died. On a nondescript evening, she drew her last gasp

Nothing remarkable about her life; or perhaps she wasn't given a shot at life to make it meaningful (I doubt if the word 'meaningful' holds any meaning here) in her own right. She may not have ended up as a Sania Mirza or a Romila Thapar but she could have had the experience of a life lived to a considerable extent. 19 is too sorry a number to call it a long-lived life.

P.S: Contrary to by ruing in my previous post, Tehran Cafe near Secretariat is unscathed and functioning like it has always functioned.  

Diary - Day 17

Recorded absenteeism on Day 16. Was busy working.

Honestly, I am only writing this to divert my mind from the boring documents for sometime. Coming to think of it, it was a conscious decision to chase money and more money (not that I had a bucket of choices either). Well, no complaints in that right. Little did I know that money doesn't necessarily imply comfort. Comfort can be sought in many ways.

Comfort is the cup of chai after a workout session with no need to glance at one of the cafe's wall-clocks. Comfort is nursing your lower back with heavenly stretches after a week long drives bouncing off the potholes. How much have the definitions changed?

Reminded of cafes, learnt that Tehran Cafe near Secretariat was demolished recently - probably to give way to a rather beautified neighbour to the infamous motel that sits in the backdrop. I did not feel a pinch when I learnt the news but coming to think of  it, it feels very sad.

Maybe I will tell my kids one day that Hyderabad used to have a lot of cafes. And Irani chai used to be much more than just another button on the coffee vending machine.

Diary - Day 15

A good old writing master looked squarely into camera's eye once & shared what I consider a timeless piece of writing advice for aspirants. He goes by the name, V S Naipaul. He said, 'consider the necessity of each sentence before you write it down.'

I was grappling with 3-4 possible opening lines for today's entry and I questioned all of their validity. They didn't pass the test. Readers wouldn't have missed anything if they didn't read those lines. This tantalising quality of writing is what has made me its unquenched pursuer. There's this suffocation inside the head to drain out the unwritten, yet failing to find the appropriate vessel that could give this shapeless string of thoughts a presentable shape.

No joy for me comes close to the one I get when I think I have given a decent frame to words that echo like a sentence I want to be echoed like. And when I am fiddling to do exactly that, time becomes a bearable behemoth. It in fact seems like a giant cloud, pleasant of the ones, whose passing nature makes them pleasant.

There are a couple of shorts I am working on, one of which I may put up here. While readers of the blog (if there are still any left) get busy in judging the short, I jaunt dreamily in the pleasure produced by merely producing a short.

Diary: Day 14

Been a day slightly twisted than the recent others. Can't go into details. Too tired to think about anything to write. So this is a small piece. 

See you tomorrow.