Musical Mood: Satrangi Re - Dil Se.

What defines "self"?

Hmmm.. I would say the definition of self is the person we are.. the whole thing. From things beyond our control like the genes we get from our biological parents (The genes themselves are not important, of course.. in this situation I mean.. but their expression matters. For instance, if our genes express a certain hereditary disease or condition, does not having the said disease or condition define who we are?) to things that are in our control like the choices we make (But even that is questionable - are the choices we make really coming from within 'ourselves'.. whatever ourselves may be.. or is there a genetic/environmental part to it?).. every single little bit of our existence is all put together to make 'self'. Even how it is all put together defines our self - is everything neatly arranged category by category or is it all just rolled into a big bundle or is it a 'logical mess' (Oh but wait... if something is 'logical', then is it really a 'mess'??)... every single bit of our life defines our self.

If we keep changing the person we are.. if, with the experience of life that comes with time, we find ourselves changing.. are we really whom we thought we were? If that 'me' that we once held as 'self' changes.. then.. was that really our 'self'? If the 'self' that we are keeps changing, then does that 'self' really exist? Or are we just 'carriers' of the different colours of life.. just little messengers that carry certain words of personality for a while, and then change to another freshly written note?

Of course, all this is assuming there is change in our lives and it is constant, isn't it? What's to say a little soul will not remain that little soul even on his or her deathbed? This is also assuming that every single hue of personality we have once had is not really 'genuine'.. just because it did not last until our death. How do we cross off a personality as 'not genuine'? Who are the judges? It is my belief that every single feeling, every single personality, if truly felt, is genuine.. it does not matter what happens to it afterwards. But my belief may vary with yours. My idea of 'truly felt' may vary with yours.

So where does that leave that little word - self? Is self what we are, or what we once were? Does the definition of self keep moulding into different shapes to fit the different situations that time and life leave us with? Or.. is self running in the fourth dimension, and does not fully reveal its complete meaning until the end of our lives? Can the story of 'self' have a title until it has been completely written?

This brings me to yet another point.. does our 'self' need a personal definition beyond that used for the practicalities of communication? It is but a word in the English language.. need we concern ourselves so much with the semantics of a word, when the feeling - the kind that can never be put into words - of 'it' is there?

In conclusion to this logical mess of a post - I don't know. See where your thoughts take you.. see what mood you are in.. see where you find yourself at peace with saying "enough".. and there, I guess, lies your answer. For now, anyway... until the next time you think about it.

Just a thought... :-)

Musical Mood: Mere Sapno Ki Rani - Aradhana. 

Friend (in an offline message): [Sunrise], where were you all my life?

Me (in a text message): If I was there for you all along in your life, you wouldn't have had the joy of randomly discovering a friend in me. Sending you my love, [Sunrise]........x

Tears...

Musical Mood: One Sweet Day - Mariah Carey feat. Boyz II Men.

... are funny things.

Just when you think you've used up every single tear drop left in you... whoosh. A new rain leaves the clouds of your eyes and moistens your cheeks in ways you never thought possible. And you start wondering when these clouds will lift to reveal the sunshine.

I like tears.

They are difficult, they make you explore depths of your self you would rather leave alone... but in each drop, there is Truth. Maybe it's Truth you already know, or maybe it's Truth you're hiding from yourself, or maybe it's a fresh discovery.. a newer angle to Truth you never thought of. But every time a tear drop leaves your eye, it is carrying a reflection of your soul, of your deepest and simplest Truth.

They are also funny because sometimes, you hide them from the people you love and need the most... the only ones who can wipe those clouds away with the warmth of their love, are the ones you trust the least with your tears.

It's quite sad, really. We should be in a happy world.

Rubber.

Musical Mood: Too Lost in You - Sugababes.


You know you are losing it when, on a gorgeously sunny day (which seems to be becoming a rare occurence in this dump, if the recent rains are anything to go by) when you should be out and about, you prefer to stay indoors and look at a rubber and allow your mind to spin with futile musings on how your life would be if you could simply rub out the parts (of the said life) you wished had never taken place. (And all I could think of to do after that was blink, stare at the rubber again and think, "Oh my God.. what is wrong with me?!"... in a Chandler-in-Friends style.)
The thought seems to be a little hypocritical, doesn't it? If you want to embrace life, then you ought to treat the good times and the bad times with equal... respect (I guess?). You can't just grumble and start wondering about why on Earth there are no rubbers for life when things get frustrating beyond your comprehension.

I guess this is what being cooped up inside four concrete walls (and a window) with nothing cooler than work to do, does to you.

Do you remember me, too?

Musical Mood: Yun Hi Chala - Swades.

Six years ago, when I was on holiday with my parents in Egypt, we used to walk past this young girl selling papyrus artwork on the street every day, as she was next to the hotel we were in. She must have seen the belt I was wearing (which was nothing fancy) one day, as the next day, she asked me if I would give her the belt as a gift to her. The following day, I remembered my belt and gave it to her, and in return, she gave me one of the papyrus paintings for free, which I now proudly display on my bedroom wall. I sometimes wonder if she is still selling them from the same place, or whether she has moved on. I wonder if she still has the belt I gave her.

Or there was one time on the Europe Trip, in Czechoslovakia, when our car crashed into the barrier at the edge of the road when we were going down a curved road. While we were waiting for the police to arrive, I looked across the road and saw a row of three or four white terraced houses. In front of one of the houses was a postman delivering letters to the house, and I saw a girl of about eighteen (I guess?) and a younger girl of about eleven (guessing again…) by the front door. The elder girl must have been saying something teasingly to the postman, because the next thing I saw, he was going after her as she was running away from him. The younger girl seemed amused by all this. I still remember thinking something like, “They are in love.” (Haha… don’t ask!) It was such a simple, innocent little scene, and I remember watching quietly from the other side of the road (I doubt they noticed me), entranced. I wonder if they ever got married, or whether something has happened to them.

Then there was this French middle-aged couple we met at a restaurant in Italy, who just started talking to us. We had fun that evening. I took a photo of my parents and the couple, which we still have on one of the computers. They seemed like a sweet couple. I sometimes wonder where they are now, whether they’ve retired or not. And there was this guy (old or young, I genuinely cannot remember) at a bowling arcade whom we were standing behind in a queue (I was around eight years old then), who won a Dalmatian soft toy from those robotic-claw-game-things, and gave it to me. Looking back on it now, I realise what a sweet gesture it was, but I guess I was too young to understand, then. I wonder who he was (he left the place after that, I think), whether he still remembers giving this soft toy to a little girl behind him in the queue. Then there was the Hot French Guy I once met at a barbeque, who is now back in France. I wonder if he ever realises I still think about his gorgeous blue eyes smiling shyly at me as I tried to put together a comprehensible French sentence.

And then there was this friendly African American (?) lady I met in a supermarket in California, who thought my British accent was "cute" (...sigh!). And this Telugu guy I got talking to in an aeroplane, whom I was jealous of because he got to travel to Japan for his work. I wonder where they are now, what has happened to these lives...
If you look at a person’s life as a little path that they are building for themselves as they go, using whatever materials they come across (and possibly choose) during their journey through life, you will in most cases – if not all - find the most random of bits and pieces littered occasionally across this path. They are very tiny (i.e. directly proportionate to how much of the person’s life at that time was taken up by these random bits and pieces), and they do not by any means play a significant role (or possibly a role at all) in altering the meanderings of the path, but they are what makes the path as it is. They are the smallest, most random of events that have played a role – however small – in the play of the person’s life. And what makes them different, and possibly stand out, from the rest of the path is that they are only ever there once every so often. If these pieces pretty much formed the person’s path, it would no longer be random, would it?

We are always making new acquaintances as we live our lives, of course, and I understand that each acquaintance is different from the other for a multitude of reasons (which I will not go into, lest I wander off-topic…), but it is sometimes possible to see similarities in the type of acquaintances we make. One such example is the ‘random bits and pieces’. It is these ‘random bits and pieces’ I see in my (imaginary) path, when I think about some of the people I have come across in my life so far – the ones I have met, when I least expect to make an acquaintance, whom I know I will ‘never’ (considering the random nature of these acquaintances, I guess it is safe to say never) be seeing again, but whose company I enjoyed, anyway. I think the beautiful thing about these people you come across so randomly, is that it is a one-off. You never pine for anything more than that one meeting, because sometimes it is nice – refreshing, even – to just meet someone randomly and let go of them as easily as you held on to them in the first place, taking back with you just the memories, that give you everything you ever wanted from that acquaintance.

And there is a pleasant feeling in one’s mind, when one (rather whimsically) walks down the path behind them, and thinks about each of the little random bits and pieces that they once held and placed in the path of their lives.

I find myself doing that. I find myself thinking about these random strangers that have touched me – each in their own way – and wondering what they are up to now. I know I will never know for certain, but that’s OK. There seems (to me, anyway…!) to be something… magical, surreal… about knowing that there is a girl somewhere, thinking about the people that are miles away from her, remembering them still, despite the weeks, months and years separating their acquaintance and her thoughts. I sometimes wonder if they do that, too. Maybe not all of them, and most definitely not all of the time, but still... I sometimes wonder if they ever think about the little Indian girl with a hearing aid whom they once met. If I think about such things occasionally, then surely other people do so too?

PS: All the memories are… well, from memory. Therefore the details may be incorrect, but they are as I remember them.

"I feel it in my fingers, I feel it in my toes.."

Musical Mood: Love Is All Around Me - Wet Wet Wet.

There are some moments when you feel that, if you shut your eyes really tightly and wish with the purest and sincerest of hearts, your wish will come true. That what you really, really, really want will appear in front of your eyes if you simply really, really, really wish for it to be there. Whether this act is triggered by faith or by madness (or both), may depend on the individual, but there is in every case a tiny feeling of hope, hidden beneath our layers of logic and rationale, that somehow or the other our wish will come true, however crazy and unlikely it may be for such a thing to happen.

As I opened my bedroom curtains to welcome in the rising sun's light, this was the feeling I was flooded with. There was something about this morning's sunrise, that reminded me so strongly of my early mornings in India. It was the shade of the sun's rays - the rays were the exactly the same shade of soft gold as they were in India.

And all of a sudden, I felt a little tug coming from inside me - the kind of tug you feel when you are longing for something, that leaves you wondering whether there really is a physical response for longing, or whether you are simply imagining things in the madness of the moment. I really wanted to be back on the rooftop back home, back in India.

I wanted the brick-paved street in front of me to morph into the grey tarmac streets surrounding our building back home, and have sand (and occasional blobs of cow dung) bordering the streets on either side, instead of the picture-perfect pavement I was looking at. I wanted to see rickshaws crawling along the tarmac streets, on their way to pick school children up, and women in saris carefully navigating their way around the cow dung, carrying their baskets to put the vegetables that they were on their way to buy in with them. And little children getting ready on the road sides to sell jasmine flowers, to earn money for their family. And men opening their shops behind them. I wanted to see people brushing their teeth on their balconies, and women picking up the dried washing that would be hanging on the clothes line on their rooftop for their husband and children.

Despite seeing the hustle and bustle of getting ready for another new day whichever direction I turned to, being on the rooftop gave me a sense of serene solitude, especially during the early hours of the day. It was during those moments, standing amidst the morning breeze and watching the world around me getting on with its life, that I knew the wind was happily flicking through the pages of my mind, that were more often than not occupied with silly and curious thoughts and dreams of a young girl. (This was perhaps how my love for sunrises began, although I cannot pinpoint the exact moment for sure..)

And - I don't know why today, why at that moment, save for the shade of the sunlight giving me a sense of déjà vu - I felt a desperate urge to go back (in time as well as in terms of space) and re-live those moments again - on the same spot on the rooftop outside my maternal grandparents' flat, in between the washing area and the stairs, overlooking the little 'dump site', that used to be the recipient of many a glass of orange juice that my grandmother used to make me drink (alas, it is no longer there) - with my morning breath and messy hair and innocence.