Word a day.

With age and a relatively mature endocrine system ( cos my pimples would have me believe otherwise) I find I am pretty positive person. In comparison to my teen years when I was a cynical, know-it-all (thank you Ma for tolerating me without any bloodshed) I am Mary Poppins herself. In fact I find I slowly drift away from people who are constantly negative.

And this word a day I have been getting this week has inspired me to start learning Spanish since it looks like the biggest buzz kill of them all is the English language itself

hircine - Of or relating to a goat, having a strong odor, lustful; lewd.
porcine- Of or related to swine, piggish: greedy; sloppy; boorish.
anserine - Of or relating to a goose. stupid; silly.
bovine - Of or relating to cattle, especially a cow, dull; sluggish; stupid.


What is this asinine need to take the perceived negative in all animals and then use it to describe people? Oh ... Oops.

Ironic?

The SlutWalks was started in Canada to protest against a comment by a police officer about how women should dress to avoid attack. There is to be a Slut Walk in Delhi at the end of July.

For me the issue is important. There should be very clear demarcation about where the responsibility lies in case of any crime against women. This is not just about what she wears but also about how a woman behaves. For me it is about being allowed to be. To do what I want, when I want , how I want and to not have to factor in how men or anybody else feel about it.

The media attention on this issue in India so far is a little distressing. Instead of highlighting that crimes against women is on the rise and that society needs to take responsibility about how women are treated in our country, the attention has shifted yet again to what women will wear. Ironic? Sad? Frustrating? All of the above?

Articles in media here, here.

He knows too much!!

Me : "I discovered this new show that I really like on Netflix. It is about this guy who is a therapist and it is rather funny. Very insightful"

Hubby : (Looks at the TV where the show is paused) "This one?"

Me : "Wanna watch?" (switching the show to play again)

Hubby : "Ha! I know why you like this show!!"

Me : "Yeah!! I just told you he is a therapist, it is funny and insightful..."

Hubby ( interrupting rudely) : "What, You find this guy hot. That's why you like this show. This is same guy in ....." ( names the other show where I reportedly checked out this guy)

Me : "Whoa!!! Really?? Is it the same guy?" ( Look at the screen closely and then check IMDB) "I think you are right. But that is not why I like the show!!!"

Hubby ( gives me a look ) : "I know all the guys you find cute. "( walks away proudly)


As my husband and I grow together we know each other better, we understand when the other person is sad, happy, what the other person finds funny, likes for breakfast and so on and so forth. But now I think he might know too much!!!!

Note to self - stop using so many exclamation marks!! Maybe large bold capital letters or red to indicate emphasis. OR WILL THAT be even more ANNOYING!!!

Right Now

It a beautiful sunny afternoon. It was only two weeks ago that I could not believe my good fortune on being able to sit outside in the sun on a weekday. And two weeks later I am sitting indoors in front of a book or a laptop on a bright sunny afternoon. The AHA moment that I got when I quit job has started fading and I am getting plagued with same fear and doubts that I have had for all my life.

I find myself pouncing at all examples of people who had taken some time off and then found their way back. I revisit my decision and think about if I could have somehow stayed at that job a little while longer. I reassure myself and set internal deadlines.

And today after a few days of relative fogginess it hit me that this was what got me where I am in the first place. What do I want to do in life is a very big question. But what do I want to do NOW is not. Yet I seldom ask myself that and fewer times follow through.

Here, present, right now what do I want? Our lives are full of tales of the caution for the people who don't plan for the future. Life lessons not learnt not first hand but handed down like a sacred text.

If I did not know any of these lessons, if I knew nobody else who quit their job, if I knew nobody who liked chocolate, what would I want to do?

And to start with what would I want to do right now with no thought to the future. For I am sure the secret to the bigger question lies in an answer to that.

Thank you Shubha for a related thought.

I wrote this a week back and almost didnt post it. This morning I got up again with doubts and anxiety and when I read this I feel some relative clarity come back into my thoughts...

More empty spaces

Since I am still working on delivering on my promises to self to write more in this blog, I decided to go ahead and open another space that I could neglect. I opened a blog space to update stuff about food, garden and other random things I do in my life.
So please visit
http://bhooklagihai.blogspot.com/

Blue and Black Thumb

Three years ago I packed all my bags and moved all the across the vast land mass of the United States of America from Portland, Oregon to New Jersey. Portland the city of roses has a milder winter full of rains and a summer blessed with long sunny days, being farther away from the equator. New Jersey on the other hand has relatively cold winters with snowfall that has increased every passing winter, followed by a rainy spring, a short fleeting summer, a surprisingly cold fall and then quickly back to the increased snow that I was talking about. So needless to add that the very summer I got here I decided to utilize the whole 4 and half months of warm weather we get to start gardening

Gardening is a pastime of the retired, people who enjoy a slower pace. You spend long hours out in the sun pottering with plants, while your pretty neighbour lady in a summery frock picnics in the lawn and waves to you. The plants which you picked after much consideration thrive under all your attention. And in return for all these sunny days, your house is full of fresh produce and fragrant beautiful cut flowers.

Or so they would have you believe. After three long seasons (before anyone jumps to any conclusions they were long only in my head the sunshine was beautiful but very brief), the one thing I have learnt is that whoever came up with gardening or maybe it was the maker of those weirdly expensive gardening gloves I see all over the place (24.99 for gloves that I am going to stick in mud, I don't think so) was very, very good at PR.

Things you should know when you start:

- When the seed company guarantees that a seed will work, if you provide not too much or too little water, not too much or too little sunshine, no squirrels (I hate squirrels but that is an another entry), no birds, the appropriate nutrients in the appropriate quantity, the appropriate drainage, the correct container size... And no they will not put all that on the back of the packet because that would leave less place for the bold 100 % guarantee that they like to display there.

- Squirrels/birds do not like the hedge plants that were mass produced by Lowe's and planted by your apartment complex a couple of feet away from the Thai basil plant that you have grown from seed. They like your 4 class teacher know what to get at to make you cry. To my 4 class teacher - thank god you had to go on long vacation half way through that year. I would never have made it without that break. I never asked why you went away because I was just so glad to be rid of you and thought I would jinx it if asked too many questions.

- If you water your plants thoroughly before a vacation it will rain all the time you are not there and you will come back to water clogged plants. If your do not water your plants there will be a heat wave that will break records and your heart.

- You will never remember what you planted what seed no matter how good your memory is. All containers with seeds must be labeled. Since I have always been told I have a mind like a sieve I am not sure why I made that mistake.

- It is very important to pick produce at the right time. That is when they taste the best and provide maximum nutrition. What is the right time to pick produce? - The week you were working late in office with takeout Greek food or the week you went for the vacation that you planned 6 months ago. Those two weeks and the week you were down with flu.

- Keeping your seedlings in the "slightly" warm oven to accelerate growth is an accident waiting to happen.

- Despite twisted backs, chipped nails, grazed knees I keep hearing about tennis elbows, golf elbows, runners' knee and not one whisper about any gardening related injuries. They are very real. Be careful and please garden while making loud noises about how hard it is with a considerate husband within earshot.

- Visit nurseries after steeling yourself against plants that will be twice the size of your plant and also will have been grown organically from an heirloom seed passed down for generations in the family of the nursery owner. Your little plant may have taken more of your time and effort and maybe from a seed that you picked in a catalogue but at least it costs more money than it would to buy this plant (wait that doesn't sound right).

Despite all this gardening is a very rewarding hobby and first thing I look at every morning are my stunted, overpriced beauties. It is indeed a hobby fit for royalty- you know with all the help they can hire...

Enjoy

All iz well

I got up earlier than usual this morning with a smile on my lips. It is a Sunday with crisp, cold spring air that helped drive away any remaining sleep from my eyes. So I checked my plants, which are flourishing courtesy all this attention they are getting, made an aromatic cup of coffee and sat down with my laptop.
Read Ratan Tata's interview which upset me a little since here is a man to be respected speaking with little regard for work life balance. The article has some eye catching headline about Mukesh Ambani but what caught my attention was Ratan Tata's views on calling meetings at the end of the day. I got a little mad and sat down and put my anger down on paper. But in doing so lost my anger. I feel a little of my peace come back to me these last weeks. So I do not want to send out judgement and opinion into the world this early in the day.
Instead here is a picture of some spinach and lettuce from my patio full of pots. The lettuce was lovely in a salad yesterday.

A Year Wiser

It has been a crazy year. I have grown a year older, hopefully also a year wiser. I have found it difficult to write this past year. I have had much less time to myself. But the real reason was the place I found myself in life.

Writing for me, even when I write jokes involves a moment of introspection. That is why writing makes me just a little calmer, just a little happier. The process gives me an excuse to collect my thoughts and look at life. Even if it just to pick something from my life to write about.

This past year however my life could not stand up to any introspection. I found myself in a job I did not enjoy at the end of commute that took time away from anything else which would have made the job worthwhile. I have been angry, frustrated and defeated. I have thought about what I should do rather than what I want and in doing so what I want has become hazier and hazier. I have been trying to fit in and have failed miserably.

A week ago, I finally quit my well paying job. I am unemployed yet I feel strangely free. I am just beginning to feel like myself again. I still panic every other day and feel a flood of fear and confusion. All my thoughts are clouded once again with the immediate. But once the first wave of fear has subsided, all the reasons why I am here come back. I have no idea what I am going to do next but in finding myself here I feel more alive than I have felt in a long time. My life can once again stand up to some examination and that alone is a step forward.

Today

It is one of those days. I have been having more and more of these.

I have the day off. The day stretches ahead with no plans, no to-dos, nothing to be accomplished, no place to be, nobody to meet, nothing to enjoy. Just time, with all of its possibilities. No running away from my thoughts. No filling the day with repeats of yesterday. A blank slate - at least for the day.

I have to unlearn so much to finally start learning again.

Teen Saal Baad

After three years of marriage, the husband and I may not finish each others sentences but have gotten to know each other very very well. Once in while this level of comfort is rather amusing.

For example I am notoriously clumsy. I am not sure how but in a matter of seconds I can wreak havoc. To a stranger the resulting damage would seem quite disproportionate to what caused the accident and the whole thing would look like a freak accident. But I know better than to write off any accident that I am a part of as a freak one.

This morning I was in the kitchen making an omelette and husband was on the phone with his father making small talk. At one point I turned around to find that the kitchen towel that was lying on the counter had caught fire and was burning at a rather alarming rate. After spending a few more seconds panicking and being useless I finally picked it up and dropped it on the very combustible floor mat.

The fire continued to burn and now had begun to blacken floor mat. I now tried to put the fire out with some oily cloth hand mittens ( because I am like that). While I was busy making a smoky mess in the kitchen, I noticed the husband had walked over to kitchen to stare at what I was doing with a amused grin on his face. And without interrupting the conversation about weather and car trouble gestured that I should drop the burning towel on the floor instead of the mat.

Together we managed to put the fire out. After which the husband ( still on the phone) wet the embers of the burning cloth to prevent all further mishaps and cleaned up the kitchen floor.

And apart from a wisecrack much later ( if you knew him you would know that though he is a good man, he cannot hold wisecracks in) there was no other exchange about what had happened.

I will Ramble now

Once blogging crept into my life I have found it to be a rather hard thing to let go. I started blogging for me and the point was to just write. I worked from home and suffered from limited human interaction. The blogging helped. The internet helped my new imaginary friend flourish.

However, what is rather tiresome is that despite my blog life not being paramount to me it is always there at the back of my mind. So as the months passed by without a single written word this blog just became an item in my to do list that remains unchecked. What was meant to be relaxing and a kind of relief has become a task. To offset this and make blogging fun again I have decided to ramble more and write less. If all that sounded to you like an excuse for poor writing, mediocre anecdotes, more self absorption - pat yourself on the back, you are bang on target because that is exactly what it is.

Reading blogs on the other hand is far more relaxing, a simple task with ample rewards. When I discover a new blog that I like I feel the same pleasure I feel when I accidently find a good book without a recommendation, a random act that resulted in a pleasurable discovery. Small pleasures when unexpected are the best.

As much as I like all the blogs in my reader list, a little weariness sets in. Reminiscent of late last year when after a month Graham Greene and E M Forster ( another to do list I was checking off) it was decided that it would be best if I limited my reading to books that did not pan 3 months forward in time when an overseas trip was mentioned. One with kitchen appliances that are operate at button press, one where there is less fan waving, meaningful glances and more undressing when a love scene arrives.

So after about a year of pretty much a constant reading list give or take a few I have decided to expand. Not as important as the inorganic growth of Google who seems to be bursting at the seams. (Also those who knew that inorganic growth meant growth by acquisition more back patting but please let’s reign in the gloating if you don't mind, husband ... uhh I mean people.)

After spending the last week poring over the world wide web, ok the last few days, oh all right a few hours this morning. Fine so I pretty much scanned some lists on my favourite subjects and added them to my reading list.

Some fashion blogs since I now work in the city and need to take it up a notch with the clothes. By which of course I mean I own formal pants with seams intact and I try not to use layering to hide food stains.

1. DC goodwill fashion blog

2. The Budget Fashionista

Travel blogs

1. Abby's blog

Random

The Floating Sheep

I am still working on my list. On a sunny beautiful day, I have the good fortune of being ill enough to have a valid excuse for not being out but not so ill that I cannot spend the after reading, and eating. Morning went past with uttapams and watching Mutalik's face being blackened. I will now make some groaning noises and take a nap and that should be just right for waking up for the batch of egg-less cookies my husband is working on. Always about the small small pleasures.