मौसम

He said he can’t tolerate
Shades of me
As varied as the weather of the city we lived in then
He couldn’t tolerate
The way I had an opinion
Loud enough to break the glass his thinking was entrapped in.

He said I wouldn’t be
What they said was “domestic”
I had ways too unbridled
Too free
Too uncharted
For him to a put a finger to

That my unique was a hindrance
My different was a difference
Both could never meet
And he was happy to let go
And shove another on my face

One who knew how to play the cards well
Knowing to push and pull
Knowing not to be everything to him
Knowing how guys like him detest girls like me

Girls who want to be something
Before becoming someone’s
And for a long time I thought
The fault was in me.

He said he couldn’t tolerate
How I was as moody as the city we lived in
But now I am in a city
With a weather moodier than me
And people seem just as eager to love it.

Namma Belagavi

Its the day 4 of quarantine and I am sitting in my hostel room living a life built from scratch – even the laptop I type this in is brand new – a gift I got for getting into residency in one of the most prestigious colleges of Karnataka.

Do I miss my family back home? Honestly, I don’t. I am 26 now. The thing about this age is that – you have progressed in your life through a vast series of trials and tribulations to not get stuck in one moment forever. You have lost enough people to understand that people are not here to stay. You have felt enough emotions to know that be it happiness or sorrow – each is fleeting. You sit in a crowd and yet your emotions can be separated from the rest.

Its a blessing and a curse.

A blessing because moving on and missing is an art almost rusted and lost to me. A curse because – that innocence is long gone.

It’s raining again – not a new thing I suppose for Belgaumites – yahan bin baat ke mausam ko romance soojhta hai – as someone had introduced me to this place and I am seeing that with my own eyes. Every evening, every once in a while, the sky embraces grey and pours a little bit of love on its inmates. I always thought Rourkela was heaven – but I have been transported into a similar one. Just I have a wider selection of hangouts and I don’t have to wait for a vacation to have zinger box from KFC as there’s one right at the campus entrance 😛 The crowd is cool – just like Manipal, and the campus is huge and green – just like NIT, Rourkela. My hostel like IIT Madras’s M.Tech hostel. My hostel room – well its a paradise.

See my point? Once you grow up, everything you do reminds you of something before. The innocence of feeling things for the first time is gone. Just like the people I talk to here. We are not fresh undergraduates who have come here wide eyed in search of experience – we all have baggage that we have put on the floor for awhile, hoping this place will make us forget it or at least make carrying it easier after three years of residency.

But does that mean I am bitter? No, not at all – I am just better and hope that this betterment continues exponentially in this place. I am excited – I am making so many new friends – a compensation for all the friends I lost once I moved from undergraduate to post graduation. I am shit scared – residency is very tough they say, and I am not sure how it will pan out for me; but I am in love – with this life I have created, the friends I have found, and the moments I am living.

Cheers to three years of what I hope are the best years of my life.

Love,

P.

A letter to my 3 day old sister

Dear baby,
I wonder what your world will be!
You’ll outlive me by a whole 26 years
I wonder what all you’ll see!

I have seen a tiny, tiny virus
Outsmart mighty, mighty empires
And our little wicked schemes
Taking down a rat’s race that thought itself bigger than nature’s scheme.

I have seen forests consumed by hell-fires
But nothing more consuming than desire
Of harrowed men trapped,
In a never ending stream of wanting.

I have seen faith,
I have seen love,
I have seen all you can,
And what to do when you cannot.

I have the felt the fresh breeze off mountain ranges
I have dipped my soul in holy Ganges
When I have washed off my sins,
I have added his name afresh.

The one that still makes me feel a million things,
Yet let me tell you
Most boys will break your hearts
Even if  butterflies and unicorns – are what you feel in the beginning.

But you’ll always stand,
Taller than ever,
Your heart will love harder than ever,
And at the end of it all, you’ll fall in true love – the one with yourself.

I have seen friends
I have seen friendship
Sometimes both seem different
I have wondered why it is.

I have had family though,
Mine and ours,
Standing by when noone did.
Cause blood respects blood but water takes the shape of every vessel it’s kept in.

Respect everyone,
Expect from none,
And maybe when you live another year after year,
You’ll thank your sister who lived 26 less, albeit happily.

Define : Love

Love is pure,
Love is kind,
Love doesn’t need you to tone down –
Your waist
Or your mind.

Love is Grace
Love is fine –
Like raindrops on dry soil
Scent wafting inside out
Firing up your senses every time.

Love is patience
Love is pain
The patience to endure through pain
Of time
Of life.

Love is needing
(Not wanting)
Love is divine
You know when you see her
Every time.

Love is knowing there are days
And there will be nights
When mistakes will be made –
Love is accepting
What we have is bigger than mistakes of the human kind.

Love is passion
Love is crazy
It is firing up the skin
While calming down the soul
Two sinners made right.

Love is letting me be the wind to your silent sails
The dream to your fluttering lids
The laugh to your morose days
Love is letting me,
And me letting you
To be any way.

Letting go

A lot of time has passed now,
To make me feel okay
About everything that went wrong
And everything that went our way.

Some days I feel it’s my fault
Some days it’s yours
Some days when the fight won’t resolve
Destiny takes up the blame for what should’ve been just ours.

You see,
I don’t hate you
And now I can’t love you
The wound you gave me was just too deep.
For any healing that might have taken place
That one careless word you said –
Is enough to make me rethink
And re-evaluate what traipsed between us in deeds.

Even fate has put me far away,
To ever take that road back to you.
I wonder if I should accept it as the logical end
And move on from something that I had very well thought through.

They don’t understand why I am hung up,
They don’t understand because they haven’t tried to understand you the way I did,
But knowing how you took one second to unravel it all in your ego
I wonder if I ever understood you at all to play by it?!

So be it,
I let go of you
And I’m not naive anymore
To believe in setting love free and to wait if it’s true to come back to you.
If I let you go, I mean it’s gone
Or will there be some karmic pull of true love to make me run right back to you?
Nevermind,
Anyway,
Another man another day,
For tonight I let go of you.

CAN YOU AND I STAY POSITIVE IN THIS LOCKDOWN? Ft. Coping Strategies

It’s so hard to stay positive when we are trapped in a pandemic situation and on the top of it depressing news are getting added up – it only makes me think of the times which were simpler – like drawing a smiley face on my bread loaf in Apollo when I finally got to eat food after working at a strech till 5pm. The truth is even those days were hard, but we were too caught up in our lives to debate why it’s hard – now we are stuck, in our homes without work – some unfortunate ones away from home with a lot of work and recession looming overhead.
It’s frustrating and frankly depressing. What can we do? I created a list for myself to turn to whenever I’m depressed and want to check myself. I hope it helps you too 🙂
1. I find that sometimes the best way to get out of the cycle of negativity is to count your blessings amidst it. You can keep a journal – count the things you are thankful for. I keep one, and it’s a great thing to look back when you are caught up in the dark with no sight if light. Just spend 15 minutes with it every day and record the things you are thankful for! You might realise you are having more fun in this lockdown that you realise 🙂




2. Makeover. This the absolute best time to get yourself a makeover. And I don’t mean the outer one – an inner, spiritual makeover can gift you a better future where you have the right coping  techniques to deal with tough situations in a better way. I started therapy for this; and I am being tremendously helped by it. Ofcourse I am still not done yet, progress is slow – but the slower things are the deeper they impact. I can’t wait to come out as a better person and be a better friend, daughter, sister, partner to people post this lockdown 🙂



3. Pamper yourself. Skincare. Haircare. Yes, now I am talking about the outer makeover too. Now that you don’t have to show up for work expose yourself to pollution and grime – it’s the best time rejuvenate what you’ve lost – oil your hair everyday : No one is going to call a champu, because no one can see you sitting at home! 🤷🏻‍♀️ Geddit? Moisturize, scrub, detan, massage yourself with inexpertise (salon wali ka massage bohut yaad aata hai 🥺). Just unlock that lockdown glow.




4. Workout, workout, workout. I can’t stress on this. A simple workout has the ability to make yourself feel better by decreasing stress hormones and increasing the serotonin, the happy chemical. Today morning I felt so fucked up after reading about the vizag tragedy I spent minutes scrolling my twitter feed, reading, debating, getting stuck in a negative loop – but one dance fitness class with my favorite trainer Naveen on Cult. Fit later – I was back on track.




5. Practice clean eating. It’s hard I know, when your body wants to make that 10th plate of maggi when you’re so lazy to cook for yourself three times a day when the maid doesn’t come – but c’mon yaar! That new diet you’d been waiting to try but couldn’t because of bad hostel/ PG food/ cook adding too much oil to stuff – now you can happily indulge in it. Clean eating with lots of fruits and vegetables and minimal oil has been shown to boost happiness. So add those reds, greens and orange to your diet, will you?




6. Try spending time with your family. If you are away from them video call and talk. If you are fortunately like me stuck with them in this lockdown, you can spend a lot of them with personally. Help them with their chores. Try to make their lives and home brighter as our parents are getting old and need our support now more than ever. Some of us who are going away for higher studies, this might be the only time we get to spend them – so use it wisely. Talk to them even if you risk running into awkward conversations that make you want to break the lockdown and runaway like – marriage! *Squeals and hides*



7. I remember when I was a kid we used to have very long summer vacations. Summer in Odisha can get pretty hot and you could be pretty sure whatever date they had given for the holidays to end – it would keep on extending – just like this lockdown. I loved it then, I wonder why this was bothering me now – mostly I realised because then we used to appreciate our time alone – now we need a lot of distractions to make us feel better about ourselves. This lockdown is the perfect excuse to indulge guilt-free in your hobbies. If you are a photographer then improve your photography skills. If you are a writer, write each day. If you love to read books, read one if you have or download a PDF and read everyday. I feel this lockdown is God’s challenge to everyone who said they needed time to be able to follow their passion. Aapke paas duniya bhar ka time hai ab, fir aapka excuse kya hai to have a profession that compromised on your passion?




8. Last but not the least, chill the fuck out of this lockdown. Kya pata itna free time dobaara kal ho na ho!


Cheers,Parnini.

To my grandfather with love

Dear Jeje,

There’s not a day I don’t miss you.

I haven’t eaten a orange candy since days,
Noone gets it for me while secretly buying paan from the local shop now.
The pan box and the art of paan hiding is lost to me,
There’s no one I have to worry to choke on betel nuts now.

Papa made me cut his hair that day,
While I combed through it,
I could only think of the texture of your hair and the number of greys in them when you said –
“French, Russian, Chinese – which hairstyle will you give me today, Sanu”, and enjoy while I made you look like a clown.

I play songs and mamma sings to them,
I watch movies and mamma watches with me,
But I don’t dare to watch Anand, Padosan and Sahib Bibi ghulam again,
You won’t laugh crazily when “Ek chatur naar” plays.

Some ask me how being a girl I am interested in cricket
They don’t know the number of fours and sixes we have cheered
The number of time I risked the dining table top falling over,
As I danced on it when Sachin beat his six.

When someone tries to tease me I think of your goofy smiled jokes and pinches,
I am still irritated easily,
But I tone it down than I did with you,
I could do anything to you and you would still love me – they won’t.

I remember you sitting on the porch
And call out to me for tenth lemonade as you chat happily with your best friend or welcome me whenever I came back from school,
I don’t see him now,
I don’t even see the porch now.

I remember the midnight I was pressing your feet tired from studying
You woke up from sleep and said my face shines brighter than the moon
It’s still better than the dozen compliments I recieve
From the half-hearted men that half love me everyday.

Emotions aren’t honest once you digitalize them,
Maybe writing this would mean I am showing off
My poetry skills or humane touch
But we don’t have to be sad and still miss someone everyday.

I might not be your favorite grandchild,
But you were my favourite grandparent.
I can make a dozen friends
But none of them can fill the void of a grandfather like you.

School Days and a dead friend – Final Part.

Sikha and I had got into a pretty bad fight in school in the morning.

In those days, since she couldn’t drive a scooty, she went along with me to tuitions. I had our driver take a by lane to her home and pick her up for tuitions – like we needed even more time together – as we sat in school together, were cracking jokes in break together. Even when school ended, we were on call together. Hundreds of rupees were wasted to support our highly important, couldn’t wait till next conversations about what my crush did or what our classmates did. Now we have free talk time, Jio, what not – yet I do not have my friend whom I desperately want to talk to.

She got into the car silently. I didn’t even greet her hi. Even the driver must have sensed the air in the car. When we reached Baburam Sir’s tuition we sat even on the bench together silently. So much commotion, so much joking all around us, yet for the first time the two epic best friends were not talking to each other. The class started. It progressed through a few concepts; there were so many potential jokes I could scratch my eyeballs from not telling her; but I was me, I had the patience of a stork, you can’t move me – she had to make the first move.

“Sanu.”

Ah yes, truce was near.

“Han…”, I suppressed my excitement.

“I am not able to stay without talking”

Oh yes, finally!

“ME TOO!”

We laughed, and caught up all the jokes we had been meaning to crack through the entire day. The ice was broken. While going back in the car to home though little vestiges of the fight could be seen; and I wondered were marks, entrances more important than friendship?!

Sikha calmly replied, “Of course. If I get in a medical college, would I give you my seat?”

That sentence seemed innocuous when I heard it, but it got deeply embedded to ruin our friendship for good. I wonder if she knew this.

***

When we entered the latter half of class 12, you could see only one thing written on everyone’s face – ENTRANCES.

Nobody was anyone’s friend anymore. Everybody lied – about the number of hours they were putting in to study, the number of hours they wasted, the place they were roaming; when they were just sitting at home and studying. You could see an MCQ book in everyone’s hand. When normal school classes went on you could find an Aakash Institute Botany module hidden carefully under my desk while a Mathematics class went on.

“Sum no 23, Differentiation, answer please?”, Ma’am droned.

I looked over at my NCERT mathematics book, calculated in my head – “2cos

(2x)”

“Correct! Very good, Parnini”

“0.5 seconds”, Sid congratulated me from the opposite bench. I smiled and went back to the real book which would help me for my entrances. Sikha knuckled me from my side. I looked up annoyed. She made desperate eyeball movements to tease me about a guy’s sudden interest in me. I made a face to show my helplessness.

When classes got over, we dragged ourselves from the schoolroom slower than the slowest snails.

“Everything is ending”, she said.

“No, we are just moving on, to another phase of our lives”, I replied.

“I feel you have changed”, she probed.

I thought about how my father had brainwashed me once again to consider marks above people. How he had scared me that I was too naïve to believe in friendship; that these so-called friends would progress with their careers and leave me behind. How I was wasting time playing best friend in the most important year of my career. How I had been ignoring Sikha’s calls lately.

“No, you have changed. I text you, you see it but you never reply”, I countered defensively.

“You know I use my mother’s phone for texting. Your messages go to hidden folder, and I miss out on them. Also, Boards are near and now she sleeps with me, when can I text back?”

Lies, I thought in my mind. She was preparing for medical entrances as well. I was sure, she was trying to outsmart me.

Dear kids who read me, here’s a tip for you: In life there are bigger things than ruining your friendship for exams. Trust me. You’ll have even bigger exams and the people who’ll actually help you sail through them will be your friends. They are not your enemies – that’s just an unhealthy culture created by our parental generation thanks to media celebrating rankers more than caring about failures who commit suicide under pressure; but when you screw your viva, you’ll need your friends to hug you and get you ready for the next one.

I didn’t know this then. We grew further and further apart. Small things about her irked me. Her disapproval of my crush irked me. Her disapproval of my Carmel friends who had treated me like shit earlier but now were warming up thanks to new found popularity irked me. Even on farewell you couldn’t see us sitting together – it’s the biggest regret of my life.

Boards started and then talking to anyone wasn’t even an option. When boards ended, two days later we had AIPMT. I had spent so much energy for boards that I had none for entrances – and very expectedly I couldn’t even clear the prelims, Sikha did, my father created a scene over it – whatever warmth and missing I had towards her ended. Days were passing by in haze and tears for OJEE. I cleared OJEE Engineering with a rank of 154 and AIEEE as well; OJEE medical was a far shot – I only qualified for a newly built college in my home city. I told at home I’ll take in engineering college; they didn’t agree, it was their dream to see me as a doctor. They decided to send me away to Aakash, Delhi. I packed my bags.

We were in Cuttack station.

I saw a figure close to me which I knew like the back of my hands, standing with a man. It was Sikha and her father. I was leaving the state for a year. Drop years required hard work – I was not supposed to be in touch with anyone. All social media accounts were deactivated. This was supposed to be our last meet.

“Hi”, she said. What a far cry from our old days!

‘Hey”, I said.

“How are you?”

“Okay.”

“What was your percentage in boards? 80?”

“89.7% overall, 94% in science”

“Where did your marks go? Physics?”

“Nah. I got 96 in that. English. . .”

The ice was broken. We started laughing. An ex-ICSE student had performed shittily in English in CBSE Boards exam and ruined her aggregate. We talked comfortably after the. She didn’t let me apologize for my behavior over the past few months.

The breeze was odd or the lighting. It felt eerie, like something was ending. It felt like our last meet.

She was advising me in her characteristic Sikha way who needed to baby sit me.

“See, Sanu, you are very gullible. Don’t let people take advantage of you. I can’t take care of you from now on. No one else will.”

“Okay.”

“Be careful when you fall for a guy, you know your taste is pathetic.” Ha-ha! This one’s so relevant even now!

“Study hard and get through medical entrances. Don’t get diverted.”

“Yeah. You too. Take care.”

My train arrived. I bade her goodbye.

That was our last meet. The last time I saw her.

 

***

Dear Sikha,

Sanu here. 7 years have passed since you are gone. You would have been 27 this year. The world has changed a lot. We have free calls and WhatsApp now – imagine the amount of money we wasted to talk to each other? Such luck kids these days. Do you know we are under lockdown for Corona? Apparently, some virus has hijacked the entire world and my life.

My life you ask? It’s very different from the way you left me. I can talk now. I can be angry now. I can express to some extent now. Can you believe that? I used to write in the back of notebooks poems which you read and now I write on blog and leave it for the world to see.

I am still a drama queen; just that instead of you my best friend Ani gets to see it. You would have liked her – she was just like me when you adopted me as your Sanu. I am the Sikha to her. I protect her the way you protected me, but now she doesn’t even need that; just the way I didn’t need towards the end and left you – which is a good thing, I guess. She has matured to take care of herself. Sometimes when she doesn’t talk to me, I feel as if history is repeating, and I think of the way I treated you. You must have been so alone. I am so sorry. You told me how all your friends had treated you and I became the same. I am sorry. I hope you have found peace. I hope you have found love.

I did. I never told him. You said I should beware of guys, I did just that and let a lot of moments slip into silence and tomorrows. I am regretting now. He has genuine eyes and a silent demeanor. You would approve of him too. I wish you could advise me what to do about him. I really need a Sikha right now. No one has taken care of me the way you did after you are gone. You were right, I couldn’t have another you. I didn’t even want a best friend for years – Ani practically forced herself into my life. She has that quality. Irritatingly lovable git. Maybe love will force his way into my life too. I hope so; but then, both of never had any luck with love, no?!

I am happy now. Happier than I ever was then. I am done with MBBS. That was a dream stronger for you than mine. Did I tell you I dreamt about you once after your death? You were wearing a completely white salwar suit with a flowy white chunni – YOU! IN A SALWAR SUIT! I literally rolled out of my bed laughing. It wasn’t you, was it?

After you died, I wanted to go to your funeral – papa, mama never let me as I am too sensitive – I wish they had, I would have got closure. For two days I sat in shock on the swing, crying, not studying for entrance exam which was 7 days away, not meeting any one until Ronak called me and talked to me for hours. He died too, one year after you were gone. I lost the closest semblance to best friends I had ever had in a short span of time. People used to come back in holidays to meet their friends and post stuff and my true friends were dead. No one from DPS stayed in touch. Our batch and our group felt so cursed – three dead. Whenever I went to Sector 5, I would look at your house but never dared to enter – entering meant accepting you are dead. I can’t . . . couldn’t accept you are dead.

Not talking to you was my biggest regret – which is why I started giving more than required of me to people. Now that is my biggest regret. They don’t understand why I live my life like it’s the last day– because they haven’t felt the pain of how abruptly, how shockingly, how without any notice life can be snatched away. They don’t understand how your favorite person in the world can be snatched from you; and all you are left is with regrets, silence and writing in a blog which everyone can read but not you. They don’t understand why I am nice to them or overly emotional or loving – that’s just penance for not being that to you. They don’t deserve it. Most don’t.

Sometimes I feel you’re looking over me, seeing what I am doing, seeing how your Sanu is living life after you’re gone – is that why I am unable to forget you? I admit, the intensity has decreased, now you’re just a blip in the back of my mind; but then – “Do the ones we truly love ever leave us?”

Love,

Sanu

PS: Let this be the last time I ever mention you. RIP.

 

 

 

Six months of disgrace

There are times my mind wanders,
To a time gone by,
A time that tortured me,
Like a soul sucking fly.

I think and think,
But I can’t remember the face.
The man who carried out
What was to be six months of disgrace.

I moan over my torn reputation,
I think about construction areas and sun drenched afternoons
I also think about my hands trying desperately to clutch
To a pair of hands too slippery to begin with;
Which is why they let go so abruptly soon.

I think about all the people talking behind my back,
My best friends talking infront,
The mess makers talking down at me –
“Just forget him and focus on your own life. He never cared for you”
Was what I got after letting my emotions spiral down at their behest.

I think about all the raging days,
And crying in my best friend’s safe space
I thought I was so cool,
Didn’t respect the layers I had donned by the by,
That unravelled at the slightest prick.
I thought I was strong,
But found out I was strongly sensitive.
‘Such a fool!’
I cursed at myself over that piece of shit.

I think about how he broke my barriers day after day,
And then pierced me at my vulnerable best.
I remember all his snide remarks trying to make me feel small,
All his probes at my defences.
For the very life of me,
I couldn’t gather, a little bit of self respect.

Every day he battered me down,
With his lies and games that became the talk of town,
I forgot anything good that had happened between us
For me to get involved in the first place.

One year later now,
Now that I am safe and sound,
I realise that it wasn’t so complicated as it seemed.
That maybe that’s how these feelings work,
It clicks with one,
And rejects another – who doesn’t meet what the soul needs.
That it was chance, fate or destiny whatever,
That had led my eyes to a pair of eyes beneath
And your luck, my bad karma or whatever
That I thought I could replicate those feelings I had two summers back with the scraps you threw at me.

Thank you,
For letting me go,
Correction : Almost pushing me out!
I could never have loved you,
I now admit.
I hope you find peace in the arms you’ve settled in,
Enough to never come looking for me
And if ever, our paths cross each other
Please take the nearest exit –
Or my hands will form a fist on your lying, scheming, manipulative face –
And it won’t be as poetic as this.

The frog in the well

I sat down with my books on the floor, to make an attempt to finish the mounting pile of curriculum I needed to get over with. A steady stream of cold air gushed in through the open door infront, which led to the balcony. I looked up. At a distance I could see construction workers in full sway at a new multistoreyed building that was being added to the locality. A new blob of affluency; that had increased recently in my hometown – more buildings, more four wheelers, more branded stores  and glittering glassed restaurants. What caught my attention though, were the hills behind it. 

I had grown up being in love with the hills that my hometown was blessed with – lush green and reaching out for the sky, but barely managing to kiss it. I had always admired it from the tiny terrace of my house, craning up my neck to look at it and wondering – How tall it is! How would it feel to be on the top of it? How would the world look like from it? I looked forward to the day I could be at that height. 

Today though, something was different. I watched the rods jutt out from that building – a harsh piercing in my view. It rose from the under-construction terrace of that building and higher than my hills itself.

The height of my world had changed! The hills didn’t look so tall anymore, so imposing, so out of reach. . .  And I wondered, is this the height I wanted to reach or is the height I wanted to get stuck at?