I would never hurt you, my love! (Part 1)

No coffee mug in hand, no newspaper or book lying nearby, no trace of any hot pakoras, no decade old romantic Bollywood songs playing in the background, no pen to jot down thoughts, no nothing to catch her dreams – she stood there looking out while the rain did its thing. She closed her eyes waiting for the soothing feeling one gets whilst watching or listening to the soft pitter patter of the raindrops to overwhelm her. Nothing came. Not even tears. The shock of the earlier day did not seem to have worn out yet. She wondered if it ever would. The phone was ringing. She knew who it well could be – the last person she wanted to speak with. He always called her when it rained. The ringing of the phone was persistent. She was too.

She could not wait for the phone to ring. But it did. It always did. She smiled. This is what fairy tales are made of and the best part was that she was the fairy. At least, he made her feel like one. She picked it up putting the piping hot coffee next to the pakoras. The book fell down from her lap as she reached out for the phone. She used the remote to put the volume down on her all time favorite Hindi Song – 'Suraj Hua Madhyam'. Her pen she still held in her hand as she picked the receiver up.

“What are you doing, my love?” He asked.
“Take a guess!”
“Coffee, pakoras, music, books, thoughts and dreams?”
“You guess right!”
“So what were you thinking of just now?”
“That you would call me any instant!”
“So what were you dreaming about?”
“How good it would be to have you next to me!”
“OK!”
“OK ..what?”
“Be ready to catch your dream....”

She could hear the door open. She resisted the urge to turn. She heard his footsteps. She still resisted the urge to turn. She marveled that the urge still existed. She felt his presence. Her eyes were still closed. He walked nearer. She felt like running away. He hugged her from behind. She did not run away.

“Thank you!” He murmured as he buried his head in her hair.
She felt the same response to him as she always did. It devastated her.
“You know I never meant to hurt you. You know how much I love you!'

That's when the tears started. They came in torrents. She could not breathe as the hiccups choked here. She turned to face him as he hugged her tighter. She winced from the pain.

“Where is my cup of coffee?”
“I had no idea you would be here...!”
“I asked you to be ready to catch your dream and here I am...”
“What did you do?Fly?!”
“Something like that...!”
“I don't believe this...”
“Don't believe what?”
“That you can go to these lengths...”
“Believe it my love, believe it.!”

She still could not believe it. How could everything be so normal? As if nothing had occurred. As if this was a day like any other day. Not only was he the same, she seemed to be the same too. This was not how it was supposed to be, was it? Shouldn't something be different. He was still holding her.

“Where is my cup of coffee?”. She felt the normalcy of the statement like a blow. She stepped away from his embrace. He looked at her – searching. She walked to the kitchen and started to make two cups of coffee. The slight doubt in his look gave away to relief.

“What are you doing?”
“Taking the mugs out!”
“I will do it...”
“No...let me”
“Why? You want to help me?”
“Yes! But even more so I want to be around you.”
“Don't spoil me!”
“But I want to!”

She took the mugs out. She heard 'Suraj Hua Madhyam' lyrics fill the air. He seemed to have walked over to the CD Player and put it on. He started walking towards her carrying the book she had been reading.

“How many times have you played the song today?”
“Maybe a couple...”
“Just a couple?”
“OK truth be told, I did not count!”

She breathed in deeply. She did not want to hear that song. She wished it would stop playing...just like she wished that yesterday had never happened. Both stayed their course. She used to remote to switch the song off. But what was she going to do about the day before – there was no switch to turn it off. To erase it completely.

“So you just use the remote to play and replay it over and over again?”
“Yes I do!”
“You are such a romantic!”
“Yep a hopeless one at that!”
“That's funny!”
“What's funny about it?”
“That you could be like this...”
“What do you mean!”
“Nothing my love”
“Are you making fun of me!”
“No..No...”
“You are!”
“Well if you think so...maybe I am!”
“Ouch! That hurt!”
“I am sorry my love, you know I would never hurt you. Don't you?”

Yeah right! What a bunch of baloney.
“You know I would never hurt you, my love!” he said as he handed the book to her.

There's a party going on in my stomach...

...that's how my son responded when I asked him how he had liked his favorite egg sandwich that I had made for him. I laughed when he said that and like all of us mothers who think the world is at their feet when their little one)or big one for that matter) does something they think is either oh so smart, oh so cute, oh so good, oh so out of this work, oh so rocket scientistic etc etc even if it is something like burping on their own - I thought the same. What a witty intelligent kid this handsome kid (yes once again belong to the category of mom's who think their son is the best looking kid ever) is! I was smiling ear to ear, ready to record in the blog of how no other kid can come close to my Einstein, Salman Khan(looks only pls...without the height impediment of course), Sachin Tendulkar(without the height impediment again ...gosh why are all our heroes in the 'shuru hothe hi khatam ho jaate category') rolled into one.

Later I hear Shaggy (of Scooby-Doo fame) saying something similar. All my good intentions of bragging and repeating the story about 5 times to everyone who is remotely connected to me in any way were punctured sparing them the agony of pretending to share my enthusiasm and most importantly agreeing with me. *Sigh*.
Then a brilliant idea hits me. I should just take another approach - how he so intelligently picks up the best thing to say - how witty he is - how smart, how very....you get the point? ;-)

TGIF

It's friday! Yaaay! Like the millions of others who work a job to feed the paapi pet, I rejoice when the best day of the week Dawns. There is a spring in the step and enthu in the outlook as you tackle Friday knowing well that the end of it all you will be rewarded with a couple of days that you don't need to think about a lot of things you mostly don't want to think about most of the time. Work being foremost amongst them. There was a time I used to enjoy my work - love doing what I did - tackling new problems - working out best solutions and knowing that I was good at what I did. I still do some of the times, but most of the times I see myself waiting to wiggle out of it. Maybe it is working from home Syndrome - wherein you find yourself taking a lot breaks and also feel like you are working almost all the time to make amends for the breaks taken. There is always something left to do. And I have lately not been liking it that somewhere lurking in my brain is the module I needed to finish but did not get time to test thoroughly. I know some of us can just put niggles aside and get on with life, but unfortunately me not being one of them, I find myself worrying about it unconciously all the time. I could be most happy if I did not have work to worry me and I keep thinking how wonderful it would be to not work at all. Maybe not as fun as I am making it out to be. I do enjoy the challenge that work provides, the discipline it requires and the neccessity to learn new things. (which I would not do otherwise for sure). Left alone with nothing, I do feel the mind resembles a devil's workshop but at the same time the possibilities it presents is exciting. I know I am going to explore that route but for now there are miles to go before I sleep - so I will just keep counting them knowing that they are going down - mile by significant mile!

Good News...Bad News

Good News: I was told by a self proclaimed psychic that I am a free spirit!
Bad News: She says my daughter is one too !

I am worried already ;-)

Mind and Matter

One of the best things I did for myself the past few months has been to enroll in a morning exercise class. One fine day past your 30s it hits you that you are aging. You look around to see what you could do to reverse this process. You discover pretty fast that there is not really much you could do to reverse or stop the process but there are somethings that could be done that definitely slow the fast hurtling age of a truck down.

One of the first things you discover that aids this trying to break hard on the age accelerator is eating well. This is a great challenge especially where I live. Even to eat a simple thing like an apple or to drink a glass of milk, one has to go through a rigorous process of determining if this is actually good for you. For a long time I used to think that nothing was better. Alas! I did not know about genetic modification or pesticides that get absorbed or cows that are fed growth hormones. Also did not know that eating rice is like taking sugar by the spoonfuls. So started the research, looking for advice and generally making modifications to the way you eat. Though not the easiest things to do (and quite expensive I might add) this was doable.

The difficult part was taking time out to exercise, which is the second on the list of the essential things to do. Not only do you find exercise cumbersome, but once you have let yourself go without exercising for so many years, the creaks and the leaks discourage you big time. Sure, I have started to try to fall into a routine - trying to work on an elliptical, cycling early in the morning, late evening walks and so on. But none stayed more than at the most a couple of months. So my husband wasn't very much thrilled when I decided to join he early morning gym class, coz he did not have the faith that I would stick to it. Neither did I! The class met at 5:15. That meant I had to get up around 4:30. Considering that I would never go to sleep before midnight this was quite a challenge. Already, I was setting myself up to fail.

With nothing to loose, except my extra pounds, I started on it. I was promised the moon if I was disciplined. I was happy and I worked hard. Eating habits were easier to change once you were working so hard to shed those calories you had thoughtlessly gulped down a day earlier. Slowly, but surely I was getting fitter and I loved the feeling. I have always been an athlete in my school and college days. So running and moving come naturally to me. The one thing that held me back was always my stamina. Simply put, I did not have much of it. I would be huffing and puffing in no time at all. Also would get a stitch in the side and that would slow my progress big time. Running, walking or exercising for more than 30 minutes would drain me completely and I would struggle to keep up.

As we worked out through the winter, slowly but surely I was getting trained to not loose steam quick. Come summer and the goal was to go running/walking outside for an hour. I was not very much looking forward to it, because I had not tried to push my body in that way. A couple of walks and I realized I was getting much better. I was actually staying in the foremost group. That felt so good. That I was able to do it. That I was able to walk/run and do 4 miles in an hour without pushing myself too much.

Yesterday I got the pleasantest surprise when I realized that I finished first in our group and what more I could have gone longer without feeling like lying on the ground and dying! My coach called me her poster girl because I am fairly new to this exercise program. When someone asked how I was able to do it so effortlessly she replied for me saying - she has a determined head on her shoulders. I always knew that I had one but to have a body that seems to be complementing it and not giving up in the middle is truly a wonderful feeling.I realize now that the challenge is not putting mind over matter but putting mind and matter together and that seems to be coming along beautifully! 5 miles an hour here I come!

Her Thoughts

She did not quite know how to think of him - but she did think of him a lot. All the times they had spent together and all the times they had not. She'd laugh at some of the memories and cringe at some of them. At the end of it all, her eyes would be moist. Well, frankly there was no end, because she thought about him endlessly. No matter how much she tried to divert her attention to the mundane tasks of everyday living, she would find herself thinking of him through it all. Earlier it used to surprise her that whenever she paid attention to what she was thinking, she would find him. Sometimes overwhelming her thoughts and sometimes lurking in the background. But he was there - always there. There had been a time when she had seriously tried to disassociate her thoughts with their focal point. She gave up when she realized the effort was draining her more than doing anything else. He still stayed there. In the middle of her thoughts as her life revolved more and more away from him. She marveled at the feeling sometimes. How could one be so connected to a person who they were not associated with any way except in the far past? Yet, there he was, above everything else, always there. Gradually she stopped analyzing the whys, hows and why not's and just went along with whatever came to her mind. Gradually her memories began to manifest themselves in tangible ways. She could hear him telling her that he loved her, she could feel his hand holding hers, she could feel his caresses, she could smell his presence....there were so many things. She carried him with her. The burden became lighter as she gave up on things that were not related to him. In the beginning when life held her in it grip, she felt like she would choke under the burden. But as she gingerly took steps away from life, the weight became more of a necessity. She created a void so that it could be filled with what she could not get away from. It was easier to give up on life and she did. Slowly but surely. Did that make her happy? She was not sure. Happiness was a thing of the past. She did not even know if she had ever felt true happiness. Even if she had, it had been so long ago, she had forgotten everything about it. She asked herself sometimes what would make her happy? His presence? Him being a part of her life like he had been once? She was not sure. Memories tend to soak up the good times while softening the impact of the bad ones. Reality blurred in her mind and she knew it. There were so many things. There was love of course but with it came a lot of other things. Things that managed to make life take on a course that seemed to suggest that love alone was not enough. If only she had believed..he had believed..they had believed that love was enough. But they had not. He had not. His uneasiness used to puzzle her. Ultimately it destroyed her trust. She could not take the risk of loving him all her life. She did not. He had walked off. Relieved? She was not sure. But he had walked off easily. She felt happy to have taken that decision. A man who could leave her so easily and never look back was not worth his presence. Yes he was best relegated to a place where he could do no harm. Where he could be controlled. Where his image could be distorted to fit whatever image she wanted of him. Where he could be God sometimes and the evil incarnate when she felt like it. Yes it was easier to live with him in her thoughts, than to actually live with him. She smiled. Finally! She had sorted him out! Sorted her thoughts out. It was time to move on.

Random thoughts

Listening to Romantic Hindi Songs moves me to start writing all those love stories I used to write so so long ago. Guess I am going to be a die-hard romantic till the day I die. Don't know if that is a good or a bad thing. I enjoy writing so much. I wish I was more disciplined about it. So many wishes, so little time!

One of the funniest moment came this week when my 5 year old son runs up to me while playing with his new playmate (neighbor's 5 year old grand daughter), huff, puffs and in his characteristic way says - "TT (his 3 year old bro) is saying bad stuff to us!" Apparently my 3 year old had run to the fence and watching them play had started shouting apparently to be let in and this is how my 5 year old intreprets it! Ah! Good times to come.