This sunset is different from yesterday's...

I’m sad. No, scratch that… I’m nostalgic.

Jaspal Bhatti passed away today. By now I hope he’s making fun of the contractor responsible for the gates of Heaven and/or taking offence at the idea that no one takes offence at divine hypocrisy.

The man was, by himself, an idealistic eccentric who simply couldn’t take things the way they were. But at least as far as I’m concerned, he was also someone emblematic of a better time; a simpler time. A time that had Flop Show, Keshav Kalsi and that tune from the DD evening news that's kinda burnt itself into our collective subconscious as a people. A time where all that really mattered was you getting the window seat on the school bus and being deceptively mean to the person you liked.

So maybe it’s just me, but it seems another chapter in a very good story has ended. 

Now this isn’t your average story. It doesn’t have any of the usual melodrama, the usual action sequences and sadly enough, the usual bedroom sequences. In fact, the only distinctive thing about it is that it’s “our” story.

Like any obscure writer, I look around a lot (It’s what we do, we obscure writers).

And I see a lot I was always intent on missing before…

There are no new wrinkles on my grandparents’ cheeks. And yet I know they’re getting older.

These people have given me my parents. And the most horrible baths a kid can ever hope not to have. They’ve given me 10 bucks a day for everyday I’ve spent at their place, so that I could bake under the sun while waiting to play video games.

Not to mention the most effective dressing down ever for throwing about 24 eggs on the nearest wall after a singularly inspiring Tom and Jerry tape.

I guess right now I’m left wishing that life were somehow less complicated. And that I could again play cricket with everyone in the backyard. You know, God bless his heart, my Grandfather always used to let me have 7 balls in every over I played. : )

There are just so many people who never get to know what they’re loved the way they are. What is worse is that there are just so many people who can’t tell they love the way they do.

My academic life had me in the same place for five and a half years. And suffice to say, I hated every brick of it. Every vocal professor, every nonfunctional water heater… everything.

And today, even after graduating, each visit to the damn place reminds me that these things that have taken a new hue. One I wasn’t particularly convinced existed.

Imagine yourself glad to see people you couldn’t stand to see before just because you saw them every day. Or basking in the sweet aroma of the autoclave room just so that you don’t forget it. Eating food Hell itself declared unsafe just so that you can bitch about it… All of it, someday, years later... over a fireplace that has gone out, and people who’ve only just come in.

Life is a series of random occurrences. But then… so are me and you.

And there is no friggin’ reset button. 

P.s. My grandfather only took 5 balls in every over he played. : )
P.p.s I've been using Jaspal Bhatti's "Hit and Trial Hospital" joke as mine for 10 years now. 9/10 would do it again.

One step back, two steps forward...

A friend just broke up with someone she’d been with for 11 years. I don’t mind telling you that’s a significant multiple of the total amount of time I’ve spent with anyone (while suppressing genocidal tendencies or otherwise). Not that the guy was any good, mind you. The first time I met him he started making fun of her in front of me. And he cheated on her. And he was going bald. And I think she always laughed a little too much at the token “I bet he was terrible in bed too” jokes.
Still, when I talked to her last, she was in tears. She’d been that way for the last month.
Of course, it’s not surprising. I mean, 11 years? Most people don’t get 11 good days between them, try as they will. (At this point, kindly insert your condescension about my maturity in relationships into an orifice of your choice)

When I started this, it was going to be about exes. Those people you can invoke in every single prayer; be it to the God you like best (available at leading pantheons everywhere); or the forces of death and destruction that populate the blog of a 13 year old these days.

However, in doing my research (Facebook quizzes), I thought it’d have a little more meaning if I made it about that person who everyone hates and still wants to be. While I know you’d simply love to read a little bit more about Daler Mehendi, I’d like to make this about the person who moves on. Or perhaps, moving on. The sense and maybe the blasphemy of it.

Moving on, not just from the relationships that didn’t work out, but from all those other things too. Things that have made you cry and wish that you hadn’t thrown out that last soft toy. Big things that nobody else seemed to get. And the little things that just added up.

So, between you and me, I know that it must hurt.
I know it must feel like you’ve walked barefoot on gravel for miles on end; leaving behind footprints deep and bloody enough that one knows you must’ve been walking on your toes the entire distance.
I know that sometimes all that remains feasible is to just tell yourself to stop feeling anything at all.
Finally, I know that what hurts more is the question of what “could’ve been”. The question of finding destinations down paths not taken, of paths that now lay broken. (I’ve read your blog. You know what I mean.)

But I also know that underneath all the stifled laughter and the self applied “Cynic” tags, there’s still the idealist of 10, maybe 15 years ago. Someone who just didn’t know any better, and ironically enough, was better off for it.
Someone who was made happy by looking at kids who smiled, who danced when he didn’t know how to, who looked forward to finishing the box of chocolates so that he could buy another one.
In fact, if this someone was anything like me, I’m fairly certain all he wanted was to walk into a garden of Cherry Blossoms and watch shadows get longer.

As it stands, your pain is your own. It always has been. But it doesn’t have to be. Not for much longer.
Reach out if you can. There are always people willing to listen. Sometimes, there’re even people willing to help. If statistics are anything to go by, someone has effed’ up just like you in the past. And that nobody should let Sreesanth bowl.
Make bad jokes. It keeps you on the right side of sane. Plus, it gives the people around you the benefit of the Temporary Insanity plea at their murder trial.
Give someone a hug. I'm sure you know lots of intensely huggable people. The fact that some of them carry pepper spray really shouldn’t stop you.
Most importantly, remind yourself of the people you want to be happy for. And of those who’d rather share cheesecake than see you happy. (I find the latter helped a lot more. But I’ve led something of a sheltered existence)

Whatever you do, just keep in mind that you stand as a warrior. And as this warrior you fight demons. Demons that will not relent. Demons that will bleed a river before they yield an inch.

The warrior thinks of the times of peace. He wishes he didn’t have to fight. He is tempted by the prospect of going back to glowing mornings when the dew has not yet left. Of closing his eyes in the middle of battle to think of Cherry Blossoms shedding in a shower of pink and white. In an autumn of browns and yellows, punctuated by greens.

Yet he knows he must kill, but knows not the weight of the sword he must lift. And as it happens, the sword is heavy. It’s easier to drop than to lift. And the fight is easier to run away from than to actually stay and fight.

It seems that even when the solution is by far, the easiest thing about the whole problem, it’s the sticking to it that remains the most difficult. But then again, it also is the most important thing in the world. The warrior did plant the Cherry blossoms himself.

So lift up the sword and try it on for size. They tell me it was made for you. And they’re usually right, even when they aren’t.

The past is right there in your head. Come back to it when you feel like it (or knock yourself hard enough on your head that you don’t have to). When you do, I recommend you stand at a window and give long meaningful glances to the world outside with a glass of Sprite in your hand. But in the meantime, look at the present.
It wants you to look at it too. And give it a compliment or two. It’s a little insecure like that. But take my word for it, it makes for a great date.

You could care less…

I think you're a good person. But then, I also believe in romantic love and the cinematic comeback of Chunkey Pandey. Clearly, I'm an optimist.

However, I also think you're seriously fucked up in the head.
Look in the mirror. You're hurt, badly so. You've entertained thoughts of carpet bombing his/her neighbourhood. He/She has found someone so wonderful that they're shiny. You're that close to crying. Why?
Maybe it's because of some strange sense of belonging to a relationship that you were "firm-titanium-rod-in-appropriate-orifice"ed out of. Or perhaps it's because you're convinced that the one sided perverted feelings you're having will mean the end of your world should they go unreturned.

While I'm that close to telling you to buy an inflatable partner and spend that rest of your undignified life in windy bliss; I feel I owe you something out of some misbegotten sense of kinship. Something apart from the aforementioned firm titanium rod. So how about this…

Nobody holds more power over you than someone who cares less about the relationship™ you're in. I'm going to hope you're not the idiot you look like and atleast know that you're with such a person. And in case you don't… here's a symptom list for you:

1. You believe you're a nice person
   You're really far too nice to tell him/her/it when you feel you've been wronged. Historically, God hath made nice people so that the assholes/dicks/bitches at the top of the food chain would have someone to feed off of. I recommend you get rid of your insipid conscience and go kick some cute puppies somewhere. For once, stand up for yourself in your Viagra deprived existence.
   
   
2. You cry
   There are only two real reasons to cry. Onions and Skynet launching nukes. In the absence of such, the third reason is that you hate yourself. As in deeply despise.
   Take a moment to be quiet. And listen.
   Do you hear that? That's the silence of 6 billion people not caring about your idiotic tears. Or the reason behind them.
   
   
3. You _always_ call back first after a fight
   If somehow you're not personally responsible for the financial security of Airtel or can be made to agree with (1) above with a little alcohol, take a MotherFrocking hint and stop doing it.
   
   
4. You like Twilight, Krishi Darshan and/or reruns of Kyunki...
   Self explanatory.
   
   
5. You have no problem expressing your feelings
   I believe the scientific term for a member of your species is "namby pamby". Nobody cares about what you feel. And if you're going about on your merry gay horse telling people about it, I don't think you do either. Go to your neighbourhood pirated software shop and get some self respect, you stud you...
   
   
6. You're willing to forgive considering how he/she must be feeling at such a difficult time
   What are you? Mother Teresa with a hangover? Don't expect an apology and don't wait for one. But persecute with passive-aggressive tactics until you do get one. No point not being mature about this.
   But don't for the love of God be understanding about anything until asked to be. I'd quote Ivan Pavlov and the hungry dog but I know you to be intelligent.
   

Moral of the story… if you find yourself repeatedly committing these common place errors usually confused with finding happiness in love, please take a closer look at the gigantic hole that used to be your soul. I want you to be happy. More so when you realize that you don't have to be tortured anymore.

You...

Always remember, it’s your fucking fault. It’s your fault that you’re fat, that you’re poor, that you consistently underachieve and that you pick relationships where getting hurt is the norm. And any self help book that’s telling you otherwise is selling lies. It’s your fault that you’re buying those lies, you fuck.

But I won’t blame you totally. You’re not entirely without hope. You hope that things will improve soon and that it’ll stop hurting out of some sense of cosmic fairness, nice fuck that you are. Thing is, the capacity of the human mind to sustain torture consistently befuddles me.
Convincing yourself time and again that somehow things will improve beyond what they are when all you’re doing is the same thing over and over again is tantamount to criminal insanity. Entropy is something that’ll always screw you over. Get that into your pansy little head, (again) you ginormofuck.

Find that hard to palate? How about we make this about the noblest, nicest, warmest and fuzziest reason of all… Vengeance. You do want to drive into your ex’s birthday party in a Maserati with an oversexed Russian model for a twinkie, don’t you? Or gift him/her a laser guided bomb beacon and watch the fun explode as you watch from your sniper scope. Or whatever else turns you on, you sick pervert.

You, O mighty king of the duffers, are the only person in the clusterfuck that is the cosmos who’s ever going to look out for you. Write that down on your forehead in reverse and look into a mirror if it’s too difficult to remember. But do yourself a favour and get a life. It’s worth it, (as always) you enormofuck.