17.9

You enter my room
Woeful and lost
To say you’ll be back
In an hour,
But the look on your face
Says clearly to me
That you intend to remain
For more.
You begin to talk
Of nominees and banks
I know you’ve been harassed
By his calls;
You make small talk
About colleagues long gone
And your medicines
And errands of yore.
You tell me it’s hard
With no one for help
You tell me it’s tough
To cope,
To manage alone
To not rely
For in this new place
Ground and comfort lay afar.
I see the silent plea
In your rheumy eyes
I see you beg me
To get involved,
To hold you
As I would hold him
To care for, to love
To respect and to adore.
But don’t you see
I can’t do it
Not for you,
I can’t.
Despite knowing
How you need me
And how much it takes
To ask.
It’s too soon for me
The loss is still fresh
It hurts
And that never must show;
But why don’t you realize
Though I would never say it
His place
Will never be yours.
I’m struggling to cope
Though I hide it well
I’m trying so hard
To stay strong,
But every single time
I enter his room
Or see his silly netbook
The tears still fall

Spread The Word!

It's funny how moods work. Then again, it's supposed to be this huge hush-hush secret, how moods work. One semester of Psychology revealed that moods have no cause, no reason - emotions are the ones with some point, some reason, some logic behind them. Bloody blessed point. Oh, well. So next time someone asks you why you're so moody, feel free to directly quote Her Awesomeness (Yours truly) and indirectly, Vinay Prabhu, and brush em off. There, good deed for the day done.



Screw previous moods and conversations, I'm all happy right now! The giddy variety, yes =)



I actually typed up a list of songs ("in no particular order, off the top of my head" =P) that tend to make up for most things distasteful. Songs that do funny things to my mood; and I mean funny in a good way. Songs that I carry with me and plug into just about every time I can. You know, that token favourite-music blog post every blogger simply must put up. Well guess what, I don't think I can do that, atleast not right now. Just previewing the post made me feel so vulnerable. Felt like I was sharing something intimate, something that's mine and mine alone. So lets call it The List That Wasn't and leave it at that. Boo hoo indeed.

PS - By one semester of Psychology I meant 10 hours of absorbed reading, get that right.
PPS - I happen to know the most awesome people ever! Moment of realization and gratitude, if you must. Immediate family, some friends and uh-what-are-we?, I love you guys. Go on, spread the word. And if this post was too flaky/senti/mushy for you, bah, just be glad we don't have conversations at 2 AM =P

Wantowrite Wantowrite Wantowrite

^ Commendable.

Uuunfortunately, that does nothing for me. *sigh* The joys of being a journalist in the making..

It's one of those days, it is.


Noon saw me grinning. Inspiration! I'll just get to the keyboard and type. Arbit stuff. Let it flow. In no time whatsoever, a blog post will be ready! :D. Now see, that's pretty much the best mood any couldbe-wannabe-but-mustneverbe blogger can be in. Out of nowhere comes this innate confidence that you can write, write on demand and write well when you get down to it. You rest your padded behind on the swivel chair and dayum. Pop goes the bubble.

See, I've been thinking. No, not the 'serious, analytical thinking' that makes up the right half of my mental activity scale. More on that later. But what romance novels call fleeting thoughts? Good kid. Those are what I'm talking about. Of course, the girl in the novel has 'fleeting thoughts' for a week at the end of which she invariably lands up with the guy of her dreams (I refuse to call the bugger Mr Right or worse, The Prince In Shining Armour. Go die, you damsel/dhikra in distress.), the job she always wanted, just the right mix of Bob The Builder inspired "YES WE CAN!!"s and I-have-it-all-and-I'm-only-25-take-that-bitches-! She gets the house, the pet and all that lovin'. Even better, no one in the picture needs to go back to her childhood days, dig out ABBA records and moan about how The Winner Takes It All. No sirree! All's dandy, rosy pink, crunchy crisps. It's a dream. How, you ask? Because of those fleeting thoughts.


Well I'll tell you what. When fleeting thoughts uh, fleet, fleet is ALL they do. They come, they sit, they go. And nothing comes off them. Fact of life. I assure you the birds and the bees will bring to your life more joy, happiness and "all that lovin'" than my flitterbug thought revelation ever will. At best, someone'll call you a flibbertigibbet, you'll spend an hour trying to say it right, you'll look it up on Urban Dictionary and Google and whatever else you've ever heard of for the origins of the word. Or you'll take the easy way out - grin and chuck it. And then? And then nothing.

So while I could have written about how I'm being uprooted and gaadhoed bang in front of PIS, Nerul - prime location as far as bus routes 23 and 25 are concerned; how the kid sister will now have full rights to be a prissy preteen because hey, half of it is what her new school advocates; how I have more existential crises and does-anybody-care moments than I care for - oh yes, very regular teenager like; how I am (EVEN MORE teenager like) so desperate for some bhaav and affection right now; how I'm at a loss for topics to talk or write since none manage to interest even me for more than 15 seconds at a stretch... fuck it. So while I could have written about all of that, I won't. Ooh rebellion. Not. How I wish I was cheap enough to repost that cartoon.


Must the blues run the game?

Awesomest Pick Me Up EVER!

Courtesy: Duck Vader =)

Gracie Lou, Who?

There are times you need to be in this gracious state of mind. Kind, polite, bloody considerate state of mind. All the times someone asks you to "be blunt" (because hey, he can take it, make no mistake of that!), all the times you're expected to tick off a 10yr old but do it all nice and mature (i.e. with patience and blood vessels intact), all the times you're asked to make that one last cup of tea (or hang washed clothes out to dry :| ) when you're running late, all the times a friend behaves like a jackass and what you really wanna do is slap HARD... All the times you click the Social Interview tab on Facebook, for fuck's sake!

And since I haven't been Shweta G. Sharma in quite a while, what you get for this visit to my blog is stuff that generally manages to cheer me up, pack rat that I am. Marginally, atleast :P It ups my sillyness levels for the next half hour or so, and since that's more than what Vodafone can do...

Thing is, I keep planning to upload them but then decide to wait for the next one to make a show. Ab bas! :P

Hope you smile, even if no one's watching =)

Cookie Monster! Awesomeness


"HNY" :P


Sesame Street, Year 40


Oscaaaar!


Series of postcards (Google's getting old) - here because they were there :P









When Bapu = Birthday Boy? :|


ELMO!


Count von Count. Oh you bloody fool, count!



Just her name picks me up! Boombah Chamki :D



Happy 'kite festival', where kite festival = holiday with gajak, popcorn and movies :D


PS - The G dissecting my name? Grace. Shweta Grace Sharma. See? Vodafone reference? The tagline 'Happy to help'. Yes, I suck. =)

Why Does This Feel Like A Hint?

Larger view ke vaaste click on image or here.

Do revert. :|

All Must Be Revealed!

More than anything else, the last 3 weeks have been full of revelations. With friends and classmates as well as the unavoidable friends-or-what candidate of the month and those involved. And what amazes me is that beyond a point, I don't feel a thing about the situation or the people concerned. Except maybe amusement.

Logically dekho toh I should be analysing and introspecting until I reach the pot of gold that's supposed to be the Answer, but right now the rainbow seems so vague that I can't trace it right. And somehow, I'm not too concerned about getting waylaid by chance puffs of clouds and gusts of wind. It borders on fun, actually.

Instead, I'm indifferent. Chirpy one minute, sober the next, but always able to see things objectively. A little too objectively. I have no personal opinion on these issues, only an objective one. Somehow, I've managed to numb myself to all of it. And I don't know how. 

I remember talking to a friend about the oh-so-detached, "I feel numb" theory months ago and being mocked incessantly so I'm expecting more of the same. But I simply do not feel like I'm affected in any way. Comfortably Numb, anyone? :|

So I don't discuss it with anyone. Heh, no one person know about more than one 'issue' at hand and that's how I intend to keep it. That logic says a breakdown will follow is hardly of significance right now. Lets just assume I'll get to that bridge, catch sight of that rainbow again and reach The Pot. Simple.

Craziest bit is that I want to write about it all. I expect it will help. I want to know how people manage to bare all. Everytime I do, I fuck up things so bad it's safer not to. So basically, I'm looking for catharsis where I don't want it. Revelation indeed.

PS- This post was of a more personal nature than any before, I realise that. Consider this a one off, ain't gonna happen. Also, I may have gone overboard with my skyscape analogy but hey, deal with it.

Massive, Massive, Massive.

The mere mention of Chate’s Coaching Classes is invariably accompanied by some ugly allegations. Old news. Also stuff I don’t need to go into. But a recent experience proved beyond doubt the (ab)sense of ethics when it comes to the man running the show at Chate’s Vashi branch. 

I accept that there is little point in ranting and raging on a blog that is probably read by 5 people a week, if I’m lucky. But when I left the coaching centre, I was convinced that a blazing write-up for a news daily, in The Twin City Times if it came to that, would be next on my agenda. I rather liked the idea of involving the MNS youth wing, until it dawned on me that I’m a north Indian and Chate dear is definitely not. Back to the article - I told myself that being a BMM student would only help my case and screw up his. Also, a copy of the article would have to be slid under the door to the office. The write-up that formed itself in my mind as I walked away was, at the very least, the equivalent of a watermelon sized stink bomb escorted by two baseball bats for some physical impact. 

Par kya hota hai na, your face goes from a furious red to a peaceful tan, you age by a day, you realize you have lesser time left to waste now than you did yesterday and so you calm down… which is why this will go up as a blog outburst and remain one. I’m writing to feel good about having let it out. That does not mean another is obliged to read. Read forth if you don’t mind a long winded post about something that may not be of concern to you. If you do mind, I suggest you head to FML. 

So. I was there with an acquaintance of a few hours to complete a task. Do drop the “task-who?” queries. We were sent out to earn some money. Given - 3 hours, a combined capital investment amount of Rs.20, a cellphone as a team bonus and our oh-so-marketable baarvi paas skills. Down to our last hour, we felt like cavemen who had just figured out what to do with fire. After all, we had our modest but hard-earned pay stuffed deep inside the deepest pockets. During the course of the afternoon, we’d met some entrepreneurs some of who who genuinely wanted to help and did – them we were grateful to; some who found that Sundays didn’t translate to a day with spare work lying around – I’ll leave it to you to work that out; and then some blessed souls who as good as slammed the front door in our faces and then tried to spray some Baygon through the cracks in the wood just in case. Nevertheless, I was feeling, and do pardon the sad but fitting OSO reference, “like the KING of the WORLD!”

Chate’s, right. We walked in, briefed the boss there and were subsequently given some records to fill in, phone calls to make. All conversations started with this totally sadau “Hello, I’m calling from Chate classes” intro (NOT my dream job : | ) and went somewhat like this –
                   “Aapka beta aaj class kyu nahi aaya?”-“Bai.. ho ka? Nighaalla hota toh.. mee tabadtop yete! Tumhi thaamba!”-“Naahi, raahu dya.. ushir aalla asel. Mark nahi kiya hoga. Sorry.”

So we spend an hour learning new panic words in Marathi, systematically penning absentee records right down to the excuse. All while the lady employed to do this stuff quizzes us about our future job expectations and what we would do if a new co-worker happened to delete all our work and the boss “took the newbie’s side”. Would we resign because the boss had no confidence in us or would we stay on to prove a point? I’m serious. I left out the quotes and commas because they can be a pain more often than not, but those were her exact words. I know, I know, the things we do… Anyway, so an hour goes by, we work, then get up to see the boss so we may reap due monetary benefits. Here you’ll say we should have decided on a certain amount beforehand. Hah. Keep saying. Mr. Ghosh, showrunner extraordinaire, decided to disappear instead. Then over the stoopid Tata Indicom his voice made its crackly crinkly way to reach us. We get told there was no “commitment on his part as such” and we have no right to demand payment. We were begging for work, he felt sorry for us, so he gave us some shitty calls to make. No contract, remember? Yeah, right. Dickhead. 

And that led to a firing. Self to Showman. Derived tremendous satisfaction from it too. And it was this dignified firing that told him exactly what I thought of him. Ah, I was so proud of myself! Incidentally, so was the acquaintance of a few hours. He was also taken aback. Net result – he stopped hitting on me. Mera time 200% vasool. :D

I for one did not get the point of basically cheating two 17 year olds. For what, I can’t understand. Say there isn’t anything for us to do and we’ll go dude! Deceive why? I didn’t type out 900+ words to complain about having lost out on 50 odd rupees. Far from that. I probably ought to take the blame for having walked into an establishment like Chate’s and then expecting fair play. I don’t know. It’s just that the whole incident had me so mad!!

My point is this – Even in the absence of a lawyer, a contract drawn out on stamp paper and two witnesses, we need to get around to honouring agreements. Just plain ol’ staying true to our word types. Be it going out to play with a kid sister, meeting a pal on time or something we actually consider ‘major’. 

This may even sound preachy. But after a thousand words and a mind mad at that man all over again, I don’t really care.

What Did You Wish For?

Fresh after the 10th boards, I was looking to keep my choices open. Why Science? So I can switch streams later. Why biology? So that medicine is always an option. Why Swami’s? So I can switch to their Arts section in the 12th relatively easily, should the desire arise. Why the CET? That way engineering isn’t out. Why Symbiosis? So that BMM isn’t the only thing I can go in for. (And, if you want the truth, to find out just what the entrance test includes.)

But dude, what do you do when on the surface of it everything works out but the core of it is a jumble of randomly picked, conflicting molten metals? 

Be careful what you wish for, dear child, you may just get it.

Without going into much detail (your cue to laugh), I’ll have you know that I want to do that ostrichy, head-in-the-sand, you-can’t-see-me thing. Career confusion has gripped me, and indecision won’t leave me. But hey, it’ll all work out fine. Haha. Nonsense. I’m gonna get hysterical soon enough, I tell you… by the way, I’m awesome company (read- entertainment) when I’m hysterical. And that’s your cue to come tell me how I’m awesome company even otherwise :P

One thing – Symbiosis is out. I could use up an entire roll of toilet paper as notepaper, explaining the hows, the whys and the therefores, so let’s leave them questions alone. Know that I won’t land up in Pune after all. I have this theory that I’d love the ‘college life’ there, so to say. But having gathered a fractionally clearer picture of what I’d be doing once I’m outta there, it’s nopey nope for me. So here’s hoping I’ll learn to live with that decision and have no regrets later. And to apple-cinnamon pies topped with domes of vanilla ice cream. And to me mother. 

Getting things in place for the interview was memorable, to say the least. Which, me being me, won't happen.

The portfolio, bless it once and twice again, was completed sitting in the car, parked bang outside the campus walls, mere minutes before the interview was to begin. And to think I was asked if I joined classes to learn how to make and do up a portfolio. Yay to life in general! A 45 minute car ride from Kothrud to Viman Nagar was spent painting, pasting and repainting chunks of papier mache and strips of cardboard. An all nighter was managed with the help of SMSes and a cold floor, so I could prepare miniature paper mounts for the snaps I’ve taken over the years. Two gullible, unsuspecting friends were dragged to a fishing village, made to wait while I captured masalawallahs, chaatwallahs and then some fishy folks on film.

Good times, good times. Given a choice, I’d do it all over again. I think whatever SID prep work I’ve done will go down as real good fun, but fun that would eventually take me someplace I don’t think I want to be. 

I kinda feel like I’m betraying those paintings and photographs by using them as part of my portfolio, using them to convey my level of art and creativity to the panelists, using them to obtain the final go-ahead and then dropping the idea once it falls in place. It’s just not about whether or not they were deemed good enough by everyone who saw them… it’s simply that I enjoyed working on them, and just for that, they’re special to me. 

So here I am, all maudlin over some paint splattered on paper. Then again, it's paint I splattered. Samples from the portfolio beloved might just show up here.

So long. 

Shoot. I need to stop ending with that. It's like I'm attracting long deliberations and long speeches and long posts and.. long hair? Clearly, sleep is the need of the hour.

Stay well, folks.

Les Blues Run The Game...

If we were talking football, I’d say I’m RED all over. Any day. But only IF. Right now, I’m blue all over. That it, folks – The blues are here! All those shades... shades I normally go gaga over, really. But sometimes, they suck. Nice and concise. Whoop dee do! Pulitzer with a side order of chicken wings please. Ack, no chicken. Dead things are bluesy. S&G sure got it right. All hail. The Internet's dead chicken below - viewing free.

All this feeling sorry for yourself business is so dumb. The rational part (not half) of you gets that it is anti-purpose, but while the majority rules… yuk yuk yuk. Emergency! This must end.


Okay, so today I painted. I kinda get why I averaged 4’s in school… make that 4.5’s. Then again, it could be the Blue Curtain dictating what I’m saying. To hell with it! So yeah, I painted. On leaves, on paper, with paints – I painted, get it? Good. All colourful stuff, I’m happy. Aw what the heck…

- - -

Now see, there’s this chap (I forget who) who said that if he was bored writing about something, he figured the janta probably wouldn’t enjoy reading it. Profound it isn’t, but so true, innit? So I’m gonna get the final fullstop of the day in place – soon. Not immediately, because I’m not bored. I’m just blank. And when over the murky blankness descends the heavy curtain… the moths attack. I have a few moth stories, actually. Ah shoot, I just got my Dad mad at me – I refused porridge at 8.20 pm, can you believe it!? Slam goes the door! Sue the girl I shall! Gah. Will someone please tell me who gets to be the teenager here?

The pictures helped, not a word from you - The dead chicken (sourced from Google, where else?) looks more alive than not. The crayons (sourced from some random profile, where the heck else?) make me happy. I sound like I think I would if I was drunk. I’m outta here. Here’s hoping Vikram Seth will help. Heh, I’m approaching a Holocaust story. My stars zonked out this evening, I tell you. Death to any joker who says this post made him/her laugh.

So long.