Stories

"I am enslaved to fate, of all else say no more..."

~ Rumi

Hidden
one inside the other
the other inside another
petal after petal
whorl after whorl
living in one another
a lacy latticework of lives
Fate sits by the window
her divine, deft fingers at work
greedy and tireless
weaving stories
secretly but surely
from the womb to the world

Of signs and tempting fate

God's exclamation mark! Will my day be funny?!

I am a believer of signs. Well, somewhat. The other day when sitting by the window, I was brooding over how supremely grey and monotonous a Monday morning feels, a flock of geese flew right across the patch of sky that I call my own. Arranged in their typical symmetrical V, they darted across like a beautiful feathery arrow. Just a flash, yet it did take some bite away from my sombre mood, thus leaving me dazed and in another world for a moment or two. That was a sign to me. That life is certainly much more than Monday morning blues, and that this too shall pass and make way for the weekend soon. Another frequent occurrence that is a sure cure for sore eyes and frayed nerves is the curious bunny who makes regular rounds of our yard. So potent are these beautiful distractions, or 'divine interventions' as one friend calls it, that the hovering worries feel half conquered by the time I rearrange my head to brave them. Haven't you felt like that on similar occasions?

Then there are moments that I call tempting the fate. When like a temptress I chase and flirt with fate for a flicker of a moment, when I feel immensely invincible. I play little bets with myself, both serious and ridiculous at once. Short-lived and punctuated with impatience, they go something like this - if the tea gets done by 3.15 pm, then the call won't come; or, if the neighbour's cat is still sitting by the hedge when I stare out of the window next, then something good will happen; or, if I reach the signal before it turns green then....

While on this topic, I am reminded of two French movies that I watched recently (yes, all a part of my bourgeoning Francophilia!). The Girl on the Bridge, through the relationship between a middle aged knife thrower and his zesty young target, explores the fragile link between luck and togetherness. Luck is an absent concept and therefore the human urge to build it through signs, love and life. In A Very Long Engagement one comes across such nonchalant bets with oneself by a young woman who is in search of her missing fiance during the World War I. At once hopeful and miserable, she trades with time, place and situations that would lead her to him.

Before I digress further, is gambling with fate more or less a woman thing? As far as I know, men generally don't entertain such follies. At least the ones I know, don't. We women do it all the time in our heads, this eerie permutation and combination of situations and their possible outcomes. Or am I the only one out here?

Conquering fear

"Faith, indeed, has up to the present not been able to move real mountains... But it can put mountains where there are none."
~ Neitzche

Tonight as I fumbled my way through butchering a chicken, my very first, my eyes feverishly trailed the blood and sinew till they could no more tell which was what. Despite the plethora of recipes and my reputation as a cook (okay, I can't help but be a narcissist here!), I had never ever dared touching raw flesh. That was always Sam's job. But tonight I had to, for the husband was 'busy'. Making my way through the wobbly carcass, I realised it's no big deal. What was I so afraid of? It's just meat and it's dead. There!

And so sprung up a string of incidents that have remained singularly unforgettable in my inconsequential life thus far...

I was barely ten then, when I had once returned home from my regular evening recreation before the helplessness of 'homework time' would kick in. How I had straight gone into the bathroom to hide the gaping wound on my thigh that had resulted from a bad bicycle fall. Lest the parents see it and give me a good piece of their mind, which I was anyway quite used to in those days. Lest I am rushed to the hospital for that much dreaded shot. But like all mothers do, mine too discovered the wound after a day or so and what followed should better be left out. Let's just say the lesson thrived well inside me, for years. Because the next time I had tumbled off and bruised myself, I had just cycled on briskly with a bleeding knee to the hospital. Shot time!

Three winters back during a rafting adventure, when almost drowning in the glacial waters of the Teesta, I had seen it looming large like a green monster. Fear. Little did I know that the life jacket would fail me when the then daredevil in me had decided to take an impulsive plunge into the tempting Himalayan waters. I was already doing the goodbyes in my mind, and all this when I was just a month-old newly wed. How supremely unreal the moment felt! Suddenly, something inside me had silenced the howling tears and strangled that sneering monster. And there I was, streamlined (what if a creature from the deep pulled me into the fathomless depths!), holding on to the boat and actually using my head. Of course, I was rescued back into the boat. Of course I cried, wailed in fact, but not before I was snug and secure in one of the changing huts.

One afternoon, when words had been whispered and blames had been hurled inside closed doors. When judgement was sung callously, the notes of which still ring deep in my ears. When I learnt that it takes only a handful of days for some people to stab you right in the heart. Just like a spell, the mirror of illusions had broken. And how I was reborn, stripped of doubts and fear. And a little respect, too. Fate lets you have only one choice (which I proudly have) and keeps the rest for herself - perhaps the most important of all lessons I've learnt.

It starts from some point. How we carry some fears with us all along and then one day we just drop it, like clothes from a tired body. One fine day, just nothing matters. Absolutely nothing.

Books that make you think

There are books that make you think, and there are books that make you think till it starts to hurt and open wounds unknown to you before. Plagued by images and insomnia, I cannot help being pensive about the fabricated yet mind-numbingly real worlds of Ian McEwan's Atonement and Kazuo Ishiguro's Never Let Me Go. The power of good books being such, I am in a mood of denial. Of the reality. Of the world around me that whirls like a possessed dervish. Of my own meaningless existence. Thanks to my wise enrollment in the Contemporary British Fiction course from the University of Oxford, without which I probably wouldn't have been introduced to such achingly beautiful reads. And I see the world with a new pair of hollow eyes - hollow, because they've emptied themselves of the pestering wants. At least for now. Let the eyes be.

Atonement, Ian McEwan

It is an unusually hot English summer of the 1930s. The looming inertia and ugly stoniness of the Tallis estate lend character to the mounting sultriness. A thirteen year old Briony Tallis is like any other child at her age - curious, immature and impatient to understand the complicated world of adults. Harbouring a feverish passion for a literary career, she loves imagining stories and giving them shape with words whose paramount importance is the moral they convey. Amidst the clutter of her castles in air, lies her twisted reality - an absent father, a detached mother, a philandering elder brother (Leon), and a confused elder sister (Cecilia). Then there are the visitors - the cousins from the north, Lola and her twin brothers, who must stay with the Tallises till 'the Parents' sort out the nasty business of divorce; and Paul Marshall, a foppish rich friend of Leon's.

Despite the smothering heat, silence and hushed up family secrets, blossoms a surprising romance between Cecila and Robbie, the charlady's son who has been friends with the Tallis children since forever. With so much oh her platter and an imagination that already runs wild even when leashed, Briony weaves truths of her own. And when she stumbles upon her sister and Robbie caught up in a passionate moment which is ominously followed by Lola's rape, Briony cannot wait to give a conquering pattern to her story. Seizing the moment and impatient to cross the threshold of childhood, Briony's prejudiced testimony sends the wrong man to prison. Sixty years later, a famous writer, she writes a novel to atone for that one sin - to rectify her mistakes via her characters and give them another chance. Is she forgiven? On the canvas of a dysfunctional family, British class system and World War II, McEwan paints a haunting picture of love, longing and loss.

Never Let Me Go, Kazuo Ishiguro

Nestled in the picturesque English countryside is the prestigious school of Hailsham, where the students are exceptionally well taken care of - weekly medical check-ups, no unhealthy teenage habits and an abnormal emphasis on art and poetry by the 'guardians' (yes, not teachers). This is the story of Kathy, Ruth and Tommy - three best friends who grow up together in this idyllic setting and fall into the ruts of the inevitable love triangle. Through Kathy's take-me-with-you narration, we at once become a part of their cloistered, yet happy lives. Almost after you are there, drawn in by her nostalgia, you wonder why these children are never let out? Who and where are there parents? Why this almost fetish-like obsession with health? And then, amidst flickering flashes of fear and discovery, it strikes you on the face - they are clones who are being reared in isolation and are perfected for their future as 'donors'. Their lives are mapped out even before they are created. But what is surprising and heartbreaking at the same time is how normal these children are - they fight and fuss, they listen to music and draw pictures, they fall in love - everything that the ordinary humans do.

Once they are adults they begin donating their organs till they just 'complete' (that's the word). Then there are the nurse-like 'carers' who take care of the donors during and after their extraction surgeries. All the while we keep asking - why this mute resignation to a horrible fate? Why the lack of rebellion? Riddled with euphemisms and a compelling narration that resembles a teenager's diary, Ishiguro slowly but steadily pushes us to an edge from where there is no escape. Dancing on tumultuous undercurrents the narration sails through friendship, love and sacrifice. And all this while death is just out there, lurking around the corner like a giant phantom beast. What option does one have on the face of absolute powerlessness? To go on living and loving, or to just wait for it?

Seattle loves them who love Seattle

Our caravan has moved back to Seattle, the dot from where it had rumbled on three years before. The nomads have finally cruised a full circle, wheeling the entire country from coast to coast. Although I am not a believer in serendipity, this does feel like one. Who would have thought that chance alone would throw us on the beaten ruts once again?! After all, I haven't forgotten the fuss and melodrama I had made when we had to leave Seattle abruptly. Just when it was beginning to feel like home. Just when the nature junkie had begun singing odes to her pagan god. Just when ...

I still remember the faint piney tickle of the air when I had first arrived at the Sea-Tac airport in a damp June afternoon, cold and alone. A jumble of myriad emotions somersaulted inside me - the excitement of seeing Sam after a month; the daunting foreignness of every single moment; the nervousness of getting into an airport express train, for I had no idea what those eerily fast moving things were until then; the fidgeting worry whether I'll get my check-in bags (a co-passenger had already scared me saying her's was lost and wasn't found for months); and above all the giddy joy of having made it, all by myself. Strangely, the nine-hour flight from Amsterdam, after a layover of seven gnawing hours had not killed me. Haldiram's salted almonds and Amitav Ghosh's Sea of Poppies had kept me nourished and warm. Also, I had slept through most of the first flight from Delhi and hence felt quite rejuvenated.

So there I was, received by an almost unrecognizable husband (with a bush instead of a head!) at the baggage area, with a beaming face and a bunch of bright chrysanthemums. I remember they were dyed - green, blue, orange - and I had thought, "Wow, you could get these in green too!" Oh, and yes, my bags arrived safely too.

After three years of feverish longing and wandering in the dusty bylanes of nostalgia, we are here again. It is the same idyll, blanketed with fragrant evergreen woods and sapphire blue lakes. And what's more, it's almost spring! A quick visit to the famous Pike Place market last weekend saw a beautiful display of dewy tulips, possibly the first batch of the season to make their way into the market. After being buried for months in the brutal blizzards of the east, nothing could be more comforting than the sight of these charming flowers and the syrupy warmth of a gingerbread latte.

Well, numbing these small joys is the nagging confusion of apartment hunting coming up this weekend. Wars have to be waged over Sam's obsession with endless square footage and my balcony mania. So stay tuned for more stories from the Emerald city.

Flashback II

Remember the moon that night?

Burning with all its might and beauty,

with a strange neighbourly expression.

Like she was your confidante,

who could peep into your heart anytime

and play that nostalgic game of hide-n-seek.

I could never fathom these smirks and hushed exchanges.

They were cryptic, probably hieroglyphic.

To be so unmindful and foolish,

when the air was swollen with prophecies,

like the proverbial lull before the storm.

And I oblivious of the lurking fate,

marveled at the swaying gulmohars

and the pristine, ethereal moon!

The moon...ha!

Where was my insight?

My sixth sense, which I was once so proud of?

Where was my heart...

Surely I had it tucked in somewhere safe,

and not just strewn morsels of it on the deserted road

to be trampled on by known and unknown prejudices.

Sure, there it was.