55 Fiction #3: He Quit

He was shocked. Marlboro. That was his choice too. He was reminded of the day when he too was around sixteen. His first puff meant a sign of being a man. He smiled with a tinge of sadness. Tears poured as he pictured his teenage son smoke. A little too late but, finally, he quit.

Unsighted

We all have a image of people we meet, see and talk to. The parameters of judgement different for each one of us. What we fail to register is the hidden qualities of individuals which like an illusion shows us a image and challenges us to discover the hidden side.

Last evening I was sitting in the crowd watching different individuals dance, sing and perform.It suddenly hit me. There is a lot more to a person than what we understand them to be. I personally feel there is nothing like a woman who can dance and a man who can sing.There is nothing like a person being able to hold the crowd in awe with what he or she can do. Nothing. But once the situation changes the value of the talent diminishes. It is more or less like a stock market value. At different times we are valued differently. For someone who has invested in us feels proud and happy and someone who hasn't aches for our company. Just like with newly signed deals and progress and new information the stock value gets altered.  Uncovering of some information. A little more knowledge about a person.Changes our perception. We see them in a altogether different light. But this light fades over the time or at times get so strongly associated that it blinds the other person of all the remaining appreciable or inappreciable qualities.

While some of us drum beat our talents- some keep it hidden. Some are so exclusive of their audience that most of us will never really understand what the other person is capable of.  I sometimes laugh out loud when people say- "I know him/her/you" . The truth is we never know. Never. Like the stock market can put a Satyam in high charts just before its fall. The human stock value (as I call it) can be tricked to be high. Or it can be tricked to be low.  We are under the misapprehension that someone's mind, someone's nature, is something real and enduring.Something we can fully understand. Only when we sit straight and look into that person , does it become clear that  we haven't looked enough. We are just not capable of that somehow. 

They say we have a blind spot and we cannot see everything with our eyes. I'd say our eyes are incapable of seeing anything at all. Forever we will continue to remain unsighted because anything worth seeing has to be seen with a mind, a perception, a emotion, a experience, at different dimensions and with understanding.

The battle

I stepped into a unknown territory today. I knew there was no escape but to face it. So be it. Before resorting to the final option of walking there alone. I dropped many hints to my friends who are very comfortable in this area foreign to me. But they all smiled and stepped aside. I understood it was a now or never situation. I had to fight this battle alone.

Honestly, I was shit scared when I opened the door. Having never visited such place alone. I found everybody and everything intimidating. I communicated my requirements. A girl who seemed more interested in chewing her (spearmint flavour?) gum than what I had to say nodded her head. I found this creepy. Finally I was made to sit in a chair on which I was made to lay back to such a degree that I thought I'd fall back. I was made to close my eyes and immense pain burned around my eyebrows and above my lip. I heard someone ask -"everything fine?" With one eye overflowing with tears and the other shut tight I guessed it was the same girl - monster -I could smell mint.

This was still a pain known to me. What followed was unexpected. My face was immersed in a steam outlet. I could only hear and feel high degree water boiling on my lap. A small miscalculation or error could burn my face. I am in a enemy territory- unknown territory. It was confirmed. A few slaps on face with something I couldn't see or smell but just feel on my skin. When the pair of hands left my face the slimy paste that was put on my face weighed 8 times the skin beneath it. I could barely breath. Just when I figured out a way to breath normally a needle like thing poked the tip of my nose, the ridges, edges and every little contour of the features on my face were attacked with an unknown weapon. Tears rushed through my eyes as I silently wept and thought- it was a mistake to come here in the first place. A cold liquid like clay touched my forehead and before I knew covered my entire face. I was just about to open my eye when that opening was also sealed with something too heavy for my eyelid to lift. Fifteen minutes later I found the clay like thing hardening around my face suffocating me. I had never felt so trapped and helpless. I tried to get up and get the hell out of that place. But a pair of hands forced my shoulders back to a dangerous angle reaching which I could rest my back.

I was left alone- as if sealed in a enclosed cabin with its walls inching in and digging on to my facial skin with every passing minute. I raised my hands in moments of despair.  My eyes still closed, my back at a angle that made it impossible to move. I gathered no attention I guess. Nobody came to my rescue. Long after I gave up and sulked behind the hardening clay thing dreaming about open fields I smelled the mint gum monster. A slight tap on my cheek as if of to check if there was anymore room for the clay to dig into my skin. The mint gum smell faded and I was forced to dream again for ten more minutes. After the torturous ten minutes like a sudden rescue for the home army water hit my face and cleared off all the clay like thing. I could suddenly breath normal again.

A exchange of few words with the mint gum monster and a reflection of my clear face made me realize the mint gum creature was an angel. I paid for my freedom. As I pushed the door I walked out from a territory not unknown anymore but conquered.

This was my successful visit to a beauty parlor alone. A good accomplishment for the tomboy I have been all my life.. till now.

55 Fiction #2: Untaught

Her eyes looked around for a hint of affection. A pair of eyes to acknowledge her presence.  What pained her more was how comfortably everybody moved on and how they believed that she also should? Tears rolled down her eyes. He taught her everything but, never prepared her for this- losing a husband at sixty.

The fabric

Slowly. Unknowingly. We reach a point where we clearly know what makes us happy what doesn't. What we like what we don't. Who annoys us. Who makes us happy. Who is appreciable who is not. Ninety percent of our daily activities are figured out. Solved. Why is that people say life is unpredictable when we are always learning and unlearning? They say that because of these moments.

Those moments that are fickle. The moments when emotions fail to register. Feelings suspend. You simply don't know. Your memory cannot relate to what is in front of you and what you think you had figured out. You think you will be too happy but you try very hard to pass a simple smile. You surmise you will be hurt but you remain strong. You cannot figure out the fabric of behaviour and feelings you very carefully wove through millions of interactions you have had with the world. That fabric in which each thread is touched and felt by you. The colour of emotions, the set of reactions -everything defined by you. Now. Suddenly. You don't know. You pause for a while and peel the layers of emotions you experience. You keep seeing a different shade each time. Different. It is illusionary and  enigmatic. You cannot stop.You have to continue. Each shade is marvelous. If you peel a layer of happiness there is grief. Beneath love there is pain. Everything beautifully hidden. You may peel off the layers and stop at what you think is what you want to feel. There is no end. There really isn't. 

What is even more gripping is the amalgamation of our surroundings. Just like a fabric fades in the scorching heat and might burn a thread or two. Our fabric of emotion gets affected. It fades. It gets torn. It has patches of different cloths. It has nothing of its own. The emotions are adopted by our surroundings.The thing that makes this adoption exciting is- the choice. The choice of surrounding. You may choose to dye your fabric in the darkness of envy or self pity or pain. Or you may venture out into a unknown colour. 

The trick is to keep conditioning that fabric of emotion. Fully realizing  the power of its dynamics. Understanding that it is too complex to be fully understood. But, too simple to manage. Just a fabric, that we weave. The fabric which is palpable just in those fickle moments.

Lights

The energy is little different this time. Unlike last year we are little bothered about how we decorate home this Diwali. In our campus such is our reputation that people look forward to our Diwali decorations. Thanks to my sister's amazing art works. But this year, we have a bigger occasion. After two years of my parents and sister taking different sides on the whole marriage issue. My sister wanting more time to be single and my parents frantic about all the good grooms being taken away [:P Indian family dramas]  They have found a common ground in my Jiju. So.. with the wedding dates set to November 18th. Cards distributed. Dresses stitched. Sarees packed. Jewelery made. With a engagement ring adoring my sister's finger. My mom's dynamic trio (her brothers) helping with the arrangements. All relatives waiting for the first marriage of this generation. The eldest grand daughter from both the paternal and maternal connections.The hour long STD and ISD calls with elders in the family.  A few cousins expecting to get hitched at the wedding get together where a pool of eligible singles are expected to gather.

As my sister enters this new phase of her life. We all mom.dad and me also will have new additional roles to play. Our family tree is now in the growth phase. We are branching out. My sister will have one more family. This is the occasion that running on our minds. We are still pacing around with the last minute preparations. With only a handful of days left for the marriage. We cannot think of any Diwali.. the lights of anticipation of a new ties that await our family.  The every passing minute making a who-oo-osh sound. We all await this big occasion- My sister's wedding. My sister's wedding.(Still sinking in.)