To all the girls I loved

This is to all the girls I have ever loved:

1. Sorry, for not being able to tell you how I feel.

2. Thank you, for being a part of my life, even if you were unaware of it. The feeling of loving you was a journey in itself- each memory to be cherished for a lifetime.

3. For those who spent some time with me- again thank you for giving me some important time from your lives which I can call my own even though I can't call you my own.

4. For all my one sided love affairs- It was a great experience to be in love even though the others didn't know it.

5. For using quiz to disguise my love letters: I can only express my apologies to quizzing and the quizzing community for using it as an excuse to hint what I was getting at, never having the courage to say it myself. To the addressee, I was stupid I admit  but you were more stupid feigning inability to understand. Good for you, in the end though! 

6. To my girlfriend- I love you, i love you, i love you. :)

Of Garcia Marquez and bedtime stories

The first time I started a Garcia Marquez novel, i put it down after almost a page.

I picked it up again after almost a year because I had nothing to do. I persisted with the book and ended up loving it. 

I have read two of his books after that. In fact, I am reading his third book. 

Garcia Marquez is someone who grows on you. 

He is someone you can take to bed. His books i mean. And when you wake up in the morning, you can continue from when you left off. His style is lyrical, his prose encompassing. He has the uncanny ability of twisting and turning the plots at unexpected times. Once, while reading 'Love in the time of Cholera', and reared in the normal school of thoughts, I thought of a character as a protagonist until he died in the first five pages. The next character I took to as the protagonist died within the next one hundred pages or so! (Am I that unlucky for the characters?)

The stories have a humane character to them. They skip generations in a few pages and return to them in a few lines. 

I can see Simon Bolivar and his last days in front of my eyes. Also his callused buttocks. I can see Dr Juvenal Urbino. I can feel the love in the time of cholera. I can see Macondo being established before my eyes, the intricacies of the various characters of the Buendia family. I can see Colonel Aureliano Buendia sitting in his chair looking out at the dusk with little gold fishes in his hand.

I can go to bed a hundred nights with a Garcia Marquez in my hands.

28 marks on the wood

Its been a while. 

Its been a while since I last wrote something. Its been a while since I did something meaningful. Its been a whole lifetime. 

How time flies! My earliest memories (that I can recall now) was tramping over our courtyard with a crude bow and arrow shooting whatever I had in sight. (Sadly, i managed to hit my aunt and she broke it in two and fed it to the fire :( ). Also of a tricycle. A two seater tricycle. Dada used to drive it while I sat on the pillion seat.

Part of the memories is also the legend of the bent leg. I dont recollect any of it and my knowledge of it is only what was told to me by my mom. It seems I was born with a bent leg which became more pronounced as I advanced in years. An operation was planned for the same. However, prior to that I had a fever that lasted around 18 days, trapped in a place where roads were blocked. As the fever waned, my leg seemed to get straighter. Today the evidence is in the form of a black and white photograph with me seated on a chair. (Indeed, my aunts used to identify the photographs of me and my brother by looking at the legs!)

And then came school. Friends. Playtime. Exams. Competitions. Infatuation. Love. Those were happy days. 

College followed. New place. New set of friends. People. Life changed. Appearances changed. Both from the inside and the outside. Quiz happened.

And then Entrance exams, jobs, more entrance exams, more jobs and more entrance exams. Somewhere in between the options a, b, c and d, the option of love also materialised. 

Again a student. Am back to being what I was almost 26 years back. Its a long time being a student. a certified student, i mean. I am sometimes apprehensive that organizers wont allow me entry into quiz shows even though I am a valid student of a reputed institution. Who will if they keep seeing you for more than ten years in a competition?

As I ramble, I keep looking at the watch. I know this is not a coherent  post. It was never meant to be. I just felt like trying to write something at a critical juncture of my life. This post is not meant for my readers (whoever comes and reads this blog). For them I have better posts to show. 

Birthdays used to feel so exciting all those years ago. I dont feel the excitement now. No anticipation. Maybe I have grown practical. As i keep going back to one of my favourite facebook status updates- Maybe life happened to me. I just hope I make the best of it