Painted in concrete...

 

Painted boat upon a painted sea,

coz your life's all concrete.

It once bore you to the shore,

and waited till you didn't care for it anymore.

The waves that licked the strings,

did not wait for the tide to turn.

They carried it away and afar,

while you roamed about in a shiny car.

The waves are still in spite,

yet the boat would still fight.

Until the wall around you breaks,

and the earth around you shakes.

Will you swim the fiery sea

And reclaim your life while its still twilight?

Or will your life forever be concrete -

only a painted boat upon a painted sea?

You Raise Me up

You raise me up so I can stand on mountains
You raise me up to walk on stormy seas
I am strong when I am on your shoulders
You raise me up to more than I can be

I dont know when was the last time I truly felt this about someone in my life apart from God, ever since the time I went away from my grandparents and came to Delhi. I was barely 14 - left at my own to sail through the murky waters of life - without anyone to raise me up. And today when I look back, the very bonds that make a person who he is and raise him to become what he does - look all broken to me. A big question mark hangs when I try to recall parents, friends, relatives...

I'm sure it wasnt me who went wrong. I was only seeking something that this world wasnt ready to give - love. I've taken care of myself all this while - raising myself up on just one thing - an undying faith in love. But I'm so tired now of keeping undying faith in a dying commodity - my shoulders are so weak, that i wish someone were here to raise me up for a change.

What happened to us? Why did we all become so stone hearted? Why is all the love ( love not just between lovers, but in every sense of the wor(l)d ) out there busy playing ostrich - so afraid to stick its neck out and always afraid of being beaten back down?

Will anyone today say -
ab jaan lut jaaye
ye jahaan lut jaaye
sang pyaar rahe
main rahu na rahu...

Bah! Humbug.... love isnt worth dying for

One last question - what do all the above pics mean to you?

Average is the best...

I was wondering if pursuit of the best- every time and for every other thing - is really the best thing to do. All my life, I've done exactly that - and the life that I live today is a testimony of how good or bad it has been. Ensconsed in a degree from a premier university and a job at a reputed MNC, I can safely look back and think about how things couldve ended differently, still without the guts to have done things differently! But what when you sacrifice your childhood, your teenage to make a brighter adulthood, which again ur'e gonna be spending on making a better future? Its a struggle for the best, where best = struggle for the best. Nice infinite loop, but seems like we(atleast some of us) really enjoy getting sucked into it. Now I feel so regretful because everything has turned out horribly wrong, and there's nobody else to blame but myself.So i guess i'm just thinking about being an average for a while.

I, for most part of my life, have never known being average i guess, except in sports of all kinds. In junior school, I was the best debator & elocutor, best singer, best student, best writer, best friend to many... and the list goes on. Strangely, I never ran after being best at these. I guess I got lucky. Things changed when I shifted base to my parents' place in Delhi. I sudddenly found myself an average guy in a new school, in a new city which was completely alien to me. It was tough to find a place and respect among the new people. It was suffocating to live like this - with everyone around, including your parents, after your life. I guess this is where I started fighting for my place - started striving for the best.

New school and 'home' somehow started to have a bad influence on me - the best debator began to stutter, the best singer lost his voice and sense of music, the best student began to forget his lessons, the best writer just went into hibernation, and the best friend to many was left without a friend to boot. Yet two things survived in me - love and the ability to laugh at myself, and a lot of it.

What started as a mission to leave home turned into preparing for the hallowed IITs (i'd heard they had hostels!) - another race for the best. Fortunately or unfortunately, I got through. Four years of hell further beat up the best in me and tried their best to carve out the average. There were no friends - only competitors. Racing for the best was not a choice, but the only option. But this wasn't the one I was gonna win easily. The average me slowly but steadily took more control. I had long lost the bests in me I had had during junior school years. The other two things that had survived till then also started falling apart. Laughing at myself no longer remained an ability when everyone else was already laughing at me. My idealistic concepts of love and friendship were bludgeoned by somebody I thought was my best friend. Self esteem just ambled away too i guess. And now i dont know if i'm even capable of loving. Getting an average job and average CGPA in the end was just the icing on the average cake.

Coming this far, I really feel average is better than the best, except when the former comes after a desperate race for the latter. I'd have been a much better person had I always been average. So what exactly is the 'average' that I talk about here?

Average is the person who doesnt have the biggest of brains, and thats why uses his heart more often.


Average is the student who knows his literature, but isn't obsessed with it.


Average is the employee who works long hours, but doesnt forget to live his life.

Average is the one who can get away doing what he wants and not what should be, because people are not expecting much of him anyways.


Average is the friend who'll pray for your success and watch your back, but wont be around you all the time to take implicit credit.


Average is the lover who'll love without expecting love in return.


Average are the parents who'll do everything they can so that their children could have a life they never could.


Average is the person who gives his best shot and lives for the present, without worrying too much about the result.


Average is the Sid in you and me who hasn't woken up yet.

Maybe I wouldnt have had as well paying a job as I have now (and i'm not saying this one pays well). Maybe I wouldnt have had a degree from IIT. But maybe, I'd have been happier. Maybe, I'd speak clearly, and be able to sing well. Maybe I'd have been laughing along with a bunch of close friends tonight. Maybe I'd have known unconditional love. Maybe I'd have smiled more often. Maybe...

Twenty Ten is here...

Ever since I wrote the "I return to blogger post", it seems like the starting credits of my sequel are still running... And it took me quite some time to realize this!! :)

But hey whatever, there's no better excuse to start afresh than a brand new year. So whats the big deal about new years' anyways? Why is it so hyped all over the world, and maybe in some distant planet(or 'pandora') we dont yet know about !! Yes its like a fancy date I agree... 01/01 followed by a pair of new numbers. But apart from the fact that the 12 pages of the gud ol' Roman calendar get exhausted on this day, I dont see anything worth harping about.

Lets rewind a bit, and try to figure out what made Dec 31 the last day of the year, and what made January cheekily follow it. From what I remember of my history lessons at school, seems like a few Roman emperors had some personal rivalry with a month called February. So Julius Caesar removed one day from it and added to July, while Augustus removed another and added it to August. Poor ol' February thus has to do with 2 days less for 3 years until it leaps to party with a bonus day the fourth year. And july and august stupidly broke the harmonic alternate 30, 31 day series just for pride and glory. Doesnt it make one wonder, then, why January! Lemme explain... Jesus Christ, born on 25th was 'circumcised' on the 8th day ie. Jan 1. And how could such a big event go without celebrations... so they called it the beginning of the New Year and "feast of circumcision" (Why anyone would wanna celebrate such a thing is beyond me... and yet we all do now!!). The romans apparently celebrated their new year in March, when Julius Caesar thought of doing something new in his free time when he'd gotten bored of all the dames and announced "Fuck you all, from now we will celebrate New Years' on January 1. And the calendar will be called 'Julian' calendar". Romans had no option but to oblige...

Traditionally, it was thought that one could affect the luck they would have throughout the coming year by what they did or ate on the first day of the year. So why do we celebrate it these days drinking like a fish into the wee hours of the morning? (Scratching head... oops...2 hair strands come out :( .. ). Another theory that makes me laugh is - "It was once believed that the first visitor on New Year's Day would bring either good luck or bad luck the rest of the year. It was particularly lucky if that visitor happened to be a tall dark-haired man." Talk of a patriarchal society and gender bias. Wouldnt it be so much better if the first one to visit you on a new year's day were a tall, fair, wavy-haired, light eyed, pouty lipped, busty brunette??!! And i'm sure this would work even for the girls out there :P

Another thing that tickles me is the concept of resolutions. Why would we want to chose one day as the day when we decide what we're especially NOT gonna do the whole year? Talk of showing the middle finger to a mirror? My new year reso is to think about a good reso for the next year. Whats yours? :P

Anyway on a more personal front, I dont remember doing anything special on new years'... something that'll bring me luck or whatever. I mean i was so stoned that I couldve been easily grinding with some random babe who couldve been equally drunk and fantasizing about another babe. Does this qualify as something that'll bring me luck?!! Or does that mean this is what i'll be doing most part of the year? Well well... now we're talking :)

After all that hype about Twenty 20's though, I'm glad that Twenty-10 is here for a change !!