Maturity = Loneliness?
I went to college last week. Met my HOD and went to the beach. It was so peaceful!
I was suprised to see that I wasnt bored at all, though i was alone there, without any company. I ended up recollecting memories as I walked through the same old streets.
Its so odd, that time I had so many friends I could count on. In fact, I used to hang out with different groups, and was always torn between them. The contrast now is so striking. Some of my friends are in Bangalore, the rest doing their higher studies.
World now is so different. Definition of "Friends" has itself changed! I have many friends in office too, in fact people envy me for having so many friends. I stay with my college friends, and I know a couple of friends in this city who are from college. None of them are people I can depend upon. None who have the spirit and enthusiasm as my people back at skal. Each one has set ideas about life and de Everyone is either already committed or looking out for a companion. Those committed prefer each other's company all the time, and in due course I only have to adjust to accomodate them and their love interests into all activities. Ufff!!
Generally such things are felt by people who are not in a relationship. But I realised today that is not true. Even being in one does not stop me from missing my friends. I still would love to do those things I did last year and even in college.
But I guess its more about accepting that my friends are moving ahead in life. Eventually we all will be settled and will place our families above friends. They have just taken the step, and I am just angry that someone else is going to be above me. I am not important, or equally important anymore! Noone will miss me!! Noone will care about me!!! Noone, none of those friends whom I have spent such great times with!!!!
I dont care about the whole world missing me. I care about my friends not caring about me. I love to be wanted. I want to be missed.
Guess I always felt this way, maybe everyone does. It's just that it is difficult to admit.
I dont miss anyone in particular.
I dont miss home so much.
I dont miss childhood.
I miss college!
Sleeping beside the Radio
I was coming back from this shop today evening. It was the usual dusty street outside my house. Ok, so I stay off this dusty street which is first of all filled with potholes and mud, and then there are people walking around, buses plying to and fro, cars and motorcyles speeding within the space left, the remaining road taken up by people selling fruits on carts . I was hurrying through the road so that I could leave that dust cloud and go back home. As I was walking past, I heard a faint radio being played at the steps of a closed shop. I turned to see, and saw this little girl sleeping peacefully next to an emergency lamp which seemed to have an in-built radio. She did look like from a poor family, but was well dressed and had her hair tightly braided. I suppose the kid's parent would have made her sleep and gone back to work somewhere nearby.
She looked so peaceful, i felt like moving my hand over her head.
Now I do not have even traces of attachment towards kids. If they are cute and smart, I am happy to see the bounce around their parents. I can go say a "heylo" to them in an artificially sweet voice just to please the kid's parent, but otherwise I do not like their company. And I was shocked as to why I felt so touched by that sleeping girl. Somehow looking at her, I forgot how dusty the road was, how people around me were yelling and bustling around. I did not hear the horn of buses, screeching brakes of motorcycles, I just felt like smiling.
:)
Yaadein
Nagme hain, shikwe hain
Kisse hain, baatein hain
Baatein bhool jaati hain
Yaadein yaad aati hain
Yeh yaadein kisi dil-o-jaanam ke
Chale jaane ke baad aati hain
Yaadein, yaadein, yaadein
Bandhan ho to chhode
Darpan ho to tode
Hum sab hain mushkil mein
Yeh dil hai is dil mein
Yaadein, yaadein, o yaadein
Nagme hain, shikwe hain
Kisse hain, baatein hain
Baatein bhool jaati hain
Yaadein yaad aati hain
Yeh yaadein kisi dil-o-jaanam ke
Chale jaane ke baad aati
Yeh yaadein, haan yeh yaadein, yaadein
Duniya mein hum saare
Yaadon ke hai maare
Kuch kushiyaan, thode gham
Yeh humse, inse hum
Yaadein, o meethi meethi yaadein
Khatti meethi yaadein
Nagme hain, shikwe hain
Kisse hain, baatein hain
Baatein bhool jaati hain
Yaadein yaad aati hain
Yeh yaadein kisi dil-o-jaanam ke
Chale jaane ke baad aati hain
Yaadein, yaadein, oh yaadein
-from the movie Yaadien
Almost a year from "home"
A couple of days more and it will be a year since i left 'home'. Yes, i did visit my college and hostel after that, but dint dare to go to my floor. I was scared it might erase the memory i have of it back when we used to occupy that floor.
Well, I dont think i have changed much. I still talk like a grad student, as I was told by my Mgr.
I do dress up more in salwars these days than jeans and t-shirt or tracks. But its still the trademark kurtas that are my favorite.
Overall i do have a huge social circle, lots of friends in office itself and a few outside because of college. I have not at all kept in touch with old friends. Somehow I just cant talk to them openly over the phone. It is so much better to just sit in someone s room and chat face to face.
And then there is a set of friends whom i had to stop calling to teach myself to move on with life. For how long will i keep calling them and cribbing to them.
I still get teased here too!! but yes, it is much easier to control than in college, or maybe i have just become shameless and not bothered.
It feels like i am at the shore, and people around me keep moving like waves. They come they go. Some return too, but with feeble effect. Everyone has an ambition , a dream towards which they are moving.
Where is mine?
Was it ever there?
Why am I still at the shore?
E mail from phone
--
Sent from Gmail for mobile | mobile.google.com
It was a dusty evening, and the traffic outside my office building was as usual. I decided to get a quick bite at Wraps & Rolls and get back to work. And hence there I was , trying to cross the road and in the process, dodging in between speeding autos and swiftly moving cars.
I had to wait some time to get my order processed, and took some time to observe the people hsatily boarding share autos, catching buses. One could almost read their worried thoughts from their faces. Another guy had bought a roll before me and as he stood there eating, a beggar girl kept pestering him. My first thoughts were at disgust for all beggars worldwide. But then I noticed that this girl was hardly 7 years old, she was hardly wearing anything, some dirty shorts, had untidy hair which was tied up in a ponytail. After a few minutes I saw her eating that guy's roll, I guess he gave it to her. She sat with her mother, hungrily devouring it.
I have read about poverty in books, written "letters to editor" as part of english exercises about slum dwellers, "garibi hatao" of the Congress, but never thought about it deeply till this moment. I saw this young working girl, beautiful long hair, fair skin, a neat patiala salwar and fitting kurta, and tried to see this through that little girl's eyes. And then, wondered if this girl would even dare to dream of owning such simple pleasures that we have without much effort.
As I quickly tried to get back my composure and cross that road of hurdles to get back to work, I wondered if it is fate, luck, or "karma" that I am where I am and the little girl is where she is.
I tried searching her the next day, dint find her, but saw her mother with some other kid. By then, the horror had set in and I dint feel much for the other kid as I had for this girl.
But some things still dont change....
You may be working, but you still belong to that herd of gals that graduated from NITK in 2007. And you get reminders of that..
- You meet some of the hostel gals over a lunch and you are reminded of the herd mentality that we so stuck by over the past 4 years.. Go anywhere, but as a gang..
- The teasing that used to happen in college is still very much prevalent. Whoever thought that it is over with college is deeply mistaken!! In fact, it gets newer and sometimes even serious.
- Dad still gives you cash when you are leaving home.
- Walk on the street of your apartment and u meet some nitkians loafing around in shorts, just like college!
- Try as refined as you can get over the dinner table, once you are with hostelites in general, all that vanishes.
- Your sis still misses you the same, and still considers you to be the same brat who can be troubled n pinched as before..
:)
A month into Corporate
A month into being a "working mahila", as a friend calls us and I have noticed some things.
- You cannot avoid the aunty type handbag if you go looking for something to take to work. That is primarily because there exist only 3 types of bags:
- college bags
- aunty bags [that our mums used to take to work when we were kids]
- party bags- very flashy, and all seem to have gold or silver on them.
So I ended up taking a normal back pack type of bag to office.
- Mums look younger than you. Go to a park, and u see a fit and trim gal chasing a lil kid n then you realise that she is a mum.. Gosh, when did I start comparing myself to mums!! Yuck!!!
- When the driver says Maam, it is for you, not for ur mum. Similarly when the driver asks for his fees, he asks you, not your Dad.
- When your Dad buys a new car, Something stops you from calling it your car. N then you realise its because people joining with you have "their own car", not their Dad's.
- When people talk of their girlfriends/boyfriends they dont blush anymore or offer any space to tease. Everything is now at a more serious level. So pulling their leg over a phone call looks very silly.
- And now u have to handle your investments n taxes and all. Your dad cannot do that for you.Nor can you run to him for help. "You are accountable to the company"
