A new year. New beginnings, ambitions, resolutions, expectations. I wonder what milestone 2012 will bring.

I hope the new year is as soothing as the winter sun, and as pleasant as the summer breeze. Here’s wishing everyone out there a very Happy New Year! 

Sideways

Why does alcohol produce such a subliminal effect?

3 glasses of red wine are most often sufficient to put you right into the mood for some wa-wa-whoom sex, the catch here being who it is with seems to be the least of your wasted avatar’s concerns. Or it could make you yearn for someone that your conscious self was quite certain it had gotten over. (Really?? But this was the person before the last.) Worse yet, it could make you feel completely in love with someone that was merely a friend 4 drinks back. It could either give you the king-of-the-world elation, or throw you right into the dark dungeons of loneliness. The most common and perhaps safest effect is that you feel everyone around you is your best friend forever.   

It’s amazing how a mere liquid can intensify the mind’s ability to feel by leaps and bounds. Sometimes I wonder who the real person is: the controlled and clear-headed pre-drinks mind, or the high and hyperbolic post-drinks one. And then I go on to wonder how clear-headed we really are even if we are not down with alcohol. Is this also not some milder form of being high?

Whatever the case may be, alcohol is known to be the catalyst to some stupidest and wildest decisions in a person’s life. Red wine is known to be especially notorious ;) Mere grapes ….

Why are boys so mean? Why do they always break our heart so? .... :)

Us, Morning Birds

We all have a morning routine. We are, after all, creatures of habit. I have noticed that our most peculiar habits are centered around what we do when we just wake up. I’m sure we all have our peculiarities.

Some of these peculiarities I have not been able to forget. I have known someone who’s very first task of the day used to be to smoke a cigarette so he could go to the loo (it used to make him ‘go’). Another friend of mine does not like to be talked to when she eats her morning cereal. I know a lot of people can’t seem to truly wake up till they’ve had their morning coffee. In Kerala (Indian state), the men wake up at 4 AM, take a bath and rush to the temple to pray. Whatever else they have to do comes after that. Some read the morning paper first thing, the world won’t function if they don’t find out what’s going on in it as soon as they wake.

My morning routine used to be a cup of coffee while I stared out of the window, and spent the time planning the day in my mind. My coffee and my solitude were all I needed after a good night’s sleep to make the rest of the day productive. Ofcourse now with my ten month old son scooting around the house demanding my attention, that solitary quarter is hard to find. Now the day starts and ends with catering to his every need. But I consider this a routine too. Soon enough I will fit right back into my morning coffee routine, and then I will miss this. Don’t we all?

To Forgive, Divine...

To forgive, they say, is divine. To err, human.

If we go by this, being human sounds like a cakewalk. Being divine, though, is a hell of a task. Do you find it easy to forgive? I admit I don’t.

Forgiveness is considered to be the noblest thing to do. It benefits not just who you have forgiven, but also yourself. You are finally past the anger that had become you. You have let go of the past and found hope again. I know they talk about the virtue of forgiveness in a lot of spiritual teachings.

As glorious as it sounds, it’s so damn difficult to let go of all the hurt! It’s a long long journey, and such a difficult one. Sometimes it may not turn out to be worth it, and sometimes so totally worth it.

I for one, have erred (I fit very well into the human race), have been forgiven, have been erred against, and have forgiven too. All of this has been quite a journey, but the most difficult and lengthy journey of all has been when I had to forgive myself. A person has such high expectations from oneself that when you goof up, you disappoint yourself the most of all.

I know that life will always demand that we let go and forgive. It has been tough, and it’s never going to get any easier. But that doesn’t mean we won’t have to do it anymore. Well, no joke being divine!  

Smart Enough?

I don’t know if it’s a good thing or bad, but we live in an age where even phones have an IQ (back in the days there were dumb phones, then came the smart ones, and then the smarter ones…now there’s no end to how smart they can get, the only limitation being your budget). We spend hundreds to have ourselves always surrounded by these gizmos. It’s almost as if we pay to let ourselves be lazy. Ofcourse the technical term for it is ‘convenience’.

So when was the last time any of us did a mental calculation of 12 times 16? Wouldn’t we rather reach out for our phone instead? The phone being so smart, would compute it for us in microseconds, add about 5 seconds to type 12X16. Now that’s our money’s worth.

But are the green bills the only price we pay to have so much convenience a click away? Aren’t we providing our own brains less exercise and more stress? We have transferred our brains’ little challenges onto these seemingly convenient and jazzy toys. We are paying to let our phones get smarter while we get stupider.

That being said, there’s no doubt that a machine can never be as intelligent as a human brain. Smart, maybe, but intelligent, never. Even then, we need to perhaps reassess our overdependence on technology. Being intelligent is good, being smart as well, even better.

"Cooler" Than We Are

Now, where's my pair of dark glasses gone to...

Today

What a beautiful day outdoors! It's as if the Gods have blessed us today. The mild breeze rejuvenates. The warm sun soothes. The flowering trees welcome. The birds entertain. It's a day to be re-energized. A day to fall in love again. A day to LIVE.  

Love this song

Original Song (in French): Quelqu´un m´a dit, by Carla Bruni

"Il vous aime, c'est secret...." 

Listen to it here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5W8SrhLVl5U
 
English Translation:

They tell me that our lives are not worth much
They pass in an instant as roses wither
They tell me that time that slips by is a bastard,
That makes coats of our sorrows
However, someone told me...

That you still love me
Someone told me that you still love me
Could it be possible then?

They tell me that destiny makes fun of us,
That it gives us nothing and promises all
It seems that happiness is within reach,
so you reach out and find yourself crazy
However, someone told me... 

But who was it who told me that you still loved me?
I don't remember, it was late at night,
I can still hear the voice, but can't see the features any more,
"He loves you, it's a secret, don't tell him I told you!"
You see, someone told me...

That you still love me. Did someone really tell me...
That you still love me, so could it really be possible?

They tell me that our lives are not worth much,
They're over in an instant, as roses wither
Someone told me that time that slips by is a bastard,
that makes coats of our sorrows
However, someone told me...

My New E-Reader

I call myself 'technologically-challenged'. Not because I can't use the 'smart' stuff, but because it repels me. I simply don't have the patience to deal with those super-efficient gadgets that can do a million things at a time, but do nothing right. 

So when someone suggested the e-reader to me, I dismissed the idea without even giving it a thought. To suggest that I give up my books was nothing short of blasphemy. It was to get closer to reading, rather than getting away from it, I was politely corrected. My stubbornness stood in the way and the idea was trashed. 

Till I happened to watch an online review of the e-reader. To have thousands of books in one little device, that was so light and could be carried with you anywhere, was enticing. This could be my own little library. And it took just a few minutes to turn the 'could' into a 'would'. I purchased the Kindle online and before I knew it I was reading away nights and days like a hooked addict. I have fallen in love with my little library. 

Ofcourse, hard covers are still closer to my heart than anything else. But the beauty is, I can switch from one to another whenever I wish to. And when I miss the all-too-familiar scent of old pages from a library book, I can simply drive down to my local library and give the kindle a break.   

Sometimes having choices is a good thing.  

The Fact About Fiction

I prefer reading fiction. Facts bore me to death. Why choose the finite when you can choose to play with fantasies?

Fiction captures me with its sheer power of limitlessness. I can choose to be a Belgian sleuth investigating a murder one day, and a beautiful heroine jilted in love the next. Being me can get dreary sometimes. To live a whole new life in a brand new character and make a fresh new story can be nothing short of fascinating.

And yet, as aloof from reality fiction may seem, I sense a queer affinity between the two. In some strange way, our own natures are touched by these strange fantastic characters that we live through our imaginations. After all, aren't we living these lives in our mind? In our mind we have traveled to these eras and felt what these characters feel, except that our bodies still exist in the present. But an experience of the mind is an experience nevertheless.

Some years back I had read a story about this girl who needs to cross across a haunted bridge, all by herself, in the middle of the night, to reach her house at the other end. I do not remember now who wrote that story. But I distinctly remember the fear I felt when I read it, and how I lived every moment of that fear in my mind, while the girl crossed that bridge (in the story). As it happens, she successfully makes it across the bridge (so it wasn't haunted after all), only to get home to find her house haunted (eeks!). Now where would we be able to live anything like this in real life?

The good thing about fiction is that it stays fictional, so you don't have to face the consequences (you don't actually die when you enter your haunted house after all, even though the character does :)). When you finally put your book down, you are happy to be real. It helps appreciate the real world. 

Wilde has this to say about fiction “The good ended happily, and the bad unhappily. That is what fiction means.” Now this is too good to pass!