A Big Time Fuck-Up-To-Be

I know this blog is usually rife with my depressed musings or cryptic natter about the people I currently hate, but today I will be commenting on something really important: How badly DC is mishandling its cinematic universe. 

Growing up, I was much more familiar with the DC Comics universe than I was with Marvel's. I mean, apart from the X-Men and Spider-man, I wasn't too familiar with now-famous characters like Hawkeye and Black Widow. Or for that matter even Iron Man. (To be honest, I knew more about Ant-Man than I did Iron Man. And Thor was mostly a joke.) 

Meanwhile, over in DC-verse resided my all-time favourite comic book hero (or anti-hero) - Batman. Even casual comic book fans know Superman, Wonder Woman, the Flash and Aquaman. 

The difference has been in the movie universe. The Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU henceforth) was masterfully set up under the guidance of Kevin Feige from the start. Even movies that didn't work too well (notably the first two Hulk movies) were interesting. 

Enough virtual ink has been devoted to why MCU is has been successful; from choosing great scriptwriters and directors, to casting the right actors (starting with Robert Downey Jr.) and picking the right comic book arcs (most notably the Winter Soldier arc from Captain America) to bring to the cinema, Kevin Feige has made a series of right decisions. However, the decision that I think deserves the most credit is the one that allowed MCU to build a world, with rules and over-arching villains and heroes that could co-exist. Each superhero was fleshed out but still belonged to the same world as all the others. That is no mean feat. 

Meanwhile, over at DC, apart from a few good choices, all I can see is the squandering of great comic book properties. To be fair, Arrow on the CW (a TV show based on the Green Arrow comics, for the uninitiated) is great. It may even be responsible for a successful spin-off in the form of the Flash, who is a truly beloved character from the comics. And of course, it goes without saying that the Christopher Nolan's Batman movies were stellar, with the second being an absolute masterpiece (and arguably the greatest comic book movie ever made).

HOWEVER, with news emerging in the last week about DC giving Zack Snyder the keys to the kingdom, a la Joss Whedon over at MCU, I am now truly afraid for what is to come. 

Snyder directed last year's Man of Steel and is now scheduled to direct Batman vs. Superman as well as a Justice League movie to release in 2017. 

First off, Man of Steel was just awful. I mean plain terrible. The last 40 minutes of the movie is just one long rampage that was directed with all the subtlety of a drag show. Most people left the theatre with a headache. Henry Cavill, and I am sorry in advance to anyone who liked him in the movie, was an abysmal Superman. I will reserve judgement on Ben Affleck and Gal Gadot as Batman and Wonder Woman because I know nerds (like me) often have a reputation for losing their shit online over casting choices for their favourite comic book characters and then having to eat their words at a performance like Heath Ledger in as The Joker (in case you didn't know or don't remember, us nerds lost our ever-loving minds when he was cast). 

My bigger problem is with Zack Snyder. He is well-known for fetishizing women in his movies, with some feminists going so far as to claim that he outright indulges in rape fantasies in many of his films. How can he possibly be allowed to have a hand in bringing to life the greatest female superhero i.e. Wonder Woman? Compare that to Whedon who was responsible for writing one of the best, most kick-ass, feminist heroes in Buffy The Vampire Slayer. Snyder also has a very heavy hand and is not too well known for developing characters with nuance and complications. Whereas, DC has some of the most complex characters in its universe. My fear is that his Batman will just be a billionaire who beats up bad guys at night (in a highly-stylized manner, no doubt; another major criticism leveled against Snyder has been his emphasis on style over substance) instead of the broken man who saw his parents killed before him and developed a complex moral code as a result. 

His Superman has already proven to be an angsty whine-machine who did not seem to hesitate to snap his antagonist's neck. Now, this point is worth discussing. I didn't have as much of a problem as other fans when Superman killed General Zod at the end of Man of Steel. My issue was that it came in the first movie itself and that too without taking pains to establish Superman's sense of responsibility and his highly-rigid honour code. He is referred to as Boy Scout in the comics because he is adamant that he will not kill. In fact, many Justice League stories have been born from his vast divergence in morality from Batman. Snyder did not establish this moral code and instead just showed him violating it. We should have been shown what a very big deal it is that Superman had to resort to killing someone and what kind of toll that could take on him.

Finally, DC hasn't taken pains to develop a universe before jumping straight away into a Justice League movie. How are casual fans supposed to know who Cyborg is? Which version of Aquaman will they be presenting and what will his character be like? And will characters like the Green Arrow and The Flash appear in the movie even though they exist in a parallel universe on TV shows?

So, here's the thing, I am very unhappy with the choices made over at DC and had to put down all my objections. I doubt any of the people that read this blog care as deeply about this stuff as I do. Still, it's worth mentioning. I'm not one to solicit feedback on my weird rants, but in this particular case, if you read this blog, comment and let me know what comic book movies you like and why.

Adulthood

Nobody tells you about all this. Not the books, the movies or the music videos. 

You grow up with misinformation. Being an adult is glamorous. It's all cars and shopping and staying out late. It's money you don't have to account for to anybody else. It's boyfriends and late-night parties in exotic locations. Somehow, you grow up with an idea in your head that the only thing standing in the way of a super-amazing life and you is an official government document that places your age at 18 and being out from under your parents' noses. 

Here I am, more than a decade past that 18, desperately trying to prevent myself from thinking about the fact that I will inevitably hurtle into my 30s in about 6 months. And I have now been privy to all the realities of adulthood that popular culture has long lied to me about.

Adulthood means responsibility, above everything else. Getting up in the morning well before you want to so that you can take out the trash, get the milk, bring in the newspaper and let in the maid. Telling the cook what to make, buying vegetables and meat on the evening before so she will have something to make and packing your own lunch. Far from being carefree with money, you realize you now have a ton of things to plan for. Before your monthly paycheck is even in your bank account, most of the incoming money has been earmarked for dreadfully mundane things like rent, salaries (for the aforementioned maid/cook, watchmen, etc.), flight tickets and bill payments. 

Ah, the glories and joy of paying bills. Not one of those music videos with J.Lo singing about 'Love Don't Cost a Thing' spend any time reflecting on how bills are paid. The first ten days of any month is spent juggling numerous bill that flood into your mailbox. From internet to cable to the newspaper, everything needs to be paid for. Thank heavens for e-banking. 

Look, maybe I didn't enter adulthood with too many illusions. I grew up around a perpetually stressed out single parent who had to struggle to make ends meet and I watched her bend over backwards trying to figure out how to pay for things. I didn't once see her dressed up to the nines on her way to a party or taking off without a care to a beachside holiday. But the truth is, I thought these were our special circumstances. I thought when I was 'grown up', I wouldn't have kids and would be able to do all those things. And I have. I take several holidays a year, often in exotic locations. Although I don't party as much as my peers (given the teetotalling and general misanthropy) I do quite frequently find myself in an expensive dress and high heels on my way to club. 

What I did not expect was the exhaustion that responsibility brings with it. At the end of each day, I'm just tired. Not the kind of tired that comes with physical exertion (because let's face it, I haven't been to my very expensive gym in nearly two months) but the bone-weary kind that comes with constantly having to think about consequences. Because that is the biggest difference between childhood and adulthood: worrying about consequences. Worrying about consequences is in essence being responsible. If I don't wake up and take out the trash, my whole house will smell. If I don't pay my electricity bill, the power company will cut my supply. If I don't buy vegetables, tell the cook exactly how to prepare them and pack them for lunch, I will find myself ordering yet another unhealthy restaurant meal that my aging body can ill-afford. 

So, here's the thing; it's a mixed bag. Clearly, I am having a much better time than my mother did at my age, when she had two small children and no help or money to raise them. But I find that I am also surprised by the unanticipated accompaniments of adulthood. No major pronouncements on the nature of life today, I have to go online and pay my internet bill.

A Thing of Beauty

A thing of beauty is a joy for ever:
Its loveliness increases; it will never
Pass into nothingness; but still will keep
A bower quiet for us, and a sleep
Full of sweet dreams, and health, and quiet breathing.

-John Keats

2014

It's difficult to describe depression to those that haven't experienced it. 

It's not sadness. Not momentary. Not temporary. It doesn't dissipate with the arrival of good news, good company or good fortune. And even when you're 'cured' of it, are out of the fog, it's like stray dog on the road, hiding behind street corners and waiting to jump out at you without notice. 

It's 2014 now. This is the year I will turn 30. Before turning 30, I will have experienced 3 major depressive episodes in my life.

Each time I've been depressed, it has been a wholly different experience for me, which means that unfortunately, I don't emerge from one with a road map for future episodes. 

I don't how others deal with it. My best friend, who has also struggled with this for most of her life, is the only other person whose experience I have some insight into. The book that most clearly articulates something close to my experience is Emma Forrest's Your Voice in my Head. The big difference between Emma and myself is the fact that she is bipolar. I am not. 

As I embark upon 2014, my most ardent wish is to not be depressed any more. It's been more than a year now. Enough. Please stop.

61

Today is the 61st anniversary of my father's birth. He's missed 14 of those birthdays now. The morning has been the usual parade of phone calls and messages between me and his parents, siblings, my uncles and aunts. Almost like condolence calls; I'm sorry your son is dead, I'm sorry your father isn't here to celebrate his birthday. This depressing little ritual we follow every year, straining to keep his memory alive. 

Yet, my father is both alive and dead in the most surprising of ways. He's alive in my eyes and my brother's voice, in unexpected gestures both of us unconsciously mirror. He is alive in my love of books and the written word and in my brother's geniality and sense of humour. These are all things we couldn't have possibly inherited from him, having spent little to no time with him at all. Despite that, we find ourselves to be remarkably similar to him. 

With each passing year though, he is further and further away from us. It takes me a second to remember his voice. We don't speak about him or tell Appa stories as often any more. Rarely do we think, it would be nice if he were here to see this today. I can't always conjure up his image immediately; I have to close my eyes and take a second and even then, the face that I see is from the picture we have hanging up of him in our house. He is no longer a breathing, moving, animate force of life. He has slowly morphed into just the picture on the wall. 

Some days though, like today, I would really just love to be able to talk to him. Nothing fancy, no garish sentimental display. Just talking to him would be nice. 

Deeper Than All the Roses

I had an English teacher in high school. She was...complicated. Something about her own internal life, that I have yet to figure out despite the time and distance away from my experience of her, made her unimaginably manipulative and cruel towards almost all of us. She was also a very good English teacher, breaking down the essence of Dickens, Shakespeare and Nehru and their works. (Conflict is drama. See, I remember)

This widely reviled human being once sat me down to tell me that my whole personality at that time in my life (I was 15 and my father had very recently shuffled off this mortal coil in spectacular fashion) could be summed up by E.E Cummings.

"(I do not know what is it about you that closes

and opens; only something in me understands

the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses)

Nobody, not even the rain, has such small hands"

Me, I personally prefer the desperate romanticism of Donne (When thou sigh'st, though sigh'st not the wind) and Barrett Browning (I love thee to the level every day's most quiet need) or the maudlin stoicism of Whitman (O the bleeding drops of red).

She said it and then quickly moved on, yet another in a series of manipulations designed to keep us all paralyzed in uncertainty and fear, so I never quite understood what she meant. 

In particular, she quoted the last line of the little couplet to me: Nobody, not even the rain, has such small hands. 

In the context, I took it to mean that she thought I asked for too little from the world, that I was hesitant to claim my portion of joy from the universe. 

Older and less inclined to blame all my problems on one thorn in my side (the aforementioned evil educator), I am left to ponder this. I don't think it is that I believe I am less deserving of happiness than any other person around me. I think there are greater complexities at play here. 

I've said this before, I have been the supporting player in the story of other people's lives. My best friend (it seems odd to still call her that given that we've spoken thrice in 2013, but that is what she is to me) lived a life at an 11. Her life was always more painful, dramatic, unhappy and exciting always. Worse things than most people can imagine have happened to her. Handsome, smart men will suddenly and completely fall in love with her. Even though she hardly socializes, when she goes out, people cannot seem to get enough of her. She is thought of fondly by most. And she spent a lot of time being in an on-again-off-again epic love story with our other childhood best friend (history has revealed him to be a Grade A asshole who I will spit on if ever I have the misfortune of running into him again).

So somehow, at absolutely nobody else's urging, I slotted myself into the role of the quirky best friend. The Cristina to her Meredith, not even the main player in my own bloody life. If there is any fault to be had here, it can be laid entirely at my doorstep. But I don't think there is any blame to go around; life turns out like this all the time. Not everyone is happy and well-adjusted. 

My larger point is this: I just don't think that life works in a way where you have a certain amount of happiness allotted to you and you just have to reach out and grab it. 

Rather, it turns out, that happiness is what you make of it. Whether it is being married to Brad Pitt and winning a Nobel Prize, or it is having a child and living the same small town where you grew up, happiness is a skill. You learn how to be happy, how to allow the fall of good fortune to add another hour. 

This is the skill that still eludes me. I do not know yet how to be happy. And I 'm not certain that I will ever actually learn. After all, Life Sucks and Then You Die. That's the motto, the credo, the mantra to get through life that I have always employed. 

So, here's the thing. I look at other people's Facebook pages and their blogs. I see their photo albums and vacation messages and I think, I don't know how to do that, how to be like that. There's something wrong with me, right?

Break on Through to the Other Side

So. We're here again. The annual 'I'm growing a year older tomorrow' post. I hate this fucking day. This entire fucking week, as a matter of fact. 

I turn 29 now. I am older, sadder, fatter, uglier, unhappier, more incomplete, less content. And less young. Why do people celebrate birthdays? I mean leave aside my obvious mother and father issues, my utter hatred for my birthday; why do people celebrate growing closer to death without having achieved anything good? Why am I the anomaly for hating this day? More people should hate their birthdays with a passion. Or is bloody everyone else so well adjusted?

What's more, this has been a truly awful year. My grandfather died, I went through a serious bout of depression, my uncle died and my relationship with my best friend has deteriorated to the worst it has ever been. Another shitty, shitty year. Another year of reasons to be unhappy. 

And worst of all, I am still all alone. Two of my close friends both made giant strides in their professional lives alongside me this year. And in the same year, they also moved forward personally in significant ways. I am still here. Still the same. No forward movement. Calcifying in this unhappy place until I won't ever be able to break on through to the other side. I can hear the desperation in my mother's voice every time she calls. Literally, every time she calls. She's terrified for me.

So here's the thing, no surprises here. I hate this day. I loathe it with the passion of a thousand burning whatevers. I'm also really beginning to hate myself.

Less Like a Whole

I've been through worse. Objectively speaking, without any sentimentality or any intent to lionize the sufferings in my life, I have been through far worse.

But this pain does not seem to dissipate. Somehow, all that other sorrow cleared. This, however, clings to me and surrounds in waves of despair that come unbidden at the oddest of times. And unlike the crests and troughs of emotion that even I experience in teenage, there is no sharp high or desperate low. There is just a persistent sadness that has permeated my life.

Today is my Thatha's birthday. For the first time in my life, when I woke up on the morning of the 6th of October, my first thought wasn't "I have to wish Thatha" but "Thatha is not here anymore".

I loved my grandfather, just as surely as everyone loves their grandfather. My relationship with him was very special to me, as I am certain that everyone's relationship with their loved ones are to them. Despite all the rationalization I am capable of, I cannot seem to reason the pain of this loss away. On the 20th of this month, I will have spent an entire year without him here. That is incomprehensible to me. Even more difficult to grasp is why I am still so very sad without my Thatha. 

Grown Woman

I am an adult, and as such, I make most decisions for myself. I was under the mistaken belief that this was the case with all adults. It appears I was wrong, and how.

My biggest source of frustration at present in life is the alarming frequency with which grown men and women are unable to use their discretion, and really basic fucking common sense, to make the simplest of decisions. I understand seeking the counsel of trusted others on matters of significance or enormity. I do NOT understand requiring my input on which shoes to pack on a short trip. 

Therein lies the issue. My irritation springs not from the idea that these seemingly sentient adults would need constant direction at all, but that they all seem to be seeking it from me. 

Let me be clear. I don't care where you put the milk powder once you open a new sachet in the office. I don't know whether you should put your socks in with your new shoes in the first suitcase of the second. I don't care if you want to put almonds rather than pistachios in your breakfast oats. I just don't care. 

Maybe I'm so controlling and anal-retentive that I don't see the value in asking other people's opinions on what I think to be matters of personal preference. Or maybe the problem is that I simply don't like my time being incessantly interrupted by what i deem to be meaningless questions. 

You're an adult. Figure it the fuck out. How hard is to decide which brown dress YOU like and want to wear to a dinner which I am not even attending?And how is it that almost every single adult in my radar seems to be afflicted with this ailment?

So here's the thing. Stop. Make your own decisions. Stop asking me. Stop expecting me to care. Stop. Just bloody stop.

Book List - A List of Books

Currently Reading:                                                               Already Own and Need to start Reading:
The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao - Junot Diaz               The way of The Knife - Mark Mazzetti
                                                                                               
 
















The Black Count - Tom Reiss                                                  Parrot and Olivier in America - Peter Carey
                                                                                               
                                                   

About to Own/Intend to Read This Year

Just Kids - Patti Smith

The Flamethrowers - Rachel Kushner

The Son - Phillip Meyer

The First LBJ Biography by Robert Caro

Life After Life - Kate Atkinson

Creeping Exhaustion, No Poetry

I have spent the last half hour of my life mired in the blog of a junior of mine from school. She isn't much younger than me. 3, maybe 4 years. Her blog, and her by extension her psyche (No really, I think that's accurate. Read my blog, it's a pretty fucking accurate description of my disposition. I'm a depressed, cynical, misanthropic fuck.) seem sunny, happy, searching and all in all, young. She is young. She hopes, loves, dreams and makes lists of things she wants to do. 

I was asked in a group chat of some sort about my bucket list. Here's the truth: I do not have one. No bucket list. No list of things I want to do before I die. No places to visit, languages to learn, planes to jump off of. What is wrong with me that I am a grizzled old man in the dying body of a 28 year old woman? Why am I emotionally the equivalent of Clint Eastwood in Gran Torino, pointing my shotgun at anyone who might intrude and being generally angry at the world for still being in it?

Some of this is amusing. I mean, I personally think it's hilarious that the word 'cute' doesn't exist in my vocabulary, that I don't get swept away in a sea of hormones every time a gurgling baby is presented before me, that I rarely giggle or act coy, that I am loudly forthright in my opinions of people and things I find distasteful (including once, memorably, a gentleman who used the word 'dyspeptic' in a conversation 2 minutes into meeting me, in a bid to be impressive no doubt). 

But some of it is not. Why aren't there things I am dying to do? Why is enthusiasm such a glaring gap in my resume? I can't seem to muster joy for things like taking trips, learning new things or meeting new people.

I can be happier. I think. Shouldn't I try, at the very least? Shouldn't I at least want to try?

To numb this creeping exhaustion, here is my attempt at a list of things I want to do before I turn 30 and then inevitably die in a bar fight of some sort whilst being sober as fuck. 

Go to Thailand with my mother. 

Read as many books as I can lay my hands on. 

Move to a new city. 

Kiss a stranger. 

Go on a trip with a man I have been a little bit in love with for more than a decade. 

Either make up with my best friend, or move on from her completely. Whichever I can manage more easily.

Enjoy myself, really, truly enjoy myself without any reservations at least once. Just once. 

Caution, Woman

As I write this, there are some things you should know. I did not really want to write this. The topic of women being unsafe in India has been covered ad nauseum; I am neither any more special nor any more insightful than those thousands of others writers, columnists, commentators and bloggers. And yet, I now feel compelled. I am also not a strident feminist. Which is to say, I don't see women as women and men as men; I genuinely do NOT get the difference between a man and a woman. And the last two things you should know: I have a black belt in Karate; I have since I was 15 years old. I also do not drink, never have, never will. 

I say the last two things, because I want to impress them upon you, if you are one of those addled people who believe that women should never be in places where they can't take care of themselves, and should always be in control so that they aren't raped/molested/assaulted/harassed. (I am calling you addled because a woman shouldn't have to receive elite combat training or live the social life of a nun in order not to feel threatened. That onus in not on the women, but on the world.) 

I can only speak of my experience. It is this: If you are a young girl living in a city in India, there are conversations you have with your girlfriends, sisters, female cousins, mother and aunts. The younger are always warned, as soon as they begin to develop breasts or have to start cycling to school by themselves, about how to conduct themselves in public. Keep your head down, don't look anyone in the eye, don't invite trouble. It doesn't help. I remember being around 10 years old and walking to school alone in a safe, quiet neighbourhood in Madras. A man on a bike stopped as he approached me, asked me for directions and as I kept walking, flashed me. So the lesson I had been taught was of no help. I did everything I was supposed to do and was still exposed to that. 

As we grow older, these are the conversations we have amongst out peer group. We would all exchange horror stories in college about being felt up in buses and trains. The depressing part is that when we would have this talk, we were not horrified or shocked; there was a weary nonchalance that accompanied this conversation. If you are a young girl taking public transport in a city in India, expect to be felt up. It doesn't matter if you have a black belt if you are in a crowded bus and are standing in such a way that you cannot move an inch to either side. this of course, is a pervert's paradise. By the time you have realized what has happened to you, he is long gone. 

Still older, I started to have a different conversation with the girls around me. I now tell the younger ones something radically opposite to what I was told. When in a public place, look pissed, look angry. If you look like a person who is going to create a scene and absolutely lose your temper in a public place, they may be deterred. I also insist they all learn some self defence. Every chance I get to teach a friend a couple of moves, I take it. 

This is the conversation I haven't had though: Why? Why should women have all these conversations amongst one another? Why is it that when several generations of women have been out of the house now, working, travelling, and becoming independent, the male of the species hasn't yet caught up to our reality? Why is another generation of mothers and older sisters having to sit 9 and 10 year old girls down since December 2012 to explain to them to keep their heads down, not look anyone in the eye and not invite trouble? Why is caution our only option? And why, despite our caution, do we each have such a wealth of nasty stories to share with our friends? Because here is the truth, following all that advice, learning how to defend myself and not drinking or ever losing control of myself has still not shielded me from having been molested or harassed. 

Your Voice in My Head

is the name of the book I'm reading. In the book, Emma Forrest the author, vividly recounts her battle with mental illness, her attempts to harm herself even going so far as suicide, and the therapist who, with compassion, humour and empathy, helped her find a way out. 

I dislike diagnoses of mental illness or disorders. In America, particularly, I find that almost everything is ascribed to an illness of some sort. I feel that this absolves people of accountability for their bad behaviour and their destructive tendencies. I can't help being a selfish asshole, I have Asperger's. I can't stop drinking, I am an alcoholic. I can't prevent myself from seeking attention by desperate acts, I'm bipolar. No doubt, this comes from being the daughter of someone who, quite likely, had a disease. I also don't think that discounts what I believe. 

Having laid out that extensively verbose caveat, I must confess that I am completely absorbed in Ms. Forrest's story. I am helped by her brilliant, sharp prose. She writes without vanity or pretense. There is no attempt to artificially make her illness more noble or tragic. She does not try and couch her intentions in something seemingly redemptive like love of family. Emma does not need you to like her and by extension see her struggles as part of some narrative arc where the heroine emerges victorious. The book, while engaging and absorbing, is also very difficult to get through, and yet almost impossible to set down. You find yourself uncomfortable reading about the way she tried killing herself, as if you are peeping on her in a department store changing room. At the same time, you recognize that she wants to tell her story and you want to know more, more, more. 

I like my books to challenge me, depress me, elate me and bury me in complex introspection. And 'Your Voice in My Head' has managed to do all that and more. 

T.V.V

I had planned an elaborate post to mark the death of my most beloved grandfather, T. V. Venkataraman. Now I find, I don't know how. 

I had planned to say: The T in T.V stands for Thiruvaroor, the town where he was born on 6 October 1924 and where his ancestors were from. The V stands for the name of his father, Veerasami Iyer. I would have mentioned that my grandfather was the oldest of six (surviving) children. He was a brilliant and gifted young man, who was offered a scholarship to go a fine University in South India. He had to decline as his father had died, and the responsibility of his entire family had fallen on his young shoulders. He then raised, educated and married off all of his 5 siblings (3 sisters and 2 brothers) while slowly working his way up the Southern Railways. He married my grandmother, Alamelu (born Rajalakshmi), some 10 years his junior. They went on to have 4 children of their own, including their only daughter, my mother. Together, they raised this entire brood of siblings and children till each was able to stand on their own. Till the day he died, all his siblings, each grown old, with children and grandchildren of their own, considered my grandfather to be the head of the family. 

At his funeral, for a particular ceremony, the priest mentioned that anyone not going to the funeral home could perform this last rite: that of giving the dead a symbolic handful of rice for their journey into the afterlife. He mentioned specifically that anybody could do it, adding, anyone younger than him and anybody older than him. At that moment, his younger sister, almost weeping, said out loud in Tamil, "There is no one older than him. He was the oldest of us." 

Like many men of his time, my grandfather could be severe on his children. He was not the warm, cuddly helicopter parent that we see today. He believed strongly that his greatest duty was to provide for his family. And in his mind, he did so to the best of his ability. As a grandfather, he was warm, affectionate and sentimental. As a young man, his poverty led him to live off the generosity of others for a while. The saddest story my mother ever told me about my grandfather was about his time as a young bachelor, when he had to depend on his uncle for food. His uncle, not being a man of great means himself, would offer him the water that had been used to soak the rice before it was cooked. It was not a real meal, but was full of starch and some nutrients, and would have to be enough for a poor young boy with no other options. That's all my grandfather had to eat, water. As a result, his feelings towards food were understandably complicated. Due to this, he took great pleasure in feeding us and taking us on food related excursions. 

My grandfather could read and speak Sanskrit fluently. He was a devout Hindu Brahmin. He took great pains and care to perform his daily rituals. He was a meticulous man; there was a place for everything. He always made time to slowly take out every item used for his prayers and then put them back after he was done, just as slowly. His lower middle class upbringing meant that he did not like to waste things. He was a frugal man in most respects. He did, however, like to spend money on gadgets (TV and computer) and on his grandchildren. He saved as much as he could, as often as he could, as long as he could. Still, I believe he may have greatly regretted that it was never enough to buy him a house. He died without ever owning property. 

He was an immensely proud man. Many believed this to be a fatal flaw, even some of his children. I saw a different side of it. He was immensely proud of me. Of my brother. Of my mother. He saw the hardships we faced and he was proud of the fact that we overcame them without much help. 

My grandfather only ever raised his hand to me once, when I was careless in playing and managed to hurt myself very badly. He felt so guilty for having hit me that he cried. 

He loved guavas. Sometime after the death of his parents, he went to Kashi (Varanasi) and, as is the custom, gave up eating them.

Although I believe he loved all his grandchildren, he had special affection for the 3 oldest. My brother was his first grandchild. Pictures of him holding my brother as a baby convey one thing very clearly, that he adored my brother without an ounce of reservation. Unfortunately, there are no pictures I can find with my grandfather holding me as a baby. But he loved me. He loved me completely. My cousin, the older son of my grandfather's oldest son, the legitimate heir, so to speak, of the bloodline, was similarly adored. The three of us spent the most time with him as children. My two youngest cousins lived away from my grandparents for most of their childhood, and as a result, spent only a few weeks every summer with them. This was to their detriment, I firmly believe. 

My favourite memories of my grandfather involve him taking the three of us to a fair, where he bought us food and candy. He bought me a little cup of soap water which I used to blow bubbles. He bought me books of Russian fairytales, which I still have.

He read everything I gave him that I had published. He was so very proud of them. 

Whatever his faults, this is what I believe, absolutely, irrevocably and firmly. He was as good a father as he knew how to be. He raised so many people, and did it the only way he knew how, by providing for them. He made many mistakes. He was the best grandfather I could have ever had. He loved me. And he was loved by me. My most beloved Thatha. He lived a full life. And now he is gone. And nothing will ever be the same again.

So, here's the thing, it appears I had something to say after all.

When We Were Young, We Were Wild Warriors

I sit here now, in the last hours of my time in the Forever 27 club, never to visit again. I mentioned to Gooseberrie today that I am shocked that we both made it. Indeed I am. 

This is a time of year that I am often pensive. It seems to me that I have not done enough, or lived enough, or loved enough. Most of all, I worry that I haven't been happy as I should be. How does that make sense; to worry constantly about not being happy? What is happy? And what on earth is 'happy enough'?

I find that I am not ashamed to say that I do not know. Not at all. 

As I now enter this new, cursed year, I am filled with determination. I know that the time to worry about being happy must pass. I will probably never be happy. And that is okay. And the loneliness that surrounds me day in and day out, as I live and breathe and die with every living, breathing, dying breath is not a thing to fight anymore. It is my way of life. If that sounds morbid, then it is against my intention. This is not sorrow, but acceptance. And with it comes a strange sense of calm, one that I fear may soon be replaced with a sense of panic. 

For tonight, I am alone, as I wish to be. And I hope tomorrow passes without pomp, ceremony or celebration. Quiet. That is what I want. 

Happy almost Birthday to Good Old Me. Not many more of these left in me.

Remember Me; I’m the One Who Loves You

Jennifer Egan’s novelistic anthology of interconnected short stories (I’m not through yet; this is what I think it is so far) has a line in its first few pages that resonated so deeply with me that I went back and read, and re-read, it several times.

“In fact the whole apartment, which six years ago had seemed like a way station to some better place, had ended up solidifying around Sasha, gathering mass and weight, until she felt both mired in it and lucky to have it – as if she not only couldn’t move, but didn’t want to.”

Living in a city like Bombay, for years now, in the same job, with the same friends, in the same apartment: this is how I feel now. Like the girl in the story in New York, I live in this big anonymous city, where people bounce off each other in myriad ways, just ducking their heads and trying to get through the day without making too many waves. We all end up finding these refuges, or building them; sanctuaries made out four walls and a bed. Some simple way to escape the frantic energy of this seemingly ceaseless urban jungle, that’s all I seem to want.

Like Sasha, I thought that this life was just a way station to something else. Now, I look around to see it solidifying around me against my will. If I don’t make a break for it and run, I might, very comfortably, never leave. 

Still, Stupid

It's a still, stupid moment. And you realize that he is not him anymore. Not just yours anymore. In a photo, smiling, far away, with someone else. Maybe not for a long time. Then a quick pinch of regret. For that still, stupid moment all those years ago, and for that still, stupid decision. It's okay. Right? It's okay and will be.

A Better Rest

It is a far, far better thing I do than I have ever done, it is a far, far better rest that I go to than I have ever known.

My Bookywooks

In recent years, increasingly, I'm never happier than when I am creating my book lists: a list of books (obviously) that I plan to acquire to add to my collection, whether it is the next day, next week, or next month. The pleasure I derive in this activity, and the somewhat pathetic ways in which I attempt to convince myself that I can afford just one more book on the list, or maybe two more, or perhaps even three more, is nothing short of amusing to friends and co-workers, all of whom have to sit through lengthy monologues on my part about why exactly I have picked each book. 

If you, my dear reader, have had a chance to peruse my blog, you will have gathered the immense love I feel for the written word. This I have to attribute to both parents. People tell me that my love of books was inherited from my father, who apart from being a vociferous reader, was also an excellent writer. However, it is my mother who cultivated my reading habit. I think the biggest reason I keep buying books at this stage in my life is because when I was younger, we were too poor to be able to do so. Let me quickly add, we weren't characters in a Dickens novel. We simply did not have the disposable income that many families do, to spend on buying books. Instead, my mother took pains to enrol us at the local neighbourhood library wherever we lived. My memories of my childhood are filled to the brim with instances of my mother walking my brother and I to the library to borrow books for the upcoming week. My mother would pick romance novels, thrillers and the occasional management tome. My brother, who my mother hoped would also become a prolific consumer of literature, would pick up as many comics as he was allowed. And I would gather all the Enid Blytons, Sweet Valley Highs and R.L Stines I could. I would also be allowed input on the comics, as I read them alongside my own books. And after about half an hour, the three of us would gather at the checkout counter while my mother rationed out how many we could afford to have each week. As we got older, we were allowed to cycle there without my mother's supervision.

During the summer, when we would spend time with our father, we were able to buy as well as borrow. My mother would allow us to borrow a larger than customary number of books in order to keep us occupied during the day. My father, on the other hand, would buy us books, and comics in the case of my brother, though not too many. Over the years, I devotedly finished reading section after section at my local library, slowing graduating to more complex fare. I was aided by a well curated school library that took pains to collect intelligent and age-appropriate books that challenged a young reader rather than pander to them or patronise them. 

Most importantly, my love of reading is also a product of the time that I grew up in. Many, if not all, of my contemporaries and peers also love to read. They continue to do so assiduously, clearly having been converted in their youth. Meanwhile, my younger cousins and co-workers, can hardly be bothered. Most of their reading is restricted to the odd Harry Potter. Most of them believe the Lord of the Rings to be simply a film series. Hardly any of them would trek to South Bombay in the midst of monsoon under the spell and promise of new arrivals at an old-school second hand bookstore. Their loss entirely, I firmly believe. 

So here's the thing, I have my next list. I am excited by it. And although I cannot acquire my books (A Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion, A Visit From the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan and The Tiger's Wife by Tea Obreht or Bringing Up the Bodies by Hilary Mantel) until August, I can spend the next 3 weeks eagerly awaiting the paycheck that I will happily spend on these.

Another Number, This Time 12

As usual, the day holds nothing but unpleasantness. I know that should read deep sorrow, but I'm not sure I can access those emotions at this particular moment in my life. Why? Because I am all alone. For the first time, in a long time, there are more people in my everyday life than there have ever been. And of course, I am all alone. Those that I would allow myself to need have deserted me. I know that's not a fair thing to say, but that's exactly what it feels like. 

I was told that my friendship is pressure. My constant being there, my insistence on helping, my undying loyalty; these are all the same things that make my friendship pressure. And I guess it's true. I value this stupid thing so very much that I expect, almost demand the same from the other person. Two separate people have told me three separate times that it's too much. Maybe I should listen? I should listen. 

Which brings me back to this blighted day, and my blighted existence. I am here. Still fucking here. Twelve long years later, still here. I am sad. And deeply guilty. And then even more guilty because I don't think I'm as sad as I should be. I should be more shattered, right? But even the little shattered I am is inconvenient for all the people that require me. These people that need me to be funny, and cheerful, and present. And interested in what they are saying, ready with a silly response. And all the other people that need me to be good at my job; to show up and be responsible and answer their many questions. And also be funny while I am at it, and laughing. The people that need me to be rock-like, to stand up to be leaned on. I have to be all this, and then disappear when they want me to, ever the supporting player in the movie of their lives. 

If he had lived. I don't know. I honestly don't know. I feel like I might disappoint him. I am not healthy, or happy, or whole. I am successful, marginally. But none of those other things. Wouldn't he think that I am lesser than I should be? Apparently, I'm not even as good a friend as I thought I was. This stellar quality I had proudly pinned to my chest turned out to be a fabrication. 

I think I may be making more of this than I should be. I know I shouldn't. So I will stop. It's just been a bad few days. One after the other. And I can see that I am making this about myself, when it should be about him. I can't even seem to get this thing right, this mourning. I should be an expert after the number 12, right?