DISINTEgration...

Seldom do the winds of change strike upon your face so torrentially. Seldom do I bump into grammatical errors in English. And she almost worships me in that context because she is so very proud of it. This nearly embarrasses me, at times because needless to say, my fetish for this unbelievably dynamic language fountains from my adulation for the gentleman’s game. And just as the fading final notes of your childhood love resonate with an inexplicable and unprecedented frequency before getting lost into the oblivion, maybe forever… the waning of your first love affair trebles your longing and eventually extinguishes a part of you!

She nods when I recount how far we have walked together. She smiles when I say how magically we lived it together. The gripping regret is that the international cricket now finds itself in a spot of bother and so do I. Heisenberg would have been gratified at his theory today for his much-celebrated ‘uncertainty’ looms larger over one of the most powerful and burgeoning fraternities of the modern era – the ICC. 

Let’s face it. It’s slam bang cricket. And I would trade all my money for stating that it’s just not cricket! The attack kills… the defence is quick… and before you’d do a certain research on who plays where, you realize they have switched sides. Overnight. There’s a certain gem called Unmukt Chand who fails to get an IPL game . The Indian cricket cuts a sorry figure because the ‘gem’ had left the Syed Mushtaq Ali Twenty20 tournament midway to join the Rajasthan Royals build-up camp in the UAE. Maybe, his shadow practice and throw-downs are well worth the freshly minted coloured papers… and his warming up the bench consistently ignites a certain fire for the selectors to take notice… seemingly, taking the ‘Ajinkya Rahane course’! But I’d say with conviction that the chagrin does enough to blur the status of the sport in the discerning eyes of a cricket fan, not an IPL fanatic. The smell of victories of an international face-off do not last… the ecstasy struggles to sink in. The encroaching schedule of the high-voltage club cricket leaves no breathing space to reflect upon the inadequacies in the strategy of a last-night battering. The lamentation of a defeat dissolves even before it could stir our hearts. Maxwell’s thunderstorm does seize the flavour of a certain Indian summer… maybe, threatening to muffle the roar of the desert storm of Sharjah. However, it dies out quick enough to place our safe bets on Virat Kohli – the only silver lining of Indian cricket at the moment. And I would go to the extent of saying that the BCCI owes him a great degree of reverence for keeping Indian cricket alive in this hour of crisis when the team is struggling to keep its head above the waters on foreign soil. An inconsistent playing eleven and an uncertain bench strength, which more often than not, relies on‘flash-in-a-pan’ performances compels me to reinstate that our domestic circuit needs to recharge its battery to prevent a bleak future – to save ourselves from the ominous clouds of the upcoming English summer and the sabotaging tunes of the chin-music Down Under in 2015. The curious case of Rohit Sharma adds another dimension to the already existing list of woes. I can vividly recall his international debut with an unbeaten 51 and then catalysing Justin Kemp’s run-out to ensure us a semi-final berth in The T20 WC’07. I thought the future has arrived. And so did the entire cricketing world. Well, it did arrive. But in the form of Virat Kohli! It is esoteric to see how our think-tank has invested every possible logic in persisting with this ‘promising phenomenon’. And it only indicates that the much-talked about IPL has failed to deliver the goods – to nurture young talent and help them cement a place in the national squad. Every year, a chunk of youngsters grab the limelight – some owing to a series of well-crafted performances while still others owing to sheer luck. However, most perish, remaining just a one-time wonder.

The IPL feeds the struggling cricketers, providing them with a safety net when the going gets tough. It feeds the audience. It brings in cash. But I have to state, ruefully, that cricket is losing its sheen… because all that glitters is not gold. When one of my favourite people on the planet stops keeping a track of the ‘irrelevant bilateral tournaments’ – as she prefers to call them – and I prefer catching up on some afternoon nap to asking who won the toss – you know it’s never going to be the same again.

                                                                                                                                                

A PaRADiGm ShiFT: of second chances and a second inspiration...

Repetition predisposes to redundancy; redundancy being an inevitable harbinger of ennui. While I am typing this, I might give an impression of savouring the opulence of an epidemic vocabulary, which is one of the pre-requisites of good writing … surely, not the only one.  On the highest rung of this ladder sits an idea. An idea that can flirt with your intellect, preoccupy your mind, divorce you from the infiltrating chunks of a hassled living and take you to the altar, constructing a spectacular piece, which is the product of this wedlock and can wow the audience. The conception of an idea is a craft that needs to be effortless. There is no perfect idea as such because the effortlessness lies in entertaining it into the expanse of your mind with its imperfections and frailties. And yet, the ‘idea’ happens to be the centrepiece of a creation.

You know you need to step down and step aside from the ‘inked’ pedestal if your pen fails to dramatize the unheard and the unseen. You know you need to seek retreat in the valleys if the bloom of your ‘idea’ ceases to flourish in the meadows. All this because it is the fragrance that entices a visitor… not the embellished carpet of flowers over the paddock! And when you are suffering from a dearth of ideas… falling back into a self-woven spiral of narcissism because concocting a new aroma feels like a far cry… you know you need to sprint back and drink from a fresh spring the waters of novelty.

Life’s not a dress rehearsal… it is, in fact, too short to repeat the colours of beads in your necklace.  Here was a moment of epiphany for me during a soul-talk with one of my favourite people on the planet, which, all of a sudden, engulfed the tides I was supposed to waltz with. Not because my waltz would be any less mesmerizing. But because the shores were too familiar and the harbours would treat me like their foster-child! Yes, I was now homeless… distraught… and insecure. Nevertheless, what appeared to be threatening me like a quagmire, turned out to be a deck of freedom. Freedom from an old school of thought. Freedom from a tight-roped walk. Freedom from a convincingly unconvinced voice of redemption. What I am learning is invaluable: it is sometimes alright to play a destitute. A destitute without the liabilities of possessions. A destitute who wanders in the valley of retreat… aspiring for second chances and a second inspiration from the mystic morning dew... in search of that ‘elusive’ spring whose elixir will satiate the parched throat of her pen and ignite a paradigm shift.

AND THE SEARCH CONTINUES…

An APoloGY

Maybe because all I need is an excuse. An excuse to write. A stuff, a situation or an event to trickle down and freeze into my writing. And that's why I choose the word 'sorry'.

A five-lettered present, festooned in a wrapper of 'caution', that the Brits left for us, can threaten to dwindle your existence big time! Caught up in a seemingly never-ending spiral, you're either sorry for not being sorry... or worse, it is the other way round! Then, you're sorry for being yourself... or sorry for not being yourself (in which case, they'll accuse you of hypocrisy). Either ways, the bottomline is : you're sorry. The gravity of the word is unquestionable... for you feel it every time you let it out of your mouth but its effectiveness becomes subjective... driving you helpless because you know 'SORRY' is your last resort - the last weapon in your arsenal that you're about to deploy. At that point, all you do is blame the 'big, fat Advanced Learner's Oxford Dictionary' for appearing listless in this regard!  :p

From the other end of the spectrum, I pity the word 'sorry' from the core of my heart... for having to juggle between multiple roles... because life doesn't provide us with an 'undo' option :p...  and also because the fate of this word lies at the heart of the receiver :D.  And before that fate turns sour and sorry, I'd pray for the 'sorry' soul to rest in peace!  :p
Anyways, I'm really sorry for making you go through this sorry experience!  :p

REMEMBERANCE...

It drizzles outside… and somewhere on a peaceful planet, the noise of the rain ebbs and flows with the rhythm of happy times entrapped in my lyrics of innocence.

A year later… as the day draws nearer, the ink in my pen decides to immortalize Her- not because She left the earthly confines a bit too early… not because the loss was so sudden and shattering that we all died a little death inside, in bits and pieces, that day… not because there remains a void along a beautiful road of fulfilled and unfulfilled dreams, spoken and unspoken words, said and unsaid desires, told and untold anecdotes… but because along this road, her was the journey of a woman with a clear conscience inside her bosom and who always wore her heart on her sleeve.

For Her, it never used to be about the silver coins but about the blessings that echoed with their jingles… Day-by-day and brick-by-brick, cementing them with compassion, while She carved out an existence larger than life and lived half a scoop more for each one of us; it sometimes belittles our own existence! When it came to choosing, I remember Her choosing for the betterment of everyone. Gracefully sweeping aside the everyday agonies and shortcomings behind those striking features, She would celebrate the goodness of life and enliven it with her love and spirit. She was a superwoman… glowing her brightest in the face of adversity… and growing from strength to strength. Unperturbed by the ugliness of humiliation and sarcasm, she would be seen finding her way to self-discovery for such was her audacity and unflinching faith in her deeds.

Memories- they flow effortlessly as I beckon them… struggling to materialize on a piece of paper for the tides are prodigious … but the lessons of life that She taught us will stay as priceless gems in our hearts…

AND SHE LIVES ON FOREVER…