Uncut

I am a conduit. I am here. No strings attached. No glue. Sometimes, no clue. No motivation. No trigger. No past. No future. The present. Now.
Burps. Blips. A pulse. Blinks. Winks. Smiles. Hiccups. Potholes. Portals. Tiffin time. Toilet breaks. Tea time. The soup. A walk around the brewery. A single drop of rain. Stray.
A lapse of memory. A new species. A new colour. Lipstick. Paint. Geometry. Toothpaste. A bean bag. A mosquito bite. A wish upon an eyelash. A blank call. A wrong number. Surfing channels. A whistle. Moment of truth. The clink of glasses. Speed of thought. A clap. A cheer. A snort. A jeer. No meaning. A glimpse. A word. A letter. An sms. A missed call. A whack. A slap. You fire. You hire. You love. You hate. You drink. You remember. You drink. You forget. Breathe in. Breathe out. Break out. Break up. Twists. Turns. Whisper. Shout. Jump. Fall. Fall and break. Break like a mirror. Look into the pieces. Pick them up. Drops of blood. Sharp shooting pain. Bursts of life. Look into the pieces. Look at you. And you. And you.

A movie is an illusion. And so is life. Seconds existed. Seconds exist. And seconds pass us by. How we string them together – that’s our story. It’s all about creativity. It’s like trying to decide the perfect line on a perfect plane. It’s just not possible. The dots. The points. Those are real. Everything else is just what we make of it.

Sessions

I sat down with the psychopath today,
He switched me on and surfed my moods and desires,
He thinks I am making progress;
I am proud and confident too.
Do you think he could proclaim me normal if I spoke louder?

He is making a flowchart and a family tree.
All kinds of roots.
He believes in summary.
It’s like when we were kids and Tom chased Jerry
On ladders with rungs that would melt away.

So am I getting there?
He doesn’t know. Maybe. Perhaps. He doesn’t care.
He has to catch a bus, he has to fry an egg.
He is here. So am I. We’re talking.

Being Lead

So I took this quiz the other day on Facebook, a popular social networking site (that I personally prefer to Orkut) and apparently I am like Lead, of the Periodic Table fame.

So how does it feel to be Lead?

Pencils. Scribble, scratch and sharpen. Noughts and crosses. Bubbles to be darkened. Scratching ears. Scratching off last page love songs from the Maths notebooks. 2B or not 2B. 4B. 6B. Shades and shadows. Confident strokes and hesitant outlines. Sketches. Smudges. Ten marks for neatness and words bathed in red in bridal examination sheets. One more world where sharpness brings you accolades. And shavings that look like Hawaiian hula skirts. Steel against wood. A gentle slice for the longest wraparound! The new age Nataraj is still formidable in red and black formal stripes. The eraser at the back is a mellowed down avatar of the Graphite God. For sometimes words need to be taken back. The sharp tip that pierces more than an inflated ego. A new world of tests and tastes. The occasional Staedtler in blue and white. And the Perumal Chetty, in an austere yellow ochre. The plastic pencils are asthmatic in their inability to breathe words fully. The lead in the pencil is an autocracy. It demands. It commands. You can burn the wood but the lead remains, toughened and dark.

And then there is paint. Colours of emotion.

And poison.

Would I mind being lead, though? It creates and it kills. Don’t we all?

Things We Cling To...

Last night I was tossing and turning and trying in vain for a nap. The wee hours of the morning play many tricks on the human mind.

Airports. The friendliest place on earth.

But as the air conditioner whirred on my left, I suddenly smelled more than just the airport grub. The CCDs, Subways and McDonald’s are in an ilk of their own. We aren’t talking fresh pages of new books either. This one comes wafting through the air on trolleys and smells of germs, sweat, detergent, guitars, creams and conditioners. Sometimes dog-eared novels. And sometimes home cooked food. You always hope it’s safe as you take flight. And that no one sat on it – and nothing broke. Zip it. Lock it. Forget the combination. But always, always keep it safe.

Seriously, why do people wait at the Baggage claim? I can’t believe people actually wait to collect their crap. Yawning. Sweaters rolled up in their hands. Frequent glances at their watches. Calling up relatives and drivers asking for five more minutes. Wait. The conveyor belt screeches into action. The mad scramble begins. You pick some. You keep some. And sometimes you realise it’s missing. Sometimes it’s too late to put it back (or is it?)... and sometimes it’s too late to pick it up. But you wait there with your trolley and struggle to heist your suitcases onto it as the trolley protests and recedes in uncertainty. You see, like true baggage, the red suitcase, the brown briefcase and that yellow “handle with care – fragile” thingy will keep coming back.. and back.. and back. You gotta deal with it. Claim it. Push it. Report it. Or even walk away. But do something.
Don’t you see it? Don’t you see what the sign says? It’s “Baggage Claim” for God’s sake.

The other thing is laptops. The HP service centre on 100 feet road in Indiranagar. I mean people actually get token numbers and you’ve GOT to check out their expressions as they traipse into the service room carrying their babies. To borrow (and paraphrase) from Priyanka Chopra’s Nokia ad, it’s not just a laptop, it’s who we are. We save ourselves in drives, folders and subfolders. Baggage, again. Secured with passwords.