My favourite Things

Thats a huge to respond :) But i can filter the important one ! My list goes !

• Most of you know i am a food blogger :) But still i want some Vegetable briyani , paneer recipe and curd rice :)Some raitha along with chips :) prepared and serve by my HUSBAND 
• A long walk on the Beach Road with Him ! 
• Wish to travel in Train that too Night Journey...
• One day full of shopping and eating(exploring food)..
• I always wanted to learn Hindi language never know why it is not my cup of TEA,"
• I want to learn Photography ~ esp Food styling :)
• Wish to taste Pizzas, Potato Wedges, Finger Chips and Burger often... Usually avoid them as it puts some extra weight on me!!!!
• I want to be a lecturer :) so that i can always say i am going to college:)
• Last but not least ! whatever i eat i should not put weight ! i have seen so many people taking beyond their limit ! still they look lean i know its metabolism :) i have poor metabolism :) and i am a great foodie ! 

I have lots to write :) it is just a random post could have done it better :)

Basic!!!

Basic. That one words describes my life of the past several months. We have been on a "basic" mode. Basic meals, basic ways of filling up time, basic ways of marking a festival, basic conversations...and just a very basic quality to life. Yes, things have been busier off late, but then again, when are they not? I think I was on a major mental burnout, and did not have the inclination, leave alone the energy, to communicate, or express. Words have this dual quality to them. They can carry powerful messages. But they can also spread around the vibes of inanity. Where a lot is spoken, for the sake of being spoken, but there was no real need for that many words to do it in the first place. See, even this last line could have been shorter. :)

So even phone calls to friends or family became hard. Especially when asked the question....how are you? What's going on in your life? That basic question, became the hardest of all. Because then I would have to use words for it, and I was hoarding my words to conserve my energy for the things I absolutely had to do. Like the basics of daily living. You can just *tell* the vibes of all the judgements making the rounds in their minds. I could sense my mother's sense of frustration with me, like she was hitting a blank wall. Or maybe it was just my guilt at not being able to be the daughter she needed me to be at least for that 1/2 hour on conversation. Its all so complex and then suddenly simple, as I realize, that I am just growing quieter as a person.

The burning need to talk, to communicate, to opine, to conclude, to express....all of it was simmering down to a zero flame, slowly...slowly....because there is enough mental chatter inside my own head, and there is a sweet communion when even that noise dies down. So where is the need to talk outside?

But then, how can we function with the world, if we don't? How can we let people know we care, if we can't listen to what they have to say, or talk back to them in a language that they can understand and use to assure themselves? And so, I must try. Every now and then...to reach out and a be a little like my old self, if there is such a thing, and to make an effort at something, that just doesn't come so naturally to me anymore.

Love is.......

...unpredictable. Big realization of the day.

What I thought of as love, actually came with many conditions to fulfill. It came from a selfish part of me which had certain illusions and conformed that love to fit the illusion of the time and day. It sprung from a need that I had, flowing to the people who I thought could fulfill that need. I painted it with the colors that I thought brightened it and made it pretty to look at, and fragrant to breathe in. I went with the ebb and flow of it because it kept changing course and intensity over and over, and I kept talking myself in and out of it.

And whenever I talked myself in, it was with the misguided notion that one day a higher form of love would come...the penultimate thing....just to have something to look forward to. But of course, nothing of the sort happened. And yet, everything of the sort happened. But before that was the full and complete disillusionment.

In people. In relationships. In ties. In roles. In trust. In life. In me.

So much so....that I "lost" myself. And cliched as it is....I just didn't know who I was anymore. I couldn't make up my mind about things. I was constantly in a state of mental conflict. I couldn't figure out what I really wanted....leave alone how to get there and how to get out of this place. There was very little self love, because of which I had nothing much to express to the world outside. Maybe that was why I didn't write here so much. Writing here was always about clearly connecting to the true me. When the truth of the me itself was in question, the question of writing didn't even arise. I sounded jaded and tired even to my own ears. The very simple bare bones question....of how are you...would throw me into a knot. I would spend hours agonizing on how to answer it. What words to conjure up from the mystique of the air to explain what was happening. What WAS happening?

Its fanciful to think of it as awakening. But in a bare bones way, it was that. Its typical to give this problem a name and call it a mid-life crisis, but maybe it w.a.s that. And its perhaps a little sad that I did the only thing I could think of. And it was that. But it was also brave. But more than anything else, it was the only way I saw then. And I took it. In that it was simple.

I wrote to people in my life. People whom I had known in different capacities and met at different points of my own path and whom I thought had seen some reflections of me. I wrote them and asked them to tell me....about me. Anything that they could think of. The good, also the bad, and especially the ugly and all those little little things in between. I asked with tremendous trepidation and tremendous hope, somehow knowing that I would have to leave myself that open and that vulnerable, to truly break through whatever I was going through. And that's the beautiful part of it. Because when you do that.....when you really, well and truly bear your arms open and cry out....whatever you held in tight fists falls and clatters to the ground. It makes a din and takes a while to die out completely. And then it does.....and there is silence. Which s..l..o..w..l..y expands outwards....clearing the rubble. And creating space. A complete breath of a space....and openness. A cradle lying in wait for that soft little bundle of purity to come rest in it. Find its home.

I am being poetic, but this is truly what happened to me too. I found love rapidly flowing in, filling up every nook and cranny of my heart, sealing the crevices, embalming the wounds. And it was not love as love alone but in different forms. The unswerving loyalty of a childhood chum who had nothing but the best of memories ....the affection of a sibling who took the time to write, even if there was no need to. The anger of a friend who thought I should care two hoots about what the world thought of me. The patient consideration of a more distant family member, who decided this was an important enough mail to send out, on a busy day. And the complete pure love of a friend, who said to know you....is to love you.

They told me many things about myself. Many of which I knew and some of which took me pleasantly by surprise, since I did not know it had been there in me. That I could be so defensive. And mistrust. And injure myself so completely with my self critical ways. And others too. In fact that was the one consensus note. That I was my own worst enemy. It is amazing how many people wrote that. And then not everyone wrote. And not everyone did I expect a response from. But I heard what I needed to hear and got the medicine I so desperately sought. And I accepted it in both the palms of my hands, looking at it wondrously before lapping it up, hungry as I was for identity.

It can be argued that your sense of identity lies with you. And yes, that is true. It does. But we also leave behind bits and pieces of ourselves in the people we meet. It is unknowing, but certain. We are all walking legacies in that sense. Never quite knowing how we impacted and imprinted the soul of this existence. And when you ask for help...sometimes, all you're really doing is asking for that piece of you back. Or a reminder that that piece of you still lies with them. Safe. Cherished. Empowered.

I got all those pieces back. And I used it to piece myself back together. Again, its poetic to say that, but it is the truth of what happened. And as I began to accept myself....it began with rage. Acceptance, many times, begins with rage. You have a healthy sense of anger at what you've become and how you got there. You point some fingers just to subsume that emotion. To fuel it. To back some intent into it.

And then, even that dies down. You start hearing your own voice again....and rejoice in the re-introduction. You start listening to it. You make others listen to it too. With a fire in your eyes, that says you won't back down. And then, even that fire dies down. But by then it has already welded the steel of grit and determination.

Awakening has spirit. And a wave of energy which can carry you in it. But like a wave, it will ebb and you have to be ready for it, when it does. Because without your own intent to back you at that point, you could easily capsize again. Which is okay because the next wave will come by....but why wait to strike, when the iron is already hot? I am kind of at that stage right now. Where I am trying to build my intent to back up my spirit. To have my awakening mean something.

Which brings me back to love. And how unpredictable it is. And how much we love people through lenses that are custom fit to improve our own sight. With narrowed walls that close in and don't always let you breathe. With an intent to always gain something from it.

Today love means something different to me. And more than anything else, it means accepting the truth in whatever form it comes. And loving it because it is the truth, with every nature of the truth, which is to teach you about yourself. I have to accept it. It is what led me to me.

Parenthood... Easy or Difficult??

After the various horrific incidents of girls being molested in different parts of the country, I received a forwarded message which said, "Don't curb your daughters' freedom, teach your sons to respect girls". It was one forwarded message which really made sense.

For after every incident of violence and molestation against girls our natural instinct as parents is to set limits for our girls, prevent them from dressing up freely, warn them against the outside world etc, when, in fact, it should be the reverse.

We as parents need to teach our sons to respect girls and treat them with equality.

Gender biases often begin at home in our families. We allow our sons to have night-overs at friends' places, allow them to come home late, ignore their innocent acts of violence saying 'boys will be boys' while we don't let our girls stay out after evenings, teach them to be well-mannered, start including them in cooking and cleaning as soon as they are of appropriate age and keep warning them about the rowdy ways of the world. We teach them to be wary of boys, relationships or love. Rarely have I heard of parents warning boys to be careful of girls.

The way fathers treat the mothers, the kind of relationship the parents share in front of their kids, the atmosphere in the home, just about everything goes into shaping up our children's minds.

If a boy sees his father beating up his mother, he assumes its natural to do so. On the other hand, the daughter too sees this as a normal part of a woman's life. So from one incident a son and daughter take different lessons. While one learns to be violent, the other learns to be submissive and accepting.

As much as we need to teach our daughters not to take violence lying down, we also need to inculcate in our sons the respect they need to give women. If every mother teaches her son to treat women equally and not merely as sex objects and if every father instills a sense of confidence and trust in his daughter, I think it will go a long way in evolving a society free of crimes rising from gender inequality or gender biases.

Actions speak louder than words. So children need to see it day after day than merely hearing empty words. A home where a woman's contribution is appreciated and respected as much as a man's will always have balanced and sound children.

An apple never falls far from its tree. It is on us to give children a rock solid foundation built on moral values and trust. The most valuable lessons are learnt in the confines of a home. The seeds of a revolutionary change are sown in a home which then graduates to a society and then to the country at large.

We just don't need to teach, we need to follow ourselves what we preach to our children.

The more we invest in our children today in terms of quality time, the more we will contribute in shaping a world where our precious daughters can roam freely with no sense of danger lurking behind her.

We need to protect our girls, provide them with a secure environment in which they can thrive and flourish and the only way to do it is to start by equipping our sons with moral responsibility towards them.

To teach them that girls and boys are born of the same womb and both are as special as the other in all ways and the mere fact that one is born a boy does not give him the right to strip or hurt a woman's modesty is the biggest lesson we need to teach our children.

The power of change lies in our hands. But are we doing enough?