Not all those who wander are lost.

So the long weekend happened, I made a loong vacation plan that didn't happen, but a mini one did. and was that super awesome or what!

I hadn't thought about it when I made the bookings, maybe I wouldn't have thought about it at all, until my director at work asked why the one week long vacation was needed.. then the sob story of me having to cancel part of the vacation came up and then this plan of the 3 day road trip over the weekend, and then he asked me, so you're going with strangers?

So yes, I went with strangers, and the fact that I haven't been this comfortable with co passengers on a trip in a loong time says everything.. who says we are strangers? we were all bound by travel lust/ history lust/ photography and food lust. that's great common ground, what's the point of going somewhere with people who aren't interested in the history of that place.. company is important and yes, maybe the road would have been a better one with people you know and antics we know, but there's a certain kind of happiness in being crazy with people you hardly know..

People from different backgrounds, different environments each have their own stories to tell... more stories to add to your own little ones.. more life experiences shared that only leave you richer.. who'd want to ditch that for the same jokes you hear regularly with people you meet almost everyday?

so that time when we play charades or put  music on in the vehicle and dance in the aisle? maybe that would have happened earlier than the last day when you travel with friends, but there would never have been an antakshari of playing only govinda songs, and maybe a never of playing old hindi kishore kumar and mohd rafi ones.. merely cuz your friends would have preferred coldplay, switchfoot or even honey singh ( oh the joy of not having his songs played, phew!)

the roads always been calling out to me, more so since I've joined work,  since the annual vacations from school stopped happening.. i soo miss timed holidays, visiting forts and museums with my parents, my dad always had a passion for wars,  and guns and long range cannons (something id like to bring up here, war is not chaas, and yeah, these kinda jokes are the ones that didn't happen cuz I went with strangers) anywho, its been a long time since I've been to a place with history,  and not merely a place to get tipsy and wasted, and this weekend took me to ajanta, ellora and aurangabad :)

wherever you go becomes a part of you somehow.. and these ancient structures at ajanta and ellora left me in awe.. the fact that structures like these were built thousands of years ago with basic machinery, maybe not all the way back to the times of the Croods,  but only a chisel and hammer is pretty cool.. each cave was similar in structure built again over a span of thousands of years.. how is it that they managed to maintain uniformity? and how is it that they ensured that some piece of rock hang suspended on pillars that too maintaining proper equilibrium so that it lasts another ten thousand or so..

The mini Taj Mahal? It lacked the grandeur of the Taj, but there under the stars in the darkness discussing the partition.. and politics and trying out slow shutter photography? That's never gonna happen at the real Taj.. It's too touristy for that, not that this one wasn't... but us being almost the only people there in what seems like midnight to a sleepy town, is something that's gonna be etched in my memory for a really long time..

And right on top of the Daulatabaad forts peak, was a moment when someone should have spouted out Robert frost or Ralph waldo Emerson,  but my brain decided to shut there, not because my being unhealthy made me pant (pretty amazingly I wasn't all that out of breath) but because of the world below.. hanging your legs there at one of the edges of the world, that's another thing I won't forget that easy..

The quiet,  the peace,  the vastness of it all, makes you wonder if all this is really worth it (this meaning our constant daily travel struggles, getting through the day without a disagreement with your boss struggles). won't selling everything and building a wooden shack somewhere around the middle of a mountain make a lot more sense to life?  (wifi, mobile connectivity and electricity,  are of utmost importance even in this middle of nowhere.  and it has to be in the middle, top would be just too over the top; plus a maid who can cook, or I'd have to survive on the only thing I make, a mean tea)

I'm still a long way from finding my purpose, and this trip was a tiny reminder of what I want in life.. I am getting there, the haze of confusion is clearing up bit by bit, and the biggest thing it did was make clear what I didn't want in life. amazingly its 7 days and I haven't relapsed into moping around cuz a certain thing didn't work out.. and that relief is certainly taken half of the weight of the world off my shoulders.. so cheers to more such journeys and meeting more such travellers!

and quoting from LOTR again

Still round the corner there may wait

A new road or a secret gate,

And though I oft have passed them by,

A day will come at last when I

Shall take the hidden paths that run

West of the Moon, East of the Sun.

:)

So give me hope, in the darkness that i will see the light...

So, Ive been staring at the white screen, with bits of orange (and a mauve maybe or I'm going colorblind) and wondering... Why are eulogies for the dead? It should be like TFIOS, I want to hear what people talk about me, how I touched their lives. On another tangent who would want to write a eulogy for me? I doubt any of the obnoxious people in my life would take an hour (stretching it?) to write some words for me….

Would writing my own eulogy be too narcissistic? I would like someone to talk about my writing, Maybe something like there are poets who sing you to sleep, some poets make you fall in love,  and poets who ready you for war. She wanted to be all (and she achieved it? To some extent, I hope, by the end of my days) . But then I've never really wanted to become a poet… Maybe how much I like reading poetry and fiction.. Maybe how I was the one who introduced Augustus Waters (<3) to a lot of people…

Maybe someone could talk about how I was generally good at knowing things.. How I could answer almost anything under the sun, sometimes with the help of google.. How I could finish telling the story of a saga like Godfather, all in under 3 minutes... How I was good at narrating my stories to others, how good I was in living lies..

I hope nobody talks about my near death incidences (In my defense, I only wanted sleep). Nor about the my fixation with darkness and light and finding purposes… Maybe someone could write about how they feel when they remember me.. would they see my face in front of their eyes? Or hear my sarcastic comments in the background.. Would they remember my belief in magic? Or how I always fell in love with words and promises… Would anyone cry when I die (well other than family). Would anyone cry if I got sick? (No, that’s only me for some people who are not worth it)

But who would write me a eulogy? One of my persons? I'm losing out persons faster than i'm losing out on time.. Maybe I should join one of those anonymous groups and make pen (email/ whatsapp) friends, but what if they turn out to be an axe murderer?

So I won't write one, cuz giving pointers is something I'm happy with.. And I believe I’m still not one of those hopeless cases who would post something and be the only one to like their own posts. I still have an audience, I still have a few persons, who may or may not write beautiful stuff, and talk about math and infinities and robot eyes and liking choices as to who hurts them in life… And I’m pretty sure the first thing they would talk about would be my mad choices.

And I will write about darkness and light and purpose instead…

Why do people always talk about light and darkness, there are grey area’s.. a lotta them which actually cloud my purpose… Isn't it also funny that all our life, we look for purpose, we pursue our purpose, only to die in the end? So death is our final purpose

Lao Tzu says, At the centre of your being you have the answer; you know who you are and what you want… But looking into my being, finding my centre is not easy.. for one its dark (:P) its inside a human body, sometimes I wonder if I will ever find an answer… But then Isn't the answer to life, the universe and everything 42? Maybe it’s the question I need to figure out (does this mean I am going to be confused upto the time I turn 42? I rather go back to finding light inside my dark human body)

Something I read somewhere.. Someone once told me that none of us are actually afraid of the dark; we are scared of what it conceals from us, We are afraid of having something with the potential to hurt us standing right before our eyes and not registering it as a threat.. So there can be darkness even in light, does that mean we should stop looking for light in our lives? Well most of the time I have found that light at the end of my tunnel is actually a train, coming straight on with its horn bajaofying. Sometimes you can move out of the way.. sometimes it hits u, and goes through you like as if you were made of smoke... But you still feel the impact.. whether your made of flesh or smoke... And sometimes in that ravaged, terrible moment you realise what you have been wanting all the time.. (My last such moment almost moved me to tears and all I could think of was I want to watch TFIOS).

So maybe the next train will give me more insight into my centre.. This one was too short term of just 2 days to the weekend and to the booking of movie tickets. And I end with this, just because I like it.. And cuz I wanted to quote Mumford and Sons.. And I don't care whether I get a eulogy or not at the end of my life cuz then there would be no darkness.. and there would be no light..

But I will hold on as long as you like

just promise me we'll be alright

The ghosts that we knew will flicker from the view, 

and we will live a long life..

What makes you Tick?

So, It’s almost a year, You’d think it would be better by now but no, This confusion doesn’t end, It has barely begun. There was a survey that day.. 5 non connected everyday questions and how you rate them.. Some Freudian priority shit And it didn’t throw up anything new..

(Five things are happening in your house at the same time. In which sequence would you solve them?

1.The telephone is ringing!

2.The baby is crying!

3.Someone’s knocking or calling you from the front door

4.You hung the clothes out to dry and it is beginning to rain

5. You left the tap on in the kitchen and the water is already overflowing

Every individual point represents something in your life.

On the list you can see which meaning every point has:

1. Telephone represents Work

2. Baby represents Family

3. Door represents Friends

4. Clothes represent Money

5. Tap represents Love/ Sex

Your chosen sequence determines the priorities in your life.)

I value work more than anything and then love/ sex, unfortunately family is last on my list( In my defense, I hate kids, crying kids will eventually stop crying if you ignore them) 

So what makes you Tick? My sad life says work. It’s when work gets repetitive and redundant that you realize the clock is ticking on with you not getting a high off it.. So this post is about getting my priorities sorted.

Two years ago everything was going right, two years ago I didn’t believe I couldn’t. It’s not that I don’t believe anymore, Im just confused as to whether it’s worth it. Two years ago my life had definition, Two years ago I knew where I wanted to be three years from then. And Now? Do I know what next year should bring me? Not really. Did I know writing would go from being my way of venting frustration towards life to being the only thing I want to do for the rest of my years?

Did I know stories is all I want to exist for? Life Experiences inspire me, Cuz they show how life changing events can turn your life around. Yes I know how stupid that sentence sounds, but I cannot find a better way of putting that sentence. Everyone struggles through life. Some more than others. Problems exist everywhere.. Theres no life without them. But in the end it doesn’t matter how u struggled or whether you struggled more than others did. The fact that you struggled in your life means that you haven’t accepted where you were. That you yearn to be in a better place. In the end it only matters where you get to, never where you began from. (Nobody’s a bad person.. Nobody does things they know is bad to others and does not regret.. If you do regret? Then why do it.. forget everything and come back.. If you don’t regret? I will regret spending a year regretting )

So back to my priorities – The basic one stays the same. I want to move. I want to keep moving. Cuz not moving is equivalent to being dead. I want to see new places, make new friends, have my heart broken by people you never would’ve believed would’ve mattered in your life. Yes, the cliché Ranbir Kapoor Dialogue of Mein Udna Chahta Hu is playing in the background right now..

I want to learn, I want to spend my lifetime sitting in a classroom not listening/ partially listening to the lecturer droning on, I want to party, I want to complete assignments with the background of maybe a beach in Phuket or a forest of pine trees at my feet. But will they let me in? Self-doubt is one of the worst things ever.

But then again wont that take me too far from you? You being all of you who have become an irreplaceable part of my life? Am I already unapproachable to you? Have I already gone out of your life? When will you realize that I don’t want that? When will you realize I am not that strong that I can go on without you? And that right now I don’t care about whether what you want is in line with what I want, Cuz I can’t think of you wanting something else. I want to move forward only with you. A year without you is enough time for me to ponder what I want in life. And although Im still not really sure about where I want to be, I do know who I want with me.

I don’t blame you, I don’t blame myself, I don’t blame the stars, I don’t blame anything. Because these two years however confused had you in it. I don’t even know if you have me in your life anymore, If you want me in your life anymore (On the other hand if you read this and realize what I mean, I’d be really glad if you let me know. Im sorry to bring this out on public domain, It’s much easier for me to write than to talk to a person who may or may not react the way you expect them to. Im sorry if you think Im expecting too much, but I don’t ever want to lose you. If you do read this on yet another hand (yes I love three handed people) and don’t react, I hope you regret it throughout your life, Cuz I had the courage to tell the world about it, and you won’t even tell me? ) So will you? If you don’t I’ll still live in the false hope of you having not read this. Because the alternate would mean only more despair and anguish (For those of you who want to slap the shit out of me for this? I stand my ground and refuse to let go of something so good)

“A soul can live in torment for years and years, even decades, as it slowly, stone by stone, builds a mound over a grave; as it moves towards the apprehension of eternal loss and bows down before reality.” So what is the reality I need to bow down before? To think I would have had a wonderful year, confused but still with the support of people I want in my life.. I’ve been fighting to be who I am all my life. What’s the point of being who I am, if I can’t have the person who was worth all the fighting for?

Last quote of today? 

“Maybe it’s like you said before, all of us being cracked open. Like each of us starts out as a watertight vessel. And then things happen - these people leave us, or don’t love us, or don’t get us, or we don’t get them, and we lose and fail and hurt one another. And the vessel starts to crack in places. And I mean, yeah once the vessel cracks open, the end becomes inevitable” 

So what is the end? But I digress again. People change, their outlooks change, their promises die, their priorities change, mine did too.. Im not saying I’m still the same.. Neither are the circumstances, but that doesn’t mean what I want has changed.. Maybe it never will… And maybe only once I get that what I want will I be able to move forward?

es muy creyente!

Belief  is a crazy thing, in my world every thing's crazy, I agree.. but this is worse. what makes people do things they do or don't do? Karma? What makes people chose?

I believe I'm too idealistic at times, everything in this world has to be right for me, although the past couple of years have been pretty wrong, according to my scheme of how the world should be, my world I mean.. I believe everything happens for a reason, this one however baffles me by not coming up on time..

I believe I am lost, I have no idea where my life is going, No idea who all are in my life and why, and who all are not in my life and why.. I believe I am just existing, I believe that i have lost my passion, I believe I don't know what my passion is..

Belief is not religion, they do go hand in hand. Cuz I'm agnostic, you would agree if you have more than a thousand gods to chose from as per your culture.. Agnostic. I believe in the power of words, I believe in the power of silence, I believe in other peoples belief. Its amazing that you wake up and pull yourself out of bed only to return late in the night to go back to bed again.

I LOVE travel, the fact that i see new places, new faces, new eats, new experiences. I believe i was born to travel. I also believe that if i were to walk/ drive straight across the oceans, the distance travelled in the past 3 years to one clients place and another and back would be enough to cover one whole revolution of the sun around this earth...

I believe words are powerful, they make my heart tremble. like the ones below...

“I care," he said in a trembling voice. "I care so much that I do not know how to tell you without it seeming inconsequential compared to how I feel. Even if I am distant at times and seem as if I do not want to be with you, it is only because this scares me, too.” 

This makes me want to will my heart out of my rib cage and shoot it with an old 18th century gun... so that it wont tremble anymore... So that it wont despair anymore...

I believe I am incapable of holding relationships. I can be a great friend, all one has to do is ask.. i can be the one person that stands with them through thick and thin, but the minute i realise Ive started depending on someone i pull back, i put up the walls around me again, but unfortunately not without letting them peek into the wreck i am. I also believe I'm incapable of getting over losing stuff.. I am also incapable of crying over lost stuff.. I believe I am just capable of mourning...

Most of my life I have mourned, whether it be the loss of people from my life or loss of material things... Only to find new things to be lost again..

I believe everyone has the power to change their life. Its in their hands to wake up in the morning and decide whether their day is going to be as miserable as yesterday or better.. or even worse.. I believe someones happiness shouldn't be dependant on another's.. That being the main reason for my mourning...

I believe I'm not sentimental (definitely mental, the other end of insane, yes, but not senti), I believe those kinda people are pathetic, I believe I am a strong independant woman who can decide where her life should be headed.. I also believe I can hear life laughing maniacally  in the background over this last sentence..

I believe that parallel worlds exist, I believe I am on this earth for a cause (mainly increase the GDP of my country) I believe that I am never going to cook in my life, I believe that sandwiches exist so that people like me dont go hungry... I believe fermentation was the next best innovation of all, maybe after icecream. The fact that wine and alcohol and sugar exist means god doesn't want us to mourn much.. I believe I am a responsible drinker (yea right :P) 

I believe that if i were a ghost, i would haunt (if it were a bathroom then it would range from the one near fratelli at RHI or maybe one of the ones in TIFC). If not a bathroom then one of the conference rooms in one of those places. I do not know when my life got so sad.. Or even maybe one of the stations where i last felt dead/ alive. my heart hasn't stopped trembling after that..

I believe that people are all yearning.. yearning for love, for money, for purpose.. and unfortunately i don't know what I'm yearning for anymore... Love is stupid, it makes you lose control of your life, alcohol is better.. it gives you the same tingling feeling in your fingertips, the same euphoria in your heart and the same kind of heart pounding you feel when it takes over.. but u can still wake up the next morning and go on about life only feeling a bit raw and not like your whole life just got lynched.. Money again, is stupid, it doesn't stay in your bank account, and by every month end you end up just waiting for the paltry salary credit.

Purpose, now that is something.. I believe that purpose is the only thing why we should live, purpose gives us passion, it gives us courage and strength.. where did you go my purpose? i want you back right now.. 

I believe I am on this earth to read, to find new books and make them popular amongst my people. I believe I know things, Maybe not a lot of things, maybe not even everything of things, but a little of a lot of things.. Enough to say I know and then be an insufferable know it all.. 

I believe that no one can handle heart break, I worse than others. If others try to act like they don't care, it is just a facade.. I believe that only another love can replace the fact that you had a heartbreak.. I also believe that i do not learn from my mistakes, this is the third time i let someone break down my walls and leave.. 

I believe people are crazy, they spend the day in front of the television only to escape from their life. I believe I should have been a doctor, I believe I also should have been an architect. I also believe I should have been a pilot for a commercial airline... cuz that would mean doing the same things over and over.. And plus there is all that travel..

I believe that people dramatize death too much. When someone dies, all it means is that his work on earth is done and he's moved on maybe to another world or into a void. When some 10 year old kid falls off his bicycle when pushed by another vehicle, and lies there brain bleeding on the road, it either means he will die or he will live, no need of awwing and oohing over the fact that he was a 10 year old kid.

I believe I am extremely impersonal. I don't know how to handle people who cry, I don't know how to handle people who mourn (although i have been moping around quite a lot these days). There are these times when I feel like slapping people who believe their lives happiness depends on others... And if someone starts crying in the middle of a sentence, I'm like bleh, what to be done now, keep chugging.. My mantra when that happens..

So, at the end, quoting from American Gods, which actually led to this post..

I can believe things that are true and things that aren't true and I can believe things where nobody knows if they're true or not. 

I can believe in Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny and the Beatles and Marilyn Monroe and Elvis and Mister Ed. Listen - I believe that people are perfectable, that knowledge is infinite, that the world is run by secret banking cartels and is visited by aliens on a regular basis, nice ones that look like wrinkled lemurs and bad ones who mutilate cattle and want our water and our women. 

I believe that the future sucks and I believe that the future rocks and I believe that one day White Buffalo Woman is going to come back and kick everyone's ass. I believe that all men are just overgrown boys with deep problems communicating and that the decline in good sex in America is coincident with the decline in drive-in movie theaters from state to state. 

I believe that all politicians are unprincipled crooks and I still believe that they are better than the alternative. I believe that California is going to sink into the sea when the big one comes, while Florida is going to dissolve into madness and alligators and toxic waste. 

I believe that antibacterial soap is destroying our resistance to dirt and disease so that one day we'll all be wiped out by the common cold like martians in War of the Worlds. 

I believe that the greatest poets of the last century were Edith Sitwell and Don Marquis, that jade is dried dragon sperm, and that thousands of years ago in a former life I was a one-armed Siberian shaman. 

I believe that mankind's destiny lies in the stars. I believe that candy really did taste better when I was a kid, that it's aerodynamically impossible for a bumble bee to fly, that light is a wave and a particle, that there's a cat in a box somewhere who's alive and dead at the same time (although if they don't ever open the box to feed it it'll eventually just be two different kinds of dead), and that there are stars in the universe billions of years older than the universe itself. 

I believe in a personal god who cares about me and worries and oversees everything I do. I believe in an impersonal god who set the universe in motion and went off to hang with her girlfriends and doesn't even know that I'm alive. I believe in an empty and godless universe of causal chaos, background noise, and sheer blind luck. 

I believe that anyone who says sex is overrated just hasn't done it properly. I believe that anyone who claims to know what's going on will lie about the little things too. 

I believe in absolute honesty and sensible social lies. I believe in a woman's right to choose, a baby's right to live, that while all human life is sacred there's nothing wrong with the death penalty if you can trust the legal system implicitly, and that no one but a moron would ever trust the legal system. 

I believe that life is a game, that life is a cruel joke, and that life is what happens when you're alive and that you might as well lie back and enjoy it.

So Lie back and enjoy waiting for the end of your days! 

Parallelism in our universe

There’s great imbalance in this universe... Cuz not everyone is happy, satisfied, even ok... Theres always someone looking back at a decision they took, theres always an if... What if, that day I hadn’t said yes, or I hadn’t said no... What if that day I had just said fuck off...

I believe in multiple parallel universes, there has to be, theres no other way this balance can be maintained... It’s like gravity... and atmospheric pressure... The reason why your blood hasn’t burst out of your skin yet is because of the pressure your blood puts against your skin... it’s around the same as the atmosphere’s pressure... So that longing, that right decision when you made a wrong one, that slap across someone’s face you are keeping in check, has already occurred in the other universe... and maybe in another one the conditions are exactly the opposite.. Im in the place of the person I want to slap and that person is the one who wants to slap me...

Maybe, when you take a decision, a part of you gets detached and does that thing you chose not to do... It’s like a part of your spirit, and that world exists alongside ours... similar to that in Lyra and Wills world... I sooo want Will’s Knife, not for anything else but to put my head into that world... and seek for that person who wants to slap me and exchange him for the person in our world..

That moment when you’re talking your crazy shit with your friend (a girl), realizing that’s exactly the crazy shit you want to talk about to your future boyfriend, and both of you getting upset over the fact that the other is not a guy? Yeah it probably happens to two guys in the next universe... There probably sitting at the same place you are as well...

So that day when you chose to stay at home and not go out with friends for drinks? Yeah, in the 1^st parallel universe, you went on ahead and reached back home feeling normally fuzzy... In the 2^nd parallel universe you got completely wasted and passed out, conscious of nothing, to wake up with no memory, in a different room from the one in your last memory and still feeling fuzzy  and swearing never to have anything to do with lemon again… (That’s and awesome feeling you wake up with actually, Cuz you feel indifferent to everything you ever felt for in your life, loosing of maybe something, maybe someone and definitely your mind)

So that day when you decided to never talk about upsetting things again, never wonder about all the what if’s, and fail miserably? In the other universe, you wouldn’t worry about any of them... But you would have had other regrets... That you actually went ahead in the first place, the reason why you did stuff that you did... Those consequences you avoided in your world... But are you happy? Is the non-happening of those consequences something you want to settle for?

Choice is the worst thing ever... Why can’t there be a way between? Why does it always have to be a Yes or No? Why is life so stubborn? Why can’t life bend a bit more to my liking? Why is life like that old oak tree that refuses to bend in the strong wind that’s your wills and wants? Didn’t we read that the old oak breaks in a storm? When’s my storm gonna break you, my tree of life? On another parallel, is there a bigger storm coming up? (Monkey with hands on eyes emote)

Theres a very thin line between stubbornness and stupidity… It’s very often that the thing your being stubborn about turn’s stupid, sometimes within a few hours of you beginning to be stubborn... Everyone around you realizes that you’re being stupid... But your bullheaded-ness doesn’t allow you to see it... What do I do then? I wait... hoping you realise your being stubborn is stupid... So what do I do to you, Life? I wait... until you realise that you’re being stupid too…

P.S. I do not regret, as much as I show it, or don’t... And of all, you will remain one of my favorite What If’s…

Nevermore

Her thoughts never stop, her eyes never tire, her amazement never ceases and never does her exhaustion flee...

She sits there troubled... wondering where life's taking her, the future in doubts shroud, impassive on first look but fire burning inside...

She hates the longing, she hates where she sits, she wants to move,  but invisible chains hold her down... caged in her own mind, flapping her large wings against the bars that keep her in...

She’s travelling, dunno where to, aimlessly wandering, looking for the right exit to take, looking for the right life to make...

And he sits there, with crossed legs, on that tall armchair, next to the ticking long case clock, his smile turning into a sneer, and watches her in his crystal ball..

He watches her futile attempts to thrash around on the bars, slowly removing his blade as the clock chimes 10, two to go he wonders, or...???

She doesn't notice him, she’s too busy fighting her own demons, demons that mock silently when she quietens to sit back on the floor, cover herself with her aching wings...

He sits back, and tests the blade... drawing blood almost immediately... enough for flesh but what about her substance?

She closes her eyes, only to see the same nightmare all over again.. her demons clawing at her, waiting for her soul to submit, until the man next to her shifts, and his newspaper falls at her feet..

She shuffles in her seat, disturbed from her wakeless terror, what's happening she wonders... The world moves forward while she’s stationary.. Or has the world been altered by her terror too?

“Sorry”, he says.. she looks up bewildered... His eyes, that’s all she can see.. His piercing blue eyes.. Like the clearest of morning skies… so inviting.. replete with promise…

His hands bend forward towards the newspaper, her feet don't move… she doesn’t react..  disbelief washes over her.. Those eyes.. they are unnatural.. Nothing can give so much hope..

Her mouth opens and shuts, like a fish.. her arms stretch outward involuntarily to touch him… He can’t be real.. But he is undeniably flesh and blood..

He smiles.. warmly, flinching only a bit at her cold touch.. “Are you ok?” he asks…

Is it really you? Are you here finally, She marvels…? So is that what you look like? “If the destination is you, I don't mind the journey”, she says…

He looks at her baffled.. is there something wrong with his guise? Did he overdo it? No, that’s her gift, Don't underestimate yourself.. He thinks..

“So are you ready? For the journey of a lifetime? For freedom from pain and craving? For freedom from feelings and …. ?” He asks..

“As always” she answers..

And he sits there by the long case clock.. As it gets closer to 12.. satisfied… His blade sprawled across his lap, touching his pointed fingertips together.. There wasn’wasn't a struggle, This one is easier than it looks..

The train lurches ahead into a tunnel.. The coach glows softly with the light from the lamps.. People’s faces obscured by the dark… Laughter and clinking of champagne glasses in the air… No one notices them disappear.. No one notices them missing…

“Welcome home, My Love” He says.. She stands there in her cage, held down by chains.. Her wings bent and broken.. Her eyes bloodshot from lack of rest..

She stands there quietly, caged, expressionless and strong.. she knows what’s coming.. It’s the same as her dream…

“Did you like him?” He says slowly getting up from his tall armchair… “He’s one of my favorites…” His black beady eyes narrow, mocking her again… “Come forth now love… Don't be afraid..”

She doesn’t move.. the noisy silence cut only by the ticking of the clock.. 

“Oh, Im sorry, Your chains”, in one swipe of his hands, the cage disappears… He motions his fingers, the force pulls her towards him… she stands there, suspended in midair, the chains her only link to reality… He motions again and she falls.. the chains are gone too..

She’s too tired to move, every bone, muscle and sinew in her body hurts.. but she still looks at him nonchalant..

Her gifts are dead too, like her will, he thinks.. so does she.. five minutes to go..

“Let’s make this easy on you” He motions again.. The force pulls her up, and draws her towards him.. she gasps as she feels his breath on her cheek… Cold and reeking of camels…

The clock strikes 12, The first gong sounds.. His pointed nails trace a line from her cheek down to her neck… His blade raised… Its tip cutting into her arm… a trickle of blood oozes out.. She doesn’t cry.. She doesn’t flinch…

In her head shes counting… 4 to go.. Wouldn't it be better if she submit.. There would be no worries anymore… just floating in timeless space…

The blood is gushing now.. the wound is deep.. 2 to go… He raises his blade over her head… Is this how it is to end… She closes her eyes, waiting for the blade’s swoosh.. The end is here..

She sees them again… Those clear blue eyes.. The clearest of morning skies…No.. This is not the end.. It cannot be the last thing I see.. Her eyes open again.. to look into his mirthless ones.. The clock chimes 12... 

He laughs, and pulls forward, aiming at her head.. A clean cut.. thats what he wants.. and then she is mine..

"No" She says, quietly and calmly.. He tries to move, but he's paralysed... His mirthless eyes now fearful.. She tiptoes forward.. and removes his blade from his hands.. With a spark from her fingers, it turns into dust... "Goodbye" 

She turns around to look at the long case clock "Nevermore", the clock ticks on...

"Umm, Sorry? but can I have my newspaper back?" she looks bewildered, into those piercing blue eyes and the the train speeds on..

And just like that, this year ends..

So, another year ends.. the world still didnt, neither does my life.. what im getting at is that you guys still have no respite from my years roundup.. And so here goes...

1. I fell in love.. with words, with literature,  with excerpts of poems, quotes by authors, books all over again.. The way I read hasnt changed. . I still live the lives the characters live, like watching memories from a penseive. . But I now pause to re-read each word searching for more meanings than mere words..

2. I did nothing this year,  I lazed around, worked, worked more, lazed around more, learnt a bit (textbook stuff), learnt a lot (life stuff) found friends, found good friends, found new persons, lost some.. and moped around lazily some more.. so that's it, nothing happened this year..

3.  You can never care too much about anything or anyone.. cuz that thing or person has a mind of its own.. and thoughts of its own.. where you have no idea how or why things happen, go where they go or end how they end... and the care doesnt end, unluckily,  it eats you up, and tries to consume the whole of you..

4. If I die on a friday night, or a saturday morning,  no one will come to know until saturday night or even worse, monday morning, when your boss calls up to ask why you aren't at office yet at 10. This is out of an epiphany I had when I was sick over a weekend. Life this year was epiphenomenal...

5. Theres always someone who knows more than you in life... even if you are Red from shawshank.. even if you always know someone whose somewhere when someone talks about that somewhere. . You sometimes find someone who knows more than the somethings you know. ..

6. Theres no such thing as no tiredness,  I am perennially tired.. if not physically by travelling half across the world.. (goregaon does seem as far as the other end of the world.. I think half across the world would be easier) then mentally.. theres no limit to how much you can wonder, theres no limit to how much you can worry, theres no limit to how much you can replay things in your head, and no limit to what ifs..

7. Soulmates exist.. they are not necessarily your life partners... they may not even have the same interests as you..  they can be your friends... its only that sometimes it takes you a while to recognise them. . And when you recognise it you never wanna ever let it go.. just hope that the other person realises it too.. in other words, some of my persons are soul mates..

8. You can never build too many walls around you.. too many is never enough.. what you need is one single iron clad unbreakable wall, that will save you from those people who try to tear them down.. or even better? Build a wall around you after the person tears it down. . That way the person is stuck with you, and wont leave you after tearing them down... never let anyone see the true you, the true you cant handle silence. ..

9. Being alone is good sometimes, it allows you to clear your mind... it allows you to not be defined by someone.. and it does good for your ego,  and mental health... it shows you that you dont need to live to survive... survival means existing, and for that you need only your body parts to function.

10. You can never hate people, you can only be indifferent towards them? Thats all shit.... I hate my boss. There I said it.. he can ruin a perfectly normal day and ruin every weekend (what are weekends?) And every holiday you plan to take...

So, thats my year for you.. morose isn't it? Whatever you write, its always about someone. .. this post is not turning out to be an exception sadly, and ive become very predictable (yeah, im still moping)  Lets hope 2014 is better in terms of job opportunities atleast... everything else looks really light years away from me.. (if you still dont get it, my life hits rock bottom every year,  and every year the bottom is much lower than the year before) 2014- please be good and ill try to burn my excess baggage with the old man that is 2013.

May this year bring to us magic, clarity and lots of memorable moments!cheers! And be cool!