Sunday 20 April 2008

SURVIVOR: TAKING CONTROL OF YOUR FIGHT AGAINST CANCER, by Laura Landro

I picked this up at a book fair back when my nephew Mehran had been diagnosed with bone cancer. After he passed away, I donated this and other books to the Oncology Dept at Manipal Hospital. It's funny (but not in a ha-ha way) that I donated them on April 16th 2007, and exactly one year later, I walked in to the department and asked if I could borrow some of them back.

The books have been bookcrossed, so that patients or family can borrow and return the books for free, and also make a journal entry if they want to, about how helpful the book was to them.

This is the first of several books I will probably read on cancer. My father, dear egg-painting Dr. Tonsils, has been diagnosed with bladder cancer. Fortunately it is superficial and low grade (I'm not entirely sure what that means exactly: but I do know it means chemotherapy won't be necessary, and for that I'm grateful). The lesions have been removed and he is in hospital recovering from surgery, while fighting a fever and coping with his chronic respiratory problems.

Me, I'm holding out, trying to stay positive and encouraging. Sometimes it feels like I've been treading water in a huge dark ocean since last week, and it can be really exhausting. But it's a situation where I simply cannot lose hope, and so I rest and then tread again, knowing that somehow we will get through this, no matter what the outcome.

Instead of my usual three or four excerpts, I'm posting all the excerpts that I think I may want to read again when I'm high on stress or low on strength, energy or hope. Maybe reading it once is enough, but I feel better knowing that I can come back and read through the encouraging words whenever I need to.

"There's no use trying to figure out why you, why now. Questions are irrelevant, because it won't wait for answers.

The key to survival is taking control, learning everything you can about your treatment, making informed decisions, and being prepared to fight if necessary;

And it is important to remember that one is never alone in the fight.

Nothing would ever be the same again in my life, nor in the life of anyone who cared for me. Everything I had taken for granted - my daily concerns, my work, my well-being, my sense of my place in the world, and even my physical appearance - was about to be taken away from me. My own mortality, something I had never seriously considered, was suddenly staring me in the face.

For some, talking directly to the victim is difficult; they don't know what to say or how to act. But there is no use trying to hide .. the face that one has cancer. One good outcome of being open is that people want to help. And that is where some of the best help will come from.

Acting strong and in control actually helped me feel tougher - the old "whistle a happy tune" scenario - and sometimes I even amazed myself at how well I seemed to be dealing with everything. But I had to fight every day to ward off the despair I felt inside.


I found it helped to write down my feelings and my fears ..

.. he gave her some advice we all needed: don't project the worst; focus on the real possibility of a cure. It was the simplest, yet most important, advice we could get.

.. going ballistic about small things can help release the steam that builds up when the larger fears seem overwhelming, even incomprehensible. And once you express your fear, it's easier to find ways to psych yourself up for the time when you will really need all your courage.

"No bad vibes, Mom, no thoughts that anything bad could ever happen; don't for an instant acknowledge that he could be hurt, only positive energy," I would tell her, trying to convince myself as well.

.. though I was terrified of needles .. I had to accept that they were now a daily fact of life. "You can always raise the bar on what you can take, how much you can stand," I wrote in my notebook. "Just raise it. Raise that bar."

Conquer fear.

I fought back tears. As close as I was to the black hole in front of me, it seemed more unreal than ever. I couldn't make myself think about what might actually happen to me, I could only take things one day at a time. From now on, that was the only way to get on with the next part of my life.

.. while staying in control intellectually is crucial to taking charge of your own care, you can't bury fears and emotions. I had focused on finding my own strength and conquering my own fear, on being strong so my family wouldn't fall apart worrying about how I was dealing with things. I had wanted to show the world that I was, in fact, invincible. Those are good feelings to have, and they do help you mentally to prepare for the complete unknown. But she was right; it was okay to be scared, and very important to express it outright when I needed to.

Patients who are used to being in charge, taking care of themselves or being the person on whom others depend will find this physical debilitation very hard to cope with .. may direct their anger over loss of control at doctors, medical personnel, or even their family caregivers. She recommends that family members treat the patient with respect and acknowledge his or her intelligence. She also stresses the importance of respecting a patient's modesty and privacy.

I knew I was lucky to have my family so close to me, but sometimes I just needed to shut them all out. "There's a sense of alienation between you and anyone related to you even though they are as close to you as they've ever been," I said into my tape recorder at one 3 a.m. session. "You don't want to push them away at a time like this, but sometimes you have to."

"You don't know what your life is going to be .. I read once that after you survive cancer, it's like a sword of Damocles over your head for the rest of your life .. but life depends on how well you live it, enjoying the freedom you get and hoping your cure has been effective and you get long-term survival - that's what you go for - you've got to be one of those great statistics. You've just got to."

My family tried to keep my spirits up. "We keep telling Laura that things are going so well," my mother wrote in her notebook .. "She feels so exhausted that our encouraging words seem to have little impact. We do it because it's important for her to hear every day that her progress is remarkable ..

"I'm scared. I've got to get that old confidence back .. I've got to start getting ME back .. Now you've got to make yourself do things, but you have to be cautious, follow the rules, make yourself watch every little thing and learn how to take care of yourself .. You have to learn that there will be setbacks but that you'll be okay. You've got to believe that this has worked and that it's going to keep working.

Your body has been through so much, your soul is battered, your psyche exhausted from the sheer effort of going through it .. "It's like you've been sent to hell, and suddenly someone says you can go home now."

But in the end, you have to make yourself believe. You have to summon all the strength and faith that enabled you to get through it in the first place, and turn that strength toward getting your life back.

Caregivers .. frequently say the biggest stress comes after they leave the hospital, when the tasks usually performed by the nursing staff have to be carried out by families.

Dr Abrams' studies found that 80 percent of the caregiving tasks fall to women, and that the medical establishment needs to establish better procedures to help caregivers cope after the patient has returned home.

Returning to your regular world after surviving cancer is much like reentering the earth's atmosphere from space. It takes a period of adjustment before you can resume normal life, and your journey has opened your eyes to things most of the people you encounter can never really understand unless they've been there.

.. made me more certain than ever of the importance of self-education for a cancer patient of any kind. The more you know about the latest science and wisdom in the medical world, the more informed your choices when it comes to the treatment of your disease. Don't assume your internist or even your local specialist is up to date on everything; become a lay expert to the extent possible, and use that knowledge on your own behalf.

.. it was good to be able to meet some of the patients who were there, and to tell them that not long ago, I had been in their shoes. I think it helped them to see someone who was already back to normal.

For the first couple of years after my transplant, I was so happy to be alive that I didn't think much about whether or now I was truly happy, or about what I really wanted. As most of my friends lamented turning forty, I was thrilled just to get there.

Once you have had cancer, the risk of other cancers is higher.

.. the fact is, I probably never will truly relax. I can only be grateful I've had a second chance at life, and I'll remain vigilant about protecting it. The fear that the disease will come back is never completely gone, but it can be kept at bay. It is hard work getting comfortable with the idea that the bad times are really over, that it's okay to feel happy, loved, and secure. As for my good health, I've learned to enjoy it. But I'm not getting too cocky about anything. Let's just say, so far, so good.

As in any cancer, early detection is crucial to increasing your odds of survival. The best advice I can give to someone who has symptoms such as chronic fatigue, a respiratory infection that won't go away, or pain in the spleen area, is to get a simple blood test. Don't procrastinate, and don't let a doctor tell you you don't need one. A CBC, or complete blood count, is a standard test that any physician can justify when a patient shows up with the kind of symptoms mentioned above. Time is of the essence once your blood starts going haywire; the longer it takes to find out what's wrong with you, the less chance there is that you can stop it in time.

When it's time for your chemotherapy, radiation, and transplant, hope for the best, be prepared for the worst, and try to take the attitude that you can handle whatever comes at you.

Expect nothing from yourself other than to get through each day, and tell yourself that each day you get through brings you closer to being better again.

Don't hesitate to reach out to the people who love you, for they will be your lifeline. But understand that this is difficult for them too, and that every relationship is likely to undergo some strain.

The hardest thing for many patients is the loss of control; .. as an adult you will feel like you are a small child again, and you may even resent that.

.. face the fact that some of your relationships won't make it. If they don't, maybe that is for the best. There is nothing like a crisis to bring out the true colours in people.

It would be nice to think that once you've survived, your brush with cancer is over. But in fact, your risks of developing another cancer may be higher than the average person. You must be attentive about follow-up care, and keep up with the latest research. After a while, you won't think about it every day, and the day will come when you get through a long time without thinking about it at all. But you can never forget it. To borrow from the famous saying about freedom, the price of health is eternal vigilance.

- from Laura Landro's book: Survivor: Taking Control of Your Fight Against Cancer

Thursday 10 April 2008

HOW TO COOK YOUR DAUGHTER, by Jessica Hendra

"When he was finished writing for the day, Daddy turned off his typewriter, stood from his desk, and held out his hand. The veins shone greenish-blue against the pale whiteness of his skin. They seemed like huge, protruding pipes just under his flesh. When I looked closely, I thought I could see his blood pumping through them. I would take his hand and run my little fingers over the back of it, exploring the bumpy map. Then we would go down the office stairs together and out into the night.

The two of us walked in the fields or the woods around the house, exploring fallen trees, stopping to spy quietly on deer or rabbits. He'd tell me stories about the spirits that lived in the woods. I'd hold his hand tightly, reassured by those bumps on the back. They proved he was alive. They proved he was my dad. And as long as he was with me, nothing horrible could happen - to me or to him."
*
"I remembered my life backward, from the last time I had confronted my father at Aunt Celia's, back to my teenage years, when he slipped me some coke the night he told me he was leaving my mother. Back to the days when I first started bingeing and purging. Back to the night just before I turned seven. Back to the piece he had written for the Lampoon just a few months before. He had called it 'How to Cook Your Daughter', and it started this way: A recurrent problem facing the gourmet who wishes to prepare this excellent dish is the difficulty he experiences in obtaining a daughter. .. People so often ask, How do I tell when my daughter is ready for the table? Well, there's always some little variation, but generally the exact age falls somewhere between the fifth and sixth birthdays .. "
*
Picked this up at Bangalore Book Fair last year. It's the biggest book fair in town, held annually at the Palace Grounds (yes - for those of you outside India - a real palace, belonging to the ex-Maharaja of Mysore, and vast amount of grounds where various events get held, and there's never any problem parking).

Bangalore Book Fair is massive and not to be taken lightly. I wear comfortable shoes, carry a bottle of water, my trusty portable trolley, and make sure I have a good breakfast. It can take me a whole day to get through from one end to the other. I love it.

So why am I telling you all this? Probably because it's easier to talk about the fair than about this book (which cost me the princely sum of Rs. 150 - more than I usually pay for my second-hand treasures).

I have shelves full of books at home. A lot of them are on child abuse. And some of the child abuse books are memoirs by adult survivors. But here's the thing. I never read the memoirs, just buy them and keep them.

Today, though, I decided to read this one, and I sat and read the whole thing through in about four hours. I have a headache now. I'm not sure if it's from bad reading posture, or from what I read; perhaps both.

I'm supposed to say something about it, but I'm not sure what I want to say. So I'll just say this: it's a good book. It's more than a survivor getting herself some healing by telling her story, it's also a good story, a good read. All the same, I'm disturbed after reading it, although in a way I'm glad I did read it. I'm not sure if I'm going to have scary dreams tonight, or if I'll have to sleep with the night light on, or if I'll see and hear things I know aren't real any more.

Well, I'll worry about that closer to bedtime. Meanwhile, I've done what any sensible survivor does after triggering herself silly over someone else's story. I've ordered a cheese and pepperoni pizza with a Coke on the side. And it's just arrived.

Saturday 5 April 2008

Vodafone: Nice accent, shame about the grammar.

"The mobile phone you are trying to call is presently busy."

A common enough mistake, actually. But a wonderful opportunity for a little Ad Nausea and a chance to be patronisingly educational. 'Presently' means 'soon' .. as in 'Vodafone will presently re-record this message'. The correct word to use would be 'currently', or the phrase 'at present' .. as in: The mobile phone is currently busy, or The mobile phone is busy, at present.

Ah, the Internet! Font of information! Aren't you glad you read this blog? Meanwhile, I am currently running low on cigarettes, so I shall presently hop out to buy some more..

Thursday 3 April 2008

27 Reasons Why I am Still Single

Can't live with 'em, can't live without 'em, so the song says. But after finding these gems on a matrimonial site, I no longer wonder why it is that I have stayed single all these years.

1. "looking for a beautiful women either she is divorced or window I don't mind"
Well, I try to keep an open mind, but WINDOW? That's going too far.

2. "I want to married issueless lady which can born a child at least"
If only. If I had no issues I could have saved a ton on psychotherapy bills.

3. "I want the educated female as I am from the educated family."
I am not the educated. I am the college dropout.

4. "Religion no bar. Qualification no bar. Only important thing is she must an USA/UK national and make easy to get me migrated there."
This man wants to go for a ride. And take me on one too. No thanks. I prefer not to travel.

5. "Girl should be well educated as well as familiar."
I can be familiar! Very familiar! But wait - I don't qualify .. see #3.

6. "I am very simiple, moderate and god fevering man."
I am too fond of God to marry someone who makes Him sick.

7. "I am slim normal person and wearing glass."
It just wouldn't work. I like being the centre of attention, but I wouldn't stand a chance next to HIS wardrobe!

8. "Well dressed always, perfumes are my necessasity."
Thanks for the warning.

9. "butyfull (no only white) good face cut. big eyes. religius mind and culture. if match with my choice. contect me. outherwis don't wrest time."
Wrest not, want not.

10. "working Sauidi arabia since a long period. looking for a good housewife who has religious and obidient."
God, no.

11. "I love flowers specially rose i m living with my mumm"
And may they live happily ever after.

12. "I had married in 1998 which lasted for mere 7 odays. Reason being mental imbalance of the girl. Authentic proofs available."
Ooh. Where would I hide my medical records?

13. "I would like her to have a long hair and she should be also loving her hair and should take care of them if not for her sake at least for my sake."
I do have one long hair, appearing from time to time on my chin. However, I find myself unable to love it, not even for his sake.

14. "looking for second marriage with kind and healty or wealthy lady of any age I hv 5 kids and need more"
With those conditions, I'd be neither healthy nor wealthy very long.

15. "she should be pleasantly plump within 5 ft. tall"
Darn. I missed this by one inch.

16. "I am gold medalist thru out my carrier."
Wow. Even in Spelling class? Too intimidating for me.

17. "I am married. I have two sons. My wife is good in health. She is a housewife. I want to marri again because I want to live in some other country."
I'm trying to cut down on the married men. Plus I prefer not to travel. (See #4).

18. "I am government employee, so I am looking widow/divorse person."
Hmmm. I'm still pondering the correlation on this one, but anyway, I don't qualify.

19. "ex-wife is an psycriatic patient"
Darn. Me too.

20. "As I being a typical Ariean, I am totally Different and Transparent, and Definately not one from the crowd."
Make up your mind, mister. Typical or different?

21. "I am considered good looking by my female colleagues."
Too stressful. I'd be looking for lipstick on his collar every evening.

22. "willing to give a happy life with full of contention."
Plenty of contention in my life already, thank you very much.

23. "the girl should be unmarried"
Hey! No .. wait, I'm a woman, not a girl.

24. "we have large ancestor's property"
All my ancestors were kind of skinny. I'm worried he might look down on anything that came from them.

25. "I am looking for an ordinary keralite with improved mind"
I have the mind, but not the Malayalam.

26. "first marriage lasted only a few days / reason is very shocking"
Too scared to find out.

27. "as long as her parents are not fishermen or street sweepers, it hardly matters."
Whatever happened to 'Caste No Bar'?

Wednesday 2 April 2008

WHAT ARE YOU DOING WITH THE REST OF YOUR LIFE - by Paula Payne Hardin, Rs. 100

From time to time, in a desperate attempt to de-clutter, I give away books before I have read them. I am SO glad I didn't do that with this book. I bought it so many years ago, I can't remember which book fair it's from, Ashish's I think. It has been such a wonderful inspiring experience! (And very reassuring, as I now know that evidently I'm not the only middle-aged person who thinks the way I do).

I will be bookcrossing this book, so am jotting down some of my favourite bits here so that I can continue to enjoy them long after the book's flown from my hands.

".. if we journey along the self-absorbed road, we fail to climb out of the pits or to recover from the detours and instead sink into an escalating concern with our own life, which becomes more narrow and irrelevant. We focus on what we eat and wear, how we feel, how we pass the time and entertain ourselves, how offended we are by perceived slights from others, how much we blame others for our problems, who much we demand attention from others, how sorry we feel about our lot in life, and so on. When we choose the path of self-absorption we find out world constricting until, as one physician observed from his practice, our lives are focused on what goes into our bodies and what comes out of them."

"The task of the midlife developmental transition is to make peace with the past and prepare for the future."

"Short-term pleasures are just that - short and quick. They are easy and do not build the strength needed to handle life's stresses and challenges. Short-term pleasures can sabotage our self-worth; they do not lead to involvement in life, but in the opposite direction, toward escaping life's demands. They do not build character, but tend to dull one's vitality."

"The costs of change are high, but the costs of not changing may be higher. When change is called for and we refuse to engage in it, we sacrifice the Self, the most desirable inner core, and sentence ourselves and others to suffer needlessly."

"Have we bought the hype that we have to be slim, rich, and powerful to have a life worth living?"

"Releasing our attitudes of criticism and intolerance toward others brings a light-hearted free feeling of vitality - and is so worth the effort. When we judge others and cast them out of our hearts, we sentence ourselves to feel like the outcast."

"People who avoid choosing and float along on possibilities - trying to avoid the pain of making mistakes - are committing a big error in judgment. In their fear of the future and of the tasks of adult life they are refusing to live fully. .. It is not the future they condemn with their fears, them themselves. The only way out of the future, Hugo said, is to die."

"To age well, to live well, is to see life as an adventure, to stand against the cultural prejudice about growing old and affirm that 'being' is as valuable as 'doing'. It means to creatively accept the infirmities which come as the body wears out and maintain a spirit that grows healthier, wiser. We calmly set about to do what we can, knowing that all is essentially well, even if at the moment there might be some difficulties."

"When you do what is REALLY right for your true Self, it is REALLY right for everyone else."

"In the second half of life we need much patience with those who are younger and perhaps do not see as yet what we have learned to see. We need to respect that they have their own agendas."

"Often when we break through to new understandings, we want other family members to do the same - the truth seems so obvious now. For lasting and fruitful change to occur, however, it is important to allow the process to happen slowly."

"Essential to life from beginning to end are our connections to others. Yet what is called love can sometimes bind, distort and sabotage human promise. We may swing between possessing and being possessed. Sometimes, thinking we know best, we try to live another's life. Perhaps we let another tell us what to do too many times and then find ourselves angry and impotent because we've diminished who we are."

"In regaining our child, we do not sacrifice reason and mature judgment, but we do add spontaneity, playfulness, and wise innocence .. Charles Whitfield, a physician who has studied the inner child in adults, defined the child within as our Real Self. It is that part of us that is totally alive, vital, creative, spontaneous, and fulfilled."

" .. recognise that dying is an important event. Death sets a limit on our time in this life and urges us to do what we need to do in the time we are given. As Elisabeth Kubler-Ross observed, death is the final stage of growth in this life. She encourages us to begin to see death as a friendly but invisible companion, reminding us to LIVE our lives and not just exist."
"In prayer we usually begin with expressing our needs and desires; we pray for others, for our world. Eventually we may turn to a comtemplative, quiet, listening prayer."
"We are freer now to seek a new world, to speak out against social injustice, to stand for fairness and mercy. We have more leverage and know-how than when we were young, and less to lose than our younger contemporaries when we take unpopular positions. We can take less compromised stands than they, speaking honestly both in small ways and big. We can contribute to building a better world, giving gifts that last beyond our lifetime .. every wall that confronts us along the way has its golden door .. it always becomes visible when we are ready to see."

- Paula Payne Hardin's book: What Are You Doing with The Rest of Your Life?

P.V. Akilandam

Life is beautiful; live beautifully;

if you can't do that, at least

avoid making life ugly.



- P.V. Akilandam

Tamil novelist

from his book Chithira Pavai, 1977?

another once upon 28 10 94

28 10 94


You don't really need people to SAY they love you, or they're proud of you. Today when we left Parveen Sultana's show, Daddy quietly tucked 3 copies of the souvenir brochure under his arm as we were going out ( I wrote an article on "Introduction to Classical Music" in it).

for those who've a fondness

for those who've a fondness for bums

might i recommend using condoms

though it feels like a glove

when its not pure love

it will catch all the germs when you comes.

poe, 2003 no visitors please

No Visitors Please, I'm Sick


If you come here with a cough

please be nice and bugger off.


If by chance you have the flu

Turn around (there's the door) you know what to do


You may be coughing into your hands

but wherever you touch a little germ lands


have you come with a throat that's sore

stay on that side of the door

Once Upon A Dream

Once upon a dream, I was a tiger! I have never been a tiger before. I must have been Siberian because I didn't feel very orange or veyr striped. I was large heavy strong and solid. The dominant sense I had was of responsiblity for the tigress and the two cubs. I was a father. I was a tiger, a father, a protector, a writer.


I was endangered. My family was endangered. I wrote a letter for help! Imagine! A tiger writing a letter! Do you know how difficult that is with no fingers and thumbs, only clows and paws. But I wrote. Somehow. To the environmental NGO people. Telling them about Tiger and Tigress and Tigi and Tiga.


(Wild cats usually terrify me when they are cast as characters in my dreamworlds. To discover that i can be one of them is like - what? I can't think. Like the object of a senstence discovering its actually the subject of a the sentence.


the NGO people laughed as they read my letter. Because they thought I was a human being pretending to be a tiger writing a letter. But I wasn't.. Still in the end they did help, they brought us away but we had to pretend to be human. Walk upright on two legs and wear silly paper face masks. That was their idea of saving us.

OCT 03 BFORE 20TH

I need to write. I think more than anything, I need to write. The pen and the ink and the paper and my hand my arm shoulder neck brain -- there is a path here and it is the path my mind needs to travel often daily, hourly, I don't know exactly. But I need to make this journey often, my sanity, my sanity, my mlife my sanity depend on these.

6 oct 2003

a once upon?


sometimes i'm tired of living. then i think of some choice dengue moments and remind myself how i wanted to live, how i didn't want to die. why is that? It didn't seem as through death would be painful. The process of dying, maybe; the explosion in my head that was building and building: that would finally be silence and stillness and peace. I can imagine that moment: surely it must have its beauty and there can be no other moment quite like it, not even birth. I hope that death is birth backwards.


That's a reassuring thought., that's why we have reincarnation theories and religions. But. But. But. When I nearly died there was no flashing stream of my life's images before my eyes, there were no loved one's waiting there was no sign or tunnel or light. Just incredible pain unbearable pain and the knowledge that death not be amazing profound or even glamourous. I would just cease to be. i would no longer exist. One moment I would be alive, and the next I would be gone. Not even gone as in Elvis leaving the building (which implies that he went somewhere else.) I had the sense that it was an ending. Like the snuffing out of a candles flame. That flame will never exist again. That fire is gone.


Of course we can light the candle again and again but it is a new flame every time. It's not a renewal. What's burnt is gone. Atoms dots in the air specks here and there I know not where. All over. ALL OVER.

dear diary friday october 9th? 2003

today i am troubled and i just want to empty the words that have been collecting, rotting, decomposing in my head. Compost is good. But the heat of it and the stench and the black juicy stew of unspoken sentences that I squashed down.


I am supposed to be a writer.

Once Upon the Backside Platform wed 24 sep 2003

to be reworked .. about City Station .. i explored my senses?


Once upon the backside platform of Bangalore City Railway Station, I waited for a train. I'd been sure it would be arriving at the front platform, but no, the station master informed me that I must go to the backside, and quickly.


SMELLS:

It smells quite interesting. as i write, the aroma of south indian filter coffee wafts across to me. As i walked down the long long platform, however, i was intermittently accosted by the not-so-appealing stench of stale uring and sewage. This mell too, wafts over to me every now and then. My luck depends on which way the wind is blowing.


SOUNDS:

That old Indian favourite, the gurgling hack of a man who is about to spit a gob of sticky phlegm onto the floor. An occasional crow. Voices, of course (the ones who talk in Kannada always sound like they're arguing. ) The slap of a porter's rubber chappals against the platform, as he runs towards a potential client. Voices: Tamil, Kannada, Urdu. There must be some English here and there, but it doesn't stand a chance against the volume of our regional languages. A "poda" here, a "saar" there. And floating down from the ceiling, a young woman gently infroms us that the Shatabdi Express will be arriving at 11 a.m. Her announcement over, the speakers now send down some most inappropriate western pop music. it doesn't quite go with the rest of this assault on my senses.


An occasional rap of a wooden stick on the tiles in front of me - intervening with a "bhaiya" and a "saab", as a beggar, mistaking fme for a man, tries to get my attention and some of my money.


I don't give money to beggars. .. f unless they are very very old or very very disabled. Clearly this one is visually challenged (didn't he notice my breasts, for heaven's sake??) but not enough for my charity.

once upons? toast

It doesn't start with bread. it begins with knees that need to be unfolded slowly and painfully, and get me downstairs, all 62 kilos of me.


I use the bannisters and the wall to support some of the weight, and lighten the load for those knees. I walk downstairs like an old woman, but I am not yet 40.


The bread is always fresh, that's nice. The toaster switch needs to be flicked on. Sometimes I forget, and then I stand at the breakfast bar for ages in a semi-trance before realising that there is no orange glow from the toaster slots.


The butter is usually soft, which helps. Hard frozen butter is difficult to spread and tends to break the toast.


My mother is responsbile for the freshness of the bread and the ease of the butter. We use a whole loaf every day: three slices for my mother, three (sometimes four) for me, one for my father. Occasionally a few slices go towards dinner when there's nothing else to eat. The rest is for the maid, the old lady who sweeps the garden, the gardener, and anybody else who might need a meal.


My mother gets up early and unlocks the house. She brings in the milk and boils it. She makes tea. She draws the curtains. by the time my knees start their painful way downstairs, the house is bright and the tea is ready and the butter is soft. Her knees hurt worse than mine.


I don't appreciate all this. I focus on the honeyed flavour of toast butter and jam melting in my mouth. It's something I look forward to every day. Breakfast with Cheers on Star World. Nothing like a good laugh to sta rt the day. And then a second helping of tea to wash down the daily medication, and to warm me up for Oprah.


Somewhere in the background my mother sits, reading badly printed, boringly written and very preachy Islamic magazines. She tries to read paragraphs out to me. She thinks they are beautiful because she sees byond the pedantic sermonising and the lack of editorial quality: she gets the essense, she can relate to the healrt of a well-meaning person with a pen in their hand.


Apparently I don't. I must be quite shallow, and I t hink too much of myself. One day she won't be sitting there in the background any more. There won;t be any flowery sermons and I'll have to make m y own tea. I'll have my toast and jam and I'll have a comedy on TV so that I can start my day with a laugh. My knees will be worse. And the butter will be hard.


this needs reworking but could be a nice piece.


10 15 am 22 sept 2003

feb 03 freeing the pomegranate

They do not want to be free. They do not realise they are individuals. Tear off the skin, pull them apart and still they cling to each other. They believe they are one because they share one soul; they too have heard the story that a girl must eat one pomegranate whole - no sharing - guess which seed holds the light and eat them all.




Which seed is it? No one knows. Not even the seeds themselves. Each one believes it holds the light, and so they all shine.




How can you free so foolish a thing that believes it is the world, that shines until sharp ceramic teeth bite and burst its world.




Perhaps though, just perhaps it does not need to be freed. It understand s better than we do because it creates its own understanding, and that might be freedom (so what does the light do? Will it free ME?)




12:05 am, Mon 22 Sept 03

The Natural Way to Press books febb 2003

a writing exercise I found from 2003.


feb


The natural way to press books is of course to do it with flowers. The fresher the better, for dried flowers are bad feng shui. try to ignore the paradox of the pressed book turning into dry leaves that will themselfes be bad fend gui.


A bressed book however contains words, many many two-dimensional words. These words, pressed, become more intense and preserved forever between the petals of a large flower. A very large flower. I gasp as I realise there will be no fragrance no colour and no difference. It is neither art nor craft, but merely the revenge of the faded petals that crumble as we turn over new leaves. Every page reveals a new cadaver. There is nothing natural about this, finding death this way. Bury your flowers and read your books.

dear diary sep 19 2003, post dengue

Childhood is really quite awful. Why on earth are we so enamoured with it, who do we yearn back to it, why do we tell ourselves what happy childhoods we had? W're abused, used, terrories, bulleid, scared, forced, ordered ..blah blah blah...


I think I would be a nervous wreck if I had children, imaginging their days at school, their interactions with friends, being bullied in a playground, not knowing an answer, being snubbed or laughed at, being not good enough or even too good. Childhood is scary. I'm glad mine is over.

3 limericks

found .. in a diary of course .. from around feb 2006


One of these days, not later but sooner

I'm going to build me a ship that is lunar

Then I'll sail far away

for an hour or a day

Till I reach the moon's shores on my magical schooner.


There once was a strapping young farmer

He fancied himself quite a charmer

But his dowry demands

Won him not many hands

Now he wanders his fields wearing armour.


I have heard that out there on the prairie

They will kill you if you are a fairy

But on Sunday they rest

Go to church in their best

Holy bloodstains! Now isn't that scary?

"Depression ..

I don't think they understand depression. I don't think they know what it means.

It's the sun shining brightly.

It's a garden filled with flowers.

It's being loved.

It's being alive.

It's fed and clothed and warm and cool and safe,

not sick, not broke, not widowed.


Depression is a grief that grows in this beautiful place.


It has no reason (that I know of).

It just is.


Don't tell me to t hink it away,

to look at the bright side,

to compare myself with the less fortunate.

I'm not a fool.

I'm not an idiot.

I'm not a shallow, self-centred pig.

Though I can be all these things

at one time or another.

What I am is depressed.

DEPRESSED.


It's a word you use too lightly.

"I'm so depressed, my new shoes got wet."

You're disappointed.

"So depressing, none of the chapters I studied came in the exam."

So frustrating. Or so unfair.

"I'm depressed"

sometimes means

I'm bored.

I'm tired.

I'm lonely.

I'm fed up.

I'm sad.

I'm mourning.


It's a word you use too lightly.

It's the heaviest word I know.


15 8 2003

Once Upon My Bed

Once upon my bed, the devil lay by my side, whispering. Behind me coiled a dark path that led to Power. I twisted back to get a glimpse of what I could not, would not accept.

"Who ARE you?" I asked unnecessarily. I did not expect him to answer: Doppelganger.
(I later found out it means "a second self, a mirror image".

Once upon a cinema screen

... need to rewrite and elaborate




the cinema hall was Lido. The "intermission" sign came up, and dim lighting went on, but nobody moved. we have just seen the Jallianwalla Bagh massacre scene in Attenborough's Gandhi. He had stunned us all, reached in and punched us each in the gut.




After some minutes, we did head out, for restrooms, coffees, cigarettes .. there was no noise: no lughter or shouting, no shoving, pushing or complaining; just subdued murmurs and eyes that had seen something too hard to see..

Once upon a cinema screen

... need to rewrite and elaborate


the cinema hall was Lido. The "intermission" sign came up, and dim lighting went on, but nobody moved. we have just seen the Jallianwalla Bagh massacre scene in Attenborough's Gandhi. He had stunned us all, reached in and punched us each in the gut.


After some minutes, we did head out, for restrooms, coffees, cigarettes .. there was no noise: no lughter or shouting, no shoving, pushing or complaining; just subdued murmurs and eyes that had seen something too hard to see..

4 Dec 2005

from my diary .. I like it because it's from a time when I was trying to get in touch with emotion and understand what different feelings feel like.


"This is joy I've just discovered. It's not an outburst of passion, it's an inner overwhelming, it bubbles up from somewhere between my breasts, swooshes up my throat around my shoulders around my head down my back till I feel it everywhere down to my twiddly toes.


It's not complicated, like jealousy or doubt or fear. it's simple and clear as pain or grief - both of these shall come again in their time. But this day, this moment, is a season for joy. It comes with Christmas carols playing on the backgroun on my old tape recorder. It comes with blushing bridelike memories of a man named Jesus (for we must fall in love with those we choose to follow). It comes with a quiet cloudy Sunday morning, picking dead leaves off potted plants and sowing marigold seeds.


Joy. It's intense but it's calm. It's contentment overflowing. It feels very very good, and so I shall stop writing for now and enjoy this joy while it is here.

"What is success ...

I'm not sure this is poetry, it's just something I wrote in a diary (yes, yes, this is yet another regurgitated pearl from the diaries I'm destroying). But it's poetic and nice and I feel like sharing:

What is success for me?
To be useful, fruitful, functional, famous.
To have peace of mind.

To be a published writer
and to have Askios flourish
and to have my art work
recognised and wanted.
To die without regrets?
To find my soul mate.
To heal my fragmented mind as is best and live well with it.

It'll feel bubbly, energetic,
worth waking up for.

I'll be busily content, my days full, and oh yes I'll be richer.

To be admired.
To have my talents not lie stagnant.
To be recognised for the way
I have used them.
To create
To preserve my ideas
To communicate them in wonderful ways.

To make a difference in the world.
To leave it a better place.
To free myself of torment.
To understand myself.
To love myself.

I want to make a mark.
A good mark that would change this world for the better.
To be remembered?
Not necessarily.
As long as I know I didn't just walk through.
I need to know that I mattered.
That the world is a better place because of me.

(from my diary 2003 July 26 Saturday, 5.20 pm)

What I have learnt from reading this now, is that I need to truly believe that the world ALREADY is a better place because of me.

Tuesday 1 April 2008

19 may 2004 "a little girl watches

a little girl watches from the parapet every morning.

dappled sunlight

and canoe-shaped pods ..

where's the snake?


Sunrays through

the leaves - and

a breeze - is that

a snake moving through

the mulch?


No ... you see the snake

only when it wants you to.

Once Upon An Index Finger

.. I flash my little mark of a voter with pride. Not just for voting. My mark is a medal that says I succeeded, after umpteen visits to Town Hall, hurdling past sullen officials. Some not sullen - but they only spoke Kannada. And when they spoke in English it was to say:


wait. Do one thing. Come back in the afternoon. Come back tomorrow.


from diary 2004

dear diary 1 1 2004

thought this could be once upon the stroke of midnight.


a few minutes past midnight. Does it really matter? It's all perception and people look at their watches and celebrate accordingly. So some scream 5 minutes earlier, some a moment later.

And tomorrow the sun will rise like any other day - no, not quite - that's the magic of it - if you wake up for the sunrise you will sense the newness of the year. Although that too is a perception: if you woke up every day for every sunrise, you will sense the newness of the (each?) day. THAT is spectacular but most people miss it, thank God, otherwise we'd have godawful crackers going off every midnight (give or take 5 minutes.

20 6 03, 4.25 pm

The beauty of being me
is that its always so interesting
I'm always so different
changing turning
like a kaleidoscope
Fragmented like a kaleidoscope.

Man-made.
The fragments are pieces
broken apart by man
bits from here and there
An undone button
broken in half.

Re arranged.
Twisted. Shaken. Turned
around and around
and around
Falling always falling
these fragments
But they fall so beautifully.
That is the beauty
of
being
ME.

March 2003

And so she went on a journey,

a long journey far away from Him

And He went His way,

leaving her to do what she willed

Knowing it was not over.

And she lived and she loved

though she did not really know how to do either.

She wandered and sang

and pretended to search

and she drank to cover

the wounds and the emptiness

And she sent a part of her to sleep,

to a dull drugged sleep.


But today she awoke.

Soon she will stretch

and lift her feet

and go in search of Him

And He will be there.

Out of the shadows that she created,

He may step forth

And she will see

that He is here,

That He has always been here.

And like a bride

she will lower her eyes and smile

and feel a flutter within

her heart

And accept Him

and ask Him to accept her.


from my diary .. but I think i should end it with he has always been here. the bride bit is corny.

fri jan 24 2003

we're all so busy with finding the inner child ... but isn't there also an INNER GIRL - that amazing creature we once were before breasts and pubic hair and periods .. not quite child, not quite teen. Innocent but wise, and free from fear and trouble, a wisdom born of the understanding that life is wonderful, life is to be LIVED.


She gets lost in the cacaphony of our world with its rules, itbs borders and its eyes, watching, watching all the time till we are forced to lower our gaze, draw curtains closed and the inner girl retreats into an attic in our head, where she waits for us to remember, and to find her.



jan 27th

i wish parents would invest as much time on their children's emotional health as they did money on tuition classes ..

list Miracles i would like to see

a condom appearing on every shiv lingam in the country. a great marketin g strategy for a good cause.


every indian becoming infertile for the next 2 years.


after those 2 years every child concieved for the following five years to be a girl.


the us govt going public with all its ugly consipiaracies and tactics since the 1960s


huge reserves of oil to be discovered on the 10 poorest contries on the planet.


my diary jan 23, 1999

Dear Me .. there once was a girl

good heavens. a pronographic limerick. with feminist undertones against sexual harassment.

april 30 2002 from diary

There once was a girl from the city
Who had an enormous left titty
She would hide it at first
But forth it would burst
that poor lopsided girl from the city.

one day she set forth from the city
in search of some kindness and pity
but the men with lips pursed
salivating with thirst
only wanted to play with her titty

Dear Me .. there once was a girl

good heavens. a pronographic limerick. with feminist undertones against sexual harassment.


april 30 2002 from diary


There once was a girl from the city

Who had an enormous left titty

She would hide it at first

But forth it would burst

that poor lopsided girl from the city.


one day she set forth from the city

in search of some kindness and pity

but the men with lips pursed

salivating with thirst

only wanted to play with her titty

Sharon Stone said

On community service:

"To be famous and do nothing is so vulgar."

found this quotation by her in my 2002 diary.

july 2002

The silent screams

continue

but now they're not for

a drug

for the family's well

kept secret,

swept tidily under the rug.

Snug as a bug.

Squashed.

Squashed down to size.

Between the thighs.

That'll teach you.

That'll show you

be a good girl

Stupid

be a good girl now

be bad grown up.

I hate it, I hate it all

but there's too much to

do I'm so low but

I'm strong and I'll make it.

I'm tired to write.

List: Things a survivor should know

You're not alone.

You're not crazy.

You're not dirty.

You're not weird.

You're not to blame.

You're not beyond help


(from my diary, 2 May 2002)

oct 4 2003

Men are all the same. They just have different faces so we can tell them apart.

22 8 2003, 11.10 a.m.

What if He's just some big Eternal Superbeing kid, playing with his trainset, setting up obstacles, road blocks, impossible routes; He flips a switch at the last moment to change a journey into something new.


We are the toys - the trains, the engines, the tracks, the goods onboard, the boulders blocking someone else's path, the switch that makes the difference. The plug points, the electricity that makes it possible.


We the people, the creatures, the plants, the cells - we are all these things. At one point or another. We're interchangeable, we become what He wants us to be - this Omnipotent Child with the Vivid Imagination.


We are toys in His game - but in a way we're more. We ARE the game, , and the game is His, and so in a way we are Him.

when kite flies jan 18 2003

from a diary entry 2003 jan 18




when Kite flies


under the sun


her shadow glides


over my garden.




think there is a hiaku in here

dear diary 11 dec 1993

The birds fly in at twilight, hundreds of them, and land on some pre-determined branch of this tree in front of my window.


There is no pushing, no fighting. Each one knows its place, goes there directly in one great swoop, and rests for the night. They seem to know that if they live through the next day, their place on the branch will be waiting for them,. And that is enough to let them rest through the night, and soar again in the morning.




There's so much man can learn from nature, and he does, but forgets; each generation has to rediscover and relish nature's wisdom for itself.

Jessica Zafra

For a while, being in the middle of my diary-ripping obsession, you are going to find a lot of posts that have been born out of my pre-ripping discoveries. (Or re-discoveries, to be precise.) One nice thing about having a bad memory is getting to experiencing all the old stuff as if for the first time. It's a bit like being celibate for ages, and then the next time you do it, you feel like a virgin again. So they say. I'm not speaking for myself, of course, I must have read this somewhere.

But talking about reading - and back to the diaries - I found some quotes by Jessica Zafra in a 1997 one. My friend Maripaz introduced me to Jessica (not personally, alas). The Internet had newly arrived in our office, and so many happy hours were spent reading this funny, sharp woman - Jessica not Maripaz - although I must point out that Maripaz wrote well too and I do miss the regular letters with all the office gossip she - Maripaz not Jessica - used to send me after I left FP7. Here are a few beauties by Jessica that I jotted down in my diary:

There are people who believe that without censorship there will be fornicating in the streets. Those who cannot deal with their own foul desires usually accuse other people of having them; this, boys and girls, is what is known as projection.
*

Denying the existence of ugliness will not make it go away. Hypocrisy is also obscene.
*

Greasy food might not be good for your body, but it does wonders for your soul.
*
Life is good. You should get one.

dear diary ? 91 -r 93

How is it we know how to send rockets out into space, but not how to stop one man from killing another?

And we have ways of knowing how the weather will turn, but lack the foresigh to see a young life going in the wrong direction.

And why is it we're disappointed when a millian dollar probe goes astray somewhere by Mars, when nearly half a lakh of children dies every day for the lack of enough food?

We look up and lose ourselves in the heavens, and forget that there are souls lost at our feet.

Dear Diary: Dec 14th 1991

I wrote this when thinking of my uncle Hilly Mamu who died on 29 11 1989. His birthday wa on 14 4.


The feeling, when you think of someone who is dead, is unlike any other. Not the unbearable ache of love for a man, or the yearning to go home. It's just a sad ache, a little twinge and then a helpless acceptance. Words you can never say, problems you can never share, achievements you can never show, voices you can never hear ... laughter.


Perhaps somewhere he is watching. Perhaps he is just behind me, looking over my shoulder. Perhaps he lies there in dark emptiness, and the only time a little light visits him is when we think of him or speak of him .. and God lifts up that heavy veil and lets him listen.