where is everybody?

recently, firangi boy and me were talking. which in itself is the news. but anyway, in an attempt to keep sarcasm at an all time low here, i will proceed to the interesting part of the conversation.

he claims that when we (me and him) first met, i claimed to have an IQ above 140, in an effort to impress him. when i had finished laughing at this ridiculous claim, i proceeded to argue. that i had never made such a claim. in my defence, i have never considered IQ to be a matter of interest. i mean, yea its really nice to know that shakira has an IQ of 140. but when it comes to my IQ, i could not really be bothered. and it would never occur to me to use that as ammunition in the Battle of the First Impressions. so i strongly disagreed with firangi boy while he claimed that i did say it. 

but of course it got me thinking. so i decided to take an IQ test and see if maybe suppleness of the hip bone is indeed in some way connected to the brain cells. and i got to page 4 of 11. 11?? 11 pages of “jack went from x to y in 20 minutes doing 40 kmph . so how many minutes would he take if he did it at 50 kmph”???? zzzzzzzzzzzzzz. i mean there is a reason why i was the maths teacher’s favourite at school. its because i used to carry her books. i used to rub out the chalk board when she was done with class, tell her that she wore nice sarees, sneak to her about my brother etc etc. not because i could efficiently do pie calculations. so the minute i got to the maths questions in the IQ test, i quit.

then i realised that i have good friends. im in love. i have a great job. i have read some amazing books. i have had unforgettable conversations. i have always got anything i’ve always wanted. i wake up in the morning thinking that i’m glad to be alive. and i am on the road to a really great life ahead. so maybe if i can’t measure Jack’s competance of reaching Y from X, maybe its not such a bad thing after all. 

and firangi boy will just have to realise that asking me not to go away to paris cuz he wants me here is something he would not tell many people. maybe even someone whose hips don’t lie. and that, my friend, is the moral of the story. 

and in case you really want to know, my hips don’t lie either. so there.  

i’ve been reading blogs. it all started out with this collegue of mine sending me his blog link. which has a bunch of other links that are his favourite. which all have a few more links. so it goes on and on. it’s like a fascinating maze-like journey where you go from one room to another and on and on. and the best part of this is that there is no end. you dont have to get to any place. and you dont have to go back to where you started from.

i am starting to think that this could be a way of meeting every person on the planet. (like i’ve always wanted to). i could start with everyone who has a blog. and then move on to the others. cuz people reveal more on thier blogs than they probably want to. and they like the fact that people read about them. even if they are stangers. being a blogger gives you that shadow that covers your face and reveals your heart. (wow, thats really profund for a friday morning!)

anyway so i was surprised by how SO many people apologise for not having blogged in a while. everyone is saying sorry for not having blogged in a “really long time” and how they’ve been busy, didnt have the time, so on and so forth. add to this the fact that a friend of mine recently mentioned that “blogs are for opinions only” and it got me thinking.

of course, things like that first make me wanna argue. cuz i like to. but also it just got me thinking about blogging. how come this has become a task? was’nt this supposed to be fun? isn’t blogging for people to relax? like a ‘virtual punching bag’?? (hehehhehe). anyway, so why are people apologising for not having ‘punched’ in so long? suddenly, everyone is aware that people are reading their blogs. and now, it’s another identity to keep up. we have not escaped reality by finding a new identity on the net. we just got ourselves another one. and again we are asking questions, answering, reasoning, explaining and apologising. i think its sad. not the fact that people are caught in a whole new web (heheheh), but the fact that they seemed to have willingly gotten themselves into it and have so quickly gotten used to their new existence which is absolutely no different from their other one.

people should stop apologising. stop explaning yourself. stop feeling sorry. everything you do and say is fine because they are the things that make you who you are. and i’m not even talking about having to say sorry for something that was wrong and was your fault. i’m talking about people saying sorry for who they are and who they are not. because everything is allowed. everything is fine. everything does depend on your own will. there really are no rules.

atleast, i think so. and i think that it is fine for you to just show up one day and ask me to marry you, just as it is for you to suddenly disappear without a trace. not that i won’t be surprised. i will be. and i might also say yes.

now, that’s too much information for a friday morning. let’s save some for tomorrow.

especially since i don’t know where you are……..

i often find myself wondering about the fact that our lives are so misunderstood, that if you set out to set all the records straight, the whole world would really be a different place. people talk, listen, belive, assume and understand. but many of them are oblivious to the fact that one thing that is said actually means another. so many people live this life of oblivion where they belive things about themselves, others and situations which actually mean something else.

i am not being clear. that could be fatal. or rather, i could be misunderstood. which is worse.

a tone of voice, an SMS message (in my view, a terrible bane to communication), a letter, a message conveyed through someone else, a look, laughter, tears, silence between people and even conversation could be understood to mean something when it actually means something else.  

and i fear that i have been misunderstood too many times. and i am pensive about those situations where i have said things knowing full well what i mean to say, but these things have been misunderstood by people and this has caused a gap in space and time and in my life that can probably never be filled. especially because when you realise that you might have been misunderstood, you often don’t get the chance to explain youself. and that
something you said may remain misunderstood for all time.

i am sad tonight. i realise that so many things that i have said have meant different things to people. i realise that i have not said the most important things i meant to say. like ‘i love you’ or ‘i’m sorry’ or ‘yes’. and i am sad to know that i don’t have so many things i want because i have not said things when they were meant to be said. or to put it in a better way, people around me could be more happy if i say things at the right time and these things were understood as they were meant.

i am thinking of you tonight. just as i do every night. and i wonder if i will ever find out whether life would have been different if i had spoken up instead of letting the fear of being misunderstood defeat me.  but right now, i am defeated. once again i have not spoken. once again i have been misunderstood. and so, now, once again, i have to tell myself that all i have is today. and now.

i am sad because i miss the people i want to be with. and i miss them because they are not with me right now. and i dont blame myself for that. and i dont blame them either. i blame the silence that stopped me from asking them to spend their lives with me.

i miss you. terribly. where are you? 

i know a howard roark. or rather, i know someone like howard roark. not just because this person, let’s call him Mr T for now, also happens to design buildings. but because he reminds of roark. and he believes in his power to influence the people and the world around him. 

i’ve spent a last couple of days with Mr T and i’ve realised that ayn rand had a few things right. but here is what i figure from spending a few days with a Howard Roark. it’s true that the heart speaks its own language. some choose to ignore its call, others listen and forget, yet others follow its every direction. and no matter who you are or what you become, sometimes all you need is someone to listen to you.

infact, the basis of the ‘relationship’ (if i may use such a word) between Mr T and myself is this very strange fact. he has nothing that he wants and cannot have. he leads a life of opulence of ideas and people and dreams. and everybody around him wants to stay around him. some people are like that. others want to be around them. they have a strange kind of magnetism. so Mr T has everything he could ask for. but i think he wants someone to listen. someone to hold.

sometimes, conversation is all we have. which usually comes with things like distance, family, children, work, love and so many other things which cannot be ignored. so conversation is the only saviour; the only thing that may hold a relationship together. and only empty space is left when you run out of things to say to each other.

and after having shared long conversations with Mr T at unearthly hours about useless things like life, love, family, distance, wine and sex, i find myself hoping that we never run out of things to say to each other. and even if we do, we continue to share our silences.

of course i could be wrong. like those you-know-someone-for-years-and-you-didnt-know-that stories. but when i am with him, i like to listen to what he has to say. even if he says things like “i don’t think this will change even if you go off to paris”. especially when he says things like that.