Grief

Grief comes in various shapes and sizes but it has no shape or size. Sometimes grief knocks loudly on the door, but most of the times it steals upon me silently. I feel it in each breath I take and I glance upon it everywhere I look. It keeps me constant company in the wintery sun and chills me to the bone in the silvery moonlight.

Will I ever know joy or peace?

Living - What Is It?

"Living is a repetition of regrets and failures." Somehow this line from a monologue in a K-drama stayed with me. We make mistakes, get hurt, and then rebound to make more mistakes. Happiness is fleeting, peace more so, regret is what remains - not spending enough time with people we like or love, getting distracted by mundane stuff, being controlled by our greed for material stuff, and so on. If I look back on the short life that I have had, I do not remember what I ate or wore or possess, I remember the people, family, friends, cousins, and feelings, and sometimes incidents. I know what might happen if I open up to someone, have been betrayed enough, but I still want to trust people. I wish to spend more time with my family, but have so much else to take care of. I want to read, write, grow plants, paint, embroider, but sit back and do nothing as well. Life is a struggle but it is still worth living.

Wishes Or Just Paper Planes

As I sat sipping my morning tea, watching feathered visitors to my garden, glancing at the eagle wheeling over the stream that snakes through close by besides keeping an eye on my roses being inspected by an overenthusiastic companion, the calm was shattered by the sound of a plane. Planes are a rarity in this part of the world, one merely gets to hear and see a helicopter now and then. It sounded like a fighter jet. I was immediately transported to my childhood, and the sights and sounds of different planes in the sky where we lived. The stream of my consciousness took me to what I wish/ed for, ambitions, desires - make things, paint, garden, write, teach, publish, care, love, rise high, stay put, run, stagnate, thrive...I still indulge myself in a bit of some, a lot of others and still wish for more, but increasingly I long for stillness, peace, quiet.

Life Is Like A Mountain

Living in the mountains is as unpredictable as the life is. It does teach a few lessons with each climb: there are summits and then there are valleys. The thrill of reaching the summit is only outlived by the joy of being in a valley. Life slows down because one realises the futility of running. You work hard but also understand that nothing lasts; it may be the last thrill or the last joy. Each day needs to be savoured, for the next may not arrive. The challenge that society throws at you is nothing compared to the questions posed by these old and yet the young mountains.

On a walk somewhere in the Himalayan hills.

Words that stay

"Breath in" are the words of the day today. They somehow stayed with me since I read them. Relax the mind and the body consciously, meditate, let go and just be. Sometimes I forget this even while doing yoga and suryanamaskars, in the rush to finish them. Finishing is ultimately not the idea, listening to the body is. I do a hundred daily (miss some days), but it is not a competition. Breathe in, breathe easy, live.

Stuff the afternoons are made of

A long day becomes more difficult when people interfere with apparently well-meaning suggestions and reminders, especially about your personal work. The cold downcast day suddenly erupted in short volcanic activity with this phone call, to upset the delicate work balance and the peace of mind. Ohh, when will I stop giving people power to cause disruptions in my life!

The poor messenger, got the full on blast. 

Some chai, korean serials and munchies on to restore the balance and that fragile peace.

Morning Read

Bunny Slope 

Tadeusz Dabrowski 

When I'm writing a poem,

there's less and less of it.

As I approach the mountains,

they vanish behind a gentle hill,

behind the bunny slope.

And once I'm standing with them

face to face,

they take away my speech.

The very best poem

finishes half way.

Translated from Polish by Antonia Lloyd-Jones

(Credits: The Paris Review)