Find me at http://thisisagoodtimetoleave.tumblr.com/ This is over.

The Big Chill

It is true. Nobody loves me, everybody hates me, I think I will just go and eat some worms.

Like my dear loves Robbie Williams/Gary Barlow say, "Self preservation was no explanation for anything".

My boss was right. I'd never survive a relationship. Anyway, this is killing me, so lets just forget it.

I am so bored with you.

Er. We need to start doing better drugs. Like exercise. Or sex. What say?

You know that first smell you get when you enter your home? Not your rented make-shift home, but the home your grew up in home. I realised just how MUCH I love that smell when I walked into my home today. It was a smell that said, hey, everything will be fine and I love you anyway.

This time of course, I'm not planning to run away for months on end, but I need this energy. I was beginning to feel like iron man out of charge. So now... see you later alligator (haha, I haven't said that forever).

Put in perspective, X is a lot like Y, in terms of being a friend, but I guess the only difference is that, I had hopes pinned on Y and a butterflies kind of love reserved for him, and I don't have that for X. So it's easier and not disappointing as such. I'm not disappointed much these days.

I think I've always been the kind of person who's happy being in an isolated kind of place with one or two really close friends and that's it. I don't like being in a crowded place with a lot of friends because I always end up disappointing someone or the other. I think I understand why people cheat sometimes.

I love Blind Pilot. On days when my uterus feels like crap, and my throat is scratchy from too much smoking, Blind Pilot is perfect. I swear I can't feel the roof of my mouth and I keep seeing feet pass me by, but its just the curtains. I think I should water my plant now, because it looks like she's dying.

Planet Earth is blue and there's nothing I can do

I think I can listen to Space Oddity on loop forever in my hell. David Bowie gives me hope, with his confused sexuality and strange hair and stranger songs.

I've done it. I've crossed a new threshold of boredom and joblessness. I'm doing nothing and I don't know how I'm doing it for so long. I'm amazing me. I wish I was an astronaut sometimes.

I just don't want my parents to discover me one day drug addicted and morbidly obese, a sociopath and secret stasher of rotten food. I've already lovingly preserved a half eaten amla and called it Fungus, for obvious reasons. I think I would have made a great scientist.

I think I am about to burst.

Truth is, no-one likes these.

It's early morning, and I need some kind of rain, some kind of catharsis. I want to take this bottle from out of my gullet and smash it open and throw it somewhere. I'm wobbly because of these bottles. One for every year since 10. I don't fucking want them anymore.

Maybe this is how Charlie Sheen feels every morning. Borderline. Mad. Mad. Mad.

Sunday

Simon and Garfunkel, fried eggs, some serious procrastination and defrosting the fridge. Oh Sunday - you mean something even to the unemployed.

Sorry for the constant whining. I'll make an honest attempt to stop.

Last night (or this morning, not sure) I had a funny dream about a robot and a man in disguise. This man (who's really a friend of mine) went to a house which had these two brothers who were real bullies. Like they were really mean sonofabitches and this dude had to find a way around them, because he had to live there and stuff for a while. So he wore this very obvious disguise of an old man, and was super cranky all the time. He did a fantastic job because these bully brothers were scared shitless and gave him some female robot to play with (who looked a little like Rosie from the Jetsons). And this robot gave hugs and did a lot of Japanese things I can't remember in detail right now. But she had a lot of buttons and this man couldn't really figure it out. Then it was time to leave, and I was also there, and I was collecting washed underwear from the verandah.

Anyhoo.

I'm deeply embarrassed to announce, I have started playing Mafia Wars again.

Have a nice Sunday.

Dark

God, I know when I start listening to Elliot Smith I've hit a new low. Life's in loop, seriously. This feels like 15 all over again, and 15, was definitely. not. good.

Thanks to a friend I have a new obsession. Monkey Dust. Fuck. It's so disturbingly, obsessively good.

Yesterday was really embarrassing. I just realized how so out of love/affection/infatuation I was. I don't think I was being cruel, but I was not being nice either. Which is immature and silly, but I can't help feeling completely and utterly disconnected. As C says, I was "dead-walling" him. Probably. Also, I think when you spend a lot of time alone you kind of get used to it and the thought of opening yourself out to others seems time consuming and tiresome. I don't have that kind of patience or understanding anymore. With anyone. I like short meaningful moments that need not amount to much except maybe a shared joint or joke and then okbye.

I need some discipline. I need to join a gym. I need to clock in time and clock out time. I need to have a principal, a teacher, a P.T. teacher. I can't control myself.

There was this article in Mumbai Mirror today, which felt kind of irresponsible because it would lead people like me to believe something was wrong. People who are weak minded and easily influenced. I am sure when you read this you'll identify too. Because we're all a little fucked up yeah yeah.

Does it bother you when you're not asked if you're okay? Especially by someone you love? Or you're asked, but in a fleeting, superficial way which feels kind of worse. Do me a favour. Fuck the small talk. Watch Monkey Dust instead.

SO bored. So disgustingly bored. I'm starting to get annoyed and annoying. Blah.

I'm tired.

Can you do me a favour? Can you keep your bloody baggage outside my door? I don't want any of it. I don't want to deal with it.

The Universe is indifferent

I am overdoing it, this back to back watching of Mad Men. My uterus is in a bunch, thanks to a certain Don Draper, and oh my god, I just can't get enough.

I have some work, which I should probably do, but I don't feel like it. I went mad buying a bunch of books from Flipkart, which in hindsight seems too reckless. But what the hell, it was a killer bargain. I love web shopping. I want to do it all the time. And I also want to smoke herbal cigarettes.

I saw a movie by myself today in the theatre, and I don't know why I don't do it enough. I love it. It's the best way to watch a movie. I've decided that, if I can help it, I'll always go alone. If it's good enough, I'll go a second time with company. And I'm not saying this because I'm some lonely girl going to the movies by herself trying to make it sound good. It really feels fucking awesome. Try it sometime.

I made some awesome mattar paneer today. It's generally been a good day doing nothing as such.

Relapse

This sort of relapse is unnecessary. I may as well be 16, discovering new books, new music, drowning out the fat and hanging onto words which meant nothing. Like, hey, I think you're beautiful and I'd totally date you (why didn't you then?).

I wish the Calcutta roads were better and Baba would drive again.

I wish we were young, sitting in the backseat, listening to The Carpenters, on our way to DB or Labony, just - being young.

I only reached out because there were no cigarettes and the book I was reading made me feel blue and I spent all of last night reading old blog posts about you. I don't feel any better. Because. You kind of suck.

I'll leave you like I've left every fascination.

I’ve said this. I’ve done this. A countless number of times. And then I've expected you to find me. There's no winning here. Nobody wins.

You'll go to her with your old camera, hung across your chest and quietly take pictures till you feel you've both had enough. She has toppled your universe by the time she asks you whether you want some camomile. You're lulled by the sleep she has mixed in the tea, and that whispery nasal voice of hers. "I have a deviated septum" she says and you hope she never gets it fixed.

The cigarettes are over and you have to leave. You have to get back to your world of dead poetry, because damn it, you've worked so hard to build it.

I don't think I have anything new to say. It's okay if you want leave early. I understand the boredom. I'm bored as well. I'll never make it through this.

Facile

I'm so much cooler than that you know? I am so much funnier, so much hotter, so much better. I am not a football field apart, and I am not a fried piece of dough. Just so that you know.

I miss going to you to hide. Right now I feel kind of naked and fat and paraded. You were good to hide behind. And I never felt naked or fat. I miss feeling that way.

I think I miss the privacy of Cal. I miss my room and I miss my quiet content. Bombay puts a whole new meaning to feeling lonely in a crowd. It's stupid, clichéd, but true. But this isn't about Bombay Vs Cal. Fuck no. This isn't about any city. This is about now. This is about all these bags I've picked up on the wayside, and I don't know why. This is about my fake smile, my growing anger and disconnect, this is about me giving up without always meaning to.

I think I need a makeover. Polished nails, better hair, better skin, less flab and a brand new wardrobe. If I have to be facile, let me at least look good while I'm at it.

I hope you're okay with the sharing S. Here, click on this and weep. We are all fucked.

Dorks are happier, what about you?

I barely caught a glimpse of him. But I was strangely happy. Happy that I knew all the words, knew every memory attached to every song, knew that this was special, no matter what.

I remembered a rainy evening, when I plugged up the stereo to this dubious plug point in my verandah, put it on full volume and listened to Everything I do, I do it for you - mainly because I wanted my hot neighbour on the 2nd floor to hear it. You know, so that he knew I was 'with it', and listened to a lot of English music. I was twelve or something, and these things mattered.

Bryan Adams was perfect. He wasn't The Beatles or Carpenters or Cliff Richard - the stuff my parents would hear and go "oho, amader generation ki bhalo" to. He wasn't a boyband. And he was loud and semi risqué. And I understood what all the lyrics (more or less) meant. He made me want to pick up my badminton racket and strum. He led to Bon Jovi, GnR, Metallica, Nirvana and more. Bryan Adams was not only my introduction to rock, but my glimmer of hope in a largely angst ridden teen life.

In school, when he was performing in India, I made an elaborate plan to run away and catch the concert in Bangalore. I'd also meet Rahul Dravid while I was at it. Haha. But I didn't have any money, nor did I have any company, so obviously, all my silly teenage dreams were turned to dust. Funny, it's almost the same now, but I am in Bombay, the tickets were free, and I had my brother with me.

I liked the fact that I went to the concert with my brother, because he's probably the only one who'd feel as nostalgic about it as I would. He'd know all the words, the riffs and solo guitar leads by heart. The cassettes are worn beyond repair, we've heard them so many fucking times.

"I wouldn't have survived college if it weren't for Bryan Adams" he said while we were singing along with shameless joy to "Back to You". I don't think I'd survive being 13 if it weren't for him. Admittedly, I don't hear him much these days. Make it, not at all. But I owe him much. At least, a concert. And yay. :)

Slacker Post Fem

This freelancing shit is tough, as expected. Especially if you're a born slacker bitch like me. Would I sound tremendously immature if I said I want to get married, make babies and gorom gorom rutis for my kids and husband? We'd have a not-so-large home, somewhere quiet, with our own kitchen garden and wine cellar, maybe a dog...no, definitely a dog and maybe a cat, but a cat seems more single womanish. I'd work from home if I'd feel like it, but mostly, I'd be taking care of the kids, the dog, the kitchen and the garden. It's not an easy job, but I think I'd be able to deal with it. I know how to fix light bulbs, take care of bills, and do all the "man stuff" as they say. Only, I can't deal with banking. It just depresses me.

In my free time, if I get any, I'll draw or paint or write mommy blogs, and read and watch films. I'd secretly do some of my kids' projects, not because I'm helping, but because I like doing kids' projects. They're lots of fun. Oh, but I cannot, no way in hell, teach math. That, I'm hoping this money making husband of mine is good at. If not, we'll have to stick to Buro Kaku from N8. But dude, you have to be good at math. I think this fellow needs to be good only at a few things in order to be my husband - math, driving, chess, sorting out bank work/taxes and maybe swimming. It would also be good if he reads more than I do, but I'll not judge too harshly if he doesn't.

And before you judge me for not being "feminist" enough, I have a two words for you: Fuck you. Feminism isn't about wearing pants, it's about having choices. If a woman chooses to be a housewife, power to her. I keep thinking of all the times I've heard the phrase "just a housewife". It pisses me off. What's wrong with being a housewife? It's a pretty creative job if you think about it. And it requires plenty of management skills. It doesn't pay, so maybe that's why it's not the smartest of choices, but hey, it's a choice - no more no less than choosing to be a doctor or an engineer or an advertising executive.

So there. I feel sufficiently like a post feminist Suffragette, or something fancy sounding like that.

It seriously sucks being your own boss. The pay sucks more than ever. :P

In your love my salvation lies

"Are we fuckups?" she asked him.

"We aren't fuckups" he kept repeating.

I hope we aren't either.

I don't know why I waited so long to watch Away We Go. Anyway, I miss home in that terrible, too late its dead, kind of way.

Mon lagche na ekhane. Mon lagche na karor shathe.

Please come take me away somewhere. I don't want to play this game.

Harder than Easy

I think I'd be better off gay. But I just can't wish it.

I wish I hadn't wasted so much time on you. I'm not wiser. I'm just sadder. The only thing I wish for from that time, was the complete fearlessness I felt. I could make a fool of myself over and over again and not feel a thing.

I discovered a song called Harder than Easy, which is nothing special really, but it's kind of nice when you think of it Grey's Anatomically. It has these lines which attracted me -

At the end of the day when you're lonely

After begging to be left alone

- because it reminded me of me. I am like my grandfather I think sometimes.

I don't feel like putting in the effort anymore. I just want to be on painkillers for the rest of my life.

I have also realised I can't draw you beautiful anymore. You come out all wrong, and kind of Chinese.

It's weird. It's not angst anymore. It's not loneliness. Maybe this is what K talks about sometimes. You're not rebelling. You're not angry. You're just in this deep deep well of inexplicable sadness where you're thrust back in the moment you step out. And by the time you pull yourself out, fake smile spent and semi-enthusiastic, you're back in it again. What's the point? I'll be like Toru. I'll live there.

This blog is my deep well I think.

Things I would do if I were Bono or someone cool

Okay, so this was totally brought on by a quick glimpse viewing of Beautiful Day on VH1 - you know the part where Bono's like lying on the baggage conveyor? I mean, that, is my fantasy. Which got me to thinking - what are the other things I'd do if I were cool like Bono? So here's my list -

1) The conveyor belt thing to begin with. Number wunn priority boss.

2) Also, in the same video, the dude is singing on the runway, while planes take off over his head - I mean, who wouldn't want that?

3) Sit in the school staff room. I mean, for some reason, thanks to my school or whatever, the staff room was this super sacred place which was kept veiled from the prying eyes of a student with this shabby fluttering curtain. We kept catching glimpses of this fantastic little world inside (I once saw Mrs. Basu smoking and heard a lot of commotion when Mrs. Mitra fainted) - but never enough to know enough. I almost walked in once, when I was helping Mrs. Sen carry some books to the staff room - but the minute I stepped inside, she let out a banshee-like scream - "You're not allowed inside! You're not allowed inside! " I almost saw the light. Bitch.

4) Sit next to the pilot in the cockpit. Ask him why they call it a cockpit. Especially now that there are women pilots. And I'd also take over for two minutes, giving everyone a ride of their lives. A brief, horrible ride. Muahahahaha.

5) Go to Mecca and Medina - and all those places where I'm forbidden to go. Like ever. Like Charlie Kaufman's mind.

Okay, I have to think too much now. So later.

Kid

I found an old diary - 2005ish. Not much has changed, I can see. Some of the things seemed silly and childish - like the poetry for instance - and the ramblings about my dream lover, when half the world I knew were banging their real lovers in their garage or attic or whatever. But yeah, the apprehensions about growing old and lonely, sick and spiritless, all of that is still thick in my brains. I have mellowed with regard to my parents. I don't get mad at them as easily. I get them.

It's weird. I always thought 2005 was one of the best years in my life. But when I was reading this silly old diary, I had such anger jumping out of the pages, I could barely believe it. I kept thinking, you stupid kid, it's okay, these are such little things. But I'll give that kid her knack for intuition. She had predicted something like this happening to me. Whatever it is that is happening to me. I should write carefully.

I should go back to Bombay. I'm scared of going back to something I cannot control, but I should go back anyway. I'm still fucking paying rent.

You know what? I'm quite okay. I may not be the peachiest of plum, but I'm okay. Like Peppermint Patty said one day after looking at the mirror - "Not so bad". Then she walks out with Marcie and says "You know Marcie, that's always been my ambition...to be not so bad after all". So if 30 year old me reads this - kid, you're not so bad after all.

You Belong to Me

Let’s get this straight. Calcutta is an acquired taste. You either love it or you don’t. You might hate it sometimes with a vengeance so severe that, you will promise never to return, never to love again. But if you have loved it once, chances are you will crawl back to it like a broken lover, begging her to take you back. Ah yes, Calcutta, this charming old seductress, will stab and twist and make you bleed. But eventually, she will reclaim you.

I was recently reclaimed, when a friend of mine decided to pop over to my hometown for a few weeks. I knew she must have had some expectations having read, seen and heard so much, so I was a little apprehensive. The perception of my city isn’t always a flattering one. Or it is always riddled with annoying clichés. Trams and Tagore, roshogolla and mishti doi, Durga Pujo and shindoor khala – yeah yeah yeah, whatever. It upsets me. Cal is either Parineeta or Lapierre’s City of Joy with the poor, hungry rickshaw pullers. I mean it is - I’m not entirely denying it. But a dumb sepia coloured postcard it is not. It isn’t a one night stand. It isn’t some chick you pick up at a bar. You have to give Cal some time and some thought - which presumably narrows down the Cal loving population to a fairly feeble percentage.

Fortunately, my friend was one of them feeble percentages. I could see it when she was leaving. The city had claimed another victim. Like Mary Anne Aunty from Scotland, who ate too little and often broke her bones and said “Oh dear” a lot. Mary Anne lived at the Grand Hotel on Chowringhee for many months before moving to an apartment in New Alipore. She was about 65, quite the Brit, very proper, liked her tea and all of that. Her husband, Uncle John, was a slightly younger, sprightly, ruddy faced Scotsman who worked with my father. He was here on a transfer, and was shacking up with his wife at one of the oldest, quaintest hotels in Calcutta. We were bang in the middle of our summer holidays, seriously excited, because having a guest at the Grand meant free swimming sessions. So everyday, under the pretext of making Mary Anne feel more at home, my mother, my brother and I would hop over to the Grand, swim (or attempt to – because I really couldn’t) and eat like we’ve never eaten before at the coffee shop over there. By “we”, I really mean my brother and I, because my mother is a very gracious sort and wouldn’t really behave like that. Mary Anne, I really don’t know what she thought of us, was really upset about being in Calcutta. It was dirty, backward, poor and chaotic. It wasn’t the right thing for her frail little British nerves. She hated it, and my brother and I would make it worse by telling her horror stories about the ‘dhapa maath’ (a dumping ground literally – where the ITC Sonar -Bangla now stands), and many more cringe-worthy tales just to make her say “Oh dear” even more. We spent that whole summer saying “Oh dear” at the littlest things and laughed till our sides hurt. But despite our sincerest efforts at creating little monsters in her head, Mary Anne, fell in love with this filthy, chaotic city after three years of living here. Not with its structures or buildings or food or anything – but with its soul I suppose. She went back to Scotland with a heavy heart, and also, I suspect, better immunity.

There is no plausible explanation for it. It’s difficult for me to be objective about Calcutta. My parents live here, I’ve grown up here, have gone to school and college here – my life has formed around this city. We’re fused together in a manner so complicated that I dare not attempt to untangle it.
I was standing at the Calcutta airport seeing off my friend and thinking this is not the kind of airport you would expect a metro to have. It’s seriously screwed up. And all this led to further thought. I pictured myself in Bangalore Airport, Bombay Airport, Dehli Airport – and none of the me’s seemed to fit in any of those airports. I considered my life in Bombay – independent, casual, scattered – and felt as though I was living someone else’s life over there.
I was incomplete. I missed my city. I fought to get away from it, but I knew I was only getting into a very complex long distance relationship with my love.

Calcutta is my Egdon Heath. I just know it.

I was listening to Michael Buble's version of You Belong to Me. I think it brought this on.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N88pp39DdS8

Sip Carefully

Obviously, I'm over-doing it - this Calcutta thing - this not working thing. To be fair (to me that is), I have (am) working on a film here - something to do with smoking awareness. And yes, all this smoking business has made me give up my pledge to quit. Yeah, I have absolutely no staying power - literally and figuratively. I can almost see the solemn eyes of my well-wishers going - told you so - and maybe a little tut tut.

So yeah. That's that. So far, I've enjoyed my new year thoroughly - mostly re-discovering Calcutta, working for myself, eating a lot and listening to and watching things I like. I've been supremely selfish and sometimes not very cool, but I think I should stop feeling bad about all that. I spent all of last year feeling used and spent - and not in a good way. I don't want that anymore. I don't want to be lonely and brooding and fake smiling. I can feel this happy juice slowly recede. And I realise it during moments of absolute bliss. What a typical, cheesy urban nutjob I am. Anyway, I'm going to make it last while it does.

I do know, more often than not, happiness is kind of isolating. Most of the time, you are happy just on your own, sticking out like a sore thumb - sounding too loud, too shiny. I've been the other guy too long to know this. But I like this cake. Let me eat it for now. We'll have plenty of time to be sad together, okay?