Songs for friends. Because you guys deserve it.

To the asshole who claims to be my friend but behaves like he's my husband, parent or the man to whom i owe my life. I owe you nothing, you jerk. This one's for you and your attitude. By all means, shove it up.

To the friend who needs to get a grip and move on already. This one is all yours.

The weirder you act, the more songs i will dedicate to you.

Honestly, what are the chances?

The day before, in the midst of a conversation with Achilles, i happened to ask him about a common friend i hadn't heard from in a while. The last time we spoke was when he had ass-dialled my number. (Ass dial, n., the phenomenon involving the phone in your back pocket dialling a random number on your contact list when you sit on your behind. And yes, i made the term up. Yay me.) Today, i got a call from him.

Just this evening, Sister K and i were bitching about a used-to-be-friend when The Boy came up in the conversation (in context, of course). Somehow, at that exact moment, i had a vague ESP of sorts - and this, i've been having on and off for a couple of weeks - and wondered, imagine the coincidence if he happens to call. Exactly 40 minutes ago, he called. From a local number. (I might be meeting him tomorrow.)

And like that's not enough, he had been on a road trip to Leh last month.

Uncanny, huh? Makes me feel like i should've spoken about things that i've been wanting to happen. Who knows, by some miracle of fate they would come to being...

Goodbye my lover, goodbye my friend.

Sweet darling,

I have loved you from the first moment i tasted you on my lips. It's been a long, overwhelming love affair, sometimes accompanied by a shot of alcohol but always by epicurean orgasms. Every spoonful was a promise of better tomorrows, happy memories and lasting loyalties.

But i'm afraid it can't go on any more. Your love is doing nothing for my curves. The larger your temptation, the worse effect it has on my body fat. For the first time in all our years together, the fact that i stand to gain something from you is not a pleasing thought. That i have to lose everything you've given me, done for me since way back when i was a permed punk in college, is heartbreaking. Gut wrenching (and even that isn't going to melt all that lard, imagine).

I have to get away from you... I can't see you any more. Love you, touch you, feel you, taste you or experience your fullness, your lustiness. I don't know what i'll do when i do see you, but it definitely won't include sitting close to you, looking at you with starry eyes, sweet-talking you, asking you how your day was behind that cold display glass you call your home, and - not able to bear it a second longer - ravishing you with passion. No, it won't be all that.

I must forget you.

I know you'll never understand, but i hope that some day, you'll forgive me.

Always your lover,
N

Silence while the Brandy+Hot water+Honey speaks!

I'm back from a fun night with a whole bunch of people i have never quite hung out with before - including someone i cannot stand at all. (I have imagined a conversation in my head: if somebody tells me that she's good fun and i should hang out with her more often, i will turn around and tell them that i will hang out with her when she and i stop being professionally attached. Until then, i will hate her.) I went out with a bunch from office to Monkey Bar. Chilled out. Nice place. Decent crowd. Actually, ogle-able crowd. Yumm food. I must go out more often!It's been a day of... well, a weird kinda day. I made a friend at work thinking that i needed new friends, and the times that we hang out, i'm mostly silent. Conversation is slightly superficial. I have nothing to say. I don't know what's wrong.
Is it weird that i'm posting at... 1:35 a.m in the morning? See, my laptop was on Sleep mode and i had to switch it off before i went to sleep so i thought i'd log in and check mail and stuff and this just happened because there's a lot i'm holding back today and i don't want to hold it in any more.

I've been extremely angry since yesterday. I want to give a lot of people a piece of my mind because their attitude is pissing me off big time. Sometimes i wonder why i even bother with them. But then i realise that they're friends, and that when i make people my friends, they automatically win the right to trample over me. I guess they forget to read the little clause next to the asterisk that says, "Ocassionally, you shall get as good as you receive". But then i get down to wondering if it's my thought process that's skewed and that they might actually be in the right and i in the wrong. And then i get confused and don't think about it any more.
Riding helps rid me of my anger. I zip on the roads and zag through traffic, and it's a cathartic feeling. Today, as i was riding to physio (yeah, major health issues, don't even get me started), going at 70 on M.G.Road, only one thought was on replay in my mind: I hope i hit a vehicle and get distracted enough to stop feeling so angry. And every time, this thought was followed by a vehement NO. I didn't really want to hit anybody. All i wanted to do was scream. Loud enough to get people within a mile to wobble on their two wheelers. Get all that anger out of my system. Anger that people judged and assumed and lied and were apparently being thoughtful for me when actually, they were worried about themselves and their association with me. But it didn't happen. I just couldn't scream. So i kept on riding. I'm unscarred, physically at least. It's like Udupi Krishna (a guy i used to bully in jest a lot at my first workplace) used to say: "One day, this volcano will burst. And then you will see."

I like the high Brandy gives me. It doesn't create a fog in my head and place my brain right in the middle of it. In fact, my head's fine. My body, on the other hand, is showing signs of tipsy-ness.

I discovered Bonobo today. And this particular song of theirs triggered a story in my head. Difficult love, surviving the odds like a first time-lucky Poker player. The man on a bicycle, the woman in a bus. Their so-common-but-so-uniquely-theirs love story. Their happy ending - in the back of an open lorry; wind rushing through their hair, content smiles on their faces made bigger by the force of the air trying to peel the skin off their faces as it whizzes past - like everything they need to live a good life has taken the form of the other person; lusty green trees on either side; blue skies above, tarred road behind, tarred road ahead, disappearing into the horizon; travelling, travelling... getting away...

Today, secrets were revealed to the family in passing.

Yesterday was a scarring family evening.

And we're all stories waiting for our happily ever afters.

Blind Faith.

An interesting thing happened yesterday. I spent a few hours at Grandmom's place last afternoon. My youngest cousin, all of seven years old, chatted away incessantly as i lay sprawled on the sofa in the drawing room, all sad and depressed about life. Suddenly, fully excited, she left the room and came back carrying a 30 cmX30 cm square that looked like a doormat with spikes. It was an accupressure thingie that people are supposed to stand on and well, heal themselves.

I didn't bother standing on it. Instead, i rested my feet as i sat on the sofa. Very agitated by my behaviour, my cousin scolded me and then proceeded to stand on it herself. If you stand on this, she said, all your health problems will go and you'll live longer; maybe 100 years even.

Really? I replied. Yes, she said, see, i'm doing it no? I'll live for very long, 100 years, 6000 years even!

No sooner were the words out of her mouth than her older sisters and i pounced on them, forcing them to surrender their false promises under the glare of our we-know-better eyes: 6000 years? Really?

She thought about it for a split second and with a confidence stretching beyond her years, replied, If God wills it, yes.

We admitted defeat. After all, there isn't much one can say to that.