Of Quirky England! #1

England is where cricket was born and football is worshipped. India, I confess I do not know what sport was born here, probably chess (?), but cricket is most definitely an addition to our many Gods. As a highly skilled migrant from India, cricket jargon came with the crib, I had no choice in the matter whatsoever, you see, but well football, not so much. Now that I have established how I met MANY cricket fanatics, football fanatics was a first for me when I landed here.

It is easy to spot a football freak in England. It is still easier to find if there is a match going on at a stadium near you. A clear indication of whether there is a Hull City match at KC Stadium (or anywhere else for that matter) is the bee-like appearance of old and young, yellow and black striped T-shirts swarming the city pubs. And while all these bees sit in front of a beaming light-box (more like light-planks, now that all pubs have super-sized flat screen televisions), sipping frothy, fermented nectar from pint-glasses - frankly, it felt odd walking in the opposite direction away from the bustle and into the arcades, where shops were getting progressively emptier as the match got increasingly interesting! Good for me!

What made me ponder over this apis phenonmenon was the difference I noticed in the sports watchers' cultures. In India, streets clear out as people head home hoping to watch the Indian cricket team win the day's match, for a change. While India headed home, England came on to the streets into the pubs in support of an equally appalling football side.

P.S.: A disclaimer is in order, I do not watch sports obsessively, I would not watch it all if there was a film (any film) on television. I know what you are thinking, I'm not judging anyone and you shouldn't either!

Of Jumping Blogs.

I started a new blog with the same name! Can anyone believe it!?! Call me crazy. Call me weird. I needed a change of some sort. Let's just say that a change was in the offing and this was the best I could came up with! So, I moved here sometime back. It's no different from here, but it feels a lot tidier, and most importantly, it feels new, that's all mattered. I enjoy rambling there just as much. Let me say this before you assume otherwise, I am not abandoning this blog. I just want an alternative address for some more blabbering, that's all.

Hope to see you at both places.

Love and warmth,
The Solitary Dreamer.

Of Things.

It's not like I haven't written anything this month. It just happened that this month has seen the maximum number of unpublished posts. I have 5 drafts on relatively important issues but I haven't the will or the courage (?) to post them here. I'm not sure if I'm an example of a private person, but lately I've raised my guards. Knowingly I've kept (almost) everyone out.

The reason, you ask me, well, haven't you read that I've become private?!

Hmmn, so I don't really know the point to this post. I want to ramble on, about nothing in particular (like always)... but words evade me (like always)...

Has someone already said it better than me? (like always)...

I am the one winged bird for flying
Sinking quickly to the ground
See your faith in me subsiding
See you prime for giving in
I give you all that I am

----

Life. I wonder what it is?
I wonder why I'm made to live by the rules?
I wonder if I'm capable of breaking the rules?
I wonder if I can survive after breaking the rules?
I find myself in a place and time in my life where I want to thrash all the Right-things-to-do and rebel, point blank, irrespective of whether I like it or not. Simply put I desperately want to go on a wrong-doing spree! I'm so full of myself and yet I can't figure out WHY? The answer eludes me.

Life happens. Then why have things ceased to happen in my life? I'm living a string of melancholic days and these force me to rethink my strategies and plans.

Isn't life just another term that has become so redundant that it has lost all it's meaning?

I'm sure now that I hate sitting idle. I need to work. I need to have things on my mind to lead a normal life. I need something to keep me occupied so that I can feel like I belong somewhere.

I am the white dove for a soldier
Ever marching as to war
I would give my life to save you
I stand guarding at your door
I give you all that I am

----

"Another one bites the dust", one of my UK friends said, she wants to get married too, you know :). This really has been a year of marriages for a lot of "my" people.

My school best-friend is getting engaged tomorrow and I am so happy for her.

Life is changing for us (for the better)... and I'm enjoying that we are going through it together.m We can actually exchange notes. We've both been hopeless with men so far and then we found our respective fiances. It's an exciting time in our lives. It's assuring to know someone else also understands exactly just how happy you are, how jittery you get, how nervous you feel, how cheerful you can be, how much love you can suddenly feel for a till-now-unknown human being, how grown-up you become, how you willfully change, how you can sway between extreme happiness and sadness in a span of a couple of hours, and finally, know how lucky you've been! It's amazing.

I am the sound of love's arriving
Echoed softly on the sand
Lay your head
upon my shoulder
Lay your hand within my hand
I give you all that I am

----

I am the one winged bird for flying
Sinking quickly to the ground
I am
the blind man for a watchdog
I am prime for giving in
I'll show you all that I am

And I breathe so you breathe
Let me stand so you'll stand
With all that I am

----

Interspersed lyrics from Rob Thomas' song, "All That I Am".

Wonderings Of A Wandering Mind.

I wonder if a loud and clear "WHY ME?" is the answer to the questions I'm afraid to ask?

I wonder if my answer is a valid question?

I wonder if questioning my answers is better than answering my questions?

I wonder if I am capable of questions or answers?

I wonder.

Of Things I Want To Do Before I Die.

*Lists not prioritized*

1. Get a PhD.
2. Go to Paris.
3. Have babies.
4. Go to an opera.
5. Go to a U2 concert.
6. Have an enviable wine-cellar.
7. Get in (supermodel) shape.
8. Make a movie.
9. Write a book.
10. Learn to play the Guitar.
11. Be able to tell a joke and make it sound funny.
12. Go Bungee-jumping.
13. Spend a night at the shore under the stars.
14. Be the first / youngest someone to do something extraordinary.
15. Make more lists of "to-do before I die".

I had to do some major modifications to this, to make it sound do-able. It was a lot more fantastic and that much more impossible. It looked like this earlier:

1. To travel the world over.
2. To read all the (good) books ever written.
3. Own a book-shop, just like the one in "You've Got Mail". (I even had a place in mind).
4. To be part of a band.
5. To be able to talk in at least 10 different tongues.
6. To win the Nobel.
7. To make an award-winning film.
8. To build a house on the beach.
10. To live all alone by myself. (I've already ticked that off my lists)

9. is omitted here for a good reason.

Important Note to Self: THINK, mull, ruminate before you write. AND then READ what you write.

I apologize that the English in my last post was SO SCREWED. I got carried away by the surge of complicated emotions and I worte some terrible crap. Sorry!

What I really wanted to say was this:

I have a feeling that a lot many things in my life have come a full circle and now another
circle has emerged from within the first one and it seems
it will continue expanding till I complete yet another full
circle and then some.

Is this life? One wave after another; One tide after another; One
circle within another and each one pushing me forward slightly,
towards a life unknown?
Probably towards a different me?

The Importance of Being Earnest.

And Now The Crap I Left Unsaid....

I think I have made up my mind about what relationships really are and I think I know that they are never what they are supposed to be, and definitely never what they appear to be...
What they are or what they become after a considerable time-span, if they are still extant, I cannot say for sure because of this very reason. I believe, rather unromantically, that these so-called relationships become seriously stagnated and progressively so with time. In an *earnest* attempt to undersand this mêlée between ideas and hypotheses generated in my tiny little brain with their tangibility, their practicality, I have tried using analogies drawn from real-life experiences (others' not mine), films, books, even agony-aunt-type magazines and blogs to no avail. I have since given up pondering over such "matters" completely, which I'm sure you must have figured by now as I am writing an entire blog. I have to admit, I don't mull over it at all!

I need a break man! I get way too involved in other people's "matters" and forget I have a life of my own that I ought to be Living. The sad part is that I gave to remind myself. Shit! Why I spend SO much time thinking and not actually putting things into practice, is something I honestly don't know. I am brooding over it as I am typing out this crap. And I am saying to myself; thinking about this isn't trivial, it's simply my general interest in other people's business, which "they" mildly refer to as curiosity, it's just my need to be earnest about everything, my insatiable necessity to be Miss Goody-two-shoes Know-it-all!
(Which, for no reason, reminds me of something I read about ignorance in Oscar Wilde's 'Importance of Being Earnest', which has nothing to do with relationships or for that matter to do with curiosity...I just remembered it and said to myself, why not get more arbitrary than my usual self. Besides I find it absolutely hilarious, so....)

Lady Bracknell: I have always been of the opinion that a man who desires to
get married should know either everything or nothing. Which do you know?
Jack: I know nothing, Lady Bracknell.
Lady Bracknell: I am pleased to hear it. I do not approve of anything that tampers with natural ignorance. Ignorance is like a very delicate exotic fruit. Touch it and the
bloom is gone. The whole theory of modern education is radically unsound. Fortunately, in England at any rate, education produces no effect
whatsoever. If it did, it would prove a serious danger to the upper classes,
and probably lead to acts of violence in Grosvenor's Square.

Ah! I have exhausted myself talking about inconsequential things, as is my favourite diversion from mundane, monotonous routine, I loosely refer to as my life. :D So, I leave you think about the importance of being earnest.

*Random-ness Alert*

Please go listen to this song by Oasis called "Importance of Being Idle"....

I don't mind
As long as there's a bed beneath the stars that shine
I'll be fine, if you give me a minute, a man's got a limit
I can't get a life if my heart's not in it

OK, so I'll go listen to the song now, and you get back to whatever it is that you were doing before you chanced upon reading and bearing with my random reflections! :D

Adieu! Tata! Bye-bye!

Rhyming and Poetry.

I was watching a series on television where they ridiculed a pansy, pathetic, wanna-be poet!
Watching it I wondered if poetry/rhyming was actually that hard? and I decided to try my hand at it...and guess what I figured?!

Not only that it's difficult! but it's draining as well!

Well, so, here is my Vogon attempt at poetry!

I try very hard to write
Something I hope wouldn't be too trite
Of things unsaid
Of things beyond the staid
Why am I writing in rhymes
Because they sound like chimes
OMG! All of this has gone over-board
Ok, I'll stop before you get bored.
Oh! you say, I should go on?
I won't be fooled, I see you've put your ear-muffs on!


I honestly hope that you did not require the use of the "imagery intensifiers, rhythmic modulators, alliterative residulators, or the simple dumpers" to help you heighten the experience of reading my poetry!


If you've read this far, your patience is gratefully appreciated! :)