Life is an illusion

 I googled empty nest boredom . Wow, ask a silly question, and sure you will get sillier answers.  The articles - there were plenty, said I should exercise, talk to people, volunteer, craft. Really? Is this your great suggestion?  Could not I have guessed any of these myself? Volunteer? Do these people think we are some rich women who have money to throw around - hire a cab, go do some social service for few hours, come back in a cab. Paisa  kaun dega? I don't have a secret garden, growing money in it. And please, do not start to ask me to ride my two wheeler. No I am not worried about petrol price - I will do my bit of patriotism, too. But do you think it is my age to drive around in a two wheeler - on Bangalore roads? What will happen to my hands, my seat? And  you suggest craft? Did I not try many of them and give up? After realizing, that these fingers can handle keyboards, not crochet needles or a paint brushes. So, little bit of cooking. Spending more time in kitchen? But wh

 There are certain devices which need friction in order for them to function. Am I right? And I am such a device. For what one and a half hour, I was just lazily and mindlessly browsing pinterest and e-commerce websites. Not doing anything, and not wanting to do anything.  But then she called. The all too important, all too powerful domestic help. I didn't even wait for her to complete the sentence that due to some problem she won't be coming. I sprung into action. If you have guessed that I started with zeal, anger and passion my chores - which I normally outsource to my help, you can't be more wrong. Instead of taking up a broom and a mop, I got ready, went for a walk, came back, took my laptop out of its hibernation and started my work.  I needed that resistance. And I do not want to bi**h about domestic helps and the constant difficulties we face because of them. I know how utterly ridiculous that is. I may talk about this with my neighbors though, they are not as woke

 We look upon Monarchy as some kind of antiquated concept which is no longer suitable for modern age. But have we really come out of this concept. Be it democracy or socialism, those in power, those who rule, are de facto kings. In democracy, the ministers and their bureaucrats are kings and their families are royal families. Don't you agree?  In communist countries - where every one is supposedly equal, those in higher rankings of party are kings. If you need any thing out of the ordinary, you need to curry favor with them. In theocracy, the priests are de facto kings. I am joking, of course. I don't know anything about theocracy. Can Taliban ruled Afghanistan be called a theocracy? Can America and other countries be said to be leaning towards theocracy as they try to bring back some ancient laws following religious dogmas?  Will God want us to have theocracy?

 Once upon a time, if something went wrong - as things go wrong often, the order of blames used to be - spouse, government and luck (kismet, adrashta). There is a saying in Kannada - anishtakkondu angaraka (anishta - adversity)- Angaraka is planet Mars. So if anything goes wrong, this little planet got the blame. Same was true with spouses -  you burnt a vessel forgetting to switch off the gas stove. Of course, it is his fault, he was angering you, as he always does. By not responding to you or by praising his mother or sisters or by not buying some other cooking stove etc.  You spill oil on the floor and the fault was of your spouse, hurrying you for his breakfast not seeing how busily you are cooking without even taking time to breathe.  And next to get blamed was the government - it doesn't provide roads, electricity, water. Up to our high standards. It just collects our taxes for suitcases, foreign trips of ministers, and their swiss accounts.  But now the order has changed,

Self love  No, I didn't mean selfie love. Which  matter is altogether different - which is much worse pandemic having attacked more than half of the populace - most of them of the fairer sex.  I want to write about loving thyself. Many of the advisers on internet tell us how important is self love and how one should devote some time for it etc. etc. But now we have taken this self love to a whole new level. We are so much obsessed with our appearances that we devote most of our waking time caring for it.   We keep looking at the mountain inside our wardrobe and hating each and every item in it because we don't look pretty in it. (And we blame clothes!) We hate ourselves a little bit too, for being foolish enough to buy such  items. And take an oath that we will not buy a single piece of clothing until we have nothing to wear.  And we open our favorite shopping app the very next hour. And the mobile camera - this has made all of us into Narcissus. We take a hundred images of ou

 Most of us have studied basics of Calculus and know too well that integration is more difficult than differentiation.  In order to integrate, you have to understand the principles of differentiation too well.  And also many internet teachers teach us to divide tasks into small manageable tasks. Divide and conquer.  So it is in politics too. Integration is much more difficult and is less vote fetching. Where as differentiation is easier. And is more popular. So leaders world over, use differentiation - division to come to power and stay in power. Because united people are stronger and so can't be ruled efficiently. What they don't realize until its too late is that the ghosts of their past will catch up with them and hound them. Like what's currently happening to our neighbor down south. Like had happened to our ex prime minister.

 I recently read a book called 'Bel canto' by Ann Patchet about few terrorists and their capturees locked in for two months. They almost forget their roles and befriend others. More importantly, the captured people understand the terrorists and commiserate with them and so do the terrorists. There is a also an article in   The Atlantic about a Ukaranian family and 5 Russian soldiers stuck in a cellar. Hiding from further shell attacks. Russians told their side of the story - a propaganda fed to them by Kremlin. But realized that their information is so very wrong. Russians are not liberating Ukaranians but destroying their lives. And the Ukaranian family realized that more than patriotism or support for Putin, Russian soldiers are in this war for the money.  Politicians in any side of conflict feed plenty of propaganda to people. And people fall for it. Little realizing that what they are doing is not some kind of holy war, but simple plain war - nowhere near holy.

I  had almost decided that this Orhan Pamuk - a Turkish writer, is like most Indian authors writing in English. Out of touch with the reality of the country, never faced any serious difficulties in life and hence writing about first world problems of rich third world people - aka shallow.  But that is changing , as English is the  first language of the middle class, not only affluent. And we middle class people are anything but shallow.   Normally the kind of books I have been reading recently (or trying to read) had just one rasa in them, melancholy. OK, according to ancient Indian traditions, a good literary work must have nava-rasas in them. kaarunya rasa, shringara rasa, veera rasa, hasya rasa , bheebhatsa rasa etc, etc. (ie. kindness, romanace, thrill , comedy etc, etc). I think old Sanskrit plays had all these. They had a Vidushak (comedian) just for the sake of hasya rasa - to make you  laugh  Yes, the books which I liked had only one rasa in them - very very sad- rasa.

 Little bit of context here : It was Sunday afternoon and I was watching muted TV. Muted because husband was asleep, and I did not want to trouble him as there are  more satisfactory ways of troubling him. And one of the TV channels was showing some thing, some thing...."SMS LIFE" to some number. And my devil's workshop got busy. What must be this number? Of course it will be the number of HIM - the almighty , as he is the one who is in charge of life of us mortals.  But again, what code do I message? Do I ask for life? But I already have one.  I am alive, at least I think I am.  Do I ask to return life? Does he have some kind of return policy?  Naah, I don't think I am ready yet for that. Then, if I am not asking for gift of life or the removal of it, what else do I ask for? Can I ask him to format the whole darned thing and re install it? Does HE ever do that ? Is he capable? Or he will say - "this is too messed up even for me. I give up"? A

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