Ramblings of a vacant brain!

Yes I am going to write whatever comes to my head. It will be a type of catharsis and whoever happens to visit my blog, shall be a victim of it!

I have been thinking about myself a lot lately. And I have had a lot of eye openers about myself! Firstly, I think I was and still am a drifter! Just drift around in life, jump on whatever boat comes in the river, never having any adherence or loyalty to any creed, caste, religion or occupation.. just go along with life. And yes, making sure am having fun all the way!!! I used to view life seriously once upon a time. I remember, as a teenager, I always used to feel as if time was passing me by, and after some time was convinced that I wouldnt be living for long!

Guess If I die today or morrow, I still havent lived long.... but atleast its more than the age I was then. So I used to read and read a lot, argue with my dad and my hapless friends in rural Vidharbha. My friends were those innocent rural types. Study your text books, help in the house, be a good girl! But I was always the adventurer! Imagine, I used to force them to bunk school! So the day Pokhran blasts happened, my friend Bhavana called up for some homework. And i started on a monologue about India pakistan relations, US hypocracy and how unfair the world was. In my mind I pictured saying all this in front of distinguished world leaders, including Clinton, and all nodding their heads in unison in support of the practical arguments I was throwing on them. I was so naive then! People know the what is right/wrong, truth/false; which again changes from the way you look at it; but people always go for what suits them the most. But I believed that nobody was telling Clinton the truth about the nuclear tests at that time and hence he was not happy about it!

Anyways, poor Bhavana! At first all I heard was grunts and later there was only silence. I stopped my monologue with some forceful dialogue which I cant remember now and after full one minute Bhavana meekly said, its ok, I will ask Ajay, and hung up! I put the phone down, my mind full of acrimonious feeling towards the ignorant friends I had! Man I was so boring :D

I think after many such experiences, I started to shut up. Same thing in Mumbai. It was all so impersonal there. You go to college, there are 100 students in your class and you dont know the names of half of your classmates. I suffered in sports too. I was the champion in school. Here I was forced to play volleyball, where I was not such a pro (I was better in basketball you see. But one look at my height and the coach wasnt interested!) So there were four of us standing in the field like puppets, while the best 2 players of the team took most of the ball and played most of the time! After few such matches, where all I did was watch the ball go to and fro, without it ever touching my hand once, I defied my coach by taking the ball myself and not allowing the captain to play my chance. The captain hissed in my ears to stop it. But I went on, unmindful of the chaos I was creating! The coach hastily asked for a timeout and told me very frankly, you think you are very smart? You are not listening to me. We have to win this match and these two girls are the best we have got. The gameplan is to get them to play most of the balls. So leave it to them.. u just make sure they get the ball. So move away! I nodded my head but went on as before! That was the last volleyball match of my life!

But afterwards, I took out my anger against the unfair system incorporated by the coach in a speech which I rehearsed again and again in my head, and which just stayed in my head. I told him he wasnt doing it right. The important thing was not to win the match, but build a team which can win matches. Give opportunity for each persons talent to get honed. But I was always unlucky to get the worst games teacher in all the schools and colleges I studied in, from Nagpur to WCC in Chennai.

WCC made me more quiet! As far as I can remember, I always felt like a fish out of water in a lot of places. In the beginning, I couldnt understand the jokes that were being cracked around me by the seniors! I was so serious with them that my sense of humour used to die when they were around! And I used to get bored too, with the converstaions that happened. All I used to do was sit with my roomie's guitar and keep jabbing at some string. I could do it for hours, more so because my roomie never used to come back to the room! Now when I think, I feel i was demented because of boredome and lack of activity in my brain. And because I was too uptight and needed a little loosening up. But it was in WCC that I lost my childhood capacity of talking and getting people to talk to me. I used to be quite a pro in getting people to talk to me as a kid. Ask them about themselves, where they have come from, their families, kula, jataka, gotram and blah blah. And after all that, ask them if they have any toffees for me, much to my mothers embarassment. If they didnt have any toffees on them, I would pout and ask with hurt in my voice- dont you know there are kids in this house? So the guest would go pink, red and crimson, apologise profusely, go out at that moment, laying aside any protests on the part of my parents and come back with sweets or toffees! Yes, I was a shameless brat!!

But I had a real opportunity to learn guitar in WCC and I missed it. I still think am a real loser to miss out on that opportunity. But I did participate in Indian Music Club as a Bongo player and did some singing too! And yes I played lots of basketball there! And because I played sports, I could take two baths in the day- a customary one that all have everyday and the other after practice! And Chennai being Chennai, that was quite a privilige those days (with the sultry weather and water shortage).

Guess thats it for today. More ramblings for later!