Life uninterrupted

Many things have happened. Life has been whizzing past while I stand frozen, like these lines from a Salil Chowdhury song,

Aamaar chotur paashe shob kichu jaaye aashe,
Aami shudhu tusharito goti heen dhaara,
Aamaaye proshno kore neel dhrubo taara,
Aaar koto kaal aami robo disha haara.

I spent last night at S's place. S is a temporary bachelor, as his wife has taken off to Kolkata for the week. S lives in a rented house in C.R. Park. For all my years in Delhi, my night life experience is actually quite limited. In fact the first time I even returned from a pub (absolutely sober and quite alone) at two in the morning, was in a small town in the French Alps! So when S asked me if I wanted to have a double-egg-double-chicken roll on a very chilly evening I was duly tempted. I don't know which billowed more vapour - the hot chicken or S's cigarette or my mouth. Much as I detest smoke, my best friends always turn out to be smokers! We wandered about, taking in the ambiance of roadside stalls selling gud (jaggery), bodi (dry dumplings of ground pulses), narkol (coconut), fish cutlets, old books and mishti paan (sweet paan). We returned home and while S worked away, I caught a movie on the tube.

Then at around 10 p.m. we went down to the kali baari cafeteria, and had a sumptuous dinner of bhaat, daal, aaloo kopir dallan, macher jhol and tomator chatni (rice, pulses, a mix of potato and cauliflower cooked in way I cannot translate, fish curry and yummy tomato chutney). And guess the cost of this three course dinner - 35 bucks! We had two huge helpings of everything (it's an all you can eat meal, except for the fish). Then I came back and watched "Aranyer Din Ratri," vintage Ray. There is nothing more intoxicating than a movie which makes you forget that you have a brain, it just seeps in through every pore of your body. I do not understand cinema as perhaps a connoisseur does, but I do live the stories of the movies I like, in the moments that I watch them. And trust me, there is nothing else which is more liberating and more escapist than this.

But you might be wondering what was I talking about when I started this post. Life seems to be treating me like a king. It certainly has been, and I am not complaining. The point, however, is everybody is moving on. Y got married. B has become a father. S got a job which is going to make him a millionaire overnight. I am still where I was yesterday, and the day before, and the day before that. I do not even know what I am complaining about here, because I have this feeling of unprecedented calm which has descended upon me. I am content. It is driving my parents crazy, because to them it seems that I have suddenly become addicted to compulsive laziness. But I have always been lazy, yet this, this is scaring the wits out of me.

I wanted to research a piece on undecidability in computation, and look what came out instead. It is like I am no longer in control, and I am content to let it take me where it does. Am I being foolhardy, or for the first time in my life do I see things clearly?

Dil ke kuch shikwe jo baaki hain dil main,
Unhe tumse kehne ki chahat kyun baaki nahi rahi,
Agaar aaj, abhi, isi lamhe me zindagi guzar jaaye,
Dil ko marna gunah hoga, ya daba dena usme tamannaye unkahi?

Postscript:
I actually had planned on posting this on Christmas eve, thinking I'll be working as always, but as things turned out I was with friends watching Chicken Little, eating a huge pizza and jingling away to Christmas carols. Then I got a cute message from D, asking me whether I had a date for Christmas eve. When I said no, she asked me to it's about time I got around to seriously thinking about having a serious relationship. Seriously!

So, as I end this post, I smile and I savour the warm sun on my face, and I am thankful for being the way I am, and where I am, today.

Shayad phir tumhe dhoondne ki koshish main,
Zindagi se kahin phir mulakat ho jaaye,
Shayad phir khwabon ke aasman se utarkar,
Kamsin chahat ki baarish bhigo jaage.