The diary of obsession

It starts as an innocuous exploration, an appeasement of curiosity. Then it takes over your life, becoming the driving force for your existence, the reason for your living, Take it away and you react like a child who is denied his favourite toy—pained, angered, abandoned and petulant in varying degrees. Rejoined—it’s like the universe has come alive again.

You find pleasure in everything around it. You worship the ground it dwells on. Every day you say, “I breathe for you. You are in every breath I take.” You spend every waking hour thinking about it, how to get closer, how to bridge this gap. It’s inconvenient, it’s distressing and it’s unacceptable.  A glimpse, a whiff, a brush, anything will do; you’ll gladly feed on crumbs. Then just this much will not do, you get greedy, you want more. Every hour, there is a need to sate the inquisitiveness with action. It’s like an overwhelming passion; the one that sets the soul on fire and torments your life. Every moment apart is like drawing in ragged breaths of life.

The hunger quickly multiplies like a rabid disease. The more you feed it, the more it demands; it’s mutated and mutilated. You notice that everything around you falls to the wayside. There are signs everywhere—forgetfulness of mundane activities, lack of communication with others, sloppiness in other tasks, yet it’s like you’ve been consumed by the all-encompassing force that commands your existence.  You can do nothing other than obey its calls, your will has no say, you are the subservient slave who has to acquiesce it’s every demand.

You realise you need to pull back. “This is not healthy,” you tell yourself. It’s a struggle of wills, an intense battle between sanity and obsession. You do everything to pull back—you try not to acknowledge its existence, you deny and deprive yourself, you bury yourself in work and menial tasks but it is a gnawing presence within, scratching, itching, wanting to rise to the surface. You call in for reinforcements, you medicate yourself and look for an alternate source of outlet. It’s easy for a while, you learn to ignore it yet you know it’s there, biding its time, waiting for the moment when you’ll be vulnerable. One day, the need returns, more ravenous than ever, angry at being denied for so long; it doesn’t take kindly to rejection. You are desperate now—you need satiation; “One, just one,” you plead with yourself. And another voice screams, “NO!”  The agony is too much to bear— you shut your eyes, your ears, your mouth but the thirst still beckons. “Just this once, NO! Don’t do this to yourself. Just this once. No! Don’t do this to yourself.” The chant is on a loop getting louder and more aggressive each passing hour. In desperation, you lock yourself up, cut yourself—let the bad blood flow. 

It’s a never-ending battle. Each day brings it challenges and torments. You’re learning to live with it. 

Talk it out

The ladies loo in my office has a chat board. What fun!

Spotted # 5?

Isn't this funny?Or is it just me?

At The Miller

Last year, the task of getting wheat ground at the local 'chakki' (flour mill) fell to me. Usually, my mom or the maid used to take care of this, but given that everyone was busy with the wedding duties and I had my 'errand girl' hat on, it came to me. Just like the garbage duty, the collect clothes from the laundry duty, the run around and get 'this' from 'that' room/place duty and the little trips to the local 'kirana' store for a packet of some innocuous thing that somebody forgot to bring—all this fell under the purvey of the 'errand girl'.

Going to the flour mill was something I never did. I always managed to excuse my way out of it. Standing there and waiting for your wheat to be ground, and slowly getting dusted in white, chalky powder is not something I fancied, and then there is the carrying of the tin, for which, according to me, exists no way to disguise. Since the flour mill is just a couple of buildings away, we usually walk it out. Carrying a tin of ground wheat ranks quite high in my list of 'not to be seen carrying' along with buckets and brooms. (I have no reason but it's just something I feel 'shy' about lugging out in the open, even if it's brand new!)

So, luckily for me, I didn't have to wait there since he had quite a few other things to grind, the 'chakkiwala' (miller) told me to come after a couple of hours. Such relief! Two hours later, I land up to collect the flour and he tells me he's just about finishing my batch. With nothing to do and no one else around, I decided to click his pics with my mom's phone.

I thought he could not be bothered with me clicking, till (the last pic will show) he dusted a bag of flour in my direction!

Ek, Do, Teen

So finally yesterday, after a lifetime of promising myself, I joined a dance class.

Eschewing the popular trend in ballroom dancing, I went for a session in waltz instead of salsa. Since this was a couple’s dance session, I was partnered with my cousin’s brother-in-law to be. I have danced the waltz before so the first class was not much of a struggle, at least for me. An hour just flew by and all I have to do till the next dance class I have to learn to turn, the whisk and chasse, and as my instructor said, “don’t lead the man, let him lead you!”

My next class, by popular demand is a cha cha cha, which I would have to skip, considering it falls on the day of the week that is jinxed whenever I have plans. 

Till then, I'll be going 1, 2, 3, 1, 2, 3

The memory of ...

“So, what do you want to do today?” I plonk myself on the sofa and ask. “Do you want to play rummy or seven-hands again? How about dominoes?” He shakes his head in bewilderment. “No, I don’t feel like. Besides you always cheat.” I look at him shocked at the accusation. “This is like the pot calling the kettle black,” I mumble but he catches that and gives off a loud laugh. I ask him again what he wants to do today. “How about dancing?”

Is he up to it? Can he handle this exertion? I look at my mom asking for permission. She nods her head even though she is surprised at the request. The music starts and I wonder if he would remember the steps. He’s already gone ahead and waiting for me. He expresses his impatience at my delay and asks me to hurry on. The song is our favourite, a smooth waltz. As he takes me in his arms, he fumbles with the first few steps but he keeps going on. Then as if by magic, everything comes back to him. He leads expertly, twirling me slowly and gently across the room. This moment is something I’ll always treasure. It’s been ages since we’ve danced like this. I miss these little moments of ours. Everyone in the room is astonished at the way we move, especially him after all these years. The song ends and they all applaud with gusto, whistles and all. He just guffaws and pulls me in for the next dance and this is the song he first taught me to dance on. I smile at the memory and catch my mom’s eye. She too is reminiscing about that moment. As we dance, I can only admire the grace in his movements and the surety of his steps, consistent even now after all these years even though the arms holding me have aged and the person frail. The dances weave one into another and he still shows no signs of stopping. Five songs later, I can see him exhausted and I call it to halt, even though I want to prolong this moment for as long as I can.

As he makes his way back to the bed to rest, my arms reach out to enfold him in a hug of longing, thanksgiving and love and I whisper, “Welcome back, dad.”

Spotted

Noticed this interesting looking rat trap (?) First I thought it was an ad for a pest control agency... then read that it's a rodent bait station (quite fancy sounding name, right?). I wonder how it works.

Then dinner with friends produced this enlightened bit of spelling. Maxican first of all and then it includes Spy Beef. We were debating what it could mean when someone figured out it could be a short form for spicy beef. Needless to say, I didn't go for this Maxican spy special!