Nocturnal

All the crazy things to write , that’s what gets decided when they come inside the brain , but when you start writing , oh boy, they are no more. What if you saw people on the street outside your house at three fifty in the morning, with torches. Imagine that – you are trying to sleep but can’t. Some random, stupid, may be uncompleted wishes (read ‘Should have asked her out….or’ Should I still?’ ‘What’s with the age thing anyway, doesn’t make much sense. Much? No sense’) and crazy thoughts, like how would a bullet from an ak 47 would feel hitting you and twisting its way inside the flesh would feel. This might sound like a dream of a sadist, but given the position acquired by this weapon in pop-psyche, its no wonder. Or if you really want a milder version, how about shooting someone else, or being a Special Forces member or something, and may be an MP5 or an M16 instead. Anyway, going a bit too wide of the middle stick here. So you are trying to sleep. The bed is perpendicular to the road, with your head to the wall and legs towards the street.

Scene 1
A quiet street, late at night…It’s a street in a residential area; houses on both sides…most of the houses are right on the steet without any porches or verandas. There are three guys in a house. Say post grad students.

(In the house)

Lights are out. All are asleep except one. He is twisting and turning, trying to stay still. Rest is not assured for him tonight. He hears some murmur outside. May be a dog sniffing at a bush. But those are footsteps, like feathers dropping on tin. The window is right behind him, He moves his head up, he can see the trees at the other side of the road, the leaves enjoying a late night breeze.Suddenly,the first flame appears, immediately followed by the other and then the next. The same view is on the other side. They are parallel running.
He is dumb founded. Not sure if scared, may be thrilled.
The torch bearers are clad in uniforms, ritual like. Kind of KKK, but not white, and certainly not with a pointed hood and a child in one arm. The faces are visible, but they have no vision. The vision is fixed somewhere ahead. They are drawn towards a larger flame it seems. Now there is a third row, walking in between the two lines….

They finally finish. He is still, playing it again and again. I could have taken that on video, given I had a camera. The beauty of it he can not deny. Will this occur again? May be. Goes back to the bed. His own response seems too cold for him. This is like none other, this is X Files stuff; well this ain’t Roswell either. He laughs at that one. Is an explanation necessary? Who cares who they were. Some cult which believes in not disturbing people by not making any noise. Oh but if some pudding hearted fool sees this at 4 o clock in the morning, he is going to think the British have come again to claim one of their biggest colonies back, and a Satyagraha is already underway.Hmmm.He might as well wake the entire street up and call up the fire brigade. Who knows.

A star is not alone

A star is not alone. At least 3/4^th of them aren’t. They have companions. Take Castor for example, in the constellation of Taurus. It is made of SIX stars! Three pairs of revolving binaries, and they are separable only by a spectroscope - by differentiating between their individual spectra. It will be amazing to travel to such a star system. Just imagine watching six stars revolving around each other – well it is not that simple, but the view would be breathtaking!

Paired stars are not uncommon, it’s the loners like our Sun that are. One of the early theories about the extinction of dinosaurs assumed that the Sun had a companion. It was the proximity of that other star, during one of its revolutions that produced imbalance in the Earth’s ecosystem, resulting in the destruction of the giant reptiles. If so, that buddy star should have been found by now, and its orbit determined.

Another exciting phenomenon occurs when one of the stars dies and becomes a black hole – you have a scene where one star is revolving around nothing, since the black hole will only be visible in x-ray or infrared wavelengths!

The Letter Never Sent

Waiting for the letter, waiting for it desperately, cause everything later depends on that letter. You might as well call me a letterhead! And in this case, the later the better does not apply;it better be early as its quite late already. Even the Indian Postal Service would be quicker i guess. I have even started to hate that show - the late show with David Letterman - it has 'late' and 'letter' together.
Actually, it's not the letter thats late - well it is late - but someone hasn't sent it. So the sender is late in sending a letter that is waiting to be sent - like suspended in the space-time continuum, lying on the event horizon of a black hole that's present in the sender's mind and body which is not letting him/her send the poor letter (the after effects of "Universe in a nutshell" - Stephen Hawking).
Man I'm impatient about this letter! It's like waiting for the last few mega bites of your torrent, the ETA is 45 secs but it takes forever...

"The batch of '06-08' (rare group photo)"

"Goa!"

Stay Or Leave...

Two years went by in a swoosh. The time was my best time spent in a college (oops..school!). Probably because engineering can really be a bitch...we'll take that up some other time.

It was really endearing to meet so many different shades of personalities. I think that's the reason why the time was so fabulous, for me at least. There is a prevailing sense among some people that the batch as a whole really didn't care about each other! I think there is no point taking THAT with you when you go away from here...I made some very good friends and I made acquaintances and I barely know some people...that's what it boils down to in the end.

I felt ,and have been feeling, quiet heavy hearted that this time was coming to an end. I've been told that I'll meet new people and other such condolences, as if that's a big secret. May be it is because all is coming to an end rather abruptly. I know it is alright to feel this way...I only want to miss what I loved and enjoyed, and nothing else.

The CRP was the crux of activities, the most awaited marathon, a roller coaster... 'Work' will take new meaning for us in a few days.

Well, if it started with an outbound, it's only proper to wish that it should have ended with an inbound!

I heard it through the grapewine...

I have found out something about me! Well it was me who realised it...that I love to gossip! Really! It is hilarious, devilish and so much fun...especially when it is about people who know you know something but they aren’t sure about it and you know that they probably know that you know...!

It is fun to share with your co-gossipers the details of how you unearthed or came across things that were too subtle to be noticed by the other, linear minded people! And when all these leads, yours and theirs, point towards one ‘truth’ and you are like – ‘No way man, really, how could they be doing this! I never thought he had anything for her!!!’ HA HA...that’s the point of nirvana; it IS what you thought it was!

And research (somewhere) has shown that guys gossip more than girls. We are very keenly interested in others’ lives; we just don’t show it that openly that we are. This is the probable reason why there are secret agents and intelligence operatives who usually are men...one should possess the basic curiosity about everything around. For example, a room which is usually not bolted from within being bolted one fine day, two people finding a sack full of reasons for spending time together alone – and reasons which on their surface seem very natural, everyday explanations, but you have to do away the clouds and take a good look at the stars behind...they shine light on everything then!

Ways of the world

Ways of the world. What does that mean? People say I’m too naïve to gauge real intentions behind people’s actions. I think I know what they mean. If someone is being cunning and bad towards me, I don’t think I’m a Forrest Gump not to understand it; what they mean by my naivety is that I may not react to the cunningness the way one is supposed to. All along I’m quite sure of their intentions and I usually just back off. But there are times when I react. The anger is boundless then, and not a very good thing for me. The anger destroys my peace. But I’ve experienced that keeping it inside is even worse. There are people who don’t deserve to be treated with my respect when they wrong me. They deserve hell then, and I give it out to them.

So, does that make me a very worldly, smart bloke? Does being angry and showing off arrogance and outrage signify a man’s coming off age? How does one handle bad company? I should give an eye for an eye, may be. But what if I don’t really care about it? If I’ve been mistreated, can’t I just forget about it? That would be nice now, wouldn’t it? But I usually don’t forget it...

Forgiveness is a virtue often taken as a man’s weakness, but it is that quality in one which will make matters so easy to resolve. At the same time, a tough and sharp mind will make sure you are not in a position where you have to compromise your position for the benefit of someone else

And as I have pondered over this with my friends, I realized everyone has a problem with it, either one way or the other. They snap too quickly, or they just keep it inside and let it seethe

Confront or avoid? Sustain or shoot it out? Maintain or manipulate?