Ordinary Lives, Extraordinary Living

 Ordinary Lives, Extraordinary Living –
Also a review of the book, This Too Shall Pass, by Elango Thambiah.

A story is alive, throbbing, when it is straight from the heart and can reach deep into the hearts of its listeners and pluck strings there. This is such a story.  In first person, from the real-life incidents that took place in the life of its protagonists, it is narrated in such a simple manner, that reading it felt like drinking a large mug of hot chocolate as a young something, snuggled into the warmth of a grandmother’s love listening to her wisdom stories.

It tells the profound story of a family living through the trauma and subsequent recovery of one of its members suffering from brain hemorrhage, and how they find their way back to the land of the living.

 I read the book last week over 4 evenings and nights, of days filled with intense, meditative study of Vibhuti Pada, chapter 3 of the yoga sutra, with a group of co-sadhakas that also included the author-protagonists of the book!  

And because of this concurrence of the yoga study and life story perhaps, this book seems forever intertwined with the learning and insights from the Vibhuti Pada of the yoga sutra:

How it is possible to connect with the ecstatic joy and beauty of simply being Alive.

How just by the virtue of being this ordinary human being, he and she have the potential and possibilities of channelizing and straddling an extraordinary state of being, the extraordariness of Life, with an ordinary self simply by surrendering to that life. To the very act of being fully alive to this present moment.

Pic by Vincent on Unsplash

This book epitomizes the above for me. And brought alive an inner story for me, completing the healing process of one big part of me, and closing a very old wound. A wound that said, “Any change means loss; loss of love, loss of warmth, loss of safety, belonging… so, fear change and shun change.” A wound that did not believe that there is anything permanent and holding a terror of everything that is not.  And yet, a deeper part of me had always searched for the permanent. Is there anything that is unchanging?

This Too Shall Pass is about that which is unchanging that rests in all the dance and drama of change. And brought home to me in a primal way, that Change also means new, fresh prANA, new forms of love, new explorations, possibilities and ways of being. How fun.

It is then possible to live life with this changing, ordinary moment, every moment, being held in the lap of the extraordinary permanence within it. And as Thomas Merton says, live and celebrate the “present festival”. Like a new, tender shoot. 

Do consider buying the book, much of the proceeds from its sale will go to The GangaFoundation, an organisation for enhancing the quality of life of persons with Spinal cord injury in India, co-founded by the author, Elango Thambiah, . , 

Decolonising Our Roads (Alternately titled: One evening in Coimbatore...)

Early evening inching towards late evening, Coimbatore, India. The road is mad, the traffic madder, and those creating the traffic, the maddest. 

A and P are part of the madding crowd (Not Hardy's or Gray's or even Spencer's). They are part of this very Indian madding crowd this early evening inching towards late evening. A starts the car, P sitting beside her on the front seat, and thinking "Here we go!" She thinks of A as a slightly crazy driver. And now, given that A has settled down in a farm in the Nilgiri hills, a couple of hours from Coimbatore, she simply wants OUT, of any traffic, and back IN her quaint, quiet nestle in the hills. According to P this shows up in her driving. A, might roll her eyes, lower her eyebrows into a frown, wave both her arms about (letting go of the wheel, but just for a moment ok?) and work her mouth into a diatribe, all simultaneously, were she to hear P's opinion of the matter. 

The guy in the car from the opposite side chugs right into P's pleasant thoughts. On the wrong side, no less. Right into A's path. She screeches more than her tyres. "What is this? Is this the way to drive? Coming on the wrong side in such a small lane, now where is the place for me to go, just look at that side, there are already vehicles there, I am stuck now." 
Wow, this woman can pack a sizeable amount in her suitcase! 

The two men in the offending car enjoy the show, their jaws slack, sporting tentative, foolish grins. After squeezing their way out, A stepped on it the moment her car found breathing space. Wow, this woman packs some speed in her engine! And then she says, "What are we talking about decolonising these people. Can they even be colonised in the first place? How he was driving! Was that a colonised mind really? Can they actually be taught anything?" 

It got P wondering about decolonising Indian roads. How can our roads be decolonised? 
- Are they not a product of colonisation in the first place? 

- Can they be transformed back into their mud-track versions, with depressed designs of footprints, hooves and paws? 

- Can we have cycles and carts again that rotate their wheels to natural rhythms and elegant heartbeats? 

- Can we again enjoy soothing dusky light turning to mysterious shades of grey unhindered by blinding and blazing headlights?  

- Can eyes look into eyes rather than at a dusty speck of the destination that they are not even sure of arriving at, at this speed? 

- Can we have questions over a sudden leisurely cup of chai or chukku kapi at the popular tea joint, "oh, what happened at your niece's wedding, did you find some suitable boys for your girl?" or "son, what are you planning on doing after your 12th exams?" (Oops! desperate escape attempts called for)

- Can we have gentle souls chewing harmless cud and in no danger of speeding harm? 

"OH! No, no, no, no!" You would say. "How is all this possible today? The cows must be in their sheds, dogs in kennels, the sparrows god knows where and people safely boxed into their cars and cubicles. No mixing of sides and spaces.  There are neat, modular spaces with doors, and the right side and the wrong side. And let me ask you this: Isn't your cup of chai colonised?" 
Nope. Tea originated in China perhaps. There is also the record of the Indian Assam tea. 
So? We are looking at what it is today. Where does all the premium, organic, bio-dynamic and fair-trade tea from India go?  

Then, one more question but not the last one surely, for decolonising our roads would be: 

- Can we have questions without easy answers, but ones for which we may have to take our right hand all around the back of our head to touch the left side of the nose, to even begin to understand them? 

Perhaps A is right - people who come on the wrong side of the road are either already decolonised or were never colonised in the first place. 

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Claimer - At least one of the persons is caricatured for effect. Creative license I think it is called. But not too much!

Writing

My first love.
My better half.
My greatest romance,
I met you perhaps
When I was 6 or 7.
You took me to a forest
And made me it's Princess.
Sitting on that Madurai terrace
With its interesting
Nooks and crannies.
I could understand
All the animalSpeak
And they understood me.
Under that darkening sky,
I was alone;
And yet not at all.
Lost in the sounds and sights and smells
Of the forest;
In finding you,
I found myself that day,
When I was 6 or 7.
I started writing!
"I am the Princess of the forest...."
I won't go further, don't worry,
Into the strange pathways
Of the 6 or 7-years old forest.

As expected,
The romance of the first years
Is unbelievable, isn't it?
My autocorrect typed in - "unreliable".
Freudian slip, that?
Romancing you,
I poured poetry and my soul
Into a zillion pages.
Well, at least a fifty of them.
Into a thick diary,
Which saw its early death
In one of the many passages,
Through rented houses
That middle class Indian families
Go through like a pack of cards.
Childhood gone too early,
I didn't know to grieve my diary.
I replaced the romance
With expectations,
As expected.

You stayed with me,
As I wandered through Life.
Even as I took you
For granted.
We met under the night sky sometimes
With the stars and the moon
And the solitary plane.
We met,
When I searched everywhere
For my specs,
And then found them in my pocket!
We met,
When I felt like it,
When I got sad,
When I wanted to impress someone,
or make them laugh.
When excitement filled the air,
Or perhaps melancholy.
You taught me humour,
And looking closely.
You taught me to do Life,
While I made you wait.

I decided,
That I wanted marriage.
I planned much
For all its trappings.
Complete with a house,
Garden, children and dogs,
Dimming lights for romantic evenings,
And bean bags for rainy days.
Red oxide flooring and earthern ware,
As local as possible,
For that is sustainable. ..
But dreams were also made up of:
Vacations in Bhutan and Srilanka
For I wanted to understand neighbours.
Foreign to myself slowly,
And you as well.

Somewhere,
Along the way,
I don't know where,
All of a sudden,
I found you gone.
And panicked.
You then came and went
As you pleased.
I threw tantrums
Kicked and screamed
Till I was blue.
Kicked some more,
Screamed some more,
Cried a whole lot more...
You seemed to soften
And said, "look closely"
And much to my chagrin,
Went away again!
Paths dried up,
Garden withered,
Poof!
The castle in the air,
Became one with it.
Dark all around,
Dimming lights be damned!
The rest of that story,
As they say is history.
Or Herstory,
Of losing and finding herself.

Flash forward to present.
I am sitting with you,
You still inspire me
To be my best.
You say,
"All I want is,
Your attention.
Your presence.
Be with me.
Whatever follows,
Follows."
Watching,
An innocuous mug
In an innocuous bathroom,
Get filled with water,
The sound,
Changing as the mug
Gets from empty to full-
When I am with you,
I am no longer innocuous.

I redo,
My vows with you.
I want nothing,
Out of you.
I want nothing,
Because of you.
I would much rather
Have these moments
Of sitting with you
And having you
Do Life, do me,
In my most private moments.
I would much rather
Just have you along,
For the conversation
And company,
As I get squished in a crowded bus,
Or am triggered by a commercial ad,
Feeling loved amongst friends,
Or like a worm after a shouting match,
Satisfied after a successful workshop,
Not getting enough FB likes!
Or getting too much,
Of unwanted counsel....
I just want you to be.
Through it all.

Garbage everywhere,
Overflowing bins too small
To hold,
the world's unresolved emotions.
When I feel too small,
And inadequate...
Or too big, grandiose --
Or anybody in between,
Spewing out garbage-
Nonetheless,
You hold me
Through it all.
Making life art
Making new meaning,
Making over,
Making love,
You make me art. 

Its a New Love Story

What do you do

When you fall in Love

All over again? 

You've been with him,

Twenty years. 

Touched heights of ecstasy,

Together,

And sunk to the depths of despair. 

You've been with him,

While separated and apart

Not understanding - 

Why & how he's within. 

You've been with him,

Thru' the times without. 

While he'was changing

To a different he.

And you'ere changing 

To a different you.

Time leaves her marks. 

It's another he, now.

And another you. 

Inexorably drawn together

Yet again,

By some ancient, secret rhythm-

That makes you dance with him. 

For him. 

Names have not changed;

It seems like,

The same old husband-

And wife,

Making comfortable home & hearth.

And yet. 

It's a new Love Story,

That you both are narrating. 

Fresh, like the morning dew. 

Of hearts in tune - 

Learning to sing together,

The many songs of life,

Blending, seasoning... 

So, what do you do? 

You write a poem,

About falling in Love again,

And the promise

Of being held by it

And holding it. 

Just Another Crow Story

The crow is cawing
on the neighbour's terrace,
trying to wake up the Sun-
And light up her dark world,
Of Disgust. 
She has been cleaning.
Cleaning and cleaning and cleaning...
Underneath pure carpets
Behind pure masks.

She can still smell the stench
Of carefully cooked food
Grinded and devoured through,
In the halls of Purity,
Until the arrival of burps. 

She can feel her skin burning,
From the sacred fire,
Carefully stoked and tended to,
By its pure caretakers-
To transform to the grey dust
that she remembers
from the crematorium. 

The beautiful chants,
that are not meant for 
dirty ears and impure minds
still reverberate in hers. 

She sees these portals of Purity 
Her mind's eyes turning Red,
As she contemplates her anger and disgust. 

With a sigh of quiet resolve,
She turns to the day ahead,
And her work of scavenging
Her eyes turning yellow and blue. 

As the sun comes up
I see the crow take wing,
And explode
Into a flurry of colours - 
Mynah,
Drongo,
King Fisher,
Bee-eater,
Roller,
Seven sisters,
Sun-bird,
Treepie...

Living the Question

It lay dormant for many years, ages. in the dark, comfortable, cosy. No water could reach it, and not the sunlight. the passage of time, the revolution of the planet, ushered in some moonlight, Some movement, in the worlds above.

They say faith moves mountains. Have you seen mountains move? now, a teacher’s faith! She brought in fresh air; The ground started breathing, and having conversations.

The sun reached in, and touched the shadows and questions. “Is the individual for society, or society for the individual?”

Water rushed in, ever-loyal to gravity and conversation flowed – “Does name matter? Work is work; water is the form of its container.”

One uncomfortable morning, the ground broke. And the young one peeped out, eyes covered. To discover the forest. Conversations abound nourishing, strengthening, questioning, the sweat and blood of growing up.

Yet another morning, not so uncomfortable, the not-so-young-one found purpose. More conversation, “Can there be an individual purpose? What is a wall? Robert Frost knew the secret.

‘Something there is that doesn’t love a wall’ roots uproot, here in the forest. creepers grow thick as thieves, and create gaps, walls crumble. Even the Berlin one did. and the great China one, is on its way there. Do the tourist, you will see.”

On this morning, fresh after the rains, the smell of beauty rising from the ground;

Fluttering its leaves, dancing with the breeze standing, with friends and family, and community, Here is the neem, There is the tamarind, and the peepal, the banyan, the young ones, the herbs and the flowering, the thorny and the leafy....

the direction seems clear, and yet not so much.

“My shade is for the asking, the fruits will come in season, twigs for firewood grass underneath for cows and goats. And yet, What is it that I am doing? What is just me? Kabir says to his Lord: You, are the bigness in the elephant, and the smallness in the ant,”

Asks the not-young-one,

“What makes the I-ness in the I? Fruits arrive naturally.”

- Priya

A Story around Tiruvannamalai's Trees

I am sort of fuzzy about what exactly I am looking or appealing for, or what I found, (missing) that this story emerged.  Am I asking for media and public communication to look for truths / actualities? Am I asking consumers to open their eyes and really look at media what news and how it is fed to them? Is it a politics of inclusion that I want as a native? A little human kindness maybe (from whom however)? Do I want to prescribe everyone a dose (or more) of pantheism?  Or could it be that I want a giant sci-fi lever / button that mutes or extinguishes altogether, all partisan agendas [except mine of course! ;)]?

The Scene

There is a crisis brewing in Tiruvannamalai around the issue of razing down stretches of forest trees to make way for a wider Girivalam road. When this matter first raised its head around a month back, it became known that authorities were simply planning on wiping away a tract of land - trees, insects, worms, birds, snakes, mongooses, civets and all, without any citizens' forums participation, any consultation etc.  Concerned people got together and the information was passed around overnight.  A group of us came together to form a human chain and protest this arbitrary action (although I am certain that each of us had our own agendas of protest - against the arbitrariness or against the actual action or for protecting the ecological and / or spiritual-cultural heritage or plain against the pro-Development attitude of authorities...).

Plot Development
I had been kicked to see that quite some people gathered on that day to form the human chain. There may have been 80 people or so. Perhaps.  A minuscule fragment of the population of Tiruvannamalai, yes, however, that this crowd was possible overnight was heartening for me. Many in the crowd, including me, were taking part in a protest of this sort for the first time.  During the informal eve of the human chain formation, the trees smiled down gently at comradely introductions (but of course, pun intended), information and assumption bullets and bombs, warrior announcements of intent, hesitant appeals, and the like, and some miscellaneous gossip.  Nevertheless, spirits were steady.  The early morning ambience of this town, and the trees, and oh! the mountain, facilitate a steady heartbeat. Or so I like to imagine!

I perceived the usual shrinking violets, the c----e (aspirants?), rebels, the wise ones, dreamers, the organisers, the public speakers, private speakers, and the parents and their children.  Many different types and stereo-types had turned up.  The monkeys and the sadhus were missing.  A sudden bubble call-out from my head with a human chain, complete with Rhesus macaques and the lion-tailed macaques and peacocks along with the humans, gave me a secret thrill.

A couple of the representative voices (leadership qualities and all) gathered the group together in order for individuals to make statements of protest (say their piece basically).  At around this time the media people came in, complete with their weaponry and artillery.  And just like that, the mood of the crowd changed.  Introductions became emphatic identities, announcements of intent became swords of ultimatums, and appeals became demands. Heartbeats quickened. High spirits abound in a matter of minutes.

Then we formed the human chain (complete with the macaques in my bubble). And someone suggested silence. The mountain and the trees and the temple town persist. Or so I like to imagine! Blessed, blissful silence.  For a few minutes.

As we broke apart, still in the stillness, there was a commotion down the road, and many things started happening at once. Some of the organisers were running towards the commotion and some others away from it, and a lone bulldozer was coming down the road and grinding to a halt by the side of the road beside the precious trees, the media people started running to the scene of action / crime.  Of course, high spirits had to take over, town and trees and mountain be damned.

Climax?
What followed can be called ignominy or a mini revolution or achievement / success or disaster averted (for the time being), or a comedy show, or cheap thrills or all of this, depending on how one is looking at it.

Seeing a large crowd advancing towards it, the driver of the bulldozer, the solitary enemy, quickly got down from the large machine and scooted away to some spot where he could be far away from the high spirits and yet close to his responsibility.

High spirits then proceeded to take over the machine, conquered it by sitting on its hood and gathering around it and making fierce and brave statements, and shouting slogans to the camera.  Reassured that he will come to no harm (I dont know how), the driver came back to his machine, and started it.  Spirits got down and stood in front of it, facing the front, and the camera captured a sensational sequence wherein we were saying, "we will not let them take over the trees, our land, our rights" (or some such) and in the background the bulldozer can be seen backing up all the way to the curve in the road at a safe distance.

Spirits descended slowly.  We were all told that we have been able to buy some time.  Some background work had been happening in the meanwhile and a meeting had been fixed further in the day with the Officials to discuss this and appeal for proper proceedings.  A show of hands went up to join this meeting and we started dispersing.

The Real Story according to me
As the morning faded away, I had a conversation in the sidelines with one of the people behind the scenes.  Paraphrasing what this person told a couple of us:  You know, the driver was so sweet. I was talking to him after he ran away there (pointing), and he was telling me, "what can I do, tell me! I was one of the people who planted some of these trees in the periphery and I have seen these trees and this forest all my life.  I don't want to do this.  But this is my job and my responsibility and the sole income for my family.  So I have to do this also.  But it is not my fault, is it?"

Plot Resolution re-titled The Dream | Cynic's Title: Utopia | Working Title: Siddhanta
The yoga practitioner and teacher in me was quietly insisting that all it needed was for us to pause. In between breaths. P A U S E.  And when we start cultivating Pause, we would stop to consider, listen to the other, widen space for conscious choices, perceive the inter-relatedness and connections between people and people, people and nature, between one tree and the other, between the worms and the plants, between children and mud, between human and divine, between you and me, and see one as the other.  Then we would take into account everything that there is to take into account, be alive and awake to the dharmasankatas created therein.  Like the dharmasankata of the driver.  He had to do what he had to do through the internal conflict that he was going through.  What would I have done had I been in his place? What would he have done had he been in my place? Could we have highlighted his story as a way of opening dialogue around this issue (and others)? Can politics expand to include all kinds of developments? Can we pause to look at and listen to those trees that we claim to protect? Can we inhale their energy and learn from them? Is that possible? What are they whispering? Could we include monkeys and sadhus and the local women and their children in the conversation?  How can we remain alive to everyone's truths at the same time?

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PS - We have a stay order on the cutting of the trees. They are hanging in the air at present.  I also dont mean to offend any individual in my story.  Much of it is in humour with a dollop of sarcasm to spice it up, while asking some questions. 

The Importance of Role Playing

I started out thinking how important role play is in a child's life. This has been a constant experience and exploration for some time now because my daughter (who is nearly 5 years old now) cannot let an hour go by without engaging in some sort of a role play game / activity. 

She plays "Housing" with her friend, wherein she is the mother, and A, her friend, is the father, and they together make and keep a home, filling it with all the activities that they see their adults do. 

She plays with her dolls, assigning them different characters and enacts stories / scenarios of her own making. (She has a weird variety of soft toys that includes a dinosaur, frog, rat, elephant, dog, reindeer, rabbit, rag dolls, and of course, a couple of teddy bears. None of which we bought!)

She dances to music and at various times, with different kinds of music, assumes different characters and roles. 

She masquerades as a mother, to a little red doll that she carries around.  She feeds it, sometimes from a bottle, or from her hand, sometimes breastfeeds it; plays with it, puts it to bed, scolds it, cuddles it, gives it a bath, combs its hair and is oh-so-protective.  Then suddenly she throws it up in the air, and when I look at her with shock, she says, "Amma, it's a doll, a non-living thing, and I am K! okay?" Oops! Okay. 

She talks to her imaginary friends.  These are sometimes created out of her imagination, are characters from the stories she hears at other times, and at times real-time friends or family or relatives, but who are imagined to be there at that point. 

This list can go on for pages.  Her latest favourite is that she is our dog's wife and she goes about on all fours, woofs at him, howls at the sky, nudges and rubs against him, and then gets up to announce that she is his wife. 

I was seeing, enjoying and experiencing with delight what I have known in theory and seen glimpses of.  That children process so much of their lives, their emotions, their joys and insecurities and so on through their role playing. I was seeing how formative and vital these stories and role play are to her image of herself and the world around her.  She is building stories about herself, about the people around her, about things, and all the emerging relationships.  

What followed this initial delight was also a lot of conflict, guilt many times, much joy of course, and also intense struggle for me.  Sometimes I would pick up a fear that I was sensing, some other time it would be a want or need.  Once she clearly communicated through her mother play that she felt I had no business doing some particular activity.  I felt completely in quandary about what I should do with all this rich data that I was receiving. I would sift through many options and try to see how am I to use what she just expressed , to do the right thing. And I sank deeper and deeper into this quicksand of action. 

And then it all fell into place as I started writing this piece. Role playing is important, not just for a child, for my daughter.  It is as, or more important, for adults, for me.  True that we discover, and develop if allowed to, this art / skill when we are children.  But it is so vital to nourish this and even "use" it perhaps as adults as well, in order for us to process our emotions and gain stable ground. I recognised that along with her, I had also been engaging in all the role playing, until I started analysing it and trying to use it. I had been feeling, experiencing, enacting, myriad things right along with her through the stories and the playing. And much was happening in the play.  So much healing.  So many stories were getting told.  Old ones discarded, new ones born, Old ones re-told.  New understandings. Insights.  Emotions were filling us and then draining away.  Without us getting drained in this process.  It was all happening in the lyrical and mystical language of stories and role playing.  It can continue to do so.  I don't have to "do" anything about it.  I am simply going to sit back and enjoy the ride! 

Kapoor and Sons - Understated, Yet Emotional

One of the wonderful things about this movie is that no character in it is perfect.  They all have interesting, even darker, shades to them, just as all of us do.  The family is far, far from perfect, just like any of our families.  And yet, we come to like each of the characters in the movie quite a bit.  Especially the grandfather, Dadu (Rishi Kapoor), although he is too flamboyant, a bit like a peacock among pigeons.  However, we take him in stride as part of the mess that family and relatives are and can be. Maybe, especially because he is raucous, contradictorily, quietly so.  Although towards the end, the sudden bit of teary-eyed noise that he makes over the internet asking his grandsons to come back, is a little unconvincing. Yes it is after a death, and deaths change people, but I still felt that he would have done better doing a semi-naked jig with a young thing, that would have jolted his grandsons and forced them to come back and find out for themselves whether he has gone (completely) cuckoo. Would have been more in line with the character.  However.

The pigeons turn out to be kingfishers and bee-eaters. They each carry shadows, which inadvertently come out in the open when they all get together after a long time and stay home for a while.  Thank god almighty that it is not yet another Bollywood wedding that we are attending.  It is rather a more macabre situation of Dadu having had a heart attack that we are called hurriedly to. Just like this instance, I find much of the movie built around ordinary, usual middle-class family happenings and things and sink into it like into a bean bag with a sigh - death and heart attack, bickering over bills and money at the breakfast table, a father screaming at his younger son about not keeping his job, the seemingly perfect and responsible first child, the faded romance of middle aged parents hinting at a once-alive togetherness and harmony, sibling rivalry... In the middle of all this, bursts and moments of love, affection and connection - the quick hug that the mother gives her son, a shared look of understanding between them, the brothers starting to fight over who has their parents' affection but then suddenly laughing about the obvious reality that they both perceive, the grandfather's mischief with his grandsons (smoking weed, no less!), apple pie(!) and more, scattered across the film's duration.

I loved it that there were not primary emotions or themes that categorised the first and second half of the movie.  Although yes, the plot moved quite effortlessly, smoothly into conflict by the end of the first half, and the little moments and hints into relationships and characters gradually build up to this publicly disastrous breakdown wherein every person in the immediate family is furious or hurt about every other.  By "smoothly into conflict" (which sounds oxymoronic) I mean there was a logical sequence to the events and the movement into conflict did not look artificial and contrived. And so, while this sequencing took its time and got our attention, it somehow felt like, the resolution of conflicts, re-building of bridges and relationships, and life returning to a new normal, was not given enough space and work.  It all seemed too pat towards the end and a little too understated perhaps.  Despite this, it works, and I shed some tears and laughed a lot and felt much.

As a soppy, sentimentalist who wants happy endings all around, what I cant wrap my heart around is Harsh's (Rajat Kapoor) death.  Should we necessarily have some part of the ending sad?  Like in Shamitabh. Why was death so necessary for the conclusion of the film? That too when here, Rathna Pathak and Rajat Kapoor carry the burdens, the heavies and the lightnesses of their relationship with such aplomb, such sincerity, I feel their ache, that wispy thread of hope when they connect, the sense of utter hopelessness when the morning-after explodes in their faces, and then again, a tentative reaching out - the phone call, and then WHAM! why do film makers do that?

I felt much more for the older couple than the younger one, which is the one thing I have not mentioned at all until now - Arjun (Siddharth Malhotra) and Tia's (Alia Bhatt) romance. I somehow didn't feel the explicit need for a man-woman romance in the midst of the family drama (it already had its own romance - the larger kind), except that, hey, this is India, and this is Bollywood - what will we do without a woman to catch the attention of one of the protagonists and vice versa.  However, what can be said about it is that it is, like other parts of the movie, understated yet poignant in its own way.  It could also be that a Tia was needed to hold Siddharth to the place, to bring him back home again and also to bring out his softer side. Love / romance can do that.  And Alia Bhatt does a great job, carrying Tia's shadows and manifesting her own style of light.

The elder son's character is totally inspired! Fawad Khan's character is Rahul. I mean, Rahul! A name like that, and you've got to watch the movie to know why this character is a subversion of Bollywood.  Although, Fawad Khan takes some time to warm up to Rahul. His punch was greater in Khubsoorat, and it struck me that the mother and son duo was the same in that movie as well.

Speaking of subversions, I feel that there is much in this movie that subtly subverts Bollywood cliches while still being established firmly as popular, mainstream cinema. Bravo, Shakun Batra.

Rest, An Oasis

Image from Barrybuzza.com

The necessity of resting and the results of not resting seem to be so overwhelmingly evident that it would almost seem a foregone conclusion that all of us would undertake to secure this necessary comfort for ourselves.  However, this is not actually the situation and hence the case for resting is stated, re-stated, and repeatedly and tirelessly emphasised in different and diverse contexts.

There is this (awe-inspiring for me) story in the Mahabharata (among many such) from the time of the great war.  Arjuna and his divine charioteer, Krishna enter the tight and skillfully arranged vyuham (a classical formation, strategic positioning and arrangement of the military) of their opponents - this is after the murder of Abhimanyu and Arjuna has vowed to avenge his son's death by killing his killers; they have to reach the centre of the vyuham before sunset that day.  So, after a long, hard day of intense fighting, and still some way to go before reaching their goal, and dusk fast approaching, Krishna actually says that his horses cannot go any further without their water and rest! Then, cool-as-you-please, the duo proceed to do the needful - Krishna stops the chariot, un-tethers his horses; Arjuna invokes an astra and materialises a pond full of water for the horses while continuing to fight, now on foot.  When the horses are rested, lovingly taken care of by their master (I am utterly charmed by descriptions of how much Krishna loved his horses and how he took care of them), he tethers them back to the chariot, Arjuna gets nimbly onto the chariot, still fighting.  And they continue towards the nucleus.  All in a day's work!

I was of course completely taken by the animal-care angle of the story, as well as the unflappable quotient of the scene and its protagonists.  It beats Vijay's cool-as-cucumber Gilli hands down! However, one of my yoga teachers offered yet another meaning to the metaphor - that of the vaahanam (a vehicle, that which carries). That we need to give utmost care and attention to the vaahanam. And that this body is the vaahanam of my spirit, my being.  Hence, we need to pay attention to the body and take care of it.  The body is the instrument of action.

Right in the middle of that bloody war and destruction, an oasis was created for the horses to drink water and take rest. And this is exactly what our bodies (and hence eventually minds - we are a psychosomatic unity no matter how much we try to divide and isolate parts of ourselves) need: the oases of rests, now and then, here and there.

Image from tonydering.com

One kind of rest is of course sleep, and it is well known that as human beings, we do need sleep to function. The contribution of sleep to restoring, repairing, healing, building the immune system, enhancing our creative processes and maintaining the nervous system etc cannot be overstated.  All one has to do is go without sleep for a couple of days to experience what lack of sleep can do to one, just like Shwetaketu went without food for many days to understand what happens.  However I am not sure about an optimum because this would vary from person to person according to their lifestyle, occupation, individual particularities and so on.  Even for one individual, the number of hours needed sleeping may change depending on season, his / her health conditions, foods consumed, recent daily activities and so on.  Each individual may need to experiment and observe to arrive at how many hours of sleep he / she needs on an average.

We also need other kinds of rest oases besides sleeping.  The oasis could be for a few minutes or hours or extend to rest days.  It depends on how much one needs to slow down, recuperate and recharge.  Or completely stop for the time being - if one has overused or abused the body so much.  But rest, we must.

- Taking that one, long breath and checking that you have taken everything that you need before you step out that door could be rest

- Having that cup of tea or coffee sitting, one sip at a time, could give you the rest you need rather than gulping it down as you try to finish other tasks

- A relaxing yoga practice at the end of a working day

- Putting aside everything else and giving your child your complete attention while answering his / her question

- a 15-minutes power nap

- Playing with the dogs when they are frisky and asking for your time

- Stopping in the middle of frenzied activity to sit down and do some praanayaama; you may find the frenzy melting away

-  Just closing your eyes and massaging them by placing gentle palms on them

- Sitting and folding clothes neatly and carefully, without creases, with ends meeting, no tails hanging out

- Washing the dishes while washing the dishes to wash the dishes (Read Thich Nhat Hanh's Miracle of Mindfulness)

- Listening to your favourite piece of music

- Practicing S-L-O-W motion in activity

- Giving your vocal chords a chance to be without work for some time - indulging in some quiet time

- Staring out into the infinite blue of the ocean and breathing with the waves (if you live on the coast of course)

- Taking a long walk without needing to get some place

- Bathing in moonlight and watching the moon climb up the sky

- Learning, practicing and creating Kolams in front of my house, especially pulli kolams

The above are some of my favourite oases of rest.  You would of course have / discover your own besides.  Happy resting! 

Sthirasukhamaasanam, the Magic of the Breath

Sthirasukhamaasanam - II.46, Yoga Sutra

Aasana (seat / posture) is that which is replete with well-being and stability. 

This statement from Patanjali's Yoga Sutra demonstrated itself recently and allowed me a 'profound' experience in a 'mundane' context. The experience yet again removed one of these divisions that we impose on our understanding for convenience - that of phenomena being either profound or mundane.  The profound is to be found in the mundane, and the mundane, in the profound. 

 My daughter and I were traveling in a suburban bus and it was a 2 and 1/2 hour ride. And what a ride it was!  We didn't get seats and the only available were behind the driver right up in the front.  This was one of those Volvo buses where the driver's space is a compartment by itself and the seat behind the driver is almost on top of him. As you may be able to gauge from the picture, it is an extremely precarious position - or at least it surely felt like it to me! With an infant to carry, even more so. You are looking down on a zooming road, vehicles hurtling at you (in your face) at godforsaken speeds, perched on a seat which doesn't want you. The dubious comfort of holding onto something stable (although what is stable about a stampeding huge contraption on the ECR is beyond me) is denied you because both your hands are somehow tied up with securing your child to yourself.  She needs to sleep; this is necessary if you want to ensure that the rest of the day passes in comfort for her and you and other poor, unsuspecting souls around.  And your child particularly needs a good amount of comfort to fall asleep and stay in sleepyland for a while.  I thought kids came possessing the secret knowledge to dozing off in any awkward, bizarre position; this one missed those lessons.  

We have here a situation worthy of Adisesha, the thousand-headed snake holding the Lord as he rests. The story goes that sage Patanjali (who gave us the Yoga sutra) is the incarnation of Adisesha.  While discussing this sutra, sthirasukhamaasanam, one of my teachers, an ardent fan of Patanjali, asked me to consider: "Who is the enemy of the snake? The eagle.  And who is the eagle hovering around Vishnu? Garuda.  So Adisesha had to feel and be sthiram (stable) and sukham (comfortable) while Garuda is around."  He is holding the Lord; he doesn't want to be shifting around to get rid of pins and needles.  He also does not want to make one wrong move, lest the eagle swoops.  Absolute stillness under fire.  One's aasanam to be called thus, has got to be sthiram and sukham not simply in favourable conditions; it's got to be so in the most seemingly 'unfavourable' situations. 

I struggled around awkwardly for a while, adjusting bags, trying to hold onto something, shifting my daughter in my arms to get her comfortable, with her protesting about the movement.  Then the bus lurched. Almost falling, I steadied myself and happened to look up at the road.  Two things happened simultaneously at that moment.  I saw the whizzing scenery in front of me and felt the thrill, the adrenaline rush of danger, and also caught sight of a woman in the driver's rear view mirror.  She was holding a baby, and I said, "Hey, that's a yoga teacher I know!"  The world shifted on its axis, and I exhaled slowly, and long, feeling it in my throat (as how one does while doing aasana practice).*  Then, an inhale. Another long exhale.  A few more such breaths.  With that, my body's intelligence took over.  Without thought, just like that, my body changed my position, I adjusted my legs so that they don't hang, held my daughter securely allowing her to merge more into my space, turned slightly and leaned against the window, all in a graceful flash of a moment (at least, I felt graceful).  

See picture alongside, for the changed position, not to see a graceful curve, or lack of it thereof.  Incidentally, this position also had more butt-space, the comfort of which was infinite.  We seldom are conscious and thankful of it when we usually sit on comfortable, full-butt spaces, are we? I think Thich Nath Hanh called it, to be aware of the non-tooth ache feeling.  

Now with every breath, the space of "aasanam" was welcoming me into it and enfolding me more and more.  The bus twisted and tottered and teetered, the breath held the world steady.  My heart now rat-a-tatted in a peaceful rhythm, and my daughter sighed as she burrowed deeper into sleep.  I was at the same time, quite still all over, and also intensely alive and aware to the scenes and smells streaking past, in slow motion.  I became very aware of the people around, and started judging correctly how the bus was going to move next by looking at the driver's subtle movements (his hands, where he looked, in which direction and how his body inclined as he drove etc).  My  entire being simply, constantly re-adjusted itself to the changes such that it can allow my daughter to be comfortable.  So the body actually felt like a bean bag, completely giving in and squished and relaxed to accommodate the sleeping child and yet alert (even joyous) to the vagaries of the bus and the road, maintaining stillness. The breath kept working it's magic.   

Eventually, my daughter woke up, and we both thoroughly enjoyed the sights and sounds offered to us, ate some idlis and got off at our stop happily.  

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* The shift that happened in that split second in the recognition of the yoga teacher is worthy of an independent inquiry and is not within the scope of this piece