To discard a sock

This post speaks of my adventures whilst packing to move to Seattle. One dominant feature of my moves before has been the crap I carry with me from place to place. Now, believe you me, simply saying 'crap' in the previous sentence took a lot of will power. Why? We shall get to that now.

Attachment. I am horribly attached to all those little knick knacks from back home. I brought a boatload of socks, underwear, shirts, pants, zoo animals, cooking stuff, masalas and other paraphernalia with me when I came to the US in 2008. You would not believe how hard it has been to get rid of any of these things except for the zoo animals of course ( ha! Didn't think I was coming back to that did you? ). They sort of ran off on their own once I landed.

The masalas went first. This was mostly just because they expired and had to be thrown out to avoid digestive distress. As I cast each packet out I would read the label or the manufacturing information or some other piece of banal writing and I would be overcome by homesickness. Or perhaps in this case I should say retail homesickness.

A bunch of the clothes went next and this was thanks to bedbugs. Gainesville being a college town seems to attract a fair number of these pests and once they strike it is infernally difficult to get rid of them. I have known some of these little demons to survive a wash and dry process. Even if you squash one you end up with a nice red splotch on whatever surface the little cretin decided to claim for itself. So I bundled a lot of these infested clothes up in garbage bags and put them out in the Floridian sun. Every time I would walk back in to the flat from classes or something I would see those bags sitting there; gathering dust, bugs, leaves, friends of aforementioned bugs, twigs and the occasional spider. Every glance resulted in guilt lancing into me as I remembered my mother picking those clothes out for me, packing them the night before I left and so on. Never once during those spirit quests did I remember that these clothes did not really fit me anymore (No one had told me about the miraculous cloth shrinking abilities of the dryer machine) and so I suffered. Eventually I tossed them out when I moved to NJ.

The move to NJ was good because I drove up in my Corolla and so I could only carry stuff that fit in there. A lot of clothes went out of the proverbial window and I was only carrying a semi boatload of crap which at this point consisted of expired medicines, torn socks (yes, they survived the culling), dry socks (not to be confused with the torn ones), shrunk shirts (yes, there were more), shrunk pants (though not to the extent of becoming shorts. The shrinkage alas was proportional) and a lot of masalas and cooking utensils. How did the masalas get a second wind? Well, I went to India again and guess what I brought back with me. Yes. Exactly. More masalas. This time in bigger more expensive looking packets optimized to enhance guilt like never before.

Most of the drive, Jamie and I had to estimate what the rear view mirror was showing since we could not see it completely due to the stacked guitar cases and half stack head. 'Twas a fun journey.

The real culling came when I moved from 40 Newport Parkway to 30 Newport Parkway, which are actually neighboring buildings in the same bloody compound. The bed bugs returned for round 2 (Now presenting! Saving private bug and Behind exterminator lines) and even more clothes went into the trash. This time there were images of my mom taking me to the tailors and getting these stitched out interspersed with my her rants on how much it cost and also an unabridged accounting of the trouble I was causing her. How much more could I take before I broke?

Pots and pans into the chute
Torn socks too, no they're not cute
Shirts and pants, that fit no more
Hand them over, they're out the door
Spice and powder, long gone from grace
Rather shoot your tummy in the face
They all must go, they all must go
this pathetic rhyme must end somehow

All of this led to the present. Scene opens on yours truly sitting on a bed holding a disgruntled looking sock with a truly contemplative expression. Just to clarify, the contemplative expression was on my face and not on the sock though perhaps in a parallel dimension there was a sock with...right, back to topic. This guy had made it all the way from India in 2008 to Jersey City in 2012 and it felt almost like a crime to toss him away. I did end up doing it however. Each article of clothing thrown into the trash bags causing yet another tiny wound to open up inside.

Here's the thing though, while it hurts to throw stuff away, it is also amazingly therapeutic. Ever heard about the whole "Letting go" line of thought? Well, it's true. You accumulate so much stuff through the course of your travels that it starts weighing you down both figuratively and literally. Letting go of these things is liberating and you can move on along whatever course you are holding to.

All that being said, I am still going to have to put some major fires out when my mom comes to visit. I can already hear it "Where's that blue shirt? I had to fight predator to get that tailor to safety so that he could stitch it for you. People died Nikhil! People died!" and so on.

So yeah, in memory of that sock and it's brethren.

-Magus.

To stay or to leave.

In recent weeks a big question has been doing the rounds in my head. "Should I leave Newport and move to Brooklyn?". This post shall be a discussion of most of what has transpired.

When I first sensed the presence of this question I shuddered inside and then outside (in that order). I did not want to leave this place. I had come to visit a good friend (now my room-mate) and had fallen in love with this place. Walking on the riverside is one of my favorite things to do and most of my friends have at one point of time or the other threatened to bludgeon me to death if I mention taking a stroll. I love Newport, I love the fact that I step out of the apartment and take a few paces and presto! I am on the waterfront walkway. I like that another few paces and I am at Morton Williams which despite being a burning example of the term "Daylight robbery" is still a convenient place to get basic groceries at. A little bit of a longer walk in yet another direction and one finds oneself in Hoboken which despite being called a New York wannabe by many a New York city resident is still quaint and charming.

Add to the above the fact that the commute to work is a breeze and the commute to practice with my band is a...some other form of wind..a gale..wait no...let me just call it another breeze for now.

How can this be a bad place to live in?

While I want to say, it isn't, the answer is not quite as black and white.

Most of the residents of Newport are the Bourgeoise of the current day and age. The majority of these residents work in IT (like your's truly) and they are great examples of the planned trajectories that Indian lives tend to follow. Living here and seeing these people is like seeing what my life is going to be a few years from now. I see people trying so hard to convince themselves that they are happy, not trying to simply be happy even though that might be infinitely easier preached than practiced. I see couples immersed in the "system" and if one looks closely one can see the cables that run from them into some place that the human eye cannot see but where the "system" is conceivably housed. I see kids and sometimes I ignore them completely and some other times I feel like punching their lights out. The perfect neutrality of the world overwhelms my senses and I am left in a state akin to nirvana but more Cobain than the dalai lama.

Just when I am about to erupt in a puff of cynicism I see a few couples who look like they might be alright. The dude looks not like a complete zombie and the female not like a complete harpie and they seem to be having not a completely horrid time. Perhaps due to some combination of the above three the cable though present is frayed. Perhaps that's as good as it gets.

So then I had friends and acquaintances tell me about moving to Brooklyn since apparently that's where all the cool people are. Brooklyn seems to be full of the young crowd with a fair smattering of hipsters and so on.There are places which are nice and then some which are not so nice. I for one did not find anything special with the place. I also did not understand one of the main points in their reasoning which had to do with hanging out being made easier if we moved to Brooklyn. I did not get this since even from Newport Brooklyn is only two trains away neither of which are a pain to ride. Over and above all of this, my being just did not resonate with Brooklyn.

Every time I considered moving away from Newport a weird sort of dread seemed to take hold of my heart and to be entirely honest I do not know what this is. By no means do I intend to live the rest of my life in Newport but I think that when I eventually do find "home" it will be a place that is similar to Newport in geography and location. I think my home will be a place very very close to if not on water. Perhaps I should have taken up my father's vocation and gone sailing the seven seas.

Water indicates escape. An opening. A path for you to take if the world becomes too much to bear. I don't mean chuck yourself into the drink and die, I mean to sail away. I see dark ships making their way slowly past the lights of New York, the water disturbed in their wake slap against the not so old stones of the pier in exchange place and within this ancient rhythm one can almost make out whispers of far away lands and stories of people. I see one of these ships and I remark to whoever is standing closest "I wish I could be on that". On a dark ship heading to destinations unknown.

The wind in Brooklyn is different, it speaks of different things, new things. It is a controlled wind, hurt at being regulated through so many narrow openings and gaps between buildings which struggle amongst each other for space. It strives to be free but stumbles and fades away into a few whispers that softly lap at your face as if in farewell. The wind in Newport (when it blows) is mighty. It is free and comes roaring in off the hudson and declares itself with that blatant confidence which only an ocean-born possesses. 

I stay because of the wind. I stay for the song of the water. I remain because there are many ships yet to leave the lights behind to travel the mighty seas.

Newport has it's faults, no doubt, but I love it for what it means to me. A place where I can be close to the water.

Quite a random and digressive post I admit, however I do believe that a few of the paragraphs do deserve some merit.

Until the next one and here's to hoping that no kids get clocked in the face.

Sentinel.

People who piss me off:


Chapter 1: The talker.


The talker is a fine specimen of the human race. As Ford Prefect once conjectured "They probably keep talking so that their brains don't freeze up" or something along those lines.


I've met a bunch of these people and almost every single encounter has resulted in me having a splitting headache. When one gets trapped into a conversation with a talker one has to drop hints with the same amount of subtlety involved in driving a tank through a china store. One has to visibly squirm, shiver and scowl and even then it might be all in vain.


Recently though I have had a couple of experiences with a talker that has left me shaken. I am a Malayalee hailing from the south Indian state of Kerala. As such I am aware that there is a fair amount of stigma associated with my people. It would not be an overstatement to say that we are infamous for a number of reasons. People poke fun at our food (coconut oil..!!! why is there coconut oil in my coffee??!!??), at our english (or Engleesh rather), our affinity to the gulf (all aboard the Duffai express) and also our adult movie industry (or whatever passes for it).


Now please, do not misunderstand me here, we fire our fair share of salvos at folk from other states. We are by no means the innocent victims here. However, all of my experiences in this regard have been good natured ribbing exchanged with my friends from other parts of the country. Keyword being "friends".


There are some privileges that are granted to people who become friends. I single that statement out since apparently some people are baffled by it.


I recently met a "person" who seems to have been made real as the result of someone pointing a wand at a steam roller and saying "I bid thee be". I say this not in any way referring to her physical attributes but her social ones. Within minutes of said fateful (read apocalyptic) meeting she had already insulted me multiple times with me being nothing short of a gentleman (Hey! I was at the very least keeping my yapper shut and minding my own business.). Over the course of a lunch that degenerated faster than the plot quality of a saas-bahu serial she kept taking shots at me.


It is very important that the reader knows that I am in no way incapable of responding to verbal spikes in english. This "person" though was a hindi speaker (in the same way that a hurricane is a form of wind) and every jibe was delivered in this hybrid of hindi and english and scarcely would I formulate a response before she would cackle in glee (much like a crone of yore) and launch into the next attack.


Never have I seen a display so steeped in vitriol.


It didn't help that the other folks who were with me understood her hindi perfectly and would laugh on cue with every spike. I am happy to say that I suffered through it all with good grace and quiet dignity and steadfastly ignored her from then on.


If our paths do cross again then I fear that I shall not be so calm. There is only so much one can bear before spewing out those magical words.


"SHUT THE DUCK UP!".


'Tis nice to know that there are people in the world for whom words like "Harridan","Crone","Harpy" and "Scarecrow" apply as well as they did in the age  in which they were coined.


There is much that I complain about and much else that I am glad for. One of the things I am very glad for is that at the very least I am not the sort of person one would cross the road in order to avoid. 


Maybe, that's good enough.


Magus.

Places and times.

Greetings all. How have you been since my last post? I wonder if questions like these point at either my megalomaniacal tendencies or mild schizophrenia.

Yesterday I drove to Philly to drop my friend's sister there. I have two modes of driving, if I am in a crowded area  I am quite cautious to the point of being a pain on the others in the car, if I am on the interstate I am the coolest cat on the planet (brrrring...brrrring....yeah, it's the 1980s and we want our vocabulary back).

So once we got out of the insane demolition derby-esque streets of Jersey city I relaxed and started looking around and actually enjoying the drive. Soon enough the motion was suggested and passed that we stop for coffee. We stopped for coffee.

The starbucks was located in this rest area off to the side of the interstate. There was nothing spectacular about the place, just another concrete monolith in a landscape dotted with such concrete monoliths.

As I stood outside sipping coffee with my friends I suddenly got struck by this feeling. There was a pleasant breeze (chilly but not arctic), it was that time of the afternoon where the sun decides to take a small nap and the clouds decide to arrange themselves in patterns pleasing to the eye. There were trees with dead leaves all around the place and the sun's light filtering through these threw dappled shadows on the ground. I opened my mouth and said "Man...this place is natural".

Considering the earlier statement about the concrete monoliths this was a most absurd statement to make. No matter how much I thought about though I could not bring myself to change it. This might partially have been due to my obstinacy but I would like to believe that at least some part of me truly felt that it was natural. Not natural in the sense of it being deeply entwined in nature. Natural in the sense of it just feeling right. The whole aura of the scene was one of complete and utter harmony.

I added a slight filter effect to the photo and a little blur but this is how it looked.

We roamed around in Philly for a while but since it was cold and getting dark we decided to head back after grabbing some Dunch at a Korean place (that's dinner + lunch in case you are wondering). I liked walking around in Philly, it felt great to be on a university campus again. It was then that I realized how much I missed just hanging out on the UF campus. There is something about that college environment which just makes one feel safe and that very same thing kicked in for me that day in Philly.

The drive back was also nice. After managing to successfully extricate ourselves from Philly we got onto the interstate and switched interstates a bunch of times including this one time where we were going in the exact opposite direction for a good while. It was dark and the lights everywhere were on.

I have always loved the lights at night especially when I am in a car. When I was a kid these experiences were always experienced from the backseat of the car which is infinitely better in my honest opinion than having to drive and try to see the place around you.

You are moving so fast that other people are just a blur. In that brief instant when eyes lock between cars at a light there is the true definition of the present. Infinitesimal contact severed once the light changes to green and suddenly we are all moving again. Is there meaning in all of these things or am I just trying to find significance where there is none? I wonder.

At this one point we got onto a huge bridge and all around us was some kind of industrial city kind of structure. Every building was studded with lights and the whole thing just looked so beautiful and out of this world. Ever since I was a kid I have had a fascination with yellow lights.

I was really young and sailing with my mom and dad on the ship. We went for dinner at this indian family's place somewhere in the US and on the way back I acquired this one memory which to this day has not left my side. I was drowsy and remember being steered by my dad. When we got back to the port area the entire place was dark except for the hundreds of yellow lamps all over. I remember being enthralled by them.

So the drive over the bridge was awesome and once again we descended into darkness.

I wish I had taken some pictures of the night drive but I did not and so it's only words, and words are all I have to take your mind there.

When you start feeling the weight of the world on your shoulders get in your car and drive somewhere nice. Roll those windows down and feel the wind roar. Squint your eyes against the mid morning sun's rays and breathe.....just breathe......and for once, let that be enough.

ainren.