Thought Jukebox

Une vie pour une vie.   I’ve been trying to find the words to express how devastating the events of last weekend in Paris, Beirut, Lebanon (and the world) have been. But, like most of us, the only emotion one can feel at the moment is that of utter helplessness. Anger, frustration, sorrow and fear are all secondary. It is extremely difficult to be optimistic when the world is falling apart around you, no longer the safe haven it was in your mind. We have no choice but to accept the reality of these very horrors- the crack in the glass fishbowl. There is nothing poetic and beautiful in loss. The romanticism of sorrow by poets and authors makes a mockery of life. Sorrow is not beautiful. But what it brings out from within a writer- that is what’s beautiful. I’ve been trying to string together words to express the emotions I feel, in support of all of us fighting the war for peace. Words may be a powerful weapon; especially words of solidarity- but these words mean so lit...

Life and Death are one; as are Love and the Sea. "Like all of us in this storm between birth and death, I can wreak no great changes on the world, only small changes for the better, I hope, in the lives of those I love". -Dean Koontz Hamlet’s “to be or not to be” dilemma has gone down in history as not just Shakespeare’s most famous soliloquy, but probably the most famous soliloquy of all time. And to the credit of words, there always has been certain magic to melancholy and defiance to despair. I think I could coin this ‘proverbial continuity’. For, considering that the subject of my last blog post centered on dilemmas, it seems as though we pick up right where we left off (albeit a few steps off-track). Or do we? Yes, life is riddled with dilemmas. And so was Hamlet’s. If not his struggle between life and death, morality and sin, that provided context to the play, it was his struggle to love or not to love Ophelia. If Oblivion was all that there was at the end of ...

The stars burned like the memories of brighter days, light years away from when I now take my walk. Do they spell to me a map of beautiful moments from my past or a future without? A dilemma stands before us all in the guise of two roads not taken- A divaricate, bi-forked future an only-seemingly simple choice that keeps us up days and nights. Do we let go of our pasts or hold on to it and make peace with the future, or do we hold on to both with what is left of a thin string, frayed at both ends? None of us has the capacity to wait in the anticipation. The stars have seen what is yet to happen and we cannot. These trials and tribulations in life make us, and break us. We have no choice but to talk to the moon on our many solitary nights together, as we take the walk and pause before the roads in front of us and take none. We live lives riddled with dilemmas, problems and sorrow. And whom do we blame for these dilemmas that span space and time? The Universe. We blame the indefina...

This post has been long overdue.  It feels great to be home- ink dipped in faith of what's yet to come. "Fairy tales are more than true; not because they tell us that dragons exist, but because they tell us dragons can be beaten." - Neil Gaiman, paraphrasing G.K. Chesterton.  I love fairytales. A love that consumes all of me, perhaps even bordering on obsession. Of all stories, I like them best. And if you happen to know me in reality, you'd know exactly what I'm talking about (and have tolerated/enjoyed my many Disney one-woman-shows). Simply put, they've cast a spell on me that doesn't have or need a cure. To many, this may seem immature or childish or weird and I've had my fair share of "Aren't you too old for-?" questions. I don't really mind. For there is no feeling that I would ever choose over the magic and hope you feel coursing through your veins when the shoe fits Cinderella or when Sleeping Beauty awakens or w...

Picture Courtesy- Me.  When I was in the 3 rd grade, I discovered Suzanne Collins by chance in my school library. I guess it was like discovering a song that would soon top the charts, before everyone else. Yes, this was years before the Hunger Games trilogy came to be, when she had authored a series called the Underland Chronicles. And I absolutely loved the series. And yes there is a point to this reminiscence. In the Underland, a world within our world (or below it, to be precise), the word ‘ light ’ was synonymous with the word ‘ life ’. And only lately have I realised that for the current optimist in me, it was definitely one of the very first positive reinforcements in life. For who could say it better than Stephen Hawking-  "However bad life may seem, where there is life, there is hope."  It's a simple formula.  Life = Light.  Life = Hope.  Light = Hope. Ever since we crawled out of that primordial slime, that's been our unifying...