Sunday 22 June 2014

I am still alive???

Image courtesy of Keattikorn / freedigitalphotos.net


It is 6 in the morning. I suddenly wake up with a start. The eerie sound of the alarm sets my pulse racing. Slowly rubbing my eyes I look at the calendar on the wall. 


“You are going through a very bad phase,” the family astrologer had said. “Doubt whether you will survive this amavasya.”

I took a second look at the calendar. Sure it was ‘amavasya,’ my last day on planet earth. My head spins, my hands turn cold. I feel helpless

“Tring…Tring…” the phone rings. It’s my daughter at the other end. Tears well up in my eyes. I gather myself and pick up the phone.

“Hi sweetheart!  Happy Birthday. So what’s special today?” She asks.

“Nothing special. Just the usual meal and maybe a glass of paysam,” I say, forcing myself to sound cheerful.

“Hey, Amma, something worrying you?”she asks

I reply in the negative. After chatting for a few more minutes she keeps down the phone. With leaden legs I move towards the kitchen. 

“Whroom…… crash…” the sound of a bike hitting the wall makes me start. I rush to the door. There just outside the gate I see a figure drenched in blood. My legs gather wings; I rush to his side calling out to my husband for help.

I draw in my breath. There before my eyes, is a young boy of just fourteen or so.  Legs crushed below the bike he moans. I try to pick up the bike but to no avail. Suddenly, two strong arms join mine. Bike removed, we quickly lift up the injured.

Luckily for us the doctor next door is in station. First aid given, the car is taken out. With hubby at the wheel we rush the boy to the nearest hospital. The boy groans in pain. I lay his head on my lap and offer words of comfort. The car moves through the maze of traffic with headlights on and the horn blaring. Out of the corner of my eyes I see an errant motorcyclist or two suddenly swerve away from our path.

The next four hours are the most difficult ones. The police are summoned, the boy’s parents contacted, the surgery is on. Hubby and myself are busy contacting people trying to arrange blood that too B-ve, for the boy in the theatre. Operation successful, we reach home mentally drained. It is already well past 11 am. I am in no mood to cook so hubby decides we go in for parcel meals.


Other chores over, we sit down for the meal in silence. The meal from ‘Kayees’ has never tasted so good. I guess it is the sheer feeling of relief that has added to its taste. I call up the hospital. The boy is doing fine. I sit down with a book. Just two pages into reading, I drift off into a world of my own.  I am transported 40 years back into the past.  My school, my friends, the adventures, the falls all comes to life. I don’t know how long it is since I have been in this yester- world. I feel a pressure on my shoulders.

“What’s so funny?” hubby asks. It is only then that I realize that I have been laughing out loud. My cheeks are wet with tears, no not the sad ones.

I put the book aside. The garden beckons me. I enter it. The sweet smell of the roses transports me to another world. I remember the time I was married. A smile plays on my lips. I gently fondle the petals of a bud waiting to bloom. The face of my newborn babe flashes before my eyes. My lips involuntarily touch the bud.  I relive the joy, the ecstasy of the moment I held my little one in my hands. Her eyes probing mine, her face breaking into a smile, her gurgles, her tantrums all come back to me. I am lost.

The sound of the temple bell wakes me up from my reverie. I rush in. It is tea time. I put the kettle to boil. 

The smell of the brewing tea reminds me of my mishaps, my blunders in the kitchen. I rewind. The kettle sings.  Sweet melody flows from my lips interspersed with small bursts of laughter. Suddenly an unpleasant incident comes to mind. I fast forward the tape (memory tape) only to slow down when another sweet moment comes up again.

I sniff. The smell of something burning hits me like a bolt from the blue. The red, hot, angry kettle stares at me. I crouch. The kettle is dumped in the sink. “Serves it right,” I think. “It had the audacity to stare at me in anger.” The second kettle goes on the stove. This time I am careful. Tea served, I switch on the television. The evening news keeps me engrossed.

Suddenly a news flashes on the screen. My bank has just won an award for customer excellence. I rejoice and break the news to hubby dear. I can’t wait to share it with my counterpart friends in another Bank. After all, they have been our greatest critique even going to the extent of hinting the merger of our Bank with theirs.  The net is connected, FB accessed, words flow. Time flies, the net has me hooked.

More than an hour into the net, I look up and out of the window. “Ah! Dusk already,” I say to myself. I get up hurriedly. The evening lamp is lit. Prayers offered, I move into the kitchen. Hubby accompanies me. Together, we work on the dinner. Chapattis are rolled and with them the video cam of my mind. The lovely time spent in the kitchen with hubby for help, the chappatis rolled out by my sweet babe, the grumbling over misplaced containers… all come to life. Before I realize it, dinner is ready.

The table is set; the meal passes off in sweet silence.  I return to my laptop and the social media. There are a lot of posts waiting to be read and commented on. Seconds, minutes, hours tick by. My fingers fly on the keyboard. A new post takes shape.

  
Image courtesy of coward_lion / freedigitalphotos.net

11.30 pm


Sleep is at the doorstep of my eyes. Net disconnected, system shut down, I get up stretch my hands above my head and release a cry of relief.  A silent prayer leaves my lips. My head hits the pillow. Sweet slumber takes over.



The next day


A crow caws, the cuckoo sings. I open my eyes.


I am still alive???
Image courtesy of Stuart Miles / freedigitalphotos.net


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This post is a part of Write Over the Weekend, an initiative for 
Indian bloggers by BlogAdda.


The prompt 

So, what would you do if you are told that today is the last day of your life? Will you hurriedly attempt to do everything in your bucket list or would you retrospect about life up till now, instead? Your blog post should start with the line,"It is 6 in the morning...."


So now that you have read the post, how about sharing your views, your suggestions here in the comment section?  Eyes waiting to read them



Saturday 7 June 2014

The 'Burden'





The temple bells rang.  Saraswathi amma opened her weary eyes chanting, “Narayana, Narayana.”

“Parvathy, I am hungry,” she said turning around only to be greeted by an empty verandah. Leaning heavily on the walking stick, she climbed down the temple steps scanning the entire premises.

Her nerves went taught; beads of perspiration gathered on her forehead, mouth went dry.

“Lord, what has happened to Parvathy? Where is she?” the mother’s heart worried.




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The bus to Alleppey gathered speed. Letting out a sigh of relief Parvathy thought out aloud, “Good riddance. At last the old hag is off my back.”

Heads turned.


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100 word post written in response to the picture prompt given below, for the 


Image taken by Lyssa Medana

Do take a tour of my blog  Fabric of Life too, 
to get a feel of some of the books doing the rounds as well as some poetry and fiction.


And Of course, don't forget to leave your footprints in the form of comments and suggestions. Your words mean a lot to me.



Thursday 5 June 2014

Time to Migrate?

It’s hot and sultry. I look up at the AC vents and then at my co-passengers, sweat trickling down my face. Suddenly a bunch of newspapers is shoved into my hand. I turn around to find my husband sitting behind me, signaling me to fan myself cool.

I resign myself to my fate and take out my laptop in the hope of forgetting the heat and the sweat in the company of my e- books. I start out reading ‘Unsettled’ by Neelima Vinod. The going is good. I am transported to another world. I find myself ‘face to face’ with Shankara and Thatri. The excitement is building up. But just when I am trying to figure out what Thatri’s reaction will be when she finds out Shankara’s intentions, the screen goes blank. The spell is broken.

I press the keys frantically hoping to revive the 3 kg thing sitting comfortably on my lap. But to no avail. The batteries have failed once again. I curse the manufacturers. The dealer too is not spared. I curse the day I decided to buy my laptop. ‘Unsettled’ had to wait till I reached my daughter’s nest. I am left unsettled.

A week later I am on my return journey. Looking out through the window I catch sight of a the mountain ranges bathed in the morning mist. I close my eyes, allowing the beauty of the sight to seep in. I hear a knock on the doors of my brain. I open it. A whiff of cool air enters. An idea is born. I pull out the laptop. The batteries have been charged fully. Yet I let out a silent prayer pressurizing the heavens to let the idea be transported into my file in entirety without a hitch.

My fingers fly on the keyboard, words flow from the finger tips. The milieu, the chattering doesn't deter me. Slowly the world and all around me fade into oblivion. What remains is me, my laptop and my ideas taking the shape of a story. 20 minutes into my endeavor coffee arrives. I take it without taking off my eyes from the screen. I take a sip, then another. The cup is set aside. My fingers once again move to give words to my thoughts. I press ‘K’, press it again and again. No response. Baffled I look to the top of the screen. The message, “Windows is not responding” stares me back.  I am stuck. I feel like tearing at my hair. The 3 kg thing weighs me down. My husband pities the manufacturers and the dealer as I mouth my shrap  (curse).

“Useless baggage,” I muttered to myself. The decision was made. The ‘thing’ would not accompany me on my journeys in future. My husband suggested I choose something small and handy, a tablet maybe. I was skeptical. Yet I decided to look out for something worthwhile and that is when I came across this site.

“Whoa!” I said when I checked out the 2-in-1 Ultra portable laptop with 10 inch tablet ASUS Transformer Book T100 a laptop with detachable tablet. The features, the size all seemed to match my wants. The size, the OS are perfect but what about the battery I asked myself. Will it last the journey from Calicut to Trivandrum?  That’s when my eyes caught sight of something catchy. “Take charge of power that never wants to end” said the slogan. I looked below it and a smile spread across my face.”Nothing will slow you down ever again with the ASUS Transformer Book T100’s incredible battery life, an astounding 11 hours of continuous web browsing keeps you connected longer and always in action. With the accelerated ASUS Instant On and Microsoft Instant Go technology, the ASUS Transformer Book T100 is always ready to perform when you are.” Now isn’t that cool I asked myself. The journey from Calicut to Trivandrum by rail is around nine hours and the assured battery life of ASUS Transformer Book T100 as per the manufacturer’s, is 11 hours. Now you know what I mean. “No interruption, no jhanjhat. Only mazza hee mazaa.”

Powered by Intel Atom Processor Z3740 this 2-in-1 ultraportable laptop has a 1.2 mega pixel camera. Now that’s another advantage that I did not have with my laptop. Suddenly I remembered my half written story inspired by the mountains, on my last journey. I knew if I had something like this then, the scene would have been captured in the lens for me to savour at my will.

Aah! And if the manufacturers are to be believed, “the keyboard dock perfectly designed 19mm travel distance provides a comfortable typing experience….” Being one, who likes to continuously give expression to her feelings, her opinions and her thoughts in her blogs, now this is something that interests me? The US3.0 Super Speed Port and easy access to the Windows Store and X Box live will I am sure add spice to the experience. Last but not the least, the weight a little over 500 gms means ‘less weight, more comfort.’ So no more back aches, no more ‘moov.’

I am on the verge of making up my mind, when something hits me like a bolt from the blue. The price!!! A whooping 32,999/- (INR). Mind you this is the ‘best buy price.’ I wonder and then decide. Let’s wait, watch and pray. The price may go down or who knows Lady Luck may smile on me. A gift wrapped ASUS Transformer Book T100 may arrive someday.


And now here's a peek into the thing that caught my fancy 
ASUS TRANSFORMER BOOK T100


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This post is written for the 

ASUS - TIME TO TRANSFORM CONTEST on INDIBLOGGER


Inviting you to visit my blog FABRIC OF LIFE too, to read the latest.




Please leave your footprints in the form of comments and suggestions. Your words mean a lot to me.