On another day

I think I need to tell this – that despite the inclination towards all things sad and melancholic, I'm essentially a happy person. As happy as I can be these days. If you thought that I sound like a poor depressed soul all the time, you were obviously mislead.

Just as there are days of melancholy, there are days of plain happiness as well. Days, when I wake up to something happy, without even knowing what it is, without finding any apparent reason. I become happy for something I cannot quite fathom. I don't know what prompts it. Maybe, it is the quietness of an early morning, the cold touch of steel railings in the balcony, the shaft of sun's rays near the doorstep, or just the whiteness of the ceiling I keep staring into.

I don't know. I can't tell.

But I find it nothing less than magical. How and what constitute such a moment of pure bliss?

Perhaps, I'll never find out. Perhaps, I should not even try to.

I'm just thankful for these fleeting moments. Moments, when I feel that everything is well with the world, including myself.

Of course it doesn't last long. But it is worth it while it lasts.

One of your days

There are some days, you know perhaps, when you wake up in the morning and the first thing you feel is a strange sense of melancholy.

It might be a rainy day with a slate-grey sky when you want it to rain all day long, and looking out of the window you watch the trees drench quietly, all alone.

Or it might be a hot sunny morning when you wake up to the sound of your old noisy fan, and coming out of your room you wonder how swiftly the world passes you by.

Or it might be one of those chilly winter mornings when your warm bed feels like heaven, and when the thick curtain of fog outside reminds you the days that has disappeared somewhere.

Or it might be a pale day of autumn when the roads you take are full of whispering dead leaves and dusty winds.

Or it might be a day just like today – when, after a long day, you fall back to your room with an empty feeling. You listen to your favourite music, you pick up your favourite book, you stand before the mirror and smile, but you cannot drive that emptiness away. And then you open the window, an evening breeze gushes in, and you see the moon rising, which only reminds you, however hard you try to forget, how lonely you had been today.

Coming back

In case you haven't noticed, I had been away for two whole weeks. I was on a impromptu break.

During this time I went to my home town, visited a few other places and people, and generally passed my time at home doing nothing.

It was a break from the routine I follow here. I had no work, cellphone, computer, or newspaper to occupy my time.

I had a feeling I'd have a good time without any of these. But, strangely, all my time I was missing these things there. I was thinking about the things I do here, when I was there. I had a feeling that I might be missing out on something. That there might be important things happening in my absence. That I might be wanted here.

But, obviously, no such thing happened. And now that I'm back, I find that nothing really has changed. Things are still the same on my desk. And nobody has even noticed that I was away.

So, it's back to my old routine. And I'm back to the things I missed.

But now, suddenly, I feel like running away again.

Isn't life disappointing?

Weekend watch

Whew! Lots of films happened this weekend. Well, not really chosen with much care and judgment – I watched rather indiscriminately – and I must say I liked every bit of it.

I began with Gandhi, My Father, which explores the tumultuous relation between Mahatma Gandhi and his son Harilal. I liked bits of it, even appreciated the performances, but remained unmoved at the end.

Then came Chashme Buddoor, the early 80’s romcom. It was a delight to watch Faroque Sheikh and Deepti Naval, the melodrama notwithstanding. Maybe, I won’t want to watch this film repeatedly, but while I watched, I could not suppress a smile on my face – the cuteness was absolutely infectious. And yes, I always liked the song ‘Kahan se aaye badra’ from this film.

Lakshya, the third on my platter, was a film which I had watched earlier on TV, but always in bits and pieces. So, when I watched it this time, at one go, I could not help but admire the film – the beautiful shots, the understated performances, the believable actions. Okay, the film is not perfect – it does not go beyond popular stereotypes – but it has an earnestness that is difficult to shake off.

The time I chose to watch Charulata was perfect – a languid Sunday afternoon. Incidentally, the film also begins on a lonely afternoon of Charu’s life. Charulata has been regarded as one of the most exquisite and flawless of Satyajit Ray’s films, and it’s easy to see why – the film is beautiful, subtle, and poetic. The rest of the afternoon, after I watched Charulata, I lay snuggled in my bed, enveloped with a feeling of subtle melancholy.

I ended my watching spree with Sleepless in Seattle, which was on HBO last night. Not much to say about this one, but it was a good company on a Sunday night.

Well that was all to my weekend.

P.S. Oh, I have one DVD still waiting, Jab We Met, which I’m going to watch soon.