The remote control

I walk into the living room. I grab the remote lying on the coffee table, lean back and switch on the television. I tune into sports. Some old tennis game between Agassi and Sampras. I put it back on the coffee table and sigh. Life is truly about these little things. How I miss them.
She walks in with a heavy tread. She grabs the remote and angrily switches it off. She is in a mood, that's what it is. She goes back to the bedroom.
I think I will play with her for a little while. I so love irritating her. I switch the television back on, tennis again, but this time a little louder. She runs into the room and switches it off and runs back again. She doesn't even look back. Hmm..I can play longer. I turn it on again. This time she doesn't come running. So I switch to music. I play my favorite, "Scarborough Fair". The tunes are haunting. I listen to her quickened breathing. She walks out of the bedroom. She is a convert too. She hated this song initially, but grew to love it.
She sits on the couch and stares at the unchanging screen. Tears stream down her face. She closes her eyes.
I sit beside her.I hold her hands in mine. She gasps and sucks in her breath. I close my eyes too.
I miss these little things in life. How do I move on? I look at her ring finger where the pale skin shines. She only removed the ring yesterday. Maybe I ought to let her move on too. I kiss her forehead.
I switch the song off. She looks around, sorrow and relief fighting to be foremost.
I walk by the withered flowers that our friends sent. I walk by the phone that has unheard voice mails, no doubt carrying sympathy and condolences. I walk by the pictures, the memories that I share with this woman. Life was truly about the little things.
I walk out, through the door.

Excellent genes

"Wow, you really pack it away don't you?", she questions me.
"Of course! If you are hungry, eat up..is what I say". I shine my smile on her.
I now see her picking through her food. Then she breathes in deeply and asks the waiter to take it away. I still am eating my third course in the meal. I signal the waiter to bring in the dessert. Mocha lava cake with strawberry ice cream. I sit and savour each spoonful of heaven.
She says, "My treat" and grabs the check before I could lay hands on it. Fine by me.
"I have never seen you exercise. And yet you put it all away. How do you do it?"
"Oh well! Excellent genes." I smile back.
She says she will drop me. I negate it and hitch a cab. I tell the driver my destination. He looks up and down at me and his faces lights up in recognition. And gives an conspirational smile. I hate it when they do it. Like they know my secret.
I get down, pay the cab, tip him pretty well. Encouraging him to think what he wants to. I walk in to the building. "00" is the name. I go around the reception, there is a heavy waiting crowd.The girl there waves at me. I go in to the cubicle. And change my dress.
The doctor comes in. "How are you?" And shows his pearly whites. I shrug at him. I hate this part. The part where he pretends that I am a new customer.He has my chart from the previous visits. My body is my temple. Nipping, tucking, sucking, lifting, pinning-all of it regular procedures. I come in regularly at least thrice a year. I also schedule visits for Botox and teeth whitening.
Excellent genes, my ass.

I love you but...

I can not remember my last conversation with you.
I woke up this morning and tried recollecting what we had spoken the last time. I can not remember. What I remember is that you wore a grey dress with a blue belt. You decided to pin a small red flower in your hair because you were feeling adventurous. You smelled of Chanel no 5. I hated that perfume. You wore black heels and you still had to stand on tip toes to kiss me and you wrinkled your nose after that. But I can not remember the words.
I know we had cereal for breakfast. You weren't sure if it would stay down since you were in the first trimester. I coaxed you into drinking orange juice. You stuck out your tongue at me and you drank the juice. You touched my face and said something. I can not remember.
It was 20 minutes after this you left. We spoke a lot, we usually did. But I can not remember what we spoke.
I am now in a panic. I rush to the bathroom. The bottle of perfume is almost empty. I spray some into the air and take a deep sniff. I then come out to the bedroom with the bottle in my hand and go to your closet. I touch the clothes, feel the sleeve of a jacket and rub my cheek on a stole.
We spoke of happy things, our future. The baby and the new house we'd put a down payment on. Reconnecting with your father. I now remember.
Your last words were "I love you, but you smell!"

The odd boy

You are a strange boy.
You smiled at me to seem friendly and the next day you frowned because I smiled back. You spoke to me to promote friendship and yet when I texted you, you remained silent. I walked alone and you did not bring your bicycle after that. You argued walking was better than cycling.
You loved to argue. You said that what you felt was the result of hormones. Yet you wrote long letters and sweet poems for me. You thought buying flowers on Valentines day was a conspiracy and yet you did that to boost economy.
You argued that Big Bang was the reason for our existence. Yet when I knelt before God to pray for my ailing grandfather you could say the same words of prayer with me.
You said you could not guarantee a secure future for me. And still you picked out china patterns that would be on our dinner table.

Why, oh why did you then break my heart? Only to say it was good for me?!

Oh!

Baby cries. Really hard. No one is able to soothe it.

Mother- I will take a leave of absence from office tomorrow and spend some the day with her. She is missing me. She probably feels she doesn't know any of us since she goes to daycare. Maybe she is frightened of all of us. Maybe we are strangers. I think I might even quit my job end of the month. I feel so guilty.

Father- Maybe we ought to change our daycare provider. Maybe they are not giving her enough attention. Maybe they are giving too much that she misses all that at home? Maybe some of the older kids teased her. Maybe someone yelled at her. Maybe she is overwhelmed by elders.

Grandmother- Maybe it's the food at the daycare. You know, making her tummy hurt..Maybe it's the food at home. I told you she was too young for cake even if it is a small bite. Maybe the water,are we filtering it? Does she have a temperature? Does she have a cold? Are her ears hurting?

Grandfather- Move away from the baby. Give her her space. You have been smothering her. She will be alright in sometime.

Baby's brother- (sniffs and makes a face) Baby poo-poo!!

#13

There are only two great pleasures in life- breaking the bubbles in bubble wrap and to physically contort and reach the itch on the back and give it a good scratch.

The protest

I wipe sweat from my forehead. The ground is giving off heat waves and I can see the steam rising from where a few drops of water were spilled. I look around. My boyfriend is on the edge of the crowd talking to a couple of police officers. As the head of the protest, he is assuring them that this will be a peaceful one.
I heave the heavy placard once again. I look at the cement and steel monster in front of me with its many glass eyes. They are so bright it hurts my eye to look at them. In spite of it I see people staring down at us. Wondering about the sense of it all. This corporation is responsible for carrying out tests in nuclear and biological warfare. They carried out tests in a remote part of the country; they thought it would remain a secret. This world that we have, this world that we leave for our children is not safe. And we are protesting against it.
All of a sudden there is a shriek, from the back. No one knows where it is from. We see some company enforcers stand up straight around a girl. She is hurt. This throws us all in a frenzy. A harsh word here, a shove there. We are soon in the midst of a mob. I search for my boyfriend. He has a gash from his forehead. I hold his hand and pull him gently on his feet and take him to the line of corporate and police enforcers.
I stand there with the placard in my hand, not word out of my mouth. The rest of the gang slowly joins in.
We hold our banners aloft. Our protest lives.
"Give peace a chance", "All we need is peace".

#93

Even if the item of clothing we choose to wear is at the top, the neatly ordered clothes still get messed up.

#58

Coffee is addictive. But there are no coffee patches, no rehab centers and no support groups.And quitting it cold turkey is still a bitch.

#21

Just when you are looking for some energy to carry on with the workout, your iPod thinks you are in the mood for slow, romantic songs. Never trust Shuffle!!

#28

Watching a lot of detective shows does not make you a detective. You will still spend half an hour searching for the keys or remote or piece of paper irrespective of deductive logic.

Confessions of a dangerous mind

There is nothing more dangerous than a person who does not have remorse for a wrong act. I read that somewhere or maybe I just made it up. I don't know. I don't quite know reality from make-believe.
I am being held a prisoner. I meet with the prison psychiatrist once a day so that he can evaluate my sanity. I think everyone is a little insane. They shield it with tightly stretched sanity. It breaks now and then. Others choose to hide it and I don't. I gave into my whims. Lived the moment, so to speak. My temper is violent, my love is intense. My laugh is loud, my crying sobs are louder. I sit so still sometimes to contemplate on the dust floating in light, sometimes I run around the room to match the speed of light- that makes me really dizzy.
I speak with great people constantly. I have adventures everyday. I traipse off to Cairo one instant to the time of the pharaohs. Sometimes I wake up in the Victorian England, I think I have perfected my English accent. Stone age, the dark ages, the middle ages, I have lived them everyday.
I love books. I love how the authors get under my skin and whisper their true meanings to me. It is is all a big plot. A big conspiracy. Everyone wants to love me, everyone wants to be my best friend.   And everyone wants to kill me. She did too. She said I was sick and I needed to let her go. But I needed to feel. To feel loved. She did not love me anymore.
I look for her in the courtroom. She is not there. And then I realize she is sitting up there with the judge. I smile and wave.
The jury decides to call me insane. Aren't we all a little insane underneath?

The empty nest

I know that I have some white lace. I think it's in the attic and decide to look up there. Switching on the light, I am confronted by stark and brutal reality. I am a hoarder! I see the gilded vase that I got in a garage sale. A miniature figurine barn set that I won in an office raffle. And I also see the white wedding gown that was a friend gave me because it was too bulky to carry with her across the country, she was divorced and our people did not marry in gowns. I look through a chest- self made from a carpentry class that I thought would become a hobby. Thank God it did not.
And then beside the chest I notice boxes. With names of both my children. Toys. My youngest one moved out 5 years ago. It's been a quiet house with regular people, no hormonal tantrums, no impassioned speeches about downtrodden rights, no midnight sneaking to friends' house.
I open it. Toys are wrapped in no particular order. Action figures hug Barbie dolls. Plush toys with Raggedy Ann dolls. Boxes of jigsaw puzzles that have peeled and torn from constant and nonchalant usage.Lots of teapots and cups and saucers. I also see a couple of real silver forks and a pizza cutter. I spy a stethoscope. I plug it in my ears and hear my heart.
The foremost beat of a mother's heart. Steady and yet constantly aflutter. My babies went through a phase where all they could do was wait for the next day to start so that they could play with these toys again. Now they are too busy in their lives, thinking of the work next day. Their life has consumed them and I often hear them muttering about their life plan going to the dogs.
I put the stethoscope back. I gently touch the toys in a sweep. And I close the box.

A man's life..

The lady walks in hesitantly. She pauses in front of the elevator to check if she has the correct floor. Her eyes are swollen and red. She stops in front of my desk. I get a call at that moment. I wave a sorry to her saying it will take just a moment. She waits patiently.
I hang up the phone. She tells me her husband worked in our office. He died three days ago. He has been cremated. She wonders if I have a final payment ready. I ask her his name. I don't recognize it. I check the records. The computer tells me he has been employed for 34 years. 34 years and I have never seen him, and I usually see them all!
I begin the process for the payment and tell her the check should be ready in about 5 hrs time. She asks me if she can wait in the lobby itself. I tell her to go ahead and point out the coffee machine. She takes a cup and sits in the corner. She closes her eyes after a sip. I can see her years etched on her forehead. I go and sit beside her. A few words are all it takes.
He woke up everyday at 6. Came to office at 8.30. Took his packed lunch- a sandwich and a fruit, exactly at 1.30. He went home at 7. He had his dinner at 8.30 and went to bed at 10 after kissing his wife. This was his workday. He had this routine even on weekends, instead of working at the office, he cleaned the house, helped her with laundry and took care of the kids while she slept. Even on the day he died, he had his dinner, kissed her and went to bed. And never woke up.
He was a quiet man, with a great sense of humor. He could quote Shakespeare and Wodehouse. He had a crackling laugh but was tone deaf.
The check is ready. I give it to her. Her eyes look relieved at the substantial amount. She smiles at me and walks away.
I update my records- Employee account closed. Person deceased. That is all I have to say to 34 years of diligence and 58 years of life.

#67

What you think looks good in the mirror may not really look good in a photograph. The eyes of the beholder are forgiving while the camera lens is not!

#92

You know you are old, when a song makes you smile and shake your head thinking of the good old days. You also contemplate on how much things have changed and how much you have changed.

Missing

I was so upset that they shouted at me last night. Maybe I should get up now. I can only see the sun coming out. I decide I will go out- it's cool and pleasant. I think maybe a snack will do good too. I grab my back pack, stuff my binoculars and go down to the kitchen. I pack a water bottle. Then it strikes me, I should take some cookies and milk, they would be totally awesome.
The cookie jar is a white pig. I climb on the counter and try reaching it. It comes down with a crash. Uh-oh! I grab the cookies and stuff them into my bag. There's also some money in there. I just take it by the handful and stuff it inside the nearest drawer.
I hear someone coming down the stairs and I rush out. I am not really in the mood to talk to them after how they shouted at me for running away from school. School is boring. And it was nice yesterday.
I go through the back door to the garden and through the garden to the field. I can hear some critters scurrying- they must be foraging for food. I go the the pond, feed the ducks some crumbs of the cookies. I splash water with my feet. I scratch cows in a field; they are so lazy, aren't they? I pilfer some apples from a cart that is loaded with apples- they wont miss two...ok...four!
I watch some horses run to and fro. I get dusty when a dusty wind blows. I dust off my dress and go the rail tracks. I put my ears to see if there's one coming. Yup! I watch it go thundering by. And after the last car is out of sight, I put my ears again on the tracks. I walk on one of it balancing like a tightrope star. It is getting late. Will go home now, a little hungry!
As I approach the house, I see cars, quite a few of them. A sherrif's, my nana's and my principal's. Uh-oh. School day! I approach with caution.
As I enter the living room, all pairs of eyes turn to see me. Furrowed brows, teary eyes, is anyone dead? I am anxious. I open my mouth to explain and my mom comes rushing to hold me and smothers me. My father envelopes both of us and smells my hair.
Maybe I can get a slice of chocolate cake too.

The couch potato

The door slams shut. Both of them enter the living room, talking animatedly. As they enter the living room, they glance towards me and their discussion stops. I don't look at them. I continue munching the popcorn. The butter is a little less, and I should have not added the extra dash of salt.
Wile E Coyote gets slammed by the anvil and the roadrunner beeps. I laugh at this joke every single time. It is funny if you think about it. And during the commercial, which I mute, I can hear them talking in the kitchen. One conversation that I have heard in multitude combinations of anger, disappointment, frustration and acceptance. Today she is frustrated and he is consoling. She wonders if I will ever step out of the house. If I will ever grow up and let go. He says to give it time. That I would definitely go out of the house soon. I need to do it in my own way.
I like this couch. It is well cushioned and I also have a blanket if I am too cold. This feels safe. I lost my best friend to a mugging gone bad. My grandmother was hit by a car and was paralyzed till her last breath. And I see the news everyday- I hear of so many accidents, deaths. And the food is good. It never hurts me and fills me up so that I don't think beyond my growing waistline. I am not a couch potato. I am a coward and am deathly scared to go out.
My mother comes and sits near me. My father on the other side. He takes some of the pop-corn. We all hold hands as we watch the coyote being blown up. Beep Beep.