Time Travel

If you could go back in time, would you change things? You would, of course you would. If you look at your life and think, wow, I wouldn't change a thing, not even the one teeny tiny bit of rearranging, I'd like to come shake your hand. And then slap you a little bit, just you know, so you'd have something different to say the next time.

What do you reckon you'd change, really? To find that one moment that set the ball rolling for the way a life shapes up. Kind of a challenge. I think I'd go through several attempts, seeing the sometimes misplaced sense of priorities I seem to persistently exhibit. Like in some movies, where the protagonist goes through a day again and again to get it exactly right, and in the end, someone dies anyway, because the moron was fixing the wrong moment.

Or maybe it's destiny and no matter how many times you adjust things, you're going to land up exactly where you were supposed to.

There's a film that sort of is about this and then some. Have you watched Sliding Doors? The movie starts with Gwyneth Paltrow having lost her job at a PR firm. She has a few drinks with her friends, goes home to a boyfriend who you realise is a bit of an ass right away. The next morning, she's running to make it in time for the train, and this is the moment the film splits into two. Two parallel tracks: one in which she makes it in time, chats with this lovely man, comes back home in time to find her boyfriend cheating on her, moves out, etc. And the other track, where she misses the train, the doors slide shut, and on her way back home, she gets mugged, goes to the hospital, remains oblivious to her cheating boyfriend for a large chunk of the movie, etc etc.

Now here's the thing. In both sequences, she ends up meeting the same people in different ways. And in one scenario, she dies in the end. And in the other one, she ends up talking to lovely man from the train much later, in the end. In an elevator.

It all depended on whether on not she caught the train in time. Scary stuff.

I watched three things about this in quick consequence, hence all this thought.

A rerun of an episode in F.R.I.E.N.D.S. where they all asked what if? What if Phoebe were a corporate lawyer, what if Monica was still fat, what if Chandler quit and became a cartoonist, etc.
The thing is, at the end of the show, they all were exactly where they would have otherwise been.

Last night, I watched an episode of Supernatural (who else wants to have Dean's babies? :)) which finally showed a scenario that the boys continue to ask in each episode. What if we'd never been ghost hunters, demon killers, vampire stakes, etc etc. They show Dean in a cool corporate job, madly rich and successful and Sam, tech support in the same company. And of course, they end up seeing a ghost and fight it, and maybe 5 years later than otherwise, they joined hands and became... well hunters. Hot hunters. Fully awesome, demon-killing, good looking, funny... okay. Back to the point.

I am a deeply impulsive being, which means I go through most things in life with the attitude of an elephant crashing through a jungle, not really thinking about how what I do or don't is shaping tomorrow. It's much later, when I reflect, I can see what I probably should have done differently. But then, what I didn't do differently also made me what I am today, yes? And if I do like that bit, then the rest becomes pointless.We're possibly meant to be just this. What we are today. Maybe when my father died, a part of me became so strong that it can take on the world. Maybe, the graveyard of my dead relationships made me so focused towards work that I soared professionally. Maybe, the hurt and the pain that every disappointment brought gave me newer stories to write. Without those, who would I have been today? Someone better? Happier? Maybe. With better stories? Unlikely, but who's to say?

What then, do I go back to change?

So, maybe some battle scars are there for a reason. Even if the reason is just to make you feel like a giant dufus.

I am like this, but then, I am also like that

(I'd written a slightly different version of this on FB. The last one, though, is from Grey's Anatomy).


I am highly prone to brief and intense addictions. It could be a TV show, a person, a song...

I love football. I used to play with the boys till I developed body parts that were no longer conducive.

For all my cautious talk, my life shows a persistent recklessness. I am alarmingly contradictory. I want, at all times, completely incompatible things.

I love sinking my teeth into a story. To turn it around, to tinker with the start, to pull things out and fit them somewhere else, and make it as beautiful as it was meant to be. I am a print editor, through and through.

I love video games, especially ones like Doom, where you’re handed a gun and an arsenal, and gross demons and soldiers ambush you from everywhere and you shoot everything in sight and all the blood splatters the walls and… what? Why’re you looking at me like that?

I am a sucker for happy endings. I get massively upset when fiction ends badly. Hello, if I want reality I have my life, no?

I don’t like all babies. Only cute ones. I live in fear that my own baby won’t be and then I won’t like my own child.

I am madly passionate about wildlife, the outdoors, and everything nature-related. I live in the (slightly deluded) belief that it feels the same way about me.

I cannot fathom how in the blistering barnacles have we reached a point where cockroaches (*shudder) are featuring in entertainment films. I could not enjoy Wal E as much as I could have (*gags). And Monster vs Aliens. The doctor's a roach?? What in the whole wide world is that about? Since when are these cute? This has to stop. Now. Yes, I am phobic. And if you're at all sympathetic to their cause, go read the Roach post in this blog. Bullies.

I think travel is the closest I've come to feeling at peace. And I think I am really good at it.

I have the gift of impossible relationships. Love is my Waterloo. 

I cannot hold my drink. And I do not sip. I gulp. One drink: (Loudly) talking about how the waaallsh are moovinng, how much I love my frandsh and my mommy, and how the tiger is going f***ing extinct. Second drink, I am horizontal on the floor… thank you ladies and gentlemen, end of day’s play. I quit when people started party conversations with a slightly nervous, ‘So what is Sej drinking?’ or ‘Who is mixing Sej’s drink?’

Dirty bathrooms depress me.

I've discovered that God takes sides. If you've hurt me, if I were you, I'd watch my back. No, no, really. It's scary.

My father’s death has left me a shadow of the person I used to be.

My mum is not as timid as she looks. If there ever was an example of looks being deceptive, my mum could run the campaign. This is me and mum in a fight when I want to do something she doesn't want me to:
Me: *LOUD YELLING
Mum: Silent and appearing docile.
Me: *MORE LOUD YELLING FOR AN HOUR
Mum: "No."
Me: "Okay." 

I get high on live performances… theatre, street plays, stand-up, concerts, anything that exudes live energy.

I think my niece is special. As babies go, she has spoilt me for life.

Contrary to popular belief, I love driving. I used to take long drives, before this city and its roads became what they are today.

Once you’re in my (very short) special people list, you can do no wrong. I mean, you will need to stab me in the back with a pretty sharp knife for me to see you’re a so-and-so. I have a few battle scars to show for this idiocy.

I adore desserts. If they put me in one of those ads where one is supposed to make those orgasmic sounds and ecstatic faces after a bite, I wouldn’t have to act at all.

I laugh at almost everything. I believe what Cyrus Sahukar once said in a Femina interview: Dude, funny is all around you, you just have to see it.

I can be painfully vicious in a fight. But I should care enough to be.

Finally, against all odds, against all logic, I believe…

Exposed

If you want to know someone, ask them to write something for you.

Over the last few years, I've discovered that writing exposes you in a way very few things can.

By that logic, yes, of course, all art does. Like painting. What you draw, how you draw, the colours you use, they're all give-aways. Movies, dance, even how you cook, all of that.

Yes, but I still feel writing (and this may be because I am a writer) can strip you naked in front of people. In front of people who don't know you at all.

I've been accused of judging people based on how they write. Guilty. But it's so much more than playing Grammar Police. Of course, if you send me a text message saying "Hi, I dont think that will happen," and then follow it immediately with one that says, "*don't", you've won my heart forever. And just so you know, I've registered the comma after the 'Hi' and the capital use of H too.

Of course, all these are turn-ons, but that's just one level. I am looking for who you are. 

You write to me in a message:
I went to a family function this evening. Everyone was there, it was so much fun. We laughed and ate so much food! (I can tell you've had a great time at your family function)

Or you write this:
My cousin got married today. The Guzzus were out in strength today, and we sat around and did what my family does best: laugh and eat. It was more fun than I've had in a while.
(I can tell you have a married cousin you like, I can tell you're aware of what your community is like and is ribbed for, you love it and that you're capable of making jokes about it. I can also tell you love spending time with this particular part of your family)

See what I mean? This is not about how you SHOULD write. No, I am merely saying these are two very different people.

The way you write tells me not just what you're thinking, or your opinion on something, but it tells me, in black and white, what you feel.

Let me explain.

In the last two years, people who've read me forever started to notice something different about the way I wrote. There was a piece that was well-written, it was perfectly adequate for the purpose it was supposed to serve. You couldn't fault it. But it wasn't always me. They said, at some point, there's a sense of a wall we can't cross.

Some said they felt cheated. They sensed a wonderful madness in the writer, a free spirit, and a potential of it coming through in the writing, but I refused it. The tip of an iceberg. Apparently, I no longer allowed them in. That I remained, in the story, tantalisingly, just out of reach.

It was not conscious. I did not know when it happened. But here's the incredible thing: I was going through a terribly painful time in my life. And I did not allow myself to show it. Betrayal, hurt, all of it. I hid it from everyone, what had happened to me, the injustice of what had happened, I hid it all. Even from the people I saw everyday. It became a way of life. To lie about it. To hide. To constantly worry about 'appearing' okay. To laugh when I wanted to cry. To smile when I wanted to yell. To purse my lips when I wanted to slap. Everyday. For more than a year. I withdrew inward. I took shelter inside, deep inside, where no one could see me.

Costly decision. Because my writing followed me. It became everything I was feeling. Withdrawn, walled in, sometimes full of fake abandon, and the most important thing: it was without me. I was lost.

Sometimes, a stray sentence, a stray story even, would suddenly bring me forth. So all was not lost. She was in there somewhere. Just too embarrassed to write what she felt. I tried to put it down, but couldn't. It wouldn't come. I told close friends that it refuses to come and they said, have the courage to write badly. Be brave and let all the rubbish out. You've stashed everything away. Deep inside. But the main thing I was told is this: don't be embarrassed. Let it flow. Don't hide behind words and smart phrases, readers will know. If you're feeling like shit, and writing rubbish, do it. Puke it out. Do anything. But write. write. write. 

They also said, it's like going to a shrink, only free. Writing is therapeutic.

This is me, then. This blog. No lies. No pretence. I'll try and stay as true as I can.

And I am going to make sure it's the most fun anyone's ever had in therapy. :)

The incredible lightness of The Morning After

It's the morning after Issue-Closing.
3 days and nights of non-stop, and by non-stop, I mean in a didn't-have-time-to-pee-for-so-long-that-I-forgot-about-it sort of way.
3 nights of coming home at 2am, falling into bed, and into an uneasy, restless sleep, trying to drown out the noise in a mind that's already making page counts for the next morning, and remembering commas missed, boxes numbered...

So, today, it's the morning after.
I am sitting at the window of my living room, laptop in lap, looking outside at the relentless, beautiful, euphoric rainfall, at the green mini-forest my mother's plants make at the ledge, and then unfortunately at a horrible, ugly building obstructing any further view, ugly or otherwise.

My mind is uncharacteristically restful, not empty of thoughts but not really acknowledging any thoughts... like a car in neutral gear... it's on, it's at work, but it's not really at work.

Comatose. Sigh.

I don't live from day to day.
I live from issue to issue.

Life becomes a 15-day cycle (the cycle changes depending on whether the mental asylum [read magazine office] you're working on puts out a weekly, fortnightly, monthly, and so on). Any plans, any at all, dinners, movies, parties, dates, revolve around the one great event of the month: Issue Closing. Happens for me around the 14/ 15 of each month. A whole new meaning to 'that time of the month'.

When you work for a magazine for a while, severe and almost permanent disorientation sets in. At any given point, I am hopelessly in the wrong month. I've just closed my October issue, so in my head, I am already preparing for November... any questions about birthdays, plans for trips, etc always start and end rather embarrassingly:
Me: Of course, you should have your anniv dinner party outdoors. It'll be nice and cold...
Baffled person: In September? In the rain?
Me: Ah. Hmm.

And so on.

Every issue, around a week from Issue Closing, all the status messages of my various networking sites start to scream sad, dreadful, ominous. 'ULTI' in all caps, is my favourite status message. SO much so, when I didn't put it up for a few issues, people started demand for it to be put up. It became a buzz word. "It's ULTI time of the month" or "Not coming for movie? Oh is it ULTI time?" Quite powerful, this social networking thing.

But the truth is, though I hate the process of it, I love the high it gives me when we send the magazine, kicking and screaming, to press. I may crib and whine and cry foul every time it comes around, but we're on autopilot that time. The office is in a state of hysteria, ideas are yelled and crushed, abuses are hurled at almost all inanimate objects, especially printers, computers, etc (Print. PRINT you dinosaur piece of S***. Of course OPEN, I SAID OPEN. don't hang, don't you DARE HANG ON ME, YOU #@%%#$#). Fun times. We're a creative, loud, opinionated group, with a crazy, insane sense of humour. Our funnest, falling-down-from-laughing-so-hard memories have been products of Issue-Closing.

Of course, in hindsight, everything seems pretty.
It's not. It's probably the incredible lightness of the morning after that's talking.
Issue-Closing is a bitch. :)

It's been two years now at LP. I live in hope that at some point, the issue will learn to close itself.