Gratitude Post: 3

There is a small Nilgris departmental store across the road from our apartment.
They remained open; being essential services even during the lockdown.
They have been a big help to us for anything we may need, especially when we specifically request them for something, they went all out to procure the item. Like baking powder, icing sugar, vanilla essence:)

They served long hours, maintaining safety and hygiene measures.
They know what are peoples preferences, tastes, passions too:)

When I bake, I tend to give away some goodies to friends and neighbours, this year on my birthday I chose to walk over to the good folks at the department store instead and gave them some of my chocolate cake.
They were thrilled, they never expected gratitude in this form.

Grateful for their service, their support when it was needed the most.

Gratitude Post: 2

I live in an apartment complex. The gates remain open during the day for vehicular movement and people to walk in easily.

Though there is an app to approve any entry of visitors, delivery and sales men it is still easy for anyone familiar to walk in without registering as long as you just keep walking in confidently.
Which is what caused the fiasco of the smashed pot on the windshield of the car.
Immediately, there was a lot of fury among residents, me included, worried about the security and safety of our community. Soon forgotten the other days of infallible service provided by them.

I have lived in this complex for almost 15 years.
Several agencies have come and gone between various changes to the apartment association representatives.

During the lockdown, the security not just performed their duties, but also took upon themselves to participate in the cleaning, helping old invalid residents, living alone and ensuring the community remained safe and protected during the spread of the virus.
They kept the gates locked, getting up each time someone stood at the gates, waiting for them to open, never grumbling.

I have had them open the gates for me while trying to slip in before sun rise after a late night out or coming in after the Cinderella hour as they watched my carriage turn into a pumpkin.
Never asking, never judging.
Just doing their job, keeping an eye out on the roads to ensure I walk in safe.

My thanks to them at those moments, are never enough.
The small token of appreciation I hand out to them during festivals and celebrations can never repay them for all the safety they provide when we need it most.

Gratitude post: 1

Lockdown, pandemic, curfews, restrictions are what we lived through since mid March 2020
There have been so many losses of lives and livelihood.
The virus did not differentiate between age, income, religion, castes.

Some extroverts and socially active people struggled with the isolation, others used the quiet time to introspect and reinvent themselves.
Some found the time at home with family a blessing, the same situation was claustrophobic to few.

I went through issues of space and peace, sought solace in movies, books and running.
Having already blocked unnecessary noise, I did not need anyone else outside of my apartment complex for company.

But everyone caves in eventually, after a while the old familiar ways are missed and comfort can only be gained from what once was and people and conversations we know and sounds of laughter.

Thus the trips started, the short trip to work, a quick detour to meet friends who could make you laugh.
The rush back before curfew hours. Weekends were curfews, stuck at home. 
Slowly the city relaxed and so did I. I stayed beyond sun down. Weekdays becoming weekends instead.
The city was waking up, transport was slowly returning to normal, cabs were again seen on the roads.

This is a gratitude post to all the cab drivers who brought me home safely, the straight road, 12 kms though not a long distance and gets covered in 25 mins late at night, is deserted and quiet.
Cab drivers in Bangalore are touted as untrustworthy and ready to take advantage of the situation.
Everyone warns me that it will not be safe all the time.
I blindly put my faith in the powers above and trust that He has sent someone to take me home safe at that hour, I fight to stay awake, I play with my phone, ready to press help if needed.

Grateful for the inherent goodness in people.
The small tip I pay, I hope makes them continue the good service they render and keep the faith of people alive.

"We often take for granted the very things that most deserve our gratitude"

Glory Days

I did not know
That my favourite song from the 90’s which gripped my soul had a sequel.

I listened to it today.
Piya Basanti Re

This was my favourite song among many other pop songs which played on TV music channels of the 90’s and early 2000

Sung by Ustad Sultan Khan and Chitra and directed by Pradeep Sarkar the music video, Piya Basanti became hugely popular, due to the music as well as the beautifully-conceived and directed music video itself.

The soul stirring voice and the video combined had me glued to music channels eagerly waiting for the song to play.

Later, much later, during the internet era, I tried to find out where this video had been filmed, I found the little tea stall, the water gushing by, the thick cloud swirling around, the quick stolen glances between the hill born girl and the gun toting guy all so enchanting, always wanting to go back and feel that little rush they had experienced.

I learnt it was set in the idyllic hills of Kothgarh in Himachal Pradesh. Never having been to a mountain in those days, always been a beach girl, and this places so far away, yet my heart felt so close to the place.

The video and music set the narrative for something more, there had to be, there was romance and mystery and allure about the glances and the chance meeting.

A daisy still reminds me of that one song. Go back and watch the video to see why!

But I never did find out what happened, every time I listened to this song, I was so caught up in the past, so happy with the memories that one song could bring back, of happy carefree lives, crushes, stolen glances, distant dreams.

Until today, something made me look up the song again and there it said sequel.
This is the one
Surmayi Aankhen

Music is like a time machine!
Sometimes it takes only one song to bring back a thousand memories.

Books I've read in 2020

January

1. The nightingale- Kristin Hannah
2. The little theatre by the sea- Rosanna Ley
3. Birthday girl- Haruki Murakami
4. Cutting for stone- Abraham Verghese
5. The saffron trail-Rosanna Ley

February

1. The silent patient -Alex Michaelides
2. The Great Gatsby- F Scott Fitzgerald
3. The choice Edith Eger

March

1. Murder of Roger Ackroyd- Agatha Christie

April

1. The beekeepers of Aleppo- Christie Lefteri
2. The ABC murder- Agatha Christie
3. Your perfect year Charlotte Lucas
4. Out of the silence -Eduardo Strauch

May

1. See you soon NC Marshall
2. Green lake SK Epperson
3. The tumour-John Grisham
4. Murder in the manor -Fiona Grace
5. Man's search for meaning -Viktor Frankl

June

1. Remembrance-Daniel Steele
2. A village by the sea -Anita Desai
3. Pocket full of rye- Agatha Christie

July

1. Little fires everywhere -Celeste Ng
2. Night road -Kristin Hannah
3. Where the crawdads sing -Delia Owens
4. The book woman of troublesome creek- Kim Michele Richardson
5. Between sisters -Kristin Hannah
6. Angel falls -Kristin Hannah
7. The things we do for love -Kristin Hannah
8. Everything happens for a reason and other lies I've loved -Kate Bowler
9. Magic hour -Kristin Hannah
10. Running like a girl -Alexandra Heminsley
11. Firefly lane -Kristin Hannah

August

1. The space between us -Thrity Umrigar
2. Before the coffee gets cold -Toshikazu Kawaguchi
3. Before we were yours- Lisa Wingate
4. Tell me your dreams- Sidney Sheldon
5. The great alone -Kristin Hannah
6. The Glass castle -Jeanette Walls

September

1. The tattooist of Auschwitz- Heather Morris
2. Educated -Tara Westover
3. Ask again yes - Mary Beth Keane
4. Dear Edward -Ann Napolitano

October

1. American dirt -Jeanine Cumins
2. Orphan Train -Christina Baker Kline
3. Winter garden -Kristin Hannah
4. A walk in the woods -Bill Bryson

November

1. Dutch House- Ann Pratchett
2. The Pearl -John Steinbeck
3. It doesn't have to be crazy at work -Jason Fried and David Hansson
4. The Elephant Whisperer- Lawrence Anthony 

December

1.  Anxious People- Fredrik Backman 
2. The Forty rules of love - Elif Shafak 
3. The Psychology of Money- Morgan Housel ( Current Read) 
4. The Nickel Boys - Colson Whitehead ( Current read) 

The Song of the Pearl

The man and his words

He writes as he speaks. He speaks to each and every individual one to one through his words
This makes me like his writing more.
He keeps it realistic yet imaginative.

I read his novella- The Pearl

Can money buy happiness?
Is it a guarantee for future well being?
The story is about poverty and greed.
Need and the chance of wealth.
Fate and oppression
Evil-an Inherent Nature of man.

It is depressing from start to finish, even the promise of wealth, leaves the reader with no
hopes for the family.

The story is predictable and does not say anything new about people, culture, values

It is Steinbeck's writing style and prose which has left me captivated.
He is Straightforward, Colloquial, Unpretentious, Earnest.
Even a bad story made me keep going till the end.
He weaves his words to create poetry in prose

“When Kino had finished, Juana came back to the fire and ate her breakfast. They had
spoken once, but there is not need for speech if it is only a habit anyway. Kino sighed with
satisfaction - and that was conversation.”

“Part of the far shore disappeared into a shimmer that looked like water. There was no
certainty in seeing, no proof that what you saw was there or was not there. And the people of
the Gulf expected all places were that way, and it was not strange to them.”

I am now curious to read his masterpiece - a timeless classic to appreciate better his writing
and influence on the literary world.

The Pearl- John Steinbeck

Your body is a wonderland

Left with no choice
when his hands
slowly decide
how to evoke my mind

Drawing his fingers,
feel the ridges,
his hardness
curves naturally
into my soft palms

my tangles
uncombed, wild;
his fingers, through them
playing their tune

lips meeting,
impatient, yet slow
deepening into
something more

longing, lengthening,
squirming, needing,
breathing, rushing,
quivering, craving

Eyes closed,
listening to the rise and fall of his chest;
the heavy thud of the heartbeat;
slowly melting into him

Abandon fears from the mind;
Focus on every inch of the body;
Inhibitions disappear;
Leaving cravings deep within the soul

The weight of his arms
blocking out the world
a constant reassurance
together in the moment

At times a silent prayer,
and others a whispered incantation,
Sometimes a frenzied cry,
Everything gets answered

Goodbyes are cravings for
the comfort of his arms and
just one more kiss to lose myself in
just for a little while longer........