this, that and everything in between

So i come out from hiding again. The weather has changed - no more dark clouds or white stuff taunting my eyes, reflecting my dark thoughts or blank mind. It is actually sunny outside.

We would be moving house again, to another town. After almost one year at this place. Will i miss it? Will this apartment miss me? i guess apartments on rent are like those ladies of the night - maybe they just move on, without getting their emotions entangled.

We went to view a place - the floor plan on the site made it look like it was as spacious as the one we are in right now. We stepped in and what the (*&^*, it is so tiny - it was one of those 'modern' apartments with open plan kitchen but with the lounge being so small, i could have cooked sitting on the sofa. Since we are really idiots, we had decided we would like the place, looking at the pictures on the net and didn't even fix any other viewings. He thought we could live with for 6 months and move on to a bigger one - the place is some 50 miles away and since we are pressed for time, it was just not possible to go view other apartments. So, i reluctantly said yes and could not digest my dinner that night. i told him maybe we should find some other place - he was annoyed - but in the end, he took time off from office and we have found another place - i still haven't seen it - it overlooks a river. For that alone, it would be worth it, i guess.

It is surprising how much stuff you can accumulate in one year - i have two boxes of books. Maybe he was hoping i would dump them but since we are using a moving van, well, he has no scoring point.

And guess what? i gave up my previous job - yes, the one i got last year - and without another job to fall back on. But then, i really had no choice. In a way, i was glad to let go of it. It was not a bad job - i learned new things - but it was too much like a job job. For the first time in my working life, i felt i was actually 'working'. Everybody was so professional - no leg pulling, no cursing colleagues - i felt like a monkey in a suit. That is what working 8 years in my previous company has done to me - i expect work to be fun, actually look forward to going to work..

The thought of applying for jobs made me cringe - i pretty much made up my mind to work at the tills in the local supermarket - if he was disappointed in my lack of ambition, he did not show it. And then, out of the blue, my previous company steps in like a knight in shining maruti and offered me a job. When i told my friend SN about it, she said i am so lucky.

This is actually what makes me so complacent - as if life was going to sort itself out without my intervention. i always go through life thinking things would always go my way, that if i make a wrong turn, the path will right itself. Someday, i am going to pay for it dearly.

And that is the reason we are moving because the job is in another town. i hope to be able to buy a Mac before the year runs out. Or maybe a cookbook with lots of pictures.

BTW, i have inherited the iPhone from him because he got himself one of the new one - 3gs or whatever they call it. i am half ashamed to be seen with a iPhone - i was happier with my cellotaped-almost-falling-apart Nokia 1100, the one i could only use for making/receiving calls and the rare SMS. This one, with its myriad functions, makes me feel sad. It is like giving a dog a diamond necklace when it rather would have an old rubber ball.

you make me smile

You, who make my world complete, who can wipe away my sorrows with just a smile, who can brighten my world...And just for you, i want to be a better person so i can deserve you. i love you, my baby.

Extramarital affair a criminal offence?

Last week, i read an article on e-pao about a couple being thrown into jail for having an extramarital affair. Now, my legal knowledge is not that sound but still, is extramarital affair considered a criminal offence in the eyes of the law?

No, i don't condone such affairs because i believe in the sanctity of the marriage vows but i don't agree with the idea that erring couples should be locked up. After all, we are talking about two consenting adults and not under-aged kids swayed by abundance of hormones. It might not be morally right and can be a ground for divorce, but to incarcerate them? i wonder under which act they were booked under.

Contrast this to the unnerving silence of the custodians of law when it comes to mobs destroying houses of people accused of crime which, going by the news on e-pao, seems to be becoming a regular event in the hell that Manipur has become. i never read anything about the police clamping down on these people who have scant regard for the rights of other people whose only crime is they are related to the accused. We have our priorities all mixed up, i tell you.

the games we played...

The other day, my sister and i were reminiscing about the games we used to play as kids and how sad it is that they are getting forgotten and would be lost to the next generation.

i was lucky to grow up with a considerable number of playmates in the guise of cousins and siblings. And oh, the games we played - chagai chongbi (the Manipuri version of hopscotch), khulokpi, marum konbi, churup upu, lai phadhibi, chak thongbi, keku lotpi, rangita, swa, amaangbi, utong lakpi, marbles, ludo...

If i ask my younger cousins if they know how to play marum konbi, i know i will get blank stares. Now, it is Mario and other video games. That or watching Ben10 and other cartoons on TV.

i particularly miss playing marbles because, in my younger days, i was a marble champion. i still have marbles stored away under my bed in my old water bottles back in Imphal (well, at least the last time i checked). In fact, when i was young, i thought of making a will (i got the idea of 'wills' from the story books) describing how many marbles should go to each of my siblings and some favourite cousins, the number changing with moods!

i still remember the near-perfectly straight line of marbles lined up, the thrill when you hit the one at the arrowhead (and thus getting all the marbles), the way we used to mutter 'burumbi kangsoi' whenever someone was about to throw a curse to make their aim go awry, the sneaking away in the middle of the game to deposit some marbles when on a winning spree (because the unwritten rule was you could not quit when you are winning so as to give the losers a chance to win back their marbles, the exception being if the tone of the mother calling you to stop playing and do your homework reached the limit beyond which a bashing was guaranteed), begging the winner to please, please lend some marbles when you end up losing everything so you could play the next round, the counting of the marbles at the end of the day, calculating how many you have lost or won, trying to coax the owner of a lucky 'laaga' (the marble used for throwing) to give it in exchange for 10 'ordinary' marbles....

i continued playing marbles even during the vacations when i went home in my college days, much to my parents' embarrassment who could not understand how a grown girl could still jump and shriek with joy playing marbles with kids young enough to call me 'mother'.

How i wish the games of my childhood were still played today. How it saddens me to know that they will fade away, replaced by mindless video games and cartoons. And how lucky i am to have at least experienced it all...

Fly away, my thoughts....

Even though i have a more than abundant supply of books now, thanks to freecycle, i had another attack of the blues. It was more 'the blacks' than the blues. Do i make sense? No. But then, no one expects me to, least of all, myself.

Sometimes, it is scary how my thoughts hold me at ransom. They go on a rampage, pulling down the shutters on my smiles, zipping up my lips, painting a mist on my eyes. Am i one of those suffering from 'manic depression'? Or maybe i am a hypochondriac? Or maybe, i am just mad, sad or bad?

i keep thinking about, what else but my pet topic, the meaning of life. Is there a meaning to all of this? What use is money, position or whatever that we hanker for in life? i would just be as happy in a village growing cauliflowers as i would be sitting in a cubicle writing lines of code that could/would break or be eaten by bugs, maybe happier. What do i want in life? Why do i worry about things that don't need to be worried about? Why do i search for meanings in the clouds above, in the dead leaves that flutter down? Why can't i find happiness in the ordinary things that people revel in?

How quickly the years pass by. It scares me knowing i will die one day without having found any answers to the questions that gnaw away at the back of my mind. So many years feeding these thoughts and still, they refuse to be appeased. They ask me "But, is that the meaning of life? Is this what you are searching for?". They refused to be fooled.

Oh, how i so wanted to be a butterfly but i know i will die a caterpillar. Now, that is a truth, if ever there was one.