Numbed Thoughts
When was the last time that I’d blogged? March, was it? & today it’s almost November, 8 months have passed & look what I’ve achieved in these 8 months. I discovered only a couple of days back that I “may” have 2 wisdom teeth & both of them made their presence felt by giving me sleepless, pain filled nights. Diagnosis of my friendly neighborhood dentist, both of the wise teeth (?) have turned out to be like me, twisted. So now I am going to have a surgery, (yeasss, finally, & I’d thought I’d never get to use my mediclaim) & remove these 2 teeth from my body, I’ve had enough of wisdom & it’s begun biting. Has anyone wondered what dentists do with the extracted teeth? I know for sure that barbers sell the hair that they’ve cut for making wigs, do dentists do something similar? (If every month, 2 of my teeth are going to be extracted, I may need a good set of reused, recycled, basically cheap (am going to be nangaa after this surgery), dentures by this time next year).
The other day, deeply engrossed in my work, I got a link to my schools alumni association webpage, from our very own (of Nanguys fame) Sid a.k.a. Anna. (How pathetic can I get? I blogged in March about my office party held in December, & all I could come up with was, that I was drunk. Surprisingly, no one cared to ask me if I am ever sober?) sorry, no connection here, I don’t know why I had to write that, only a symptom of my compulsive disorder, on medication for this & its on the wane so no worries there, but I ask you, are all the thoughts in your head always linear? They’re bound to be some randoms creeping in, esp if you are human (apparently my shrink disagrees, no, not to me being human, to my thought process being normal). In this given link of alumni association, that Sid (a.k.a Anna) had sent me had a class photo, black & white might I add, of this one Kindergarten class & wonder of wonders; yours truly (before education corrupted me version) was staring back out of the screen at yours truly (education even corrupted my wisdom teeth version). The joy was unspeakable, the immediate reaction were of a few tears, mistaking the feeling to be my toothache, rolled down. The fact was I’d forgotten I was kid ever, that I’d a beginning; ergo I’d have an end, like all you mortals. Before all the shrinks reading this start jumping to conclusions, let me be clear, my childhood was normal, both my parents (biological, rare in this day & age) took care of me, as should be of a child, its just that I was too reckless with my childhood than I should’ve been & too observant of my post teens. I should have been more observant & accepted my childhood than my adulthood, like taking childhood seriously & spend adulthood as a child, the other part I am trying to achieve. Back to the photo, no need to tell you that I am so ancient that we dint have colour photos back then. I’d even started suspecting that maybe only Sid, Iyer (maybe Iyer is the reason I blocked out my childhood from my memories, bloody Iyer) & I were the only people left of our batch, the rest had just died of old age. But there was the photo in front of me, of me, of years gone, probably sometime like 1983-85, in the middle of the most hectic week of the month & of the worst day possible, but it brought cheer to my soul, body has been crumbling since birth. This brought to my mind something I’d read from Osho's (I think)works, only the soul remains constant, otherwise even our appearances from our child hood to old age change; change so much, that all the stages of your youth to your old age could pass off as different people. Think of it, wouldn’t it be possible that the 5 year old you, was someone else & the 60 year old you, would be another person, maybe all are indeed different people, different entities. Also that, nothing that is visible is constant all that is invisible is never changing. Thanks Sid for the link. And I promise I’ll encourage my kids to take part in their schools alumni association once they pass out. I’ll always remain a rascal, blame my soul for it.
Bus#422, I am in love with this bus. The few buses in the BEST fleet (for all curious researchers & to the helpless people who will be diverted through all the search engines, my lil bit of guidance) that I am in love with is, 422 & 84 Ltd., since 422 is not a limited bus I have an even more special place in my heart for 422, its in a league of its own & probably one of the longest routes to cover. Both these buses are exceptionally quick, be it traffic or rains, these buses will always be comparatively quicker than other buses, and BEST being the best transport system in India, these 2 buses are amongst the best buses in India. How cool is that? It does not matter how old or new the bus model is, the driver will make it run like wind, and I could go on praising like this, suffice to say I am in love with this bus. I like to believe that there must be a special training school for their drivers, that they pass out through the BEST equivalent of the “Top Gun” School, that the “best of the BEST” are only ever allowed to go near a 422 or a 84 Ltd, that you have to prove yourself till you are handed over the keys to these 2 buses. And there are other people who have come to accept that these 2 buses are special, they tell me how they’d begun changing their schedules to catch the 422, just to make it to the office faster, or how they’d give other buses the pass just to board the 422, I feel happy, these buses are gems in the BEST Fleet, just like Happy is a gem in all the restaurants on this planet. If anyone plans on coming to Powai or to Mulund & back to Bandra, take the 422 (not the A.C 422, it’s a shame for the 422 fleet, they should call it AC 425 or AC 424).
Also, if anyone says that I like this bus just coz it takes me to work everyday, I could take the 424 or 425 too, but I hate them as much as I love the 422. Both, 424 & 425, are slow, have exceptionally weird routes, probably plotted out by some poor traffic controller sitting in the weirdly named Dindoshi Depot (someone pls tell me what Dindoshi is supposed to mean), who was just curious regarding the small lines on the Mumbai map & decided whether the small by lanes go anywhere & voila, we have the routes for 424 & 425. The 425 has one more thing going against it, its rich ladies from the far suburbs of Seven Bungalows, who think they own the Bus, the City & my bag, some lady asked me to put my shoulder bag on the floor, coz it was messing up her view in the front through the windshield (I think). WTF!!! Mera baap ka bag hai, can’t put it down without his permission, can i? How hard is it to understand, it took me 15 mins of argument with the lady, for her to understand. Anyways “my” 422 has the most understanding crowd, no one speaks with you, they’ll just burn you with their hot tiffins, step on your trousers (just some dude passing through the aisle as you stand, I have yet to understand the whole process of human locomotion, how high does one need to bring his leg in order for some forward locomotion, I have instances where people’s shoes have scraped the back of my knees, why? Why does anyone need to bring his leg so high up? Is the person moving ahead or doing a ballet?) & puke, yeah, some kid decided that he’d give me some memory for me to remember him with, cute kid, if not for his 7 ft dad, I’d have thrown him off through the window.
Ever wondered why bus conductors have such wicked sense of humour:
Incident 1:
Conductor: Tapping me on my back, “Eh boss aage bado, khaali jagah hai na”
Me: “Jo Hukum” (do the Michael Jackson moonwalk, so that it just appears that I’ve moved forward)
Conductor: “itne padhe likhe log hoke bhi, peeche khade rehte hain”
Me: (Confused, what’s my educational qualification got to do with where I stand in the aisle of the bus? With the stated logic, the person right up ahead must be a Ph.D & I need to get off this bus, fast)
Incident 2:
Conductor: Kidhar jaayega? (Pls. note this is a first, conductor never asks, if he does address you, you must’ve broken one of the laws of traveling in a BEST bus, as are nailed to the ceiling. Plus you better repent for making the conductor speak, I’d commit suicide if I ever made one speak, rather than living with the shame for the rest of my life)
Some Bhaiyya: Powai Do.
Conductor: Rs.20
Bhaiyya: (mild angina stroke later) ek ticket ka Rs.20??!!! Kal tak Rs.10 tha na.
Conductor: Arre “Do” Bola na
Bhaiyya: Do matlab Do
Conductor: Ha wohi, Do ka Rs.20
Bhaiyya: Nahi, Do, Dijiye
Conductor: De raha hoon na, pehle paisa nikaal.
Bhaiyya: Lekin Mujhe ek hi chahiye….
Conductor: Arre, abhi to do bola…
(My attention was diverted by the view of Powai lake after this. Plus I am used to such conversation on a regular basis in the office, my boss being a Chinese has helped me immensely in overlooking such exchanges.)
That’s it for my bus memories. I’ll write more as & when I remember or Powai Lake stops being such a distraction.
Update on the Wisdom teeth surgery:
Pleased to announce that both (wisdom teeth) have been extracted successfully, with terrible inflammation to my lower jaw & continuous bleeding thereafter from the left behind, stitched cavities. I hate it when 2 dentists discuss their Dentistry Associations politics while extracting a tooth from a seriously scared, on the verge of a heart stroke patient. The politics discussed & played in the Scouts troupe in my school, was better & much more interesting than this & then we left all that because we’d thought we had grown up for such petty things to matter us anymore, some, it seems, just dint grow up or are still in the scouts. I wonder when the dentists worldwide will learn, remove the paining teeth dammit, stop scaring me:
(Both the Chief Dentist & his assistant, the hot chick, are peering into my mouth, going about their work when the following conversation occurs)
Chief Dentist : Its bad. I never expected things to come to this.
Me: (!!!, WTF is bad? What’s come to what? am I going to die(with my wisdom teeth)?)
Dentist Asst: And to top it all, we can’t do a thing about it. I feel so helpless.
Me: (What? What? Lady, you don’t know what helplessness is. BTW can I have my last cigarette?)
Chief Dentist: Yes, exactly.
Me: (For all the times I have disowned you, God, I believe in you, You exist, You rule, You rock!!!)
Dentist Asst: Yeah, they shouldn’t (some ch***** in the dentist’s assoc) stoop to such a level. These are only elections to the regional Assoc.
Me: (You blood b******, wait till this is over.) (P.S. God I don’t believe in you anymore)
Have you ever wondered why all dentists’ assistants are beautiful chicks? You can’t even cry openly in front of them, another case for investigation.
Beatiful Dentist trainee: This might pain a bit?
Me: *Thumbs up sign & wink of the left eye, for showing her how cool I am with this pain thing* (Inside my head: Mom? where are you mom? let me see you for the last time)
Anyways, after such beautiful events, it’s not over as yet, more visits to the dentists yet, it was time to nurse my swollen face & bleeding gums. The childhood photo still brings back peace in the middle of pain, & hopelessness, that like everything that has begun & going on smoothly, so will it end, and yet it will not be over. Whoever preserved that photo, Thanks man, from the bottom of my still functioning heart (I can give you two teeth for this).
I have done this for the past 2 posts & I am in no mood to change it this time. So before signing off, something I like: (something I was trying to tell Mannu in CT the other day)
WHEN RABBI BIRNHAM LAY DYING, HIS WIFE BURST INTO TEARS. HE SAID, 'WHAT ARE YOU CRYING FOR? MY WHOLE LIFE WAS ONLY THAT I MIGHT LEARN HOW TO DIE.'
LIFE is in living. It is not a thing, it is a process. There is no way to attain to life except by living it, except by being alive, by flowing, streaming with it. If you are seeking the meaning of life in some dogma, in some philosophy, in some theology, that Is the sure way to miss life and meaning both.Life is not somewhere waiting for you, it is happening in you. It is not in the future as a goal to be arrived at, it is here now, this very moment -- in your breathing, circulating in your blood, beating in your heart. Whatsoever you are is your life, and if you start seeking meaning somewhere else, you will miss it...
OshO The Art of Dying Chapter #1 Chapter title: The Art of Dying
For all that it is, life, for me, is all about observation, internal & external. Internal is scarier than external.
-Bird
(DISCLAIMER: The above contents & all the ideas are written under effects of various painkillers & sedatives, anyone who may have felt offended by anything written above, I am sorry for that, but it’s still the truth)
The other day, deeply engrossed in my work, I got a link to my schools alumni association webpage, from our very own (of Nanguys fame) Sid a.k.a. Anna. (How pathetic can I get? I blogged in March about my office party held in December, & all I could come up with was, that I was drunk. Surprisingly, no one cared to ask me if I am ever sober?) sorry, no connection here, I don’t know why I had to write that, only a symptom of my compulsive disorder, on medication for this & its on the wane so no worries there, but I ask you, are all the thoughts in your head always linear? They’re bound to be some randoms creeping in, esp if you are human (apparently my shrink disagrees, no, not to me being human, to my thought process being normal). In this given link of alumni association, that Sid (a.k.a Anna) had sent me had a class photo, black & white might I add, of this one Kindergarten class & wonder of wonders; yours truly (before education corrupted me version) was staring back out of the screen at yours truly (education even corrupted my wisdom teeth version). The joy was unspeakable, the immediate reaction were of a few tears, mistaking the feeling to be my toothache, rolled down. The fact was I’d forgotten I was kid ever, that I’d a beginning; ergo I’d have an end, like all you mortals. Before all the shrinks reading this start jumping to conclusions, let me be clear, my childhood was normal, both my parents (biological, rare in this day & age) took care of me, as should be of a child, its just that I was too reckless with my childhood than I should’ve been & too observant of my post teens. I should have been more observant & accepted my childhood than my adulthood, like taking childhood seriously & spend adulthood as a child, the other part I am trying to achieve. Back to the photo, no need to tell you that I am so ancient that we dint have colour photos back then. I’d even started suspecting that maybe only Sid, Iyer (maybe Iyer is the reason I blocked out my childhood from my memories, bloody Iyer) & I were the only people left of our batch, the rest had just died of old age. But there was the photo in front of me, of me, of years gone, probably sometime like 1983-85, in the middle of the most hectic week of the month & of the worst day possible, but it brought cheer to my soul, body has been crumbling since birth. This brought to my mind something I’d read from Osho's (I think)works, only the soul remains constant, otherwise even our appearances from our child hood to old age change; change so much, that all the stages of your youth to your old age could pass off as different people. Think of it, wouldn’t it be possible that the 5 year old you, was someone else & the 60 year old you, would be another person, maybe all are indeed different people, different entities. Also that, nothing that is visible is constant all that is invisible is never changing. Thanks Sid for the link. And I promise I’ll encourage my kids to take part in their schools alumni association once they pass out. I’ll always remain a rascal, blame my soul for it.
Bus#422, I am in love with this bus. The few buses in the BEST fleet (for all curious researchers & to the helpless people who will be diverted through all the search engines, my lil bit of guidance) that I am in love with is, 422 & 84 Ltd., since 422 is not a limited bus I have an even more special place in my heart for 422, its in a league of its own & probably one of the longest routes to cover. Both these buses are exceptionally quick, be it traffic or rains, these buses will always be comparatively quicker than other buses, and BEST being the best transport system in India, these 2 buses are amongst the best buses in India. How cool is that? It does not matter how old or new the bus model is, the driver will make it run like wind, and I could go on praising like this, suffice to say I am in love with this bus. I like to believe that there must be a special training school for their drivers, that they pass out through the BEST equivalent of the “Top Gun” School, that the “best of the BEST” are only ever allowed to go near a 422 or a 84 Ltd, that you have to prove yourself till you are handed over the keys to these 2 buses. And there are other people who have come to accept that these 2 buses are special, they tell me how they’d begun changing their schedules to catch the 422, just to make it to the office faster, or how they’d give other buses the pass just to board the 422, I feel happy, these buses are gems in the BEST Fleet, just like Happy is a gem in all the restaurants on this planet. If anyone plans on coming to Powai or to Mulund & back to Bandra, take the 422 (not the A.C 422, it’s a shame for the 422 fleet, they should call it AC 425 or AC 424).
Also, if anyone says that I like this bus just coz it takes me to work everyday, I could take the 424 or 425 too, but I hate them as much as I love the 422. Both, 424 & 425, are slow, have exceptionally weird routes, probably plotted out by some poor traffic controller sitting in the weirdly named Dindoshi Depot (someone pls tell me what Dindoshi is supposed to mean), who was just curious regarding the small lines on the Mumbai map & decided whether the small by lanes go anywhere & voila, we have the routes for 424 & 425. The 425 has one more thing going against it, its rich ladies from the far suburbs of Seven Bungalows, who think they own the Bus, the City & my bag, some lady asked me to put my shoulder bag on the floor, coz it was messing up her view in the front through the windshield (I think). WTF!!! Mera baap ka bag hai, can’t put it down without his permission, can i? How hard is it to understand, it took me 15 mins of argument with the lady, for her to understand. Anyways “my” 422 has the most understanding crowd, no one speaks with you, they’ll just burn you with their hot tiffins, step on your trousers (just some dude passing through the aisle as you stand, I have yet to understand the whole process of human locomotion, how high does one need to bring his leg in order for some forward locomotion, I have instances where people’s shoes have scraped the back of my knees, why? Why does anyone need to bring his leg so high up? Is the person moving ahead or doing a ballet?) & puke, yeah, some kid decided that he’d give me some memory for me to remember him with, cute kid, if not for his 7 ft dad, I’d have thrown him off through the window.
Ever wondered why bus conductors have such wicked sense of humour:
Incident 1:
Conductor: Tapping me on my back, “Eh boss aage bado, khaali jagah hai na”
Me: “Jo Hukum” (do the Michael Jackson moonwalk, so that it just appears that I’ve moved forward)
Conductor: “itne padhe likhe log hoke bhi, peeche khade rehte hain”
Me: (Confused, what’s my educational qualification got to do with where I stand in the aisle of the bus? With the stated logic, the person right up ahead must be a Ph.D & I need to get off this bus, fast)
Incident 2:
Conductor: Kidhar jaayega? (Pls. note this is a first, conductor never asks, if he does address you, you must’ve broken one of the laws of traveling in a BEST bus, as are nailed to the ceiling. Plus you better repent for making the conductor speak, I’d commit suicide if I ever made one speak, rather than living with the shame for the rest of my life)
Some Bhaiyya: Powai Do.
Conductor: Rs.20
Bhaiyya: (mild angina stroke later) ek ticket ka Rs.20??!!! Kal tak Rs.10 tha na.
Conductor: Arre “Do” Bola na
Bhaiyya: Do matlab Do
Conductor: Ha wohi, Do ka Rs.20
Bhaiyya: Nahi, Do, Dijiye
Conductor: De raha hoon na, pehle paisa nikaal.
Bhaiyya: Lekin Mujhe ek hi chahiye….
Conductor: Arre, abhi to do bola…
(My attention was diverted by the view of Powai lake after this. Plus I am used to such conversation on a regular basis in the office, my boss being a Chinese has helped me immensely in overlooking such exchanges.)
That’s it for my bus memories. I’ll write more as & when I remember or Powai Lake stops being such a distraction.
Update on the Wisdom teeth surgery:
Pleased to announce that both (wisdom teeth) have been extracted successfully, with terrible inflammation to my lower jaw & continuous bleeding thereafter from the left behind, stitched cavities. I hate it when 2 dentists discuss their Dentistry Associations politics while extracting a tooth from a seriously scared, on the verge of a heart stroke patient. The politics discussed & played in the Scouts troupe in my school, was better & much more interesting than this & then we left all that because we’d thought we had grown up for such petty things to matter us anymore, some, it seems, just dint grow up or are still in the scouts. I wonder when the dentists worldwide will learn, remove the paining teeth dammit, stop scaring me:
(Both the Chief Dentist & his assistant, the hot chick, are peering into my mouth, going about their work when the following conversation occurs)
Chief Dentist : Its bad. I never expected things to come to this.
Me: (!!!, WTF is bad? What’s come to what? am I going to die(with my wisdom teeth)?)
Dentist Asst: And to top it all, we can’t do a thing about it. I feel so helpless.
Me: (What? What? Lady, you don’t know what helplessness is. BTW can I have my last cigarette?)
Chief Dentist: Yes, exactly.
Me: (For all the times I have disowned you, God, I believe in you, You exist, You rule, You rock!!!)
Dentist Asst: Yeah, they shouldn’t (some ch***** in the dentist’s assoc) stoop to such a level. These are only elections to the regional Assoc.
Me: (You blood b******, wait till this is over.) (P.S. God I don’t believe in you anymore)
Have you ever wondered why all dentists’ assistants are beautiful chicks? You can’t even cry openly in front of them, another case for investigation.
Beatiful Dentist trainee: This might pain a bit?
Me: *Thumbs up sign & wink of the left eye, for showing her how cool I am with this pain thing* (Inside my head: Mom? where are you mom? let me see you for the last time)
Anyways, after such beautiful events, it’s not over as yet, more visits to the dentists yet, it was time to nurse my swollen face & bleeding gums. The childhood photo still brings back peace in the middle of pain, & hopelessness, that like everything that has begun & going on smoothly, so will it end, and yet it will not be over. Whoever preserved that photo, Thanks man, from the bottom of my still functioning heart (I can give you two teeth for this).
I have done this for the past 2 posts & I am in no mood to change it this time. So before signing off, something I like: (something I was trying to tell Mannu in CT the other day)
WHEN RABBI BIRNHAM LAY DYING, HIS WIFE BURST INTO TEARS. HE SAID, 'WHAT ARE YOU CRYING FOR? MY WHOLE LIFE WAS ONLY THAT I MIGHT LEARN HOW TO DIE.'
LIFE is in living. It is not a thing, it is a process. There is no way to attain to life except by living it, except by being alive, by flowing, streaming with it. If you are seeking the meaning of life in some dogma, in some philosophy, in some theology, that Is the sure way to miss life and meaning both.Life is not somewhere waiting for you, it is happening in you. It is not in the future as a goal to be arrived at, it is here now, this very moment -- in your breathing, circulating in your blood, beating in your heart. Whatsoever you are is your life, and if you start seeking meaning somewhere else, you will miss it...
OshO The Art of Dying Chapter #1 Chapter title: The Art of Dying
For all that it is, life, for me, is all about observation, internal & external. Internal is scarier than external.
-Bird
(DISCLAIMER: The above contents & all the ideas are written under effects of various painkillers & sedatives, anyone who may have felt offended by anything written above, I am sorry for that, but it’s still the truth)
posted by Bird at
3:03 PM
26 Comments
