There is a request from the person who runs the company Intranet to write a little something about myself and send it on for inclusion. It feels a little like being tagged in the blogosphere and for once I am not too keen on defining myself. I feel like I have been doing exactly that for so long, screaming out who I am and now I am hoarse, I want to stop trying to tell people who I am (then again just because I want to stop, doesn’t mean I really will, even the rest of this post is an indication of my fight with myself!)
The strange thing is that I probably have a blog because I have no qualms when it comes to talking about myself. I have no idea what compels me to do it but I do keep coming back and broadcasting for the world my latest thoughts, reflections, insights, such as they are. Even at this particular moment in time, no reason to write what I am writing but I am doing it anyway, doing it as I think of these lines from an old Talat song:
Tu aa ke mujhe pehchaan zaraa
The lines mean: Come, get to know me better. Talat sang that line with such a note of insistence and as the scene was enacted on film, it showed Nargis rising from her seat and being drawn towards Raj Kapoor, who was singing the song in the film, all set to do as she was told and to get to know him better, as the line demanded.
Is this what some bloggers hope to do as well? Find echoes, seek resonance and find someone who would be keen on getting to know them better? Why is it so important for some of us to find someone to get to know us better? Does it validate our existence? No two individuals are exactly alike, not even identical twins, and yet we seek people who are like us, who respond similarly, think alike, the search never ends.
For instance, even the song mentioned above is unknown to most people I know, much to my genuine chagrin, because if they don’t know it I can’t discuss it with them! It is a famous song and many people from my parents’ generation know it well, Talat fans would know it, connoisseurs of old Hindi cinemas may know it, but as it turns out, I am the only one in my circles who has any familiarity with it.
I often think of old songs, old lyrics, I like seeing how the music wrapped itself around the lyrics, how beautifully the song was rendered and then I like talking about it. Needless to say, I don’t find too many people who also like indulging in this rather meaningless, rather inane pastime, but I’ve found a few, and whenever I have, I couldn’t help feeling oddly pleased, even thrilled at the meeting of minds in this manner. Don’t know why, really a rather strange thing!
Such a discovery isn’t “important”, doesn’t change the course of my life, it doesn’t affect any outcomes. Heck! It probably even makes me look like an incredibly boring person to some others. Whatever it is, it is a part of me and when I see that there is someone out there who is also incredibly drawn to Hindi film music from the 1940s, 50s and 60s just like I am, it just feels good, somehow, to connect - tu aa ke mujhe pehchaan zara…
It feels rather shameful to admit to this reason for blogging, to come to a realization that it is a calling out of sorts, “Hey there, this is me! Are you like me? Let’s talk.” So what if there are others out there like me, what next? A few moments of shooting the breeze and asking each other, “Hey, heard this one? Know that one?”
What next? Even a meeting of minds loses its novelty in a very short frame of time.
A writer who posts as Seekersought on the Shakespeare & Company Network of Writers said something in one of her posts that got to me:
“I learnt it is important not to bracket one’s life within assertions (I am bohemian/ My family needs me/ I don’t do poetry…)”
The lesson learnt is quite the testament to her evolving maturity. It seems important to be able to get away from the temptation to bracket our lives within assertions that define us and brand us. It seems important not to want to call out for resonance, understanding, to not seek echoes, to stop screaming out to the world that which we think defines us. It seems important and idealistic, verging toward enlightenment and, as such, quite an impossibility.
Thursday, May 22, 2008
Thursday, May 15, 2008
Good Providence: An Agnostic's Tribute
Providence: The care, guardianship, and control exercised by a deity; divine direction
Human fortunes notably run in cycles, a glut of good fortune followed by a patch of bad. If we've lived long enough to cultivate a panoramic view or prescience, it is only natural to expect the sinusoidal nature of our fortunes.
The next peak or the next trough will always come, there can never be any doubt about it. We accept that we're born and we die; we know we work within those two bookends, but we refuse to acknowledge as an irrefutable fact that our fortunes are cyclical. We try countering the cyclicality with superstitions that suggest that it's never a good idea to bask under a smiling sun of good providence. Doing so, most of us believe, signals our complacence, or hints at hubris; somehow tempting the fates to take it all away from us.
I have also been afraid of jinxing my very extended run of luck. A glance back at the life, that has preceded every moment before this one, is a trip down a memory lane lined with fragrant meadows, green pastures and gentle winds; classically bucolic. I don't recall any unpleasant speed bumps or potholes or confusing forks in the road on the paths I have already treaded.
The fact that I am aware how grief feels, or how sadness can cast a grey shroud over everything, or the taste of salty tears, or the shudder brought on by fear or apprehension, shows that I have lived and have been sentient enough to recognize these troughs. However, the bigger picture, the aerial view of the time that's passed shows serenity, peace and gentleness; as if the rest was too insignificant to register or leave any lasting impressions.
If there is a higher power, a guardian, then I thank her (wonder why I feel the power is feminine!) for the blessings she has bestowed. In moments such as this I feel very much like her spoilt and bratty child; like a child who is constantly testing her limits, a child who loves upsetting the proverbial applecart just to observe the tumbling apples and the frown on the face of the owner of said applecart. I thank her for her indulgence, for her infinite patience in allowing me to learn from my mistakes rather than punishing me with consequences that could certainly shorten the frequency of occurrence of the sinusoidal troughs.
I am human and come with guaranteed frailties, so I know I will continue to do what I do best till the day I die, that is: be human.
But I want to acknowledge, with grace, the good providence that enables me to live my life in relative serenity.
Human fortunes notably run in cycles, a glut of good fortune followed by a patch of bad. If we've lived long enough to cultivate a panoramic view or prescience, it is only natural to expect the sinusoidal nature of our fortunes.
The next peak or the next trough will always come, there can never be any doubt about it. We accept that we're born and we die; we know we work within those two bookends, but we refuse to acknowledge as an irrefutable fact that our fortunes are cyclical. We try countering the cyclicality with superstitions that suggest that it's never a good idea to bask under a smiling sun of good providence. Doing so, most of us believe, signals our complacence, or hints at hubris; somehow tempting the fates to take it all away from us.
I have also been afraid of jinxing my very extended run of luck. A glance back at the life, that has preceded every moment before this one, is a trip down a memory lane lined with fragrant meadows, green pastures and gentle winds; classically bucolic. I don't recall any unpleasant speed bumps or potholes or confusing forks in the road on the paths I have already treaded.
The fact that I am aware how grief feels, or how sadness can cast a grey shroud over everything, or the taste of salty tears, or the shudder brought on by fear or apprehension, shows that I have lived and have been sentient enough to recognize these troughs. However, the bigger picture, the aerial view of the time that's passed shows serenity, peace and gentleness; as if the rest was too insignificant to register or leave any lasting impressions.
If there is a higher power, a guardian, then I thank her (wonder why I feel the power is feminine!) for the blessings she has bestowed. In moments such as this I feel very much like her spoilt and bratty child; like a child who is constantly testing her limits, a child who loves upsetting the proverbial applecart just to observe the tumbling apples and the frown on the face of the owner of said applecart. I thank her for her indulgence, for her infinite patience in allowing me to learn from my mistakes rather than punishing me with consequences that could certainly shorten the frequency of occurrence of the sinusoidal troughs.
I am human and come with guaranteed frailties, so I know I will continue to do what I do best till the day I die, that is: be human.
But I want to acknowledge, with grace, the good providence that enables me to live my life in relative serenity.
Thursday, May 1, 2008
Smiling Sun?
It is amazing for me to see how many people type in the words "smiling sun" in their search engines and arrive at this blog! I suppose the smiling sun traffic will double, triple or quadruple now that I have those words in the title itself.
My post about smiling suns was a short and impromptu one when I was thinking about my daughter and her drawings; our rapidly growing collection of refrigerator art.
I am sure no one is seeking out that post for re-reading so that leaves me with the mystery of what it is that people really hope to find on the Internet when they key in the words "smiling sun"? Very intriguing.
Another intriguing question that brings them here is a quest for what to put on ones head during an epiphany! I wish I knew and sorry to disappoint you folks, I have no idea! I generally leave my forehead unanointed when I have one.
My post about smiling suns was a short and impromptu one when I was thinking about my daughter and her drawings; our rapidly growing collection of refrigerator art.
I am sure no one is seeking out that post for re-reading so that leaves me with the mystery of what it is that people really hope to find on the Internet when they key in the words "smiling sun"? Very intriguing.
Another intriguing question that brings them here is a quest for what to put on ones head during an epiphany! I wish I knew and sorry to disappoint you folks, I have no idea! I generally leave my forehead unanointed when I have one.
Tuesday, April 29, 2008
Spring Fever ...or something like it
Wonder what it is about Park Avenue that brings out the most gorgeous looking dogs in the city. It must be the broad sidewalks making it easier for people to walk their dogs. But these dogs look good, quite the sight to see as I make my way back to the bus terminal at the end of each day with a smile on my face.
I am starting to recognize some of these dogs and their owners. I know which owners are getting friendlier, brought together by their dogs bonding over an evening promenade.
Walking straight up from 32nd Street to 40th Street along Park Avenue and then turning left on 40th to walk straight into the Port Authority is, I believe, the longer way to go. When I timed myself along this route I clocked 30 minutes, and I am a fast walker, albeit a very distracted one when this is my chosen path.
When I am in an incredible hurry I zigzag wherever I can, left on 34th, right along 6th Ave, left again on 36th, right on 8th and finally – Port Authority. I can cut 7 minutes off my time when I do this. But it isn’t as interesting as the leisurely stroll along Park Avenue and Bryant Park.
The other day I was strolling along Bryant Park, the first leg of my right angled walk, in the morning, humming the Raag Bhairav scale, and lingering on the Komal Rishabh, and was startled at the sense of overall peace and oneness I felt while doing that. Something about that note awakened my senses to a palpable sense of belonging, felt in that instant. I heard my inner voice saying, "I love this place, I love this city!" I am amazed at the familiarity, at seeing the same people walking along the same paths everyday, smiling because I look familiar to them. If they were to bump into me at a restaurant or a movie they would probably wonder where they’ve seen me for awhile, as would I, and then we’d walk over and say, “Hey! Fancy seeing you here, don’t I see you cutting across Bryant Park everyday at 5:30 PM?”
And I didn’t just dream that incident up. It actually happened to me when I went out to lunch with some co-workers and found myself staring at this person on the table across from me. He was staring as well, in between bites of his sumptuous looking California Pizza. It finally occurred to me that he was a bus mate. It must have struck him at the same time because we spoke up at once saying we knew each other from the bus. We had never spoken to each other while on the bus and here we were like old friends.
There are so many such faces all around, people to whom I feel vaguely connected even if I know nothing about them. It makes me feel at home, as though this is the permanence I missed before, as I felt I was skating through life, unable to put down any roots anywhere and not sinking into any experience. I once caught sight of myself in a photograph, sitting on a chair somewhere. I was leaning forward and not back, ready to spring, to leave at any moment. None of my pictures ever show me leaning back in a chair or relaxed and at ease with myself. But in this gorgeous city I feel totally at ease. Its streets and avenues feel like hallways and corridors of a much loved home. Perhaps the kind of home where an extended family lived in days of yore; uncles, aunts and an entire spectrum of cousins. That's how the city feels on a balmy spring day in April, after the heavy coats have come off and the Mr Softee trucks have appeared on every corner. The lady who sits within the Mr Softee truck by my corner smiles at me when I fuel myself with a milkshake before starting my thirty minute walk every evening. She recognizes my face and is always amused and surprised by the flavor I am going to demand each day, flavors that range from vanilla,, butterscotch, strawberry, banana, cookies and cream, banana etc. She tries to read my mind and guess what it will be.
I love such interactions with total strangers. The one advice from well meaning souls that's hard to heed when one feels so much at home is the one about not talking to strangers. I love talking to strangers, rather...love it when they talk to me. Like the man who was relishing his ice cream cone and met me in the elevator ride to work. He was telling me how he had a big dinner planned so decided to go for the ice cream cone for lunch; his way to budget his daily calories and to keep that waistline- in line.
And of course, there's always the requisite weather talk, the vacation talk, the gardening successes - elevator, bus and water cooler buddies regularly providing the baseline tone in the background adding a certain richness in timbre, a slice of their lives forever embedded in my memory cells, becoming an inseparable part of me.
I am starting to recognize some of these dogs and their owners. I know which owners are getting friendlier, brought together by their dogs bonding over an evening promenade.
Walking straight up from 32nd Street to 40th Street along Park Avenue and then turning left on 40th to walk straight into the Port Authority is, I believe, the longer way to go. When I timed myself along this route I clocked 30 minutes, and I am a fast walker, albeit a very distracted one when this is my chosen path.
When I am in an incredible hurry I zigzag wherever I can, left on 34th, right along 6th Ave, left again on 36th, right on 8th and finally – Port Authority. I can cut 7 minutes off my time when I do this. But it isn’t as interesting as the leisurely stroll along Park Avenue and Bryant Park.
The other day I was strolling along Bryant Park, the first leg of my right angled walk, in the morning, humming the Raag Bhairav scale, and lingering on the Komal Rishabh, and was startled at the sense of overall peace and oneness I felt while doing that. Something about that note awakened my senses to a palpable sense of belonging, felt in that instant. I heard my inner voice saying, "I love this place, I love this city!" I am amazed at the familiarity, at seeing the same people walking along the same paths everyday, smiling because I look familiar to them. If they were to bump into me at a restaurant or a movie they would probably wonder where they’ve seen me for awhile, as would I, and then we’d walk over and say, “Hey! Fancy seeing you here, don’t I see you cutting across Bryant Park everyday at 5:30 PM?”
And I didn’t just dream that incident up. It actually happened to me when I went out to lunch with some co-workers and found myself staring at this person on the table across from me. He was staring as well, in between bites of his sumptuous looking California Pizza. It finally occurred to me that he was a bus mate. It must have struck him at the same time because we spoke up at once saying we knew each other from the bus. We had never spoken to each other while on the bus and here we were like old friends.
There are so many such faces all around, people to whom I feel vaguely connected even if I know nothing about them. It makes me feel at home, as though this is the permanence I missed before, as I felt I was skating through life, unable to put down any roots anywhere and not sinking into any experience. I once caught sight of myself in a photograph, sitting on a chair somewhere. I was leaning forward and not back, ready to spring, to leave at any moment. None of my pictures ever show me leaning back in a chair or relaxed and at ease with myself. But in this gorgeous city I feel totally at ease. Its streets and avenues feel like hallways and corridors of a much loved home. Perhaps the kind of home where an extended family lived in days of yore; uncles, aunts and an entire spectrum of cousins. That's how the city feels on a balmy spring day in April, after the heavy coats have come off and the Mr Softee trucks have appeared on every corner. The lady who sits within the Mr Softee truck by my corner smiles at me when I fuel myself with a milkshake before starting my thirty minute walk every evening. She recognizes my face and is always amused and surprised by the flavor I am going to demand each day, flavors that range from vanilla,, butterscotch, strawberry, banana, cookies and cream, banana etc. She tries to read my mind and guess what it will be.
I love such interactions with total strangers. The one advice from well meaning souls that's hard to heed when one feels so much at home is the one about not talking to strangers. I love talking to strangers, rather...love it when they talk to me. Like the man who was relishing his ice cream cone and met me in the elevator ride to work. He was telling me how he had a big dinner planned so decided to go for the ice cream cone for lunch; his way to budget his daily calories and to keep that waistline- in line.
And of course, there's always the requisite weather talk, the vacation talk, the gardening successes - elevator, bus and water cooler buddies regularly providing the baseline tone in the background adding a certain richness in timbre, a slice of their lives forever embedded in my memory cells, becoming an inseparable part of me.
Thursday, April 24, 2008
Tagged again!!
Damn! Damn!
Don't I talk about myself enough, anyway?
Here's what's required of me now:
Eight things I am passionate about:
1. Spending time with my family - doing things with my daughter.
2. Reading at least four books at a time, reflecting on what I've read, using it as a basis for digressing to other flights of fancy.
3. Music - practicing playing the violin (western) and singing Indian classical music for at least an hour a day. Have taken to heart the general saying that to be an expert in anything one needs to practice at least 3 hours a day for 1o years. Can't do 3 hours a day so maybe I'll be an expert by the time I am a doddering old woman of ninety or so.
Someone also introduced me to some old time fiddle music. He gave me a CD where every song has been played at 3 speeds and the idea is to listen and learn - that's the next musical challenge.
4. A few long, solitary drives every year with the music blasting and windows down, one way to feel really alive.
5. Trying to become a better writer but while that's a distant goal, I am passionate enough about writing whatever I can, whenever I can.
6. A passionate Internet junkie.
7. Passionate impulsive spender.
8. Passionate about making new friends and retaining them.
Eight things I want to do before I die:
1. Outsource aging to a Picture of Pragya Gray
2. Carnegie Hall debut at 90?
3. I want to be a published author before I die but the Stones said that you can't always get what you want and that if you try sometime you just might find that you get what you need. So it's a good thing to list as a want but seriously lack what it takes to make it happen and definitely don't need it.
4. I want to make sure my uncle's gift of clairvoyancy didn't fail him when he was telling me that someday I would excel in the areas of kala and vigyan (art & science). Maybe the art of procrastination and the science of laziness!
5. I am usually "walking down the line that divides me somewhere in my mind, on the border line of the edge..." just like Green Day and maybe sometime before I die I'll take a long hard look over the edge at what lies beyond.
6. See my daughter excel in everything she chooses to do.
7. Restore...
8. When I've had a good practice session with my violin, I can play with my eyes closed for a few minutes, without worrying about what my left or right hand is doing. The bow glides over the string in a few surreal moments before a lapse in concentration or focus reintroduces a scratchy tone (hey, I just started). But in life (as in violin or anything else) I would like to be able to do everything with effortless ease with everything I touch, do, say being a direct extension of my thoughts - kind of the way the heroine in the vampire novel Hunger felt the day she was turned into one!
Eight things I say often:
1. I just finished reading...
2. Here's something I read...
3. I was wondering...
4. Long time no see, how goes?
5. Did you ever see that show?
6. Just like in that song!
7. Why does it have to be perfect, approximate is good enough
8. It's like driving...
Eight books I have read recently(only 8??????):
1. This Is Your Brain on Music
2. Musicophilia
3. The Raw Shark Texts
4. Laura Warholic: Or Sexual Intellectual
5. A Sense of the World
6. The Gathering
7. The Innocent Man
8. Echo Power
Eight Songs I could listen to over and over:
1. Boulevard of Broken Dreams
2. Old Habits Die Hard
3. One
4. Angie
5. Madhuban Mein Radhika Naachi Re
6. Ae ri jaane na doongi
7. Main dil hoon ek armaan bhara
8. Most classical based old hindi film songs, Robert Plant, U2, too many to name!!
Eight things that attract me to my friends (guessing, like Alankrita...don't have too many friends, so don't really know):
1. Sense of Humor - I can be funny - I think
2. I listen
3. I am relatively unstressed and unflappable, usually.
4. Have a "Just Do It" approach
5. Non-judgmental and objective
6. Try not to have expectations
7. I follow up on promises
8. Consistent, constant, reliable...or at least try to be...
Phew! That felt like punishment of sorts!
I think I'll tag Ranjini and John.
Pragya
Don't I talk about myself enough, anyway?
Here's what's required of me now:
Eight things I am passionate about:
1. Spending time with my family - doing things with my daughter.
2. Reading at least four books at a time, reflecting on what I've read, using it as a basis for digressing to other flights of fancy.
3. Music - practicing playing the violin (western) and singing Indian classical music for at least an hour a day. Have taken to heart the general saying that to be an expert in anything one needs to practice at least 3 hours a day for 1o years. Can't do 3 hours a day so maybe I'll be an expert by the time I am a doddering old woman of ninety or so.
Someone also introduced me to some old time fiddle music. He gave me a CD where every song has been played at 3 speeds and the idea is to listen and learn - that's the next musical challenge.
4. A few long, solitary drives every year with the music blasting and windows down, one way to feel really alive.
5. Trying to become a better writer but while that's a distant goal, I am passionate enough about writing whatever I can, whenever I can.
6. A passionate Internet junkie.
7. Passionate impulsive spender.
8. Passionate about making new friends and retaining them.
Eight things I want to do before I die:
1. Outsource aging to a Picture of Pragya Gray
2. Carnegie Hall debut at 90?
3. I want to be a published author before I die but the Stones said that you can't always get what you want and that if you try sometime you just might find that you get what you need. So it's a good thing to list as a want but seriously lack what it takes to make it happen and definitely don't need it.
4. I want to make sure my uncle's gift of clairvoyancy didn't fail him when he was telling me that someday I would excel in the areas of kala and vigyan (art & science). Maybe the art of procrastination and the science of laziness!
5. I am usually "walking down the line that divides me somewhere in my mind, on the border line of the edge..." just like Green Day and maybe sometime before I die I'll take a long hard look over the edge at what lies beyond.
6. See my daughter excel in everything she chooses to do.
7. Restore...
8. When I've had a good practice session with my violin, I can play with my eyes closed for a few minutes, without worrying about what my left or right hand is doing. The bow glides over the string in a few surreal moments before a lapse in concentration or focus reintroduces a scratchy tone (hey, I just started). But in life (as in violin or anything else) I would like to be able to do everything with effortless ease with everything I touch, do, say being a direct extension of my thoughts - kind of the way the heroine in the vampire novel Hunger felt the day she was turned into one!
Eight things I say often:
1. I just finished reading...
2. Here's something I read...
3. I was wondering...
4. Long time no see, how goes?
5. Did you ever see that show?
6. Just like in that song!
7. Why does it have to be perfect, approximate is good enough
8. It's like driving...
Eight books I have read recently(only 8??????):
1. This Is Your Brain on Music
2. Musicophilia
3. The Raw Shark Texts
4. Laura Warholic: Or Sexual Intellectual
5. A Sense of the World
6. The Gathering
7. The Innocent Man
8. Echo Power
Eight Songs I could listen to over and over:
1. Boulevard of Broken Dreams
2. Old Habits Die Hard
3. One
4. Angie
5. Madhuban Mein Radhika Naachi Re
6. Ae ri jaane na doongi
7. Main dil hoon ek armaan bhara
8. Most classical based old hindi film songs, Robert Plant, U2, too many to name!!
Eight things that attract me to my friends (guessing, like Alankrita...don't have too many friends, so don't really know):
1. Sense of Humor - I can be funny - I think
2. I listen
3. I am relatively unstressed and unflappable, usually.
4. Have a "Just Do It" approach
5. Non-judgmental and objective
6. Try not to have expectations
7. I follow up on promises
8. Consistent, constant, reliable...or at least try to be...
Phew! That felt like punishment of sorts!
I think I'll tag Ranjini and John.
Pragya
Wednesday, April 16, 2008
Darkly Dreaming Dexter
Had a conversation with a friend the other day about movies and books and about how disappointing it always was to see a movie based on a brilliant book that one may have read. So much is lost when mediums are changed. Characters get reinterpreted, stories get hacked, changed. It's almost always a disappointing experience.
We did acknowledge with some reluctance that movies can whet appetites, make one want more, like when one sees a movie and knows that the book has to be the immediate next step.
However, TV shows, surprisingly, can often do more justice to the novel and stay true to form. Perhaps because they have more time. I have been watching Dexter on my iPod. I downloaded all of Season 1 and am almost done with all 12 episodes. The show is amazing. In essence it is about a serial killer who kills serial killers and other murderers; a serial killer who enjoys killing but has been taught (or programmed by his father over several years) to never take an innocent life. I hear that the show is based on Jeff Lindsay's - Darkly Dreaming Dexter and almost as soon as I finish watching the 12th episode of Season 1 I am going to acquire a copy of the novel. It would be almost as hard for me to resist as it is for Dexter to resist a good kill.
In watching these episodes what's hooked me are the moments of introspection that Dexter goes through when he wonders if being nothing but a collection of learned behaviors makes him a fraud.
How often are the rest of us simply pretending, showcasing learned behaviors and burying the slumbering and occasionally awake beast within. What's our essence, what's acquired, what's real?
He feels empty inside as if he's floating above, watching things, observing, not really a part of anything. When he feels nothing for a person he pretends he does or rather, has been trained to pretend and to blend in so that no one ever suspects his sociopathy. He resists sexual encounters because he believes that such intimacies will bring him too close to someone and then they'll know him for who he really is. Makes one wonder what it is about sex that triggers a series of expectation building or triggers an alteration in behavior. As if a new precedent has been set and all that came before was meaningless. Even though all concerned know, deep down, that what's going to come after isn't necessarily meaningful either.
One wonders how a show so bloody and so monstrous could have one contemplating so much else. But there it is.
We did acknowledge with some reluctance that movies can whet appetites, make one want more, like when one sees a movie and knows that the book has to be the immediate next step.
However, TV shows, surprisingly, can often do more justice to the novel and stay true to form. Perhaps because they have more time. I have been watching Dexter on my iPod. I downloaded all of Season 1 and am almost done with all 12 episodes. The show is amazing. In essence it is about a serial killer who kills serial killers and other murderers; a serial killer who enjoys killing but has been taught (or programmed by his father over several years) to never take an innocent life. I hear that the show is based on Jeff Lindsay's - Darkly Dreaming Dexter and almost as soon as I finish watching the 12th episode of Season 1 I am going to acquire a copy of the novel. It would be almost as hard for me to resist as it is for Dexter to resist a good kill.
In watching these episodes what's hooked me are the moments of introspection that Dexter goes through when he wonders if being nothing but a collection of learned behaviors makes him a fraud.
How often are the rest of us simply pretending, showcasing learned behaviors and burying the slumbering and occasionally awake beast within. What's our essence, what's acquired, what's real?
He feels empty inside as if he's floating above, watching things, observing, not really a part of anything. When he feels nothing for a person he pretends he does or rather, has been trained to pretend and to blend in so that no one ever suspects his sociopathy. He resists sexual encounters because he believes that such intimacies will bring him too close to someone and then they'll know him for who he really is. Makes one wonder what it is about sex that triggers a series of expectation building or triggers an alteration in behavior. As if a new precedent has been set and all that came before was meaningless. Even though all concerned know, deep down, that what's going to come after isn't necessarily meaningful either.
One wonders how a show so bloody and so monstrous could have one contemplating so much else. But there it is.
Thursday, March 20, 2008
Love...
...is so easy to understand in the context of one's child. One doesn't need words.
I was with V today; saw her after 10 years. She has grandkids now and was talking about them fondly. I got teary eyed as she spoke because I suddenly realized how much I had missed A, who has been away from me for almost a week, she'll be back in three days. It was a short separation as she graced her grandparents' home for Spring Break week. But I have missed her so much in just this one week.
I see her everywhere, placing all her stuffed toys in comfortable sleeping positions all over the house and then covering them up in blankets. I see her drawings on the refrigerator, the painting of hers that I hung up on my office wall...she draws so well...this painting has a giraffe, a deer and dog prancing around in green, lily covered fields and her caption reads, "Beu -te- ful Mother Nature". All eyes are drawn to it instantly, that's the first thing my visitors see.
Today I hung up another one of her works...this one has two dogs, two cats, two people and pawprints and footprints everywhere in the background. The blurb here reads, "Love comes in twos." Where does she come up with these! Every drawing is rich in colors with smooth lines, the effect is not childish, but very clear and distinct.
I told her once that I had never been able to draw animals well to which she responded,"Don't worry Mommy, I'll teach you."
Then of course I keep thinking of the times I tell her, "I love you" and she is quick to respond, "I love you more" and then I say, "I love you more than that" and she says, "I love you even more than that plus infinity plus another infinity plus two thousand plus two hundred and forty eight..." and she can keep going, I am the one who needs to tell her she wins.
Most family times are at dinner tables, ours have switched to the basement gym where I am usually on the treadmill or the elliptical machine for an hour, little A hanging on the various arms of the nautilus like a little monkey and big A lifting weights until the role playing begins and the little one becomes Miss A the teacher and big A is given the role of Little Joey. She then proceeds to coach Little Joey in first grade Math, English and last but not least - the hula hoop!
Little Joey is especially bad at the hula hoop, he just can't get it right despite Miss A's excellent teaching technique.
Those are the best moments.
She left me a message today, her tone as clear as a church bells...or something else...the notes so rich...she tells me, "Mommy remember when you said we would do some planting and gardening together in the spring and summer? Remember you said we'd go buy seeds and saplings? Well, you don't have to worry Mommy, I found seeds here, now we can get started on it soon as I come home. I have put them aside with a little note saying, 'Please don't touch'. It'll be so much fun!"
I am not deleting that message ever, it sounds so good to me! I want to find a way to make it a .wav file and save it forever, replay it for her when it stops becoming obvious to me, ten or twelve years down the line, that she loves me infinity times two plus two thousand...
For now I understand love when I think of her, I recognize the warm glow of happiness at thoughts of her, the feeling of standing tall, at one with the universe and everything else as the smiling sun she's so fond of drawing glints off her shiny hair and gentle face.
I was with V today; saw her after 10 years. She has grandkids now and was talking about them fondly. I got teary eyed as she spoke because I suddenly realized how much I had missed A, who has been away from me for almost a week, she'll be back in three days. It was a short separation as she graced her grandparents' home for Spring Break week. But I have missed her so much in just this one week.
I see her everywhere, placing all her stuffed toys in comfortable sleeping positions all over the house and then covering them up in blankets. I see her drawings on the refrigerator, the painting of hers that I hung up on my office wall...she draws so well...this painting has a giraffe, a deer and dog prancing around in green, lily covered fields and her caption reads, "Beu -te- ful Mother Nature". All eyes are drawn to it instantly, that's the first thing my visitors see.
Today I hung up another one of her works...this one has two dogs, two cats, two people and pawprints and footprints everywhere in the background. The blurb here reads, "Love comes in twos." Where does she come up with these! Every drawing is rich in colors with smooth lines, the effect is not childish, but very clear and distinct.
I told her once that I had never been able to draw animals well to which she responded,"Don't worry Mommy, I'll teach you."
Then of course I keep thinking of the times I tell her, "I love you" and she is quick to respond, "I love you more" and then I say, "I love you more than that" and she says, "I love you even more than that plus infinity plus another infinity plus two thousand plus two hundred and forty eight..." and she can keep going, I am the one who needs to tell her she wins.
Most family times are at dinner tables, ours have switched to the basement gym where I am usually on the treadmill or the elliptical machine for an hour, little A hanging on the various arms of the nautilus like a little monkey and big A lifting weights until the role playing begins and the little one becomes Miss A the teacher and big A is given the role of Little Joey. She then proceeds to coach Little Joey in first grade Math, English and last but not least - the hula hoop!
Little Joey is especially bad at the hula hoop, he just can't get it right despite Miss A's excellent teaching technique.
Those are the best moments.
She left me a message today, her tone as clear as a church bells...or something else...the notes so rich...she tells me, "Mommy remember when you said we would do some planting and gardening together in the spring and summer? Remember you said we'd go buy seeds and saplings? Well, you don't have to worry Mommy, I found seeds here, now we can get started on it soon as I come home. I have put them aside with a little note saying, 'Please don't touch'. It'll be so much fun!"
I am not deleting that message ever, it sounds so good to me! I want to find a way to make it a .wav file and save it forever, replay it for her when it stops becoming obvious to me, ten or twelve years down the line, that she loves me infinity times two plus two thousand...
For now I understand love when I think of her, I recognize the warm glow of happiness at thoughts of her, the feeling of standing tall, at one with the universe and everything else as the smiling sun she's so fond of drawing glints off her shiny hair and gentle face.
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