What are the chances?

'For there is nothing so imperfect, so helpless, so naked, so shapeless, so foul as a newborn babe: to whom almost alone nature has given an impure outlet to the light of day: being kneaded with blood, and full of defilement, and like one killed rather than born: which no one would touch, or lift up, or kiss, or embrace, but from natural affection. And that is why all the animals have their udders under the belly, women alone have their breasts high on their bodies, that they can lift up their babes to kiss, to dandle, and to fondle: seeing that their bearing and rearing children comes not from necessity but love. 
-plutarch.

This year, so far has had a spectacular beginning. There have been some tremendous changes in my lifestyle, that I am beginning to understand and appreciate and throw them into the dustbin:

I turn my bike to the right and lock it, as opposed to doing it from the left.

The wallet goes into the left pocket, instead of the right.

The quota alloted for idlis is raised from Rs 20 to Rs 25.

The message that I do not like podalanga has been very clearly, unequivocally, carefully reported to amma. (And duly rejected, but that's different.)

No more amrutanjan. Only zandu balm and iodex.

The calls I get on my phone have a significant improvement in quality-previously, they were automated voice messages from my service provider about low balance, now they are wrong numbers. atleast human.

New saloon. Same old haircut. (Let's face it, there is only so much they can do with what little is left on top.)

*********************************

I know. You are all confused. I am too. I ask myself the same question every now and then. How can something like this happen to me? Perhaps you don't know the whole story, but a long story short-I was selected to play cricket. I am torn by this sea of conflicting emotions that appear to engulf me and destroy the very person that I was, that I want to be. How, can I be selected? If we do a root cause analysis, we find that the answer is quite simple:

No one else was available.

Ok, then again, how can I shoulder so much responsibility, to be taken into confidence at such a short notice? This has raised some very serious self-esteem queries that were so dormant from all that chakkara pongal and thayir saadham, and the occasional paruppu usuli, and the paal payasam and the...oh, wait. where was I?

Anyway, I decided to go meet my destiny. I was standing there, with all the props necessary for the 12th man, the substitute, with the water bottles in had and an annoying cheering noise asking people to go for it, and god knows what that 'go for it' is.

**********************************

You would be interested in knowing about my performance. Ah, yes. we always have to know how well we do, don't we? We need some comfort in knowing that we are a little better than some, and that we fit somewhere on the normal curve-only to the right of the average line. The exceptional ones. The talented lot. Oh, no, you cannot settle for the averages, or anything less than that. That would just shatter that already fragile self-esteem and ego, that we so shamelessly and pointlessly cherish...Ah, anyway, I fielded.

Yes, I fielded at fine leg. I saved two runs. I am now short of breath from all that adulation people foisted on me for such an excellent piece of...oh, what crap.

*********************************

I'm going to give some simple answers for some simple questions:

Why did I not write for such a long time?

Because I am between unemployments, and I am walking a real tight rope. Well, not physically, a little metaphorically. Actually, not even metaphorically...So, yes, I don't understand what I am saying right now.

Why is the world such a mean place?

Because everything is based on law of averages.

Why is the mount road in such a bad shape?Or Indian politics as such?

Pass.

What is karma?

A bitch, according to a trying-to-be-hip song.

What have the people done to my beautiful madras?

Destroyed it. Its gone. 

Why am I trying to do a cho and write q&a columns?

I am bored, and so are you.

What is the point of our existence?

chakkara pongal and rava idli, as opposed to perfomance and stupid notions called 'ambition' and 'pride'.

You only say that because you suck.

Yes. ok. moving on.

Why did it take 10 seasons for ross and rachel...

Shut up. and get out of my life.

புத்தாண்டு வாழ்த்துக்கள். 


Cheers.

ps: performance, do a cho, yes. very funny. I will laugh when I am in high school again.

Story.

Raja, get in here. That is going to be where you live from now on. That is your house, you like it or not.

She is hardly eighteen, he is all of twenty two. She is naive, and completely unaware of a future. He is bold, intelligent and a man of dreams. She walks quietly by his side, head bowed down under the immense uncertainty of a future. He waves to her family, head held high with all his expectations. She is clueless. He is certain.
The jutka comes to a halt outside the majestic house. As the jutka starts to crawl towards the station with the man and his woman, the woman watches her entire past come crashing down on her,slowly moving away from her: her house, her sisters, brothers, the poonai and the thinnai, the thulasi plant and her dearest lakshmi, the most innocent cow she had ever seen. She finds it hard to come to terms with a different and strange man, his close cropped hair and his smell of an after shave sitting in close proximity, and is terrified of a new place away from her home which she thought would never abandon her. She is completely unaware of the tear drop that slips out of her eye in this melee.
A hand slowly brushes the tear off. She is afraid.

Amma, he is making fun of me. He keeps tugging at my kudumi.

Sheis now the mother of three adorable children. He is busy making plans for his children. She teaches them with love. He teaches them arithmetic. She nurtures them. He sets targets. She forces herself to grow up. He cannot stop behaving like an adult. She looks at everyone around her with kindness. He makes wary observations about people. She cannot but help thinking about her old house and her family. He cannot stop thinking about the future.
She is now the queen of the kitchen. The entire place is not new. She is a woman. No more the little paavadai dhaavani rajaathi. She is not even called that anymore. All of a sudden, she is amma. Little things look at her with their cute little eyes, rajaathi like eyes. She is old. She notices new lines on her face. She can no longer run around. She tires easily, but does not admit fatigue.

Granny, you have to come and watch this tree!

She now has white hair, full of wisdom.  He is frail, and fails to make sense of the headlines in the newspaper. She caresses the hair of her grandson. He frowns at the newspaper and throws it onto the oonjal admitting defeat. She smiles, and whispers into her grandson's ear. The little boy walks across the hall and slowly pats the old man on his back.
The man looks at the woman. The woman smiles. She is reminded of the jutka and that hand that wiped the tear off her face.
Slowly, she gets up from the koodam and moves into the kitchen, as her grandson follows her-

konjam paal payasam kudu raajathi...

Ex nihlio nihil fit. Nothing, comes from nothing.

The blur of the distant headlights on the velachery main road and the screaming ferocity of the approaching E18 with hardly any passengers. The vibrations shake the ditch water in the nearby canal, that lays open to the vicissitudes of nature, lashed and rendered cruelly unmotorable by the torrential rains. The stray dog that wallows in the safe confines of the shelter under murugan motor repair works, blinking its eyes at the passers by whirring past in their cars and bikes and cycles.

The stretch on the newly created destroyer of the city, the 'IT' expressway. The million stereotypes walking in and out of the fluorescent caves filled with coffee pots, files and cubicles; missing a live-it-yourself survival kit automatons floating around. The air is laden with greed, emotion, money and a dense fog of expectation. The place is empty, but for the people who work in the nights. Survival. Or more than that. The equally barren but green trees lining the sides of the road and the barrier. The occasional transvestite prostitute on the bus stops near madhya kailash. Flesh, and blood, this cheap human life.  

The gandhi mandapam road, a visible temperature gradient thanks to the lush greenery inside the iit and the raj bhavan. The sidewalk gleams with pride at its checker board tiles, with the street lights shut off and the signals out, the image of a fresh coat of white paint on the lane dividers on the dark ashpalt tarpaulin. The bridge and the canal under it, once a pride of the city, now an unbearable eyesore, a coat of acid on the beautiful image of the history of a beautiful city.

The royally aligned mount road, stretching across the entire city, breathing madras into every one of its alleys, smelling of the night and nothin else. The dangerous traffic signals that all of the intimidating trucks and buses and cars and bikes and cycles want to ignore. The t nagar bus stop, smelling of nothing but stale urine and a hard day's sweat of the million footsteps crushing the road under the heaviness with their empty dreams and hopes.

The tiny person on a scooter, shrinking under his own insecurities, waiting for everything to empty, waiting to cross the road, waiting to see what's on the other side, waiting to get into more complications, and waiting to see what happens. All, for nothing.

Ex nihilo nihil fit. Nothing.

Have you met poonkuzhali?

கனவு கண்டதிலே ஒருநாள் கண்ணுக்குத் தோன்றாமல்,



இனம் விளங்கவில்லை- எவனோ என்னகந் தொட்டு விட்டான்


வினவக் கண்விழித்தேன்-சகியே!


மேனி மறைந்து விட்டான்


மனதில் மட்டிலுமே-


புதிதோர் மகிழ்ச்சி கண்டதடி!

Poonkuzhali is about twice the size of your adult hands. around the size of your leg. She fits comfortably in the hollow between the legs, and in the forehands. She has eyes the size of the entire universe and her eyelids bat to tell us what is day and night. She sleeps and everything subsides. All the words in the world are not enough to explain the sight of poonkuzhali sleeping. She winks at you and you notice that you were worried about something before, but not any more. Her eyes tell us that we are human. We fail, whilst she reigns supreme. She teaches us to let go, with those tiny giant eyes.

poonkuzhali likes the idli thattu, perungayam dabba and the assorted tupperware boxes more than the monkey that makes woohoo noises and those lego like plastic blocks. She runs around in complete disdain of the world around her crawling to the ends of the universe.The thalayaati bommai of a dancer shaking her head side to side makes poonkuzhali break into a fit of glee and excitement. She likes the nail jutting out of the cupboard, and is unmindful of the people around her worried about her safety. Clearly, they have lost their minds, as to how somene who has created everything could be hurt by something!

'பெண்ணே உணதழகைக் கண்டு மனம்


பித்தங் கொள்ளு'-தென்று நகைத்தான்-'அடி


கண்ணே எனதிருகண் மணியே- உன்னை


கட்டித் தழுவமணம் கொண்டேன்...!

When she cries, the whole world bleeds and cataclysm prevails. The world enters into a state of shock, and there is cosmic imbalance, and the forces of nature struggle to equilibriate this tragedy. When mere mortals are hurt, that is natural. When poonkuzhali is hurt, it is the cosmic deluge. As she gains composure, we see the kali-gauri transition in the world around us, from the brink of extinction to fertility. From misery, to prosperity. From evil, to good.

Poonkuzhali does not eat. It is neivedyam for the supreme mother. She basks in the radiant light of the arms that cares for her, and she slowly opens her mouth to accept our oblation and to bless us, to forgive us for all our sins, and to be the caring mother, at the hands of a doting mother. She makes us understand a futile cycle of life might not be as futile as it really looks. Maybe there is reason, but then every other philosophical viewpoint dissolves in her beautiful round eyes.

சாத்திரகாரரிடம் கேட்டு வந்திட்டேன்- அவர்



சாத்திரன் சொல்லியதை நினைகுரைப்பேன்


நேற்று முன்னாளில் வந்த உறவன்றடி-மிக


நெடும்பண்டைக் காலமுதற் சேர்ந்து வந்ததாம்...

She points at us and squeals and grunts. She nods her head and claps her hands and feet, and taps the chair in preparation for a cosmic dance, which makes sense only to her. She walks around on the heads of the billion asuras, the demons and wrestles with them in a mighty tug with her big tiny hands and legs. The demons, in the heads of the adults, feeding her expectations, hope and trying to tarnish her original pure self, how dare they? She reasserts, and slaps the hand that feeds.

I don't know for how long. Maybe until she begins to understand. When things start to make sense to her, that is when she will let go of her supreme form, and become another one of us, a cheap perverted form of a splendid and blissful original.

Until then, poonkuzhali is goddess, the kanchi kaamakshi with the sri chakram, the thaayar alamelu manga of tirupati, and the mahalakshmi in vaikuntam.

மோனத் திருக்கு தடி! இந்த வையகம்


மூழ்கித் துயிலினிலே


நானொருவன் மட்டிலும்-பிரிவென்பதோர்


நரகத் துழலுவதோ!

Poonkuzhali, is my marumagal.

ps:
#Strongly recommend reading kannan/kannamma paatu of bharathi. I almost cried.
#All little kids are equally divine; this post also applies to the other little ones.

(I wrote this one a long time back, hence the title)

Poonkuzhali. October, 2011.

I managed to sneak some time with my niece yesterday in between all the noisy mawkish and unbearably excited grandfathers, grandmothers, cousins, maamas, chithis, and the entire clan. I don't understand why old people start to babble incoherently much worse than the new borns in front of them- maybe they play a game with the newborns in who gets to say the most nonsensical words or make the most outrageously stupid noises that our cave dwelling ancestors would have been proud of. I am quite sure in the entire history of human race, no newborn ever won this game. The way the grand parents talk, even shastri or gavaskar would make more sense, and frankly, there have been times when I would have gladly taken up listening to their commentary as opposed to this gibberish. Why do they not acknowledge the baby as a human being and talk normally?

My sister raises her child at a standard temperature and pressure rating of 1 bar and 294 K with the sea level of the house properly maintained, and the angle of inclination of the sun's rays in such a way that most of the UV light bounces off of the house, with a sterilizer that turns any viruses into dust for a diameter of upto 10 microns, and beyond that, we are currently involved in building a miniature Large Hadron Collider to study the impact of high energy particles to kill viruses less than 10 microns. My god, parents who have just had babies are much more painful than the babies themselves. When I was young, I distinctly recall my sister's room which was a colossal mess, and that would have been an understatement. Now, she washes the room with dettol thrice every four minutes, and dips all the other people who live in the house in a solution of  Hydrochloric acid with a strong acidic pH. We have been quarantined in our own houses, and there is just no escape. Apparently, when the temperature of the food that is being blended is a little less than 29.845 C, the nutritional value is lost. We have temperature scales and sensors in our house that Lord Kelvin would have loved to get his hands on.

If there is more than one baby, the best time to be in the house is when all of them are asleep. The probability of more than one baby falling asleep is equal to the probability that I will solve the standard model in physics in under three hours. So, it is a good idea to keep off limits when there is more than one baby in the house. My own mother, the grandmother now, has completely abandoned the kitchen in favor of talking to her yet-to-start-talking little doll. How can you switch allegiance from the vendakka saambar to a toddler with such callousness? Travesty of justice, I tell you. The other day, she asked 'avanukku pasikkardha',and I answered that I was not really hungry. As it turns out, that avan was that little brat(my niece is referred to  affectionately as a 'he'), and not me. Fuming, I went into the kitchen and ate all by myself. So much for avan.

When you see a little baby crying, you can do three things:
#take chloroform, and faint.
#panic, fuss excessively, kick up a storm equivalent or greater than the noise created by the baby in the hope that it would scare the baby into silence. Fair warning, this never works.
#Genuflect infront of the gods in your poojai room, cry and beg for mercy asking for the divine astra that can put the baby to sleep.
When I see the baby crying, I go to the next room, lock the door, drink benadryl and count to a billion, by which time its over. Before it starts again.

Some common observations on the little one.
#She gets up, eats, cries, goes to sleep. How is that any different from the rest of us?
#She has to get her way, or she starts crying. If she cannot stand when she is trying, and she falls down, she begins to heave and cry. Again, how different are we?
#She becomes very restless when she doesn't have much to do, or when she is asked to do the same thing again and again. Again, the question begs repetition.
Looks like we are genetically hardwired to behave in a specific stereotypical way ever since we are born and start to understand the things we have to understand.

Life is supposed to be interesting with kids. I disagree. Life can be interesting even without them(I suppose a lot of couples are forcibly made to accept this fact). People who don't want to breed do not exactly hate kids. I love my niece; she is probably here by no fault of hers. I sincerely sympathize with new borns. The first time I see a little kid, I cannot stop but look disapprovingly at their parents. I am being told, someday, I will have kids too. If that should ever happen, please come to my house, bring a copy of this blog post just too, frame it using the thickest wooden frame and smack me hard on my head with it. 

#I call my niece poonkuzhali, hence the blog title.

All praises to the Maha Shakti.

Tell her she has the smile that rivals the smile of the majestic Andal in the sculptures. Tell her that her hair flows down her spine the way waves caress the shore. Tell her she has the ears of the snake, as she cleverly  spots the loose tile on the bathroom floor. Tell her that she sees the things that no man can see, and understand things that he cannot understand. Tell her only she can tell why her baby is crying. Tell her she smells of the mallipoo and turmeric and an entire kitchen in the morning. Tell her she breathes life into the plants, men and children in her life. Tell her she can stand up, be bold and smack the hand that slides maliciously on her delicate body, and break it into pieces. Tell her she is everything that she stands for, and she is everything that she believes in.Tell her she cannot lose heart. Tell her she is powerful and guileless. Tell her she is the goddess. 

The first signs of blossom on the plant is the first signs of prosperity in the heart. Nothing can come close to the emotional upheaval this strange thing can evoke. The sight of something blooming into glory is bliss. The sight of the bud and the water droplets slowly clinging on to the safe confines of its beauty is the sight of a child sleeping in the dark warmth of its mother's bosom. As the flower blooms, the heart longs for peace and permanence. The flower slowly fades away, withers, and falls. Like everything else, the crushed flower pains the heart, leaves a void. A void that permeates passivity, ambivalence, indifference, and ultimately educates-nescience, and Aananda.

The stick that makes us understand the random walk. As the old man walks down the stairs of the station, he very carefully positions the stick on what he thinks is the level plane. To him, that plane is not geometry; It could well be the universe, and it could well be the head of the numerous devils he would never have seen anywhere in his life. It could be his own devil, the djinn that haunts him all his life for not being able to see, or it could be the light that guides him safely. Slowly, the stick dips into the first step. Clack. It hits the floor. It sweeps an arc to see what is around it. Enough space to stand. He slowly lowers his leg. And places it upon the djinn's head, crushing his own insecurities. 

காடோ செடியோ கடற்புற மோகன மேமிகுந்த 
நாடோ நகரோ நாகர்நாடு வோநல மேமிகுந்த
வீடோ புறந்திண்ணை யோதாமி யேனுடல் வீழுமிடம்

நீடோய் கழுக்குன்றி லீசா வுயிர்த்துனை நின்பதமே...

Forests, plants, lands with seas, cities, countries, houses-this body falls somewhere here, but you are my only solace.

God bless.

Cheers.