In a few days, one will start inching closer towards a milestone birthday. Not much seems to have changed in the past year and yet everything seems to be changing. I still like my seven year old rickety car and eight year old broken phone. I still sleep alone but always with books on my bed. The loves remain the same and the hates? Well, I hate very passionately, like I can scare the crap out of myself with that emotion it can be so intense so I avoid going there, completely. But the people I’ve harboured resentment towards the past two years…I wish I was mature enough to say I’ve forgiven (I’m not there, yet) but one’s found a better way of dealing with it, by being totally engrossed in other things and venting on this platform. Therapy has helped, it makes me realize, how intense the abandonment issues are , what an asshole one is ( not really a revelation but the intensity certainly is) and how intuitive one is. The humour is too self deprecating, apparently, areee come on, I don’t have a spouse to pick on, so I’m my best source of entrainment. But the prime get away has been there are things you can gain with effort but love isn’t one of them, so there’s no shame in giving up on some things and some people. Another thing one has figured out is avoiding human contact, is freaking awesome for my mental health because I have the maturity of a two year old.

One’s been surprised by people, this year. The Art Fair, was something else. The gallery didn’t inform me that they were discussing my work during the art walk, so one was a bit taken aback, with the way they described my pictures. One’s only met a few people in the past two decades who have really seen it from my point of view, so that was refreshing. And there’s another thing that will stay with me- I met up with some batchmates and one of them, has written this interesting read called Cupidity. So, one was having a fan girl moment and what truly surprised me was her friend’s reactions. They were so thrilled for her, that it pleasantly surprised me. Aspirational. I think one would want to someday be like this author’s friends, actually be really, genuinely as thrilled for another woman, with that kind of intensity.

The other thing one has been fixated on is:- what do I want to be when I’m forty five? So, the hours that one’s been putting in, has very little to do with money and much to do with that thing that one wants to turns oneself into- an unstoppable machine ( the only problem with that plan is the BPD- the highs are so freaking high, one’s totally energetic, like a disciplined soldier and the lows make it impossible to get out of bed. It’s like something I read- sometimes I feel like Van Gogh’s starry nights and sometimes like his suicide note) who doesn’t need anyone, especially not a man.

Before you accuse me of being a man hater, let me just say, ‘ come on, look at me, if anything I’m totally, unbiasedly, misanthropic. But I do adore men. Not all though, not the weaker ones who get off on verbally, physically or emotionally abusing women. I’m done with those, for this lifetime! But the rest- I love working with them, I think like them and I thrive in their company, as they’re aggressive and very competitive and that’s totally up my alley. In fact, every time I walk into a room, my first instinct is to gravitate towards the mundas because that’s where all the fun is and one has failed at decoding one’s gender, as miserably as they have. Plus, like them, I too am looked at like a spoilt, badly behaved, work in progress, rogue who needs to be fixed ( no man has been able to fix me, maybe a woman can).

Having said that, the super clingy (SC) part of my personality, looks at all of them with doe shaped eyes and has always wanted to be rescued by one of them. They’ve tried and failed at doing a job, that isn’t meant for them ( we have to rescue ourselves, I know, I know…dil ko behlane ke liye Ghalib yeh khyaaal acha he). In any case, women are better at this, unfortunately the thirteen year old who was going through a I hate all men after a molestation attempt, who developed a crush on SK and PK, twin sisters who played basketball and looked so cute, with their short hair hasn’t found a woman other than Anokhi Parekh and Sushmita Sen, she would want to be fixed by. ‘Please God, help me tap into my bisexuality, send me a woman with a deep husky voice, broad shoulders and strong hands before I die. I want to play Romeo, someone needs to play my Juliet..man, woman I don’t care’, is my birthday wish, this year but unfortunately nothing, nothing is happening.

Other than my very sweet aunt, sending me proposals. I know she likes me but sometimes , I want to tell her and the boys, who seem to loiter around that, ‘ For once look at me carefully….if I don’t get along with my own tubbar, I’m the blackest sheep in a family where everyone is not really normal, what are the chances that I would get along with a man’s family and especially his friends? With my Sheldon Cooper type ability to put my foot in my mouth and my intense aversion to being controlled or even being answerable to anyone for anything, on what planet would this work out?’ But I remain invisible, I guess, some are blinded by love and the others by contempt. But one remains Mr India, nevertheless.

Happy Father’s Day, to my constant source of entertainment and woes, my companion and my in-law and my source of inspiration for the person I wish to be and also someone I hope I never become. This statement, as dichotomous as it is, falls short in explaining our rather complicated dynamic. But like the boy, you insisted I should be with said, ‘it’s like Amitabh and Deepika in Piku!’ Who knows? For now let’s just try to fit into that box.

I look at you with amazement and horror and that makes me realize how lucky one is to be able to have parents who were fallible humans and not demi Gods, one would have idealised but instead looked at as co travellers, who didn’t have all the answers. Having said that, it doesn’t mean one doesn’t appreciate how hard working and dependable you were. How you stuck around when most would have bailed and how you managed human relationships, so well, for the longest time. To deal with your life partner’s illness, then loose a young son and then to deal with your wife’s death and inspite of your grief to consistently work and focus on someone other than yourself and not shut shop, when you have the option of an easy life, is commendable and highly admirable. It reminds me of the tortoise and the hare.

Your sense of humour keeps me entertained and is also the absolute death of me. No one in this world can come up with such one liners-

‘There are two biggest doomsters ( which isn’t a word, it’s doomsayers but you insist on calling me thus) one was Nostradamus and the other is you! Always, preparing for the worst case scenario .’

‘Jo bhut aur dayan hote he unna koi gender nahi hota!’ Ya, I know, I’m one!

And my most favourite, ‘ You’ll never be a good daughter to me, so don’t do this pakhandbazi!’

The last statement has helped me more than a year’s worth of therapy. It has set my heart free. Hope something takes away the woes of your heart, as well. Have a lovely day.