Thursday, June 22, 2006

Aha! Take that all you cynics of my writing style!

I just didn’t know how to begin. The words, the thoughts, the lines, they came and went and with them they brought and took away a million feelings a million times. I was not ‘consistent’ they said. ‘Consistent’ is a strange thing to be as one learns one must change every second. Survival is adaptation so ‘consistent’ I was not – did not want to be.
Poetry, I thought. Rhyme and rhythm. That amazing combination of words that express emotions unsaid and sights unseen with such laconic expertise that it bewildered. It had to be poetry. There must be poetry. Yet there was none…as yet. And if it were to be then I must write it.
This was a disturbing conclusion so I ignored it. For writing was something of the past. The rhyme had deserted me and the rhythm no longer beat in the freely flowing words. So I turned to words. Just plain words with no frills. And then there was the abstract. That which was known yet unknown and that which was above all loved because it left all but a slight notion to the imaginative mind. Was this an option when I wanted to make myself clear? To make myself heard and most importantly understood.
The fact of the simple matter was, I did not know. Did not know what was to come. What had passed and what was now. Yet there was no sense of foreboding. No uncertainty for that had passed too. With no help from the world I might add.
And then it nagged again. Something between thought and feeling, somewhere between mind and heart. So elusive that even though it was within me I was unable to grasp it. Even though its origins lay in, possibly, the deepest darkest recesses of that unknown part of me, it was as swift as the most fleeting glance.
It turned the day into night and the night into a gloom cast. It made the laughter artificial and it made the heart heavy and the mind dysfunctional and dull. It nagged at joy and boosted the sorrow. What was it, this creature? So illusory yet so effectual.

Something between thought and feeling
Lay somewhere between heart and mind
In swirls of darkness hopes were reeling
Till solace those illusions did find
Its origins lay in the deepest,
Farthest part of the soul we had
Illuminated were the recesses darkest
With memories sad and glad
Strands of thought formed from the mist
Of reason and belief, they stood
Alone and apart from the rest
Enshrouded beneath the sacred hood.
The Holy Grail, it has been lost
And the purest blood has flowed
The boundaries of faith, they have been crossed
The seeds of doubt are sowed
What will become of reason now?
What destiny does lease
We have lost what was ours – and how!
We have shattered the simple peace.
The bonds that hold the world together
Have snapped between you and I
So now there is no forever
It just seems like there is goodbye.













Wednesday, June 21, 2006

Those were the days my friend...

So I have made a grand entry into the elite group of 'blogs once in a while'ers. Almost feel like re-writing my 'profile' in something:
Living with - out a choice
Political view - opaque
Humour - Ive done better!
Drinking - need a stiff one to get over today!
smoking - arite hand me that too if it will make today better!
blogging - occasionally :-)

Today was a bad day, one of those where all your effort leads to zilch and you feel stupid and almost...almost... decide to come away with a Masters instead of PhD (blasphemy!!). Anyhow, so just as I was thinking that I am probably the stupidest moron (if such a combination is legal!) to walk God's green (and smart!) Earth, not to mention the harrowed halls of the LPC, RSPHYSSE(that's an acronym for where I work!) - just as I was on the verge of wallowing in self-pity, somebody pulled me out (kicking and screaming no less!).
Self pity is a blissful state where everything is justified. So also the pre-awakening state where 10 mins more is always justified, never mind that you will get to work an hour late and have to sneak in the back door of a different department and then down in the dark corridors of the dimly lit labs and then very swiftly past the administrator to your desk, get rid of bag and coat in the blink of an eye, put bottom on chair and look around as if to say 'What! ive been here all morning!'.
Back to self-pity, so it is a state where one can be lazy, depressed, lethargic, condescending and critical. One can eat ridiculous amounts of food for comfort, watch TV all day to feel better and do nothing if that's what it takes. If you are a very unlucky self-pityer you will have some 'enlightened' soul around you who will give you the whole rigmarole about how nothing ever came off self-pitying (although Im not sure how they know that!) and one must pick oneself up and move onto greener pastures as it were. A very lucky self-pityer will have another self pityer so they can self pity together :-D!
Im a moderate self pityer, like to wallow in it for a while but then have to drag myself out of it because big things at hand. A hot cup of tea to brew and some good company to drink your sorrows away with is that not all one needs - or is it?

Thursday, June 08, 2006

Of Blogs Thus Far

I find my writing skills rapidly deteriorating, anybody who has had the misfortune of keeping up with my blogs will vouch for this - that is of course if they consider honesty more of a virtue than niceness. My first few blogs - ah! sheer class (or so I would have myself believe), the intermediate ones were struggling between heaven and hell and the last few were competing in a downhill race!
I like to think this happens to the best of us. Mr. Archer should agree since his 'Sons of Fortune' seemed to draw inspiration from a bad Saawan Kumar flick! (sincere apologies and sympathies to anyone who liked the book!)
Personally I find that writing, although it begins as a very intimate thing, in moments of introspection and reflection for those blessed with (or willing to put in the effort to acquire) a rather more flowery vocabulary than the masses - it very quickly digresses into something more appealing to these very same masses. A tried and tested style will, no doubt, work but a different style that recieves just as much attention will soon become tried and tested too!
I am unsure as to where blogs fit in in the general scheme of things. One cannot pour one's heart out nor can one write about the blueness of the sky in any great detail.
There are of course things like last week's dream or 'How I was chased by ducks around South Oval' (in that case I reckon a picture would be worth a thousand words and a video would be priceless!).
Current issues is another subject and will always recieve attention as they are ...well...current. they don't get outdated! However I am not keen on unleasing a monster with such open endedness as 'please feel free to share your views on *some sensitive (non) issue*'.
Where there are numerous options, indecision is paramount, hence the random rants about seemingly random things.
THE question, at the end of every day is 'What do I write about'. Should it be something that my 'readers' (I have readers now?!) care about or something I would rather they cared about, or alternatively (and this is the easier option) something I care about. More often than not I choose the last option and the eternal struggle is to make something I care about sound so worth caring for that the reader, by the end of the blog, cares about it too.
Here's to success!

Monday, June 05, 2006

Gratitude!

Sometimes people do things that leave you at a loss for words. Now I cannot personally say that I have had this experience several times. I can spring in my two-cents to anyone at any given time without thinking twice about it. But every once in a while someone does something - so thoughtful and nice that I am at a loss for words. Honestly only unadulterated kindness can leave me tongue-tied. I have never been big on self-confidence, I dont possess it in any reasonable quantity and I dont inspire it in the masses, as it were. However, there have been instances in my life that have made me sit up and take notice - of myself! Generally I am of the notion that my life makes not an ounce of difference to more than a handful, and those handful I can explain myself to, hence I can continue with the general air that by simple statistics my life makes no difference to the person next to me (almost 99 out of 100 times!).
Even so, as I mentioned in my previous rant (about tools building life and such) I try (strive even!) to be a nice person and thanks to several people today I know I have succeeded.
So basically this is a THANK YOU! blog - to everyone who has made a difference and although I would love to gush like I've just won Miss. Universe, with a bouquet in my hands and a crown on my head and start thanking this lot - Im going to do something a lot more from the heart.
Im going to put it in black and white (words!!) - THANK YOU!