Amazing people who make me go on n on n on:)

01 June, 2011

I hear, I watch, I wait


I hear, I watch, I wait...

It is the story of my life heralding to its dusk but perhaps I am now getting weary of the same old chronicle as my pent up body feels drained of supporting my equally tardy soul. It has been seventy seven years of a life less ordinary and hence I can’t really blame my bones for giving up on me. How do I admonish these wrinkles that line up my once flawless face? They tried to stay at bay for the longest of times on the human calendar but couldn’t really hold up against Mother Nature’s. And when one came even though peeping out a little hesitantly, the others lined up earnestly, as if to party! My smiles and frowns and ups and downs, perhaps made their resistance even tougher. They say fairer and softer skin is more prone to visibility of age’s vengeance. Now do I thank god for them or call Him in court on charges of un‘fair’ness? I laugh at the irony, which like everything else, is evident to me alone.

Sometimes I wonder, had I led a common life of drudgery, would this decline into oblivion been less painful? Or should I be indebted instead that at least I had my share of envious gaiety even on the run? Lady luck had been kind to me although many others of my own gender could barely bear me; but even she has rules about availing her allotted quota. Mine extinguished due to mindless gorging. I managed to eat my cake and have it and even lick the plate clean! And whatever if any remained on my lips, others made sure to do the honours...if you know what I mean.

I have loved and been loved umpteenth of times in ways that could create epics, seen the world, been there and done that, raised many an eyebrows and then many a good children!

However, today the world seems to have moved on beyond my grasp. Love is just another four letter word that is still not slang. At my age you don’t ‘fall’ in love, for the vision is anyways impaired and the ‘falling’ is anyways an everyday affair. My good children are now struggling to be good parents and hence priorities have shifted. Wherever I have been and whatever I have done is something that can’t be done again. No matter how much the optimists proclaim that history repeats itself, I know it won’t, or at least mine won’t.

I watch how the grandchildren enter my room and bow their head in obeisance before filtering away in the blink of an eye to merrier milieus. I am not the traditional granny telling on her beads and watching freshly hair spa-ed and face lifted ‘saints’ on the idiot box. But I am a granny still...who forgets things, seldom walks and that too with a limp and the only thing hard about her is her hearing. I have a television set for company although everything there is either too soapy for my taste or too loud even for my partially deaf ears.

How I wish they would sit with me so I could relate to them the stories of my past! That’s all I have got with me-a hard disk of memories embedded in my brain that the virus of monotony and vagaries of life could not erase.

I was not hip and happening like they are now, but I had managed to create ripples in many tranquil surfaces. Suddenly the stories that I struggled to hide through my youth are now getting restless to see the daylight, hammering upon my insides ravenously, fearing that their lively exuberance would be embedded with an old body in its sepulchre.
 
If only someone could lend me their ears!  Would they believe me or would they be aghast to hear that old granny could be anything other than a dignified and antiquated epitome? I ache now to strip off the garbs of pretence, to breathe free in the element that is me-no longer so and so’s wife or so and so’s mother but such and such person, as I have always wanted non-judgemental people to know, admire and reckon which many did, who dared to knock repeatedly at my closely guarded portals.

I sit here and concentrate on the merry din that falls upon my eager ears like soft but happy mumblings coming from behind the doors of the other rooms of my house. I sometimes watch the empty bed beside me, run my fingers on its surface and then sigh. The empty bed has been my closest companion since the time its incumbent decided to quit the show while it was at the height of its glory. The empty bed seems to cruelly reinforce to me every day that it would never leave my side. It has loyally taken up the shape of my contours or whatever is left of them.

My materialistic accomplishments lie mockingly tugged into drawers. I sometimes rummage through them and take them out to adorn myself and relive in some iota my past glories. But these that once looked heavenly, pronto throw ghastly shadows on the looking glass, almost beyond redemption. No amount of even the latest accruements can adorn an edifice in its fading glory. My so-loved little black dress looks more of a little black mess at this point.

I wonder should I write a book on myself now, after all, I no longer bother about scandals and appraisals, with one leg in the grave. You can yack how much shit about me in the aftermath, how would it bother me when I can’t care or do a shit about it? Maybe I could disclose the hidden murky side to my perfection, which is instilled in every human, though very rarely acknowledged, let alone flaunted. I can relate how and where these legs travelled before reaching this space. Perhaps my shaking fingers would allow me this last consolation or maybe it is too much to ask of these petite things that allowed me every discretion, when they could enable others to dance on them.

And I hear again, the laughter coming from the adjacent room. What could they be discussing? Why can’t they come in here and talk for if there is anyone who needs to laugh most now, it is me. It is almost like a dying wish now-give me a moment to laugh like no one’s watching, to laugh like I did earlier that set the hearts fluttering, to laugh like it’s the only natural thing meant for me to do in this world.
I hear, I watch, I wait!

Oh my mute lips have spoken too much today!
Perhaps now I should go off to sleep and not get up ever.
Let my youthful soul be free of the dilapidated body that I was once so proud of, to find a new home and begin new glories!

38 comments:

Shady said...

The Death wish of every writer .
Shall the truth be told .

Rachit said...

musings @ noon :)

Bikram said...

Truly second that love is a four letter word :)

I hope and wish we look after our parents much better and that we dont jsut leave them to live .. After all end of the day they are the reason we are here, had they not been we would not have been we own them this much ..

Hello why this sudden thought I want to know ..


I dont know if i have taken the article the right way I hope i have :)

Bikram's

Blasphemous Aesthete said...

The evil that men do lives after them; The good is oft interred

So tell this lady, do write a book, maybe these feeble hands have one more prestigious award (material possession) to hold before they get cold.

People don't exactly die, they live on, only that they don't return.

Nice post.

Cheers,
Blasphemous Aesthete

Sakshi said...

Things that you like to hide from the kids, so that they don't become estrange often, become tales that you would want to tell!

*This seems to be from the perspective of a grandmother- and I was bought up on the stories of my grandmother- her childhood and then the partition and various other antics that we had done when we were kids or older cousins... which we missed!*

Lovely!

Amrit said...

@Suruchi,

It is very well written. Sensitive, complete with full of emotions. Eyes are wet.

Tanvi said...

Where is all this coming from?!! :) Interesting and engaging write up though!

♡ from © tanvii.com

Periodical Memoirs said...

You are just 30+ and u wrote a superb piece here.My respect for you went up several notches again today. I have my Mil who is almost 90 and for sure she thinks the same as your protagonist.
God bless u for being the person u are...as beautiful from within as u are outside.

Alka Gurha said...

After witty and scientific glimpses of your personality in your previous posts the sensitive side is visible in this one. How beautifully you have read the mind of a man approaching dusk....Wish all youngsters could read minds like you have done here.....

Jack said...

Suruchi,

A very serious topic written with a lot of wit as evident - " And whatever if any remained on my lips, others made sure to do the honours...if you know what I mean." LOL.

A post which is truth absolutely as each one of us has something or the other which was known only to us and in the dusk of life we, on reflections, do feel to let it out of our system to ease our own going off without any burden on mind.

Take care

moonlite:D said...

what's making u think abt the old-age already!! :( ,, i thought you'd remain young forever!! *sigh*

imagination is good, though ;)

moonlite:D said...

double comment for publishing the same post, twice ;)

Suruchi said...

@Shady,
But this was not a writer...just an ordinary woman who wanted to vent out loads of truth that she neither denied, nor accepted:-)


@Rachit,
Hi..yup, I guess lazy afternoons kinda make you contemplative:-)

Suruchi said...

Hi Biky,
Aap itne sweet ho na ki aapko sab cheez mein sweetness dikhaye dete hain...
True the post talks of parents being neglected, but not because the children are unbothered but because they have so much to do now to make ends meet!

It talks more about the helplessness of an old woman who has had fun in life and misses it...her body’s grown old yet her aspirations and needs remain young...worst, she is not heard like she used to be earlier, which kills her worst than death can!

Thank you for the concern...aaveiyen likha hain...totally fiction:-)

Suruchi said...

Hi Anshul,
That’s my favourite-est line from Julius Caeser...though I wish I could remember half of all my favourite lines to quote them like you do!

I wish I could tell this lady and many more like her that people don’t die..they live on. Wow, that’s such a superb surmise, if we could call it that!

Thank you!

Suruchi said...

Hi Sakshi,
It is a never ending dilemma I guess...my mother now tells me scandalous stuff that she never dared to venture into when we were young.
Now she comes out with stuff for which I need to tell her, “Mom, control, I am still a child as compared to you”:-)

Suruchi said...

Hey A,
Wow...eyes wet? My god, aap to mere se bhi cute ho:-)
Thanks


Hellow Tanvi,
I don’t know yaar where this came from...I have a super cool aunt who is turning sixty and has amazing stories to tell always...she expressed concern about life getting thanda after crossing the half century!
And rest...just came along:-)

Suruchi said...

Hey A,
Wow...eyes wet? My god, aap to mere se bhi cute ho:-)
Thanks


Hellow Tanvi,
I don’t know yaar where this came from...I have a super cool aunt who is turning sixty and has amazing stories to tell always...she expressed concern about life getting thanda after crossing the half century!
And rest...just came along:-)

Suruchi said...

Hey A,
Wow...eyes wet? My god, aap to mere se bhi cute ho:-)
Thanks


Hellow Tanvi,
I don’t know yaar where this came from...I have a super cool aunt who is turning sixty and has amazing stories to tell always...she expressed concern about life getting thanda after crossing the half century!
And rest...just came along:-)

Suruchi said...

Hi PeriodicalMemoirs,
That was such a sweet ting to say...you kinda made my day!
And you also say ONLY 30+??????
Double wow! At least someone things like me about age...hehe!

I have always felt more for helpless aged than helpless kids or orphans...
You know, somehow they manage to grow bigger n live on n in their mind at least, they don’t know they are being neglected...
But for the aged, who’ve seen brighter n more energetic days, for them the helplessness churning in their minds must be worse than death!

God bless u too for being such a caring daughter in law:-)

Suruchi said...

Hi Alks,
Haha..you are such a sweetheart!
I am still gaping at the screen at the idea of me having a scientific glimpse in my personality!
I should treasure this compliment:-)

You are very kind with me Alks, and you know always that any praise coming from someone who writes as wonderfully as you, can never be taken lightly...I am flying:-) Thank you!

Suruchi said...

Hi Uncle Jack,
Thank you...when you comment, I always read it a couple of times, before replying. With your experience and keen eye, you always manage to catch the undertone!:-)

I added a bit of dry humour n wit here n there so that the post does not escape being read...things we do for comments, eh?:-)

Suruchi said...

Hi Moonlite,
Are general perception hain yaar...I would remain young forever, don’t you worry...probably would be going for outings with your kids too;-)

And thanks for making me realize I posted twice:-)

Rià said...

Loved the way u hav written it. So thought provoking.

rainboy said...

I really liked this one.

This made me remember 'Atonement'.
Very nice writeup.It's quite true too :)
the stories that want to sing,
the secrets that want to be found... ;D

Start writing your story and publish it one day ;D

Take care

The Smell awaits you ji :D

sobhit said...

aap 77 yrs ke ho? WOW.. lagte ni ho yar ;P.. jokes apart nice post.. dunno wot 2 say or comment on this.. mein toh khud budha ho chuka hun.. gona hit quarter f a centuary dis yr n am alrdy depressd :(.. dunno how will i manage till more milestones in d centuary.. dont wan2 tho.. but life nvr hapns d way we want it.. n no mattr how n wot all v do.. we alwaz miss out on somthing or d other...pata ni.. feels am alrdy bored n done wid dis over rated life.. or rather am too scared to go in2 d real world n face d pressure myself.. to b responsble for once..

pata ni time moments n ppl keep on moving by.. none remains.. i dont say nothing shud change.. it shud.. but wots left behind shud not b lost.. but to kary all along aint possble.. kya bakwas hai yar :P

nice post nehw.. well written .. well ur a english teacher.. aap bhi galti karoge toh fir kya hoga :P :P

Shruti said...

Oh my god! Intense stuff. Amazing write up. A really good break from all the 'airbrushed pics, narcissistic write ups,and close ups of self' blogs. Keep up the good work!

Pavitra said...

Woah woman! Where did this come from...Amazing write up...
So deep and intense...
Lovely work! :))
Hugs!

Shriti said...

:O wow!! :D
this one ish really deep o__o
and awesome <3 :D

umm you are tagged in my blog ^_^

Anonymous said...

So what? I want to share this post on Facebook, I am under name John McCain there.

Suruchi said...

@Ria,
Thanks girl:-)


@Rainboy,
Thank you ji...now I must know more about ‘Atonement’
And sometimes what we want to hide the most is also what we want the world to know...funny species we are, eh?

And about the book...pata nahi yaar..shaayad kabhi, budhape mein;-)

Suruchi said...

Hey Sobhit,
Baby, just let go of all fears...
Life is never easy...but it ain’t that tough either!
Things won’t go as you planned...but often they would prove that it was better that way:-)

Abhi to 25 he hua hain..and the best years of free thinking and being who you wanna be, begin now...so please cheer up!
Baaki mein hoon na...advice forum pe...as always:-)

Suruchi said...

Hi Shruti,
“Air brushed pics, narcissistic write ups and close ups of self blogs”
Lol!

That’s such a great quote and don’t know if you’d say the same after going through some of my other posts*keeping fingers crossed*
:-)

Suruchi said...

Hi Pavitra n Choco,
Thanks guys...don’t know where this came from!
Thought it was a bit different from what I am used to of, so put it up here:-)

Choco honey, thanks for tagging me...hope I’ll be able to do it soon:-)



@Anon
I guess you could!

aakash said...

Wow... this is intriguing.. I read it twice, so real, so sensitive. I will think about it in the night. Never thought of such a perspective.
P.S.: I love your space way more than you like mine :)

aJ

Suruchi said...

@Akash:-)
Wow...someone would think over again about what I wrote at night and that too a piece like this....
I am so flattered...
Thank you!:-)

pRasad said...

Back to your blog after almost a month..(as I was in Lucknow for work)..

Simply loved this line-

At my age you don’t ‘fall’ in love, for the vision is anyways impaired and the ‘falling’ is anyways an everyday affair.

Entire post is soooooo realistic and full of emotions..:))

BTW..I got to know Kanpur is very near to Lucknow..soooooo..what I mean to say is---you were soo CLOSE to me..hehheheeee :)) ..(PUN INTENDED FOR SURE:D )

Suruchi said...

Hi pRasad,
Wow...and I would have thought this was not your kinda post...you generally like me when I am funny and there are two such posts up here awaiting you thereby:-)

And yes, Kanpur is barely a two hours drive...something anyways a regular with you Mumbaiites n Delhi people:-)

And itneeeeeeeeee paas n phir bhi kitne dooooooooor...hai!:-)

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...