Where there is a will, there is a way....

17 words... That was all he had in front of him at the moment. After 8 hours of hard work and countless coffees later, all he had were these 17 words.
He laughed out loud enough to scatter the pigeons on his window sill. These words would have to do. "The Last Will and Testament" was the heading for what would be the most explosive document to break his current society's spine and astonish everyone who knew about what was to come.
He had thought hard and long about it, spent countless nights wondering if it was the right thing to do.

"No, Mr W, how will you explain it to the superpower above, the one true God you believe in...? How will they ever learn? It is up to you to teach them. After that, it is up to them to apply what they have learnt. We can only hope they turn out well..."

came back these harsh words of his servant of forty years. That was enough to steel his resolve and make him sit on this computer today.

"I leave 400 million $ to charity. My sons are not my own.They belong to their vices".

"That would teach them",he hoped,nay,prayed.
As he signed the document, he could already see tomorrow's headlines,

"Millionaire leaves heirs penniless"

A smile came over his lips as he eyed the gun on his table. His last and final act would bring his sons together,at last.


--- Based on a story that could be true...

The End is near....

And so ends another year...2009! what did we see in this year that blew our hats away?
Nothing special, just the usual apathy, ignorance,indifference and even more interestingly, the same old boring routine that marks our everyday life for what it really is...an attempt to make something of ourselves that has gone horribly wrong, somewhere along the way...
As we gear up for another festive season around the corner(God, I'll miss them next year,all of them on weekends.....damn!) we do the usual introspection and come up with the usual suspects- Time and Money.There's not enough of both to last us our lifetime...
And so we end up rushing through our day, trying to save all the hours that we have saved up for what?So that we can rush some more?
And so, when this year ends, I have decided one thing.My resolution for next year is very simple. It is the end of my apathy, my ignorance of what truly matters - the time I give to myself and my family.
And so I say with full pride, the end is near... And there is going to be a new beginning. Happy New Year to everybody in advance!

He stood on the ledge overlooking the breakers and looked at the sky above.
It was a beautiful evening made even more beautiful by the fact that it was the beginning of a new life for him...
He'd been struggling for the past 3 months with a lot of things in life. And today, all that was about to change.All that suffering was about to end forever.He closed his eyes, feeling the cool breeze whip at his face.
He smiled and opened his arms wide.He could almost feel the embrace of hope that he had been carrying with him all these days.
"My first song", he thought. "All these years. All these years of hard work, and its finally here...".
As a struggling singer, he'd spent so many sleepless nights on this very ledge.Speaking to the sea.Crying his heart out when he couldn't take it anymore.
Today, his dream had come true.His first recording had just ended and the director's words rumbled loudly in his ears,"Dude, you are gonna rock this nation...".
He felt the temperature fall suddenly. The first drop of rain came rushing to his parched eyes. As he heard the faint strains of his song flow through his head, he finally felt free.This was it.His moment.

"Oye, kya kar rahai? baarish mein kyu khada hai?" asked the policeman with a mixture of suspicion that was hard to miss.
"Bheeg raha hu, sirji." He said with a smile. "Main star banne ja raha hu. Pata nahi shayad baadme kabhi aisa mauka mile na mile....."

His heart was beating wildly out of control and he knew there was nothing he could do about it.
He had waited, 28 long years for this day. God, he thought, has kept me alive just for this.

His forehead was burning hot, feverish with excitement. His eyes were unblinking, focussed and completely attuned to his target.
He had the feeling that there were a hundred horses in his stomach,racing for their life and he had the strangest feeling that he was enjoying it all the same.Muscles tensed, bunched,knotted and stretched,like bands of steel,he knew this couldn't go on for long. In a few moments, he knew it would all end.

He was a qualified doctor, and a good one. But today, all that had been forgotten.The hundreds of people awaiting him at the clinic would have to wait another day for him.This was far too important for such trivial matters as life and death.

And slowly, as the moment neared, he could feel the rest of his senses slipping away, oozing slowly from his body as only his sight remained.
He realised he was holding his breath. The man on the screen in from of him finally stepped forward and hit the ball out of the ground off the final ball.A SIX!!!
This was it!! India had won the World Cup!!!
He let his breath whoosh out of him.And he screamed.And screamed.

"Wake up Sid!!! what the hell is the matter with you??" he heard.

And he blinked.Suddenly, the colors changed.He was blinking furiously at his bedroom ceiling.
"Whew!!!" he said out loud.
"Mom, don't worry. It was just a dream.A dream that may never come true....."

Laughter club

There were gaping holes on both sides of him. There was also something about that emptiness that haunted him too badly to want to continue with his daily routine.
Mr Singh and Mr Malhotra.Both victims of age.And disease.And he knew it was not long before he too would walk the same path.
And yet, today here he was, at the foot of his building, laughing his guts out.Loudly.
"Fantasy Laughter club", he thought. "What a name! Fantastic.All I need is a pin and a name tag."

He looked around with quiet amusement.A pot-bellied gujju fellow he barely knew,who had just joined the club a few days back was laughing out the loudest.A few ladies trying hard to match the volume with their shrill laughter, but only managing to add to the general cacophony.
A hundred windows opened out to them, each cursing the club for the club's early morning incursion into their precious hours of sleep.And a few kids rushing around,on cycles, on skates, on rubber shoes,each pushed by an inner need to....
To what exactly?He didn't know.But he wished he did.

"Mr Purushottam, what's the matter? Why aren't you laughing?" asked the young man at the head of the group.
"I'm not happy", came the reply.And it surprised him.He didn't know he was capable of such lucidity. "None of us are.We only laugh because it beats stress."

And finally, it hit him. His laughter had now become part of his daily monotony.

A day in the life of Mumbai

I look out of my window on a dark and gloomy Friday evening, and it strikes me as amazing, how so suddenly the weather changes right in front of our eyes, and yet we do not notice it.

The evenings, they have always been theatrical, the riot of colors, the blue vistas and the oranges and grays, each competing for our attention, but sadly, none succeeding.
One day, the evening ends at seven, all happy and aglow, and over the next few days, it’s as if they are in a hurry to spread out the blue blankets. Six o’clock suddenly seems like seven used to, and seven, well, seven as always.

The evening walkers, in their daily attire, are amused at the lack of light, but nevertheless, carry on in their mission to cover their daily distances as usual. The kids are unhappy, for their hours of delight are woefully cut down, and for no fault of theirs too. The rains, as is usual during such days, bring with it a faint smell of melancholic sadness, as if nature herself rues the haziness, but is helpless against it. We all feel it in our bones, that moment when we wish we could all have spent a more profitable today in Switzerland or other places north.

But Mumbai in its inevitable madness never ceases to amaze me either. As has been said a thousand times before me, the city never sleeps. The trains, they rumble on, regardless of the rain and the light, or the lack thereof. The buses continue to hog the road and fight with rickshaws for supremacy, putting countless commuters through their daily grind.
And really, come to think of it, we all feel a bit let down if there is no harassment, no real incident that marks out the Mumbai city life for what it is. What is it with us? No one knows. It’s part of the mystery that is Mumbai. It is part of our existence, part of the mark on our foreheads that tells the devil leave them be, they have already gone through hell.

And when all is said and done, in the evenings, we all travel the same roads that lead to home, after what is a normal day for us, with another battle on our hands.
The roads(At least I assume that’s what they are called these days) continue to win the pockmarks contest hands down, and everybody gets home at the end of another harrowing day, too tired to notice that the weather has changed again.

Words...

all the words in the world,
are not enough when we are sad,
yet,a simple touch may take away
all the grief we ever had...
Some company,compassion, a little love,
are all we ever pine for,
Yet,these very things evade us,and how
it makes us wish for more...
Those little words, every man searches within,
To make peace,with himself,his soul
To find his place in this vast vast world,
To make his life seem whole...
Words that seek to justify his living,
To regale,reveal,reverberate,
With a story,of life,still unfulfilled,promising,
And words,asking him to wait...