Maliny Mohan's Blog, page 4

The Wait – Fiction

It was a quarter to six in the morning. The crimson-tinted rays of the dawn leached in through the thick foliage to rest on his skin. He rubbed his nose onto the hairy dorsum of his palm and let out an unrestrained yawn. Last night had been uneventful. Not that there were many ways for him to keep himself engaged during the night, but usually he managed to immerse in one activity or the other so that he didn’t feel bogged down by the lullabies of boredom. But last night was unbearable. He had been hungry for most parts of the night. At one point of time, the hunger turned so grave that he had to let go off his sleep and set out into the wretched coldness of the night in search of food. One would expect him to be akin to a night owl, what with the innate traits of the beings of his like who felt utter bliss in breathing in the serene, placid wisps of the midnight air as they embarked on their soulful journey into the heart of their passions – be it feeding nutrients to the wanderlust, setting the streaks of adventure ablaze or even rolling themselves into a bundle on the ice-cold floor so that they would finally have their much needed moments of introspection. But last night was simply about satiating the glum pleas of his weary body, which he had not been able to achieve quite the way he had expected. And so also, as he had been doing for most part of the night, he was still trying his best to shut tight his eyes and roll up into a ball on the smooth, pale, marbled floor when the house- maid arrived at the strike of six. If he wished she would be kind enough to lend him something from the kitchen he was wrong, and he knew that more than those irrational nerves of hope that sprang up inside him intermittently. Perhaps, she was scared of losing her job by doing so. Perhaps, she simply despised him for what he was. How could he know what was going through her mind?

He went back to his nap as the maid closed the door behind her. He had to suppress his yearning to eat something for at least half an hour more. The boy who resided in the house was the only person who treated him with love and he always woke up at 6.30. He knew it for he always approached him in the morning with his hair unkempt and his eyes puffy, just as someone would be right after long hours of sleep. A short yelp from him was enough for the boy to carry a tray of biscuits from the inside cupboard to the backyard. How the boy’s eyes shone while he kneeled down beside him, watching him lick away the delicious crumps from the ground. Those were the moments when he wished he too was a human. How could he be sure if with his soft moans and the deliberate nudges with his head, he was being successful in letting the boy know that he was grateful? However, the boy seemed happy every time he did that, for he always patted his head or scratched his neck all the while whispering something in his ears. Maybe he understood nevertheless.

As the motes of sun pressed hard against his back signalling the relentless motion of time, his heart fluttered with relief. The boy would be awake in no time. His stomach made somersaults inside him and abandoning his sleep, he sat erect facing the house. His quivering eyes were glued onto the closed door and his ears pricked up for the slightest movement from inside the house. The wait was about to end and the joy of being rewarded for being patient was always worthwhile. 

Sometimes he wondered how he knew the exact moment when the boy would stride out and that too on every morning without fail, but he always knew. Somehow, he always knew. 

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Wistful – Short Fiction

The room was garnished with the most luscious of elements. Bright, velvety flowers lay strewn across the neatly made bed, from which emanated the fragrance of splendour and a resident whiff of the exhilarating mystery that lay ahead at the fall of midnight-darkness. A silver tray filled up to the brim with carefully selected array of fruits, lay perched on the table near the adorned door.

Rhea ran her deeply painted eyes over the embellishments, done studiously with the sole intention of celebrating the uniqueness of the night. Plaintive motes reflected from the murky corners of the room blinded her vision, as a lone drop of tear rolled down her rosy, made-up cheek. As on a cue, a southern summer breeze that sailed through the partly open window settled down on her damp face and stroked it in its vain attempt to erase the redundant streaks of melancholy.

The impatient thud of the door being closed startled her. She rose from the bed and stood against him with her head hung low. The wax and wane of her heart gripped her, gluing her frail body to the floor.

“Hi”

The longing that reverberated in her husband’s voice failed to pierce the thick, stoic veil of her heart. She felt an unprecedented gurgle emanate from the deep recess of her throat.

“Hi,” she uttered, forcing a smile on her face.

She realised then that she had a lifetime ahead to try and forget her past.

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My Delicious Bait – Mid Week Quests

There are people who, with utter madness, admire talented personalities. I am not saying  I don’t admire laudable talents, but I am not excessively, fiercely dependent on them when leading my life. Good books satiate me, good music fills my heart and soul with joy and a beautiful piece of writing, magnificiently laced with evocative threads, never fail to uplift the person in me.

But these days, I find myself lend an attentive ear to memoirs – both written and spoken. Perhaps that bit of character has been an innate part of me for long, since I have always liked reading personal blogs more than anything. I am not overtly dependent on them, but yes, I do find happiness out of taking a stroll through the life of another person. I am yet to decipher the craziness that resides in the liking, or if I have company in the form of people who nurture similarity in that regard. Some are of the opinion that such people are diffident about their own lives. But then, what if the act inspires me to be more? In my case, there is a second reason too, to which I shall reach in a while. 

People are different, I believe, and everyone has his/her favourite bait, which quite positively hooks them, feeds their souls and releases them for a better life.

Well, I have a few other such similar nourishing baits too on my list – like A.R. Rahman’s music, A Kazuo Ishiguro novel, an Alice Munroe short story, a Mohanlal movie, a chat with my best friend and so on. But the latest one to have conquered my heart, once I started working on my own manuscript, is reading the writing story of my favourite authors. Sometimes, I might not even have read their works, but their presence – their sheer authoritative presence and their diligently acquired accomplishments, out of the many other reasons, inspire me and I look forward to knowing more about their writing journey. I have been flipping through many such authors, a few of them blogger-turned authors, when my eyes fell upon the blog of the acclaimed author, Ruchita Misra – Blogging All The Way. I read and re-read most of her blog posts and they brought smiles to my face more often than not. There is something surreal about reading the amateur works of a person who have been a success ever since. 

Is it because of she is famous and widely accepted now, that I find her earlier writing amusing? 

I don’t have an answer. But I do know that I have a soft-spot for innocous memoirs and I can read and re-read personal blog posts for any number of time I want. Somehow, they take me closer to the writer and I feel I have been given a huge comforting bear hug by an invisible force. 

I came to know that she too is an anxious person like me and although I never read the blog aiming to end up with a tutorial to alleviate my anxiety, my haphazard mind was pacified to realise that I am not alone when it came to matters such as that. She, in one of her posts’s, mentions about bringing down her anxiety by trying to solve the mathematics table in her mind. Every person has his own technique to deal with his problems, griefs or similar downsides. For me it has been work. But I cannot work round the clock and there are times when struck with a bout of anxiety ( for a reason ), I discern methods to escape from it. These days, it has been reading good blog posts for me. I blog-hop, find interesting blogs and devour the articles which strike a chord with me. They inevitable leave me at peace at least for a good one hour or two, when my mind returns back to the jovial self.  

Even as a child, I used to listen to my dear ones sharing stories with one another – my mother about her work place to my father, my grand mother about our relatives to my mother, my mother about my brother and me to her friends, my brother about his eventful day to me . .  the list is endless. No, I am not nosey, nor am I a gossip-monger. I simple love stories. Good stories. Happy stories. Intriguing stories. Undoubtedly, there is something soulful about listening to true stories. They are flawless and pristine. On the contrary, I hate movies made out of real stories. The tweaked version irks me and I would rather have someone narrate the story to me than watching it. 

So much for my love for true stories. As I wrap this post up, I can’t help but leave you with one simple question. If ever you feel lonely and would like to have a friend listen to your story, you now know who to approach, don’t you?[image error]

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P.S: This post is tagged with ‘Mid Week Quests’, a sub section of this blog where I write on a Wednesday, about random nuggets from my life.

Desirable Chaos – The Tale Of A Hectic One Week

Last week was chaotic. Too many things happened in a span of seven days that at one point of time, I felt my head almost reeling out of control, thanks to the multitude of emotions that sprinted through me seamlessly. Those wonderful readers who have been frequenting this space would remember how I have been travelling dizzyingly and how it has been acting as a double-edged, bitter-sweet sword for me. You may also remember how I contemplated on moving to a rented house near the hospital where I worked, so that I would be more productive, with lesser amounts of work time and less frequent hours of travelling. Well, the hours of contemplation bore fruit over the last two weeks, when the raucous thoughts inside my mind give way to heated discussions in our living room, which eventually led to renting the upper storey of my father’s friend who resided at a kilometer distance from the hospital.

I moved in last week and what more can I say, the stay has found the naive, amateur me cooking for my survival. I find the cooking part easy and hassle-free, but the work that comes with it and the cleaning afterwards are harrowing. Perhaps, I think so because I haven’t cooked anything further than a few dishes out of egg, noodles, pasta, tea and similar tiny bits of acts that harbour around the wide precincts of the giant that is cooking and haven’t had to cook the ‘real’ dishes ever before in my life. But I have a feeling that I am slowly reaching there, although I do have mile to cross before I could happily serve my food to those who are brave enough to experiment it. 

I didn’t sleep properly the first day I stayed there, and again it was the first time that I was living in a place alone. For my MB.B.S course, we were accomodated in a hostel where I shared rooms with three other girls. After graduation, I had to do rural service as part of my one year bond and for that too I stayed in a hostel, a YWCA, and those few months saw some of the most memorable and beautiful days of my life. I had three friends who were extremely jovial and fun to be with and we had the best of times, mostly during the dinner hour and during the hour long walk we had through the hostel premises after dinner till the time came for us to retire to our respective rooms. I remain friends with two of those girl, and I haven’t been in contact with the third one, since she got married and moved to Chennai. I lost her number and anyway she would have changed her number too. Sadly, I couldn’t trace her on Facebook too! She was sweet, amiable and used to talk a lot, which indirectly drained the home-sickness out of me more often than not. I hope our paths cross a second time and maybe if I keep trying, I would be able to track her down someday. 

The second half of the past week saw us packing our bags and going on an impromptu pilgrimage of sorts to a temple in Tamil nadu.The plan had been peeking in and out of our talks for a long time and I now realise the best way to make such plans work is to let it rest, when one day you are shaken out of your sleep, panic driven by the same plan and you decide to do it finally for fear of not being able to sleep, owing to a sudden feel of urgency. Is it what people call destiny? 

We had a three day long trip, which saw us hiring a cab and going all the way to the temple, an arduous ten hour drive. Now, the particular way with this temple is that the seekers could par-take in ‘Giri valam’, where you walk a long, hard 14kilometers around the hill where the temple resides , so that you are freed from your sins of a life time. We went ahead and performed the ritual. We started at 4 0’clock in the morning and finished it by 9 0’clock, when we walked for five long hours, with few scattered two minute long breaks in between to catch our breaths. We reached back the hotel and slept through the day and revisited the temple again in the evening. We felt pacified and calm after the ritual and to this moment we find it hard to believe how my grand mother, who accompanied us, could walk the endless sinewy path with almost the same agility as us at the age of 82. ‘She used to work hard as a young lady’, my mother’s comment set my grand mother nostalgic and she sat recollecting those years, around 60 years back, when she used to walk for miles to reach her school and after graduation, to the place where she worked. I sat listening to her awed by her sheer diligence, patience and resilience. 

We returned the next day itself and as usual, the pain that ineviably follows while wrapping up a trip started to bother me. A trip undertaken with the family is special in more ways than one. It brushes the rusty corners of the relationship, lending them bright and resplendent again; it brings the members closer, consolidating the treasured bond that binds them together. 

Owing to the trip, I didn’t have to stay at my new home for more than two days. I will be going back in a day or two and that is when the real trial starts. Will I survive the month or not? My hunch is that I am going to return a much better cook. What do you say? 

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Peep Into The Past – Short Fiction

I gazed longingly at the effervescent girl, who looked back at me from the photograph enclosed in the safe, glittering walls of the exquisite photo frame. I knew what she was thinking while she smiled her heart out, her dainty arms perched delicately on the welcoming, supportive hands of her sweetheart.The jet black strands of hair that fluttered in the warm summer breeze heightened the twinkle that sparkled in the summit of the valley that was her eyes. I knew what her eyes chanted as she posed for the photograph, trying hard to make her naive attempt at a pout succeed, after the many rehearsals in front of the mirror during those secure, inconspicuous moments of her solitude. I knew what her heart yearned to scream out till her lungs gasped for breath. I knew, for her smile, as infectious as it was, managed to hide little.  I knew, at that very moment, she was wishing upon the stars for that stage of her life – those deeply satiating, resplendent years that formed it – to last forever. She was hoping for her youth to be arrested; her evocative bond with her loved ones to be preserved in virginity. Under her breath, she was unassumingly whispering a prayer for her thoughts forever to be just as vibrant as the present. A fleeting seed of fear that hinted towards the inevitability of change failed to bother her. She lived in the moment, sans doubts or dilemma, and believed it the right way to face life.

As I sat absorbing her charm, my long lost charm, a drop of tear rolled down the shallow lines, diligently masked by the concealer, on my wry face. 

Will I have that girl back in me, again, ever? Or was she already dead? But how can she be dead, when I myself am that girl? Aren’t I very much alive this moment? Indeed I am, silly. Or am I, really?

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Self-doubt And The Likes: A Piece Of Me

So I sit down to write and I find myself doubting whether I will be able to churn up a good post or rather, put my thoughts into words most precisely as they fleet through my mind. This is not the first time this stump of doubt has left me wondering about my writing abilities. I find the same, old, irksome piece of bone gnawing at my peace of mind, every time I sit down to write – be it a story, a poem, or maddeningly enough, even a personal rant, which I assume, I would be the best one to be writing. Even when the heinous mote of doubt lurks as a shadow in the precincts of my conjuring mind, I somehow make my up mind to bring to life the idea that sprouted in my mind anyway. This has been a routine, since forever. No, wait. How can it be since forever, when the fact remains that I started ‘writing’ when I was 20 years old. Random thoughts on the many inconspicuous nooks of my belongings wouldn’t classify as writing, I believe, even though, they could be the first appreciated signs of the likelihood of spring around the corner.

So, I am confiding in you the secret that I started writing when I was 20 years old. A whole post on the rationale of my naive mind which tugged me back from even trying to write could be read here and hence, I am not going into the details of the same. The point is, good things have happened to me when I yearn for it with all my heart. I am a Piscean and I am an undeniable one at that too. I am indecisive most of the times and I wish to be assured of the genuineness and wiseness of my plans by a second person, so that I would go forward with it sans hesitation and with a mind not muddled with paranoia. Does that make me weak? I don’t know. It is not that I cannot come to a decision alone; it is simply that I make happy decisions with a speck-free mind when someone agrees to my line of thought. But there have been times, when the little fish in me is all charged up and resolute, when I ultimately find me speaking up for myself, not feeling the awkward need to have someone shout ‘You couldn’t have made a better decision’, inorder to let me going. And the truth remains that during such situations, I would go forward with the decision, even if a second person disagrees to the same. I try hard to let my reasoning insinuate into the other person, so that he/she too would understand the amount of passion the decision invokes in me. And this usually happens when I am about to do something I have been longing to do with all my heart for some time. Indecisiveness comes sneaking in through my determined mould nevertheless, but I garner the courage to defy them in the end, so that I could at last acquire that pristine grail of happiness that one is presented with when we embark on a journey we have been dying to get on board for so long.

Likewise, the tiny stains of doubt are wiped clean from the surface of my mind eventually and I find myself giving wings to my thoughts, at those times. And the emotion that descends on me when I sit admiring a finished piece of writing is priceless; something which, I am almost completely sure, I shall be addicted to forever. The key to writing a good piece, or for that matter, doing anything worthy, is to finally shred those dark, ugly cloaks of self-doubt and apprehension, and do it, come hell or high water.There is no point in waiting for the right moment to do something worthy. The moment you start doing something which you think is worthy enough, would undoubtedly be the best moment for it to happen.

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The Year So Far

There are so many things I have been pining to write about. Anyone who would be travelling a lot to work would share similar feelings with me when I say that there are gazillion events scattered around us, waiting to be experienced.  They are accustomed to yet another gazillion ways of interpretation as well, which in turn augments the rich journey experience. I fail when it comes to creating individual posts about each nugget I picked along the way. Nevertheless, I sure can create a collage in an intriguing, fascinating way if I try to throw you some light into the images picked up by my mind’s eye. What triggered this post was watching‘Marley and Me’ for the umpteenth time last week. Those of you who have watched the movie would know a certain cascade of scenes in it, where Owen Wilson narrates the interesting and the not-so-interesting events in his life in a seamless motion. Well, since the first time I saw that movie, I have been wanting to pen down something on that line, even though doubts are high whether I can pull it off. Albeit, there is no harm in putting a little effort, is there? So here it goes. In the following paragraph, I have tried my best to summarise a particular day last week, when I actually wrote this down on my way back from work.

‘Woke up peppered with laziness. The hues changed to exuberance while taking bath. Had my favourite breakfast of roti and egg. Moved to the railway station by car. Felt a tinge of sorrow as I left my father to the train. The emotion was overpowered by embarrassment as I thought about returning home the next day itself. Sat smiling in the train. Thought about the solo book that I have been working on. Thought about the cats back at home. Thought about shifting to a house near the hospital where I was working. Imaged myself cooking on my own and felt a tinge of pride thinking about the satisfaction. Thought about a few other things too (which are too personal). Reached the station. Walked for a good few minutes before reaching the hospital. Treated 200 plus patients. Ate dinner in two minutes. Caught few hours of sleep somehow. Returned by train. Observed the child and mother who sat against me. The child was falling asleep, which the mother didn’t want to encourage as their stop was nearing. She tried to keep him awake by asking him to look out for elephants, who were supposedly meant to cross them the next minute. Laughed hearily at the scene. Read ‘’. Reached home tired and relieved. Took bath, slept and ate. Read again. Edited a story. Watched ‘Everybody loves Raymond and ‘How I Met Your Mother’ on Romedy Now. Had dinner. Talked to parents. Talked to a friend. Slept peacefully. Repeat (Almost, when I am working)’

So, there, I did it!

The days I work are the most eventful for me, although a budding thought of being at home and writing the whole day, crosses my mind at times and allure me strongly. I discard the thought every time, as soon as it tries to overpower me, labelling it too spontaneous and an injustice to the almost one decade of my married life with medicine.

 Anyway, I have had a very long day and I think I shall now have a cup of tea and relax. But before that, I would like to raise a toast to the first three months of this year, which found me reading more books than ever. I finished reading 20 books out of my 50 book reading challenge and I can’t be happier! I got a permanent Govt job and I have been writing stories along with that, which points to the fact that my New Year resolutions are slowly turning out to be true.  

I am leaving you with a list of the books I read this year, along with the ratings. Wait, how about a photograph? That sounds lively, isn’t it? You can follow this link for my reviews too – Goodreads. I would love to write reviews for all, but then it takes a lot of time for me to write a detailed review, as a book is never easily written and it deserves the attention it wishes for. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

My birthday was in March and the day went great too, if you remember my last post. Oh, and a book where I am a contributing author released on March 23rd and it can be ordered from Amazon by following this link – Here. I ought to have announced this news at the start of the post! 

Life is indeed a double edged sword, isn’t it? Sadly, there had been matters of sorrow too, which I feel I should let reside in my heart and not spill out here, for your good. So, quite a balanced beginning to the year it was, I would say. Now tell me, how was your first three months of the year?

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Of Good Conversations And Birthday gifts- Mid Week Quests

I am forced to keep this post short due to constraints of time, but you wouldn’t mind it as the topic is one that is packed with the sweetest of flavours. Before I proceed, I would like to recall a scene from a movie I hold close to my heart, ‘You’ve got mail’, where the character played by Meg Ryan, after an impulsive bout of speech, confesses to the character played by Tom Hanks that it was the first time in her life that she has been able to say the exact words she intended to say. She goes on to say that it was something she had wanted to experience for a long time. Now, I don’t know if you have thought much about it before, but I don’t usually dissect the conversations I have with my friends or family. I am not much of a talkative person and I don’t make friends in the blink of my eye. Socialising doesn’t come easily to me. It takes hours of cajoling from the aspiring author in me to put up a post on my page on Facebook. I am an introvert and proud to be so. But that doesn’t mean that I don’t discern good conversations the moment I have one. I do. I am an ardent admirer of soulful conversations. I love soulful bonding over a cup of tea or a dinner spent in the company of my near ones.

Coming back to the movie, Meg Ryan’s dilemma didn’t completely complement my stand, but what reminded me when I saw that scene again a few days back was the way I yearn to write down the thoughts, that visit the nooks and corners of my mind, coloured with precisely the same hues and emotions as they had trotted through me. If there is one thing that I would like to wish for as a writer, it would be to present my mind before the reader as an exact replica of the vortex of my mind. I struggle most of the time to do that and I fear if I am alone in that. There have been times when I ended up crying while writing a short story, and believe me, I have never been that happy to have cried my heart out ever. I wouldn’t want to cry every time, I am somewhat sure of that, but then, I would definitely wish to write my heart out every time I make an attempt. And maybe that is why I have made it a habit these days to jot down the plots and nuggets that whizz through my mind, the moment it do that. May be that is why I long to develop and scribble down a story, the moment the seed is sowed in my mind, scared that the moment would pass.

Even when it comes to conversations, as I told earlier, I do have an insight to appreciate good conversations when they happen. It simply persists in your mind for long, making you smile for longer. The memory of one such rendezvous lingers fresh in my mind and perhaps that is why I felt a persevering nudge to write this post today. Imbibing the pleasing silence that floats between a group of like minded people can be a beautiful form of conversation sometimes, but just think how special the moment would be when the same silence is intersperced with soulful words too- words that matter to them, matters that are legible to that circle of people alone and seem jargons to anyone outside. A good conversation might be short, yet it manages to blow you off with its sweetness. It could be spontaneous, yet it turns out to be perfectly worded. A good conversation is not concocted, but it flows unpromted, defining the uniqueness of a beautiful relationship. 

Basking in the swooning delicacy, I am excited to have more things to be happy about. I am celebrating my birthday tomorrow and even when the fact remains that I am a year older, I cannot help but feel grateful that I could spend it with a peaceful mind and a healthy body. Moreover, the gift started flowing in today from close quarters, satiating the petulant little girl in me and the truth that it doesn’t happen often makes it even more special. 

Before winding this post, the birthday girl would love to hear about the last time you had a soulful conversation with a dear one. Was it with your child, your spouse, a friend or your parents? I am looking forward to reading your comments. Maybe a birthday wish too, if that is not too much to ask for? 

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P.S: This post is tagged with ‘Mid Week Quests’, a sub section of this blog where I write on a Wednesday, about random nuggets from my life.

Reaping The Hard Way – Doc Life #2: Mid Week Quests

I have loved travelling all my life. My parents had to work in a district around 9 hours from our home till I turned four (if my memory serves me right). Travel had been an inevitable ingredient of my blooming days so also. Even though I can’t recollect the subtle details of those days, I remember been excited and enticed about the thought of a journey by train, which evidently lasts to this day. My mother’s home too is in another district, which is a good two hour journey from our home. Since my father bought a car four or five years after I was born, all those to and fro journeys from my mother’s native place and our home were by train. I stayed and prepared for my medicine entrance exams at a reputed institution in a town far from my place and there too journeys had been an unavoidable part of my life. After that came the M.B.B.S days, where , even though the journeys had been mostly by bus, I remember having looked forward to the rare enough train journeys that came my way in the selected few days when there was a proper train during the days I promptly decided to go home. The formidable locomotive called train, needless to say, has been threaded into the pages of my life like no other.

The concept of train journey for me is sort of linked to trips I undertake mostly for a pleasure- like visiting my grand parents and part of a pilgrimage to the temples scattered throughout South India. They were mostly coupled with memories that enthralled the wander lust in me, who loved being lost in the icy breeze that hit against her face as the huge vehicle trundled its way towards destinations. They were the pieces of heaven that life offered me when I could relish the many passions of the soul in me- Reading a good book, observing nature and the lives of people, scribbling down stories and accounts, listening to music and contemplating. Until now. As stated in my previous posts, I was posted in a hospital atleast three hours from my home and the modes of travel I have to depend on includes, an auto, a bus, a train and a five minute walk-. Not so pleasing, is it?

The journey for job has become the most tiring one I have ever undertaken in my life and I am appaled to realise that on my To-The- Hospital Journey, I am at my cranky most because of the sheer heat and the sweat born out of it. On top of that, there have been days when the train distressingly decides to run a wee bit slower, which would topple my entire journey cascade that would otherwise place me at the hospital steps for my duty at the right time. A train running late would mean missing a bus and that would mean, an hour of nail biting and lip chewing in the bus, frantic calls to the doctor at duty apologising for the delay and another gallon of guilt for having brought trouble for him/her, although I am not entirely at fault.

On the contrary, the From-The-Hospital Journey has a different version to say altogether. I would say, those journeys would easily be the happiest ones I have ever taken in my life. Intriguing, isn’t it? For me, the happiest hour in life would be the dawn that breaks out after a hectic 24hour shift I have taken. Seriously. You have to experience it to understand it. The satisfaction of having worked hard, the joy in finding atleast two hours to sleep at night when patients suddenly decide to not visit the hospital in the middle of the night  and the hopes for a entire off day waiting to be savoured and slept, gather into an amalgamation of emotions and I feel like twirling in joy and relief. I pick up my reading while on the return journey and end up clicking pictures, which would eventually appear on my Instagram page.

Back home, I feed the cats, talk to them, take bath and sleep for a good three to four hours before having food or sitting down to write something or even watch T.V.  

In a nutshell, I am now encountering a bitter sweet facet of life it seems. My mother pacified me by saying that I need to take up such challenges in life, rather than run away from them, for then there would be scope for hopes and better times in the future. Hardships, according to her, are to be suffered when and where they arrive, or life would throw us even harder ones along the way. Taking cue from her words, I end this post by raising a toast to the hardships in life which make us who we are. After all, can anyone reap what they haven’t sowed?

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P.S: This post is tagged with ‘Mid Week Quests’, a sub section of this blog where I write on a Wednesday, about random nuggets from my life. I had duty yesterday, hence the delay in writing the post. I hope that wouldn’t be a problem:) 

Special Announcement- Shades Of Life, The Book

Hello, fellow bloggers. With immense pleasure, I announce a very important news today. A short story anthology which carries a story of mine is all set to release on March 23rd. The book is a well thought out and diligently selected collection of short stories, which mirror a similar theme. The stories focuss on the varied hues of life, whether it be joy, love, sorrow, jubilation, success and the multitude of other emotions the days offer us in the walks of life. The journey from sending my story for the contest to this moment has been eventful with periodic emails from the editor, Sarav, who is also the one at the helm, enlightening me on the progress of the book. I have to confess that this book is close to my heart, as the story I wrote for it is one of those few stories that make me feel proud of my decision to follow my passion as a writer. Rarely is the writer is me completely satiated with my own writing and this story sure speaks volumes about my confidence in my growth as a story teller. Not simply that, there are several reasons that nudge me to vouch for this beautiful book.

1.It contains Guest stories by prolific writers, Namrata Madhira( Author of the highly acclaimed novella- Metro Diaries and Neelam Saxena Chandra, an admirable writer who holds the Limca Book of Records for having published the most number of books in a year)

2.The book is the dream project of blogger friend, Sarav, who has an enviable niche in the field of blogging. Check out his blog here and know for yourself. He is also the editer of this book. He had his stories published in several anthologies before taking up solo projects of his own. 

3.  Most of the authors who form part of the book have been published multiple times and must be familiar to the bibliphiles out there. I feel grateful to know that my story would be published along side such hugely talented personalities. 

4. More importantly, the stories garnered in this book are evocative and are beautifully crafted, which solely stands as a valid reason for anyone to pick this book to read.

The pre-order of the book has already started and you may secure a copy for yourself and your friends from Amazon at this link-   Pre order ‘Shades Of Life’

I am leaving you with the blurb of the book, along with a short excerpt from my story – He Who Loved Her. 

The Blurb

Life is a supernova of emotions, a multi-colored extravaganza and a celebration of colors that carve a way for us to be “expressive”. These colors often vary from situation to situation. They may be vibrant, bright and attractive, or even bland and gloomy. Nevertheless, they invoke the soul from within and portray the various dimensions of life.

Come and explore the various shades of life – from the lighter tones of friendship and love to the murkier hues of revenge and murder – of human beings, of how their personalities and their situations mould them into their real selves – in this anthology of prose and verse, from authors across the world, Shades of Life.

Excerpt from my story- He Who Loved Her:

Later that day, after having his dinner, he went up to the terrace to inhale some fresh air and that was when a distressing thought struck him hard.

‘Oh! What if the Father comes to know about this? He is going to be really angry at me!’

A sullen expression spread across his face and he sat munching over the thought for minutes at a stretch. His friends sat playing carom board at the far end of the terrace, oblivious to the turmoil that was creating havoc inside him.

He looked around as a chilling breeze swished past him. The sky was revolting, partly due to the magnanimity of the twinkling stars and partly due to the full moon that adorned it with serenity. The air was calm and he felt as though the atmosphere was nudging him to move ahead with the plan sans hesitation.

“True love happened rarely and standing in the brink of one, it would in all certainty be an act of cowardice to retreat without letting her know his desire,” he thought.

“Nothing in this world can keep me from owning her. She is mine!” A rock-hard decision took form in his mind.

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I believe that this book would touch souls the way it aspires to and I would be more than indebted if atleast a few of my readers are inspired to chose this book from the pile of anthologies that are fleshed out in the market. 

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