Haven't been keeping well lately, say for the last week or two. Mostly indigestion problems, welcome as much as the Bangalore rains were this time, they didn't quite agree with my health. I have become tired these days, I can feel it, the strains I could take very easily earlier, seem overwhelming now, for example the simple act of standing in a bus during commutation - I'd rather pay 5-10 times the fare but can't take that exhaustion. May be I am growing old?
So, what with throwing up whatever I had as food or drink yesterday, and a lot of work that still forced me to go to office and stay back till 8 (someone was contemplating resignation but has apparently agreed to stay back till the current project is completed - may be for a little more bank balance, or may be because she can pay for that past time called work - which gets her to keep her clock ticking?), why am I staying up late?
I dreamed of him, in his navy blue shirt. We walking in strangely calm evening, with the sultry Calcutta breeze blowing, he agitated, and me in deep never before realizations unfurling before my eyes. I don't know, once you wake up from your dream, your dream tends to get mingled with reality. May be, that was not the shirt he wore in the dream? May be he was being a perfectly normal person and just naturally talking to me as a friend or an absolutely unrelated human being, just having a casual chat? And when the dream ended, I forcefully decorated it with my favorite impressions of him, he touching my cheek and turning my face towards him to examine my new colorful ear top (if I remember correctly, it has a meena work of green and magenta on gold plating)...my favorite memories, he winning over my introvert brother in a moment (way no other friend of mine has succeeded ever)...oh a hundred other things he brought back because of the fact that he unnecessarily came in my dreams in a time when I have been rendered quite lonely and helpless and I haven't ever spoken to him even on the phone for say the last 5 years...a time when I am still mourning my favorite artist's premature death and still struggling with the decision about whether I should bring in petty things in a friendship and throw away my career, whether I should bring in career in a commitment and look away from my parent's wishes, was being torn apart by do's and don'ts, would be's and could be's...he simply chooses to stir me up one Monday morning, and remind me of a good time I never cared to admit that I had with him - the best time - the time one spends with a soul mate...that I conveniently forgot in my other priorities. Well, even he should be blamed, for even he forgot promises - in fact only he forgot promises, I am still free and available for him, who'd never come for he has a wife and a little girl. A little girl whom he chooses to call by my nick name. He stirs me up and I throw up and am sick to the core, and it is followed by one hell of an unnecessary period - which I don't need to have - I am apparently not meant to play a role of creation of a life ever.
But his memories don't leave me. And the movie name haunts me, Memories in March. One of my biggest pains in life is that I am not informed about the things that are happening in the city I left behind. The cultural things. The movies, more than anything else, the movies. Nobody told me about this movie man, Arekti Premer Galpo came to the news for some other reason, and somehow reached my ears, I being the conservative me, chose to look away from it (I would be ashamed to admit now, but I kind of did the same thing for Chitrangada, and told myself, when Rituparno makes a more generic next movie, I'd be sure to go and watch it) - but I never heard of this one, before the day when the news of his death came out and his work was being discussed in all the forums.
After finishing up work and my phone call to mom, I should have gone to sleep, but I chose to stay up and watch the movie. Internet connection in India is pathetic man, why, I have watched all the major movies I missed out in these years, in my short stay in Prague, and I never faced a connectivity problem being on wifi. And this dongle of mine can't process a youtube video at the lowest resolution of 144p? I have been obsessed all these while with Mathura nagarpati...I feel he's penned an even more beautiful poem in the form of Sakhi hum - I wonder how he got so influenced by vyshnav couplets, and imagine the irritation when such a mellifluous tune and such amazing lyrics come distorted because of low quality of video. Still, me being the patient me went through it calmly, in places where I couldn't hear the dialogue clearly (but I needed to), I had to rewind, once, at times twice, again spoiling the pace of the movie, but I must admit, this was one rare movie which never got me bored for a moment. Which again proves, the most engaging action is the formation of relationships - which this movie is all about. Why call it a mere formation, catharsis would be a much more apt word. A beautiful movie, it can be termed almost as a poem or a painting.
So it is 2:30 and I have office tomorrow. But I am sure I will be able to manage that. How? Wasn't I this tired, broken, given up being just a little while back? You know what, this splendid work - from this immensely talented person who is no more with us, just shook me up. I talk of things being pent up in me? I talk of being the lone sufferer? Each single frame of this movie shouted out to me, a much greater suffering, and a celebration of that suffering. What is life, apart from being a big bland continuous suffering, if we don't decide to celebrate it? No, I won't give up. I'd be very sick, very sad, very fatigued, but then, this is all the time I have, to establish my identity. I am probably not talented enough to give the world such amazing work of creativity and self actualization, but I can at least take in this beautiful world with all my senses, so long as I live. No, I don't live by falsehood, and that is the only pride that keeps me alive.
I watched the lyrical agony of love that Memories in March is, and I felt so lost...so totally lost in thoughts. Yes, it is time to go to sleep. Tomorrow, as we all know is yet another day, and I am unsure how to face that day, but dear Rituparno, even after you have died, you were able to give this hapless girl a gift of bliss through your flawless acting skills - or was it really acting? Was it something aching out from you, which I could so identify with? Wonder how much more you could have given us if God would have allowed you to stay back a little while more...I am sorry about not having understood you in a more rational way, when you were alive.
So, what with throwing up whatever I had as food or drink yesterday, and a lot of work that still forced me to go to office and stay back till 8 (someone was contemplating resignation but has apparently agreed to stay back till the current project is completed - may be for a little more bank balance, or may be because she can pay for that past time called work - which gets her to keep her clock ticking?), why am I staying up late?
I dreamed of him, in his navy blue shirt. We walking in strangely calm evening, with the sultry Calcutta breeze blowing, he agitated, and me in deep never before realizations unfurling before my eyes. I don't know, once you wake up from your dream, your dream tends to get mingled with reality. May be, that was not the shirt he wore in the dream? May be he was being a perfectly normal person and just naturally talking to me as a friend or an absolutely unrelated human being, just having a casual chat? And when the dream ended, I forcefully decorated it with my favorite impressions of him, he touching my cheek and turning my face towards him to examine my new colorful ear top (if I remember correctly, it has a meena work of green and magenta on gold plating)...my favorite memories, he winning over my introvert brother in a moment (way no other friend of mine has succeeded ever)...oh a hundred other things he brought back because of the fact that he unnecessarily came in my dreams in a time when I have been rendered quite lonely and helpless and I haven't ever spoken to him even on the phone for say the last 5 years...a time when I am still mourning my favorite artist's premature death and still struggling with the decision about whether I should bring in petty things in a friendship and throw away my career, whether I should bring in career in a commitment and look away from my parent's wishes, was being torn apart by do's and don'ts, would be's and could be's...he simply chooses to stir me up one Monday morning, and remind me of a good time I never cared to admit that I had with him - the best time - the time one spends with a soul mate...that I conveniently forgot in my other priorities. Well, even he should be blamed, for even he forgot promises - in fact only he forgot promises, I am still free and available for him, who'd never come for he has a wife and a little girl. A little girl whom he chooses to call by my nick name. He stirs me up and I throw up and am sick to the core, and it is followed by one hell of an unnecessary period - which I don't need to have - I am apparently not meant to play a role of creation of a life ever.
But his memories don't leave me. And the movie name haunts me, Memories in March. One of my biggest pains in life is that I am not informed about the things that are happening in the city I left behind. The cultural things. The movies, more than anything else, the movies. Nobody told me about this movie man, Arekti Premer Galpo came to the news for some other reason, and somehow reached my ears, I being the conservative me, chose to look away from it (I would be ashamed to admit now, but I kind of did the same thing for Chitrangada, and told myself, when Rituparno makes a more generic next movie, I'd be sure to go and watch it) - but I never heard of this one, before the day when the news of his death came out and his work was being discussed in all the forums.
After finishing up work and my phone call to mom, I should have gone to sleep, but I chose to stay up and watch the movie. Internet connection in India is pathetic man, why, I have watched all the major movies I missed out in these years, in my short stay in Prague, and I never faced a connectivity problem being on wifi. And this dongle of mine can't process a youtube video at the lowest resolution of 144p? I have been obsessed all these while with Mathura nagarpati...I feel he's penned an even more beautiful poem in the form of Sakhi hum - I wonder how he got so influenced by vyshnav couplets, and imagine the irritation when such a mellifluous tune and such amazing lyrics come distorted because of low quality of video. Still, me being the patient me went through it calmly, in places where I couldn't hear the dialogue clearly (but I needed to), I had to rewind, once, at times twice, again spoiling the pace of the movie, but I must admit, this was one rare movie which never got me bored for a moment. Which again proves, the most engaging action is the formation of relationships - which this movie is all about. Why call it a mere formation, catharsis would be a much more apt word. A beautiful movie, it can be termed almost as a poem or a painting.
So it is 2:30 and I have office tomorrow. But I am sure I will be able to manage that. How? Wasn't I this tired, broken, given up being just a little while back? You know what, this splendid work - from this immensely talented person who is no more with us, just shook me up. I talk of things being pent up in me? I talk of being the lone sufferer? Each single frame of this movie shouted out to me, a much greater suffering, and a celebration of that suffering. What is life, apart from being a big bland continuous suffering, if we don't decide to celebrate it? No, I won't give up. I'd be very sick, very sad, very fatigued, but then, this is all the time I have, to establish my identity. I am probably not talented enough to give the world such amazing work of creativity and self actualization, but I can at least take in this beautiful world with all my senses, so long as I live. No, I don't live by falsehood, and that is the only pride that keeps me alive.
I watched the lyrical agony of love that Memories in March is, and I felt so lost...so totally lost in thoughts. Yes, it is time to go to sleep. Tomorrow, as we all know is yet another day, and I am unsure how to face that day, but dear Rituparno, even after you have died, you were able to give this hapless girl a gift of bliss through your flawless acting skills - or was it really acting? Was it something aching out from you, which I could so identify with? Wonder how much more you could have given us if God would have allowed you to stay back a little while more...I am sorry about not having understood you in a more rational way, when you were alive.
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