Just to see you smile...

The romantic reunion that made me cry the most recently? – the old servant reuniting with his wife when Drew Barrymore rescues him from the slavers in Ever After: A Cinderella Story

Why did that make me tear up when most romances just make me barf these days?

Guess because I’ve seen how love seems to die for most people. Most people after 20-25 years of marriage seem to be bound only by society and habit.  They no longer care about each other, they no longer wait to talk to each other, they no longer appreciate the smile on each other’s face… and that is sad, for what is love if not the desire to make someone happy, to take away their pain and bring a smile to their face…

When you no longer care about making the person you love smile, you know that you’re very close to the end. And vice versa – when someone doesn’t care about making you smile – maybe it’s time to pack up and kill that particular story. Maybe wait for a love that will truly last ever after – long after you’re bent and crabby, long after you’ve lost your teeth and charm, a love that will look at you and still care that you smile…

Fringe

Fringe – I’m somewhere in Season 4, and I have no idea where the show will go… I know I can google n find out but… there’s more pleasure in watching it unfold each day.  But today, I just want to pay homage to the minds who created it.  They may never have written books, but the episode in which Walter, Peter and William Bell enter Olivia’s mind to find her blew my mind! And whoever visualized the episode beginning with the reversed gravity – awesome! The writers are writers in every sense of the word. They have created worlds second to none, and their plotting, and characterization is good enough to have made them very popular authors at least to the sci-fi crowd.

How has this show not won its writers more awards?!?

August 2014 - An ending

August 2014 - So many things can happen in a month... Some good, some bad

True to form, I'm going to write about the bad - hoping that this blog will help me process my life as it did 8 years ago when it made me who I am.

I'm so picky about my friends because I truly believe I have high standards.  And because I pick them so carefully I usually never hesitate to give them my all.  Because of which, when for the first time a friend accused me of 'conduct-unbecoming-a-friend', I was shattered.  I'm so used to my friends trusting me and knowing that I would do anything for them maybe it was just a gigantic kick to my ego.  But jokes apart - yes, it hurt. And yes, it broke me. And yes, I crawled into my head and licked my wounds until other friends finally told me to snap out of it because to them I've been the friend I always believed myself to be.  So, here I am, once again myself again. Thanks to those who reminded me I'm so much more than one person's opinion of me.  Scarred again, but hell, whats a few scars anyway.  Down the road they just remind you how strong you are.

That was a few weeks ago, but much worse than that was in store.  Once again I've been proved wrong.  And the funny thing is I wasn't even trying to be proved right or wrong.  I made a request, a simple one.  One that could be fulfilled by the expenditure of time and caring.  The problem with making simple requests is that it feels so much worse when they are ignored.  Ask for something complicated and you can tell yourself that the person couldn't grant it.  Ask for something simple and you'll feel every denial like a million little reminders of how unimportant your request was.  So how was I wrong?  I didn't think the request was a big deal.  Its only now, when I'm feeling like a discarded tissue (my favourite metaphor) that I realize what a big deal the repercussions of denial of a small request can be.

I hope September is better...

Eid, friends and books...

Purpose of this post: None

Went to a friend's house for Eid lunch yesterday.  I introduced her and her husband almost 8 or 9 years ago and the three of us are pretty close. (Will share the story of their romance sometime - it's so true that everyone has a story...)

Anyway, I wasn't feeling like going.  Had a bad day the day before and just wanted to avoid humans who know me. (Office is different - hardly anyone knows me there any more - it's like working with a bunch of people some of who I used to know, and the rest that I don't have the energy to get to know!)

But anyway, I realized they'd feel bad if I didn't show up so I made the effort and guess what - I was so glad I went.

No, it was not because of the food - which was very nice indeed... (Her husband apparently spent 12 hours cooking - he didn't sleep all night! Abnormal behaviour? Maybe not for a foodie - which he is.)

The best part of going over wasn't the lovely food - the best part was that I found that my friend has a bookcase with two shelves of books, most of which I haven't read before!

Fun!

Borrowed eight yesterday.  I'd have taken some more - but felt too embarrassed.

Guess I'll visit her more often now.  If anyone want's more of my time it's so easy - just dangle a book, or a discussion about a good book in front of my nose and you'll find me sitting near you purring happily (or barking enthusiastically, depending on which way you swing)!

Writing and me

Apparently all great writers were consumed by their passion to write. Hmm... what does that say about me?  I enjoy writing usually, but then there have been days and even weeks when I didn't really write anything - and I didn't fall down dead with the gap in my life.  Does that mean that I am not 'meant' to be a writer?

The thought makes me sad but not despondent.  Is this why I never finish any of the books I start?  Am I mere dabbler, playing at being a writer, living with delusions of grandeur?

Note to self - I need to research all my famous authors, specially those that got published for the first time late in life.  I need to see whether they were 'closet' writers writing everyday or whether their talent lay dormant underground, until one day, some day, it finally grew above ground (as hopefully some day I will).

More losses...

Sometimes I scare myself when I realise how much I care for someone or something. Specially when that person or thing is on it's way out of my life.

Life took away something valuable earlier this year, but I could bear up because I got something so precious in return.  Now life has taken that away too and given me nothing in return.  I'm lost for words.  Why on earth would this happen?  Why give me something and then yank it away. Cruel!

Waking in darkness

He woke, scared and confused in the darkness.  Lying still, trying to figure out what woke him up, he noticed the room was darker than usual.  He waited for his eyes to adjust, but nothing happened at first. Then he forgot about his eyes as his ears tuned in to a low rumbling noise.  A chill ran up his spine as he realized the noise was under him.  Under the bed, right where he lay..

He sat there petrified as the rumbling grew louder, changed to a growl... He couldn't move even when the bedsheet started moving as something started to come out from under the bed.  He tried to scream, to call out... his father lay asleep in the next room and would surely know how to deal with this...

He strained to make some noise, but all that came out was a whisper of sound, so soft he hardly heard it himself... "Dad..."

But even if he didn't hear it, the thing did. It ceased the growling sound and for a moment, a flash between breaths, he thought things would be okay.  But then the sheet started moving again - this time towards him. He fought his frozen limbs. Struggled to get them to move.

As the thing beneath the sheet reached within arms length he wrenched his head away, and finally leapt from the bed just as the thing leapt too...

Feeling so ashamed

Feeling so ashamed that I care so much,

Pride's out for the count, so out of touch,

Walking in the shoes of the fallen,

Feeling my cheeks burn,

Feeling so ashamed.

Forgiveness

A friend gave me a wonderful gift and then took it away. He didn't mean to hurt me but did.  He apologized, I forgave him. End of story. Or it should be....

The problem is I am still angry.  The anger sweeps over me unexpectedly and then I have to remind myself of how I'd feel if the tables were turned to force myself to cool down.  After all if I had hurt someone unthinkingly and then genuinely apologized, I'd want them to forgive me.  So why can't I get this out of my mind?!

Maybe there's a part of me that doesn't believe it was completely unthinking.  I think at some level, he must have known what would happen.  And maybe it's because a part of me also believes he doesn't have any idea how much he hurt me.  Maybe he doesn't think I am justified in feeling so bad.

I don't know. I may never know. It may not be important anyway.  Things come and go.  I just wish this anger would be one of those things. 

Awake

So I've been watching a few episodes of a TV show called 'Awake'. And it's made me think.

The show's premise is simple - A man meets with an accident with his wife and son.  After the accident his reality seems to split.  In one reality his wife is alive and his son is dead, and in the other reality his son is alive and his wife is dead. Or maybe there's just one reality and the other is a dream.  Or he's in a coma and both realities are a dream.  Hmmm... okay maybe it's not too simple, but anyway... getting back to the point.
As a man, as a husband, as a father, what would he choose if he had to?

As a woman, neither a wife nor a mother, I wonder what I would choose. Lose my husband who I presumably loved enough to marry, or lose my child? (Everyone seems confident that mothers would choose their children over their husbands, but I don't think that's always the case!)

I think I know, but I'm not sure. And I pray God that I never actually find out.