The Story of My Trouser

When I handed it over to the boy and told him to cut a piece towards the buttom half so that we can use it for cleaning the pelmets of my newly allotted quarter, I got a mild jerk. It was rather a series of flashbacks. The cutting was little uneven. The jigsaw has hit me by then. Seeing the disturbance, the boy offered in a lighter vein, " Sir, I am doing it such that you cannot use it again, it is a gone case now".

But I decided to keep the upper portion back into the trolley bag like its pervious avatar. It was pretty clean, well folded but slightly torn. I thought I could still use it in bed room. It has been used, abused and misused so much that it has became a part of my fundamental possession. It has sustained my bohemian nature, shifting of cities, career progression, and over and above, it has sustained Me. I have disposed of my Vanivihar-HCU Diary, the Women in Love, the bedsheet that I had been using since Class X (1994) till 15th August 2004, the eye-opener road rage. But I have kept this as my most essential baggage. It has been a symbol of my struggle for some identity (izzat) in society, my metamorphosis from a real asshole to Ashu.

It has been a mute spectator to many ups and downs, twists and turns at personal level. It was purchased from the paltry salary I used to get as a struggling jurno in Hyderabad days. When I touch it today, I still get a mixed aroma of irani chai, Fine buiscuit and TOI-Hyderabad. The portion where it looks like the real India (read the torn part of thigh region) triggers my past bonding with RTC buses.

What can be the better option than this to use it for cleaning the quarter where I am going to start my family with my 'Trophie' wife ? The upper-half may be treasured to be served on a better day !!

This was probably the last remnant of the Making of Ashutosh after the most cherished rejaei was left to its fate while shifting from Mumbai. Later, the rejai, as revealed by its new care-taker, has been a proud healer of my erstwhile room mate who had been a victim of Mumbai's 26/11. The guilt in me to part with its warmth quickly subsided knowing its famous turnaround in the later stage.

Sometimes, I try to figure out all these strange inanimate equations in forlorn. They give me an understanding of unconditional love that we fail to foresee in our life. My Trophie differs me on this. She gives instance from her surrounding and I don't disagree. But I can foresee her desire to come back when she repeats that she actually doesn't.

But my love story doesn't propel me to come back.

(Tail Piece : I love the story of My Trouser. Eccentric brand, grey colour, 28 waist, 40 length, purchased for around Rs 280 from the Hyper Market in Mushirdabad in Hyderabad way back in 2003 and kept alive till today.)

Waka waka, kabhi kabhi

End of the day, the Dutch had to feel the (S)pain. But I had all the fun without even having the glimpse of a single match. Waka Waka jai ho. The rush of adrenalin that Shakira offers in less than five minutes is something that the month-long carnival fails to trigger in me. But I did the most creative parallel, the poetic justice, with the help of my desired addiction, the drug , my Trophie (still over phone).

I remember how I had explored one of my favourite hobbies, cropping pictures, during Football World Cup in Times Days. I used to give so much attention to the messages in the tattoos irrespective of their locations on the sexy soccer fans that my senior female colleagues would not stop going ga-ga over my creative intervention. And I would feel like the high school boy in Ek Chhoti Si Love Story starring Manisha Koirala. (That's the only movie I had watched in a theatre in Abids when I was a student of SN School, HCU along with one of my close buddies paying Rs 10...we were on the first row....)

Where was Octopaus 'Paul' (OP) then!!

OP, be careful. You do soothsaying, play football even, but don't ever try tweeting my dear. You have seen our Shashi anna (Tharoor), Lalit da (Modi) and yesterday, the CNN's (West Asia) editor who has been sacked for her pro-shiite cleric remark on Tweeter.

xxxx

I love to admire this guy of ..Blue Mangoes, David Davidar. I hope he had some mangoes in deed. Very few like him really do such cheap at their height and then try to do some 'honest' talking. Reading David, I believe creative people are little too pro-creative. You can't write sex unless you think of it. Since most of the writers love to roam around the theme of sex in the guise of creative freedom, they happen to have the experience of that journey. If not, the journey itself provide them enormous opportunities to suck the Milk of Paradise at regular intervals. (Otherwise, politician Ramnika Gupta had not bared it all to say how a former president of India had turned up naked before her!!)

xxxx

I hate rainy days. No exercise, No motivation, No reading much. (But I remember school days football and the oriya poem of class III.) Of late, I am enjoying The Professional by Subroto Bagchi. Great insight. Watched a good movie, Life Mein Kabhi Kabhi. Love to recite the song :

Ham khusi ki chah main...har khusi se door ho gaye
Dhund na chale the jindegi...jindegi se door ho gaye

Mayritual

“Mr X, You are so lucky. You had that miserable childhood, so you got something to write about. What are we going to write about?” I tend to recall this exchange between a Pulitzer-winning author and his student that figured in a recent issue of Readers’ Digest.

All good writings are probably a result of great disturbances at personal level or beyond. May be that’s why new age authors fail to attract like their old counterparts. Chetan Bhagat takes the help of so many slangs to convey the meaning which can otherwise be written in plain English and can also cater to a larger landscape. Celebrity writers a la Sobha De, baring a few, seem to be a bunch of jokers. I sometimes doubt how many people really perceive the Midnight’s Sallu bhai (read Salman Rushdie)!!

Having said this, I too respect the clan for being able to create a literary hellscape amidst all the luxury. I love to write when something haunts me deeply. I sit back and reflect upon. The objective is to get some solace at a personal level. They never give an impression of attracting a publisher!!

See, I have done hardly anything of this nature in the last couple of months. Don’t know how the last six months passed. Soil, salt, water, ship, wheeler and tear... all an after-effect of a knotty affair on 21st May 2010.

Earlier, I used to poke fun when I would meet any of my close buddies after a long gap. I used to tell them to “write a letter to some friend explaining how was the experience…ten marks,” drawing a symbolic reference to the most common assignment in school days after summer break.

And now I would like to keep them all close to my heart. Posting pictures does not cheer me anymore.