Wednesday, September 28, 2011

The pensieve that makes you pensive

Haha, sometimes I can come up with the darnest of titles :D I'm in one of my moods tonight.. and that makes for a perfect occasion to blabber away on my blog. I remember sharing this thought with a friend that I'm definitely more fluent when I'm slightly upset as that makes me contemplative (aka pensive) as opposed to being chirpy/happy which doesn't propel me enough to pen down my thoughts.

The above characteristic in me is not just limited to blogging. I generally enjoy being thoughtful and having food for thought, rather than mindless talk about shopping or similar. I like serious movies with substance than chick flicks revolving around shiny objects, superfluous drama or seducing men having chocolate-boy looks. I have had enough of those movies portraying a relatively serious guy being swept off his feet by an overtly talkative, chirpy girl. The guy is usually a well accomplished professional (which is wrongly shown to make him lonely and sullen) and the girl has just some small-time job and a sole aim of finding the knight in shining armor (duh.. making the exception of Aragorn leading the riders of Rohan to war against Saruman's army of slimy orcs, there is no credibility to this supposed "knight" concept).


Anyway, I digress. The reason I titled this the "pensieve" is because I was taking a small gallop down memory lane today. And thinking about the things that I loved and hated. The disadvantages of being a thoughtful, non-impulsive person is that I don't act upon instinctive reactions to day-to-day events. I deliberate and then react in a composed manner. While that is usually the right thing to do, it makes for lesser and lesser instances that either caused me to squeal and jump in exuberance or, on the other hand, shake with anger enough to swear at someone or hurl a shoe at him/her. And then one begins to crave for it.. the simpler times.. the time when you weren't held accountable for your mistakes.. the time when acing your school tests made you feel you can achieve anything in this world....

Among those things I enjoyed to the core are - group dancing. I'm not a very talented one at it and sometimes I swear I dont even look symmetrical and rhythmic while dancing. Add to it my skinny arms that don't make me look even half as pretty as some of the other girls with sculpted bodies. But how about I stop giving a rat's ass to these thoughts? How about I only remind myself of the thrill I feel each time I step on the stage, take my position and await for the music beats to start? The rule about any good stage performance is to look towards the audience and not at some imaginary far-off horizon. But then they skip the part where the lights illuminating you on stage are so blinding that all you see is black oblivion in front beyond the stage's edge. So where am I supposed to look? Go figure!

Among the things that sucked the joy out of me were bouts of loneliness. I was never shy or reserved.. but I hesitated to let my guard down and get too involved with new people around me. I didn't wanna draw too much attention to myself for fear of falling flat on my face later on with no-one to help me up. I was just being cautious and not hasty. But that sorta behavior backfired more than once as people misinterpreted it as pride and being too full of myself to open up to empathizing with others. A lesson learnt the hard way after years of battling self-doubt and being limited to a hi-bye friend to most. Even today, I won't try to be the life of the party, but small gestures of making others feel comfortable around you, go a long way in making deeper, better relationships.

Enough of blab for tonight.. gonna go read something about aviation before going to bed - seeing a small documentary about the Boeing 787 Dreamliner launched by All Nippon Airways, Japan has sparked my interest :D

P.S If anyone here has contacts to a flash mob organizer, I'd be interested in adding to their numbers :P


Monday, September 12, 2011

The path into the sparkling lights...

People drive cars for a variety of reasons. Some drive to get to work, others to drop their kids to school or to their myriad activities; some others as a means of livelihood.. and then there are folks like me who drive since it gives immense pleasure.


I consider myself fortunate to be in a position to be able to buy my own car - my own mean machine that is a testimony of man's progress in engineering. I'm sure my parents' eyes must've welled up when I told them the happy news (I stay away from them in the USA so I couldn't experience it first-hand). I'm saying this not coz I'm boasting about the car, but because I'm from an average middle class family for whom owning a car is a huge deal and a product of years of careful investment. When I heard my mom dad saying they're proud of me becoming independent, that's when I prized my car even more - its my own, my baby, my faithful companion. She signifies my freedom...my independence....my efforts......and she makes me look darn good ;)

It might be just co-incidence, but I've ended up driving mostly at nights rather than daylight. There's something very thrilling about how the hundreds of reflectors lining the freeway lanes shine due to your headlights. And it feels like a game setting with you exercising total control on your ride. Adrenaline.. here it comes..

So day before yesterday I was driving a friend home. As the city of San Francisco started rising up at the horizon, it looked like jewels studded on a sloping canvas.. beckoning to keep driving to them. After dropping him and turning back home, I took a casual decision to drive by the scenic Bay bridge by the coast instead of taking the shorter internal freeway (CA-101).

(what the junction might've looked like in daylight)

It was 3:30 am after a friday night party and I was slightly tired. I began to reconsider my decision about taking this detour unfamiliar to me. Plus my phone-cum-GPS leading me home was almost drained of charge. But I kept driving and then a sight like this (even more spectacular up close) materializes in front of me!


It was mesmerizing... my body dint feel a single tinge of my weariness as I took in this image passing next to the street I drove on. "Best decision ever to drive here although its wayy too late in the night." So captivating! I was driving alone but I didn't miss anyone in those moments.... simply me and my wheels...

Hoping to have more such great drives. In a place like California, one just hits the road and welcomes any destination because the journey... is just beautiful.