Magic of unplanned moments!

Today, I am here yet again at my son's swimming class - with my laptop and grand plans to finish pending day's work. I have been working since 6 AM and yet, I know even till bedtime - there is thin chance of me touching the finish line!
Phew - well, so my son jumped in pool with his coach and with a grin I opened my laptop.
No distractions of "I need a snack!" , "I am thirsty", "Its so hot!" - feels like I shall conquer the world.

And  - ALAS!
My laptop wouldn't connect  to my workstation - I tried almost ten times with disbelief! Sometimes fate loves to play trick and pass back the grin to me!

So here I am with a laptop , and internet and too bored to read emails or look at any more tulips pictures on Facebook!

Fate has better plans for me and I planned to  look at my forgotten blog post - reading through the post. It was like turning the pages of life - reliving the old carefree days and it brought back such beautiful memories.

Now I just hope that life shouldn't always go as I plan - it's the unknown turns and the unseen paths that sometimes bring back the real magic.

Well that brings me to the end of forty minutes - and what a holy moment to reflect back on my own path. Like Steve Jobs once said, you can only connect dots of life by looking back and not ahead!
Wish I had captured more such beautiful moments to relish!

Cheers to the power of unknown and unplanned!

Jara Muskurao To ...

One more of the few childhood poems revisited :), this was published in local newspaper and I was honored to receive letter from editor to never stop writing. I was 15 then and hence started the mad rush of education and for some reason my mind got completely wiped off of creative outburst!

बचपन के पन्नो से मेरी एक कविता, मुस्कान से करती है आपका अभिनन्दन । 

जरा मुस्कुराओ तो !!

एक मुस्कान से हो जाती हैं सारी मुश्किलें आसान ,
जैसे, एक फूल के खिलने से बढ़ती  है बगीचे की शान। 
लगता है ये दुनिया तो है बच्चों  का खेल, 
जो है आसान हर एक लिए, चाहे हो बूढ़ा या जवान। 

एक मुस्कान से मिलती है ज़िन्दगी को दिशाएँ अनेक ,
हर उलझन सुलझ जाती है, जैसे हो कोई  सपनो का देश  । 
ले जाती है  हमें ज़िन्दगी के उस छोर पे ,
जहाँ साथी  मिलते हो विभिन्न  भेष में  । 

है मुस्कान में इतनी गर्मी ,
कि नर्म  कर दे शीत  की  कठोरता को , 
है इसमें इतनी शक्ति कि ,
दे नव उत्साह  हर एक थके हुए दिल को ।  

मुस्कुरा के कर लो अपनी ज़िन्दगी हरी भरी ,
जहाँ खिले हर रंग के फूल, पर कभी रहे न तेरा बगीचा खली । 
हर सुबह मुस्कुरा कर करे तेरा अभिनन्दन,
हर शाम मुस्कुरा के ले तुझसे  विदाई । 

                                                          -अदिति मोहन 

Mortal Life and Immortal Memories

As I add on more miles to my car of life; life brings me closer to it's mortal nature. The journey does have a destiny and the horizon does exists.It's the fuel, engine and roads chosen which determines where the halt happens.

Well, before getting further into analogy let me get into the chemistry behind these thoughts. I realized all the above when I suffered loss of a near family friend; whom I had recently met and am never going to meet again. It's such an unexplainable feeling of not being able to see a person again and incapability of repairing the loss.This is the point where the human power ends and I start loosing faith in "Nothing is impossible". Nothing can re-create the person, the moments and the special bond shared.

Even though life is so mortal; there is something that remains immortal.Thoughts start drilling into memories and brings back a flood of memories in form of words, actions, stories. Wow, the moments that were so ordinary at that point suddenly have such a special place in my life! Now I understand better why capturing memories is an "involuntary" action and am so glad that our mind is not judgemental in storing them. As the memories start playing back, I start reliving them and ahhh .. wish I had lived it in a better way and expressed my appreciation. Each memory adds fuel to my life and inspires me to handle relationships better and express my feelings.

So; even when people leave the world; they leave behind such living memories in hearts and minds of countless people. Some I guess; they must not have ever imagined they would  leave an impact on, and a transition of ordinary to special moment would occur. During lifetime we focus more on imperfection of person but at this point, imperfections also become perfect by the fact that even with imperfections; you had a living person to count on. This definitely makes me a better person and careful about small acts, each moment I spend and the way I respond to each call. Reminds me of a line from song "If tomorrow never comes" by Ronan Keating: "Avoid the circumstance where there's no second chance". It's crazy and it's weird but it does scare me to say "Good Bye", the feeling does come "Will you see me again?", "Did I make this moment special enough?" ..

The car of life needs fuel of memories, rich relationship, special bonding and never the less special deeds to add to fuel of your near and dear ones.

This quote from the legendary poet Kabir summarizes it all - "When you were born, you cried while the world rejoiced, live your life in such a way that when you die; the world would cry while you rejoice".

A Clean Sheet of Paper

Few days back someone asked me a question "What would you draw if you have a clean sheet of paper?" This was like a shot to my brain and felt as if I was placed in some unknown planet with no boundaries. It felt like zero gravity! Felt like freedom granted before I was well prepared for it. I wondered how much the mind gets wired and life gets single tracked with daily chores and a "well-planned" life . I suddenly felt the excitement of re-writing my story with just this simple question.

Well the answer to above is still being processed but it made me think what exactly drifted me away from this freedom? If I was a kid and was given a clean sheet what would I draw? What comes first in my mind, directly pumped from heart?

Looking back, I realized that there were very few instances in life when a clean sheet was ever provided. It has been mostly about connecting the dots.

To begin with, a prescribed education system and learning within boundary, learning to just be a shining star in school rather than truly enriching knowledge. Then get into best college that can give the best job, maybe from top 10 colleges of the country, a prescribed professional turn. When in job, comes time of prescribed task, prescribed priority and prescribed red carpet carrier path.Whoa! I never realized my life was so prescribed!

Well,I agree it's just easy to build this blame list and there have been examples where there have been outstanding individuals from the same system. So, I do diligently take part of blame to me. What I am trying to get at is, it's very important to ask such questions to oneself. These open ended questions can at times blow up mind and open up new channels.

It's wonderful to be in zero gravity so grab this opportunity and color your "clean sheet".

Back to school days ..

"We gossiped all day long and still had so much to talk on phone.We shared laughter, we shared tears and we shared our greatest fears. We laughed till our cheeks and stomach cried of stretch and yet we went on and on and on ... Those friendship bands we weaved for this special day, still binds us till this date!"
Am nostalic of my school days where I met some of the most special people in my life. We spent ten glorious years with each other which had all colors of fun and all shades of happiness.Ah! And one day the roads diverged and we all moved on our destined way. Yet, the memories are still green with me and I often see you all in my dreams.
Those noisy corridors, those lunch boxes which got over seconds after they opened, those color dresses on teachers day and those fun filled sports day! Those happy hours when we got a free period and we tried hard to stay calm.Those excitement of Children's Day when our teachers bestowed so much fun with their plays. Those fear of the results day when all we could do is just pray :).Those musical evening in our school bus and those jokes we reserved for our way back.
I wish we had an option to re-live those days and have so much fun again. Life just keeps moving in a fast forward mode and we get farther away from each other. I wish all our roads meet some day and we relive all our magical moments. Miss you all a lot!
Wish you all a very Happy Friendship Day!

Some childhood poetic outburst

These are two of my very old poetries which I wrote while I was in school. It was when I was preparing for my boards and was isolated at home to study for the D-Day. The silence outside churned a new conversation within me and below are some instance of those:

Keep Smiling

" A crooked line on your face;
Enclosed sweetly in a brace
Lits the face as bright;
As moon shines in a star lit night.

Transmits warmth in others heart;
And sweetens all corners turned sour,
Melts the roughness between foes;
As the warm sun melts the toughest snow.

When all round trapped in stress;
All say it works the best,
Unties every knots of thoughts;
As rain releives the earth blown hot.

When seen on a child's face;
It looks like God's grace,
Take my advice and tie a knot;
"Keep Smiling,it helps a lot"."

In arms of past.......

When eyes go drowsy;and nights go calm,
When stars go twinkling;midst the cloud,
My thoughts travel down the path....
And I; drift away in my past.
With twinkling eyes and sizzling dreams;
I used to think;"I am a born queen",
Mother's love and father's care;
Made my little world glare,
Dolls were my little friends;
In whose hairs; my hours would blend,
Wondered why the rain should fly;
When the colorful rainbow did arrive,
Tried hard;to hear the Moon say "Hello!";
Wanted to make the clouds my pillow.
Then gently I feel the patting of wind.....
Which takes me to the world of dreams,
I wish I could stay there.....
Like a little doll;with careless hours.

An ordinary day with an extraordinary evening

It was a weary day. My work was still haunting me at all places. Everywhere I went I could find trace of my incomplete TODO's.Kitchen was shouting to be cleaned, clothes howling for laundry, carpet could not breathe in dust and every other thing was complaining.Phew! No peace for my little soul.
I just wanted to break out of all this and breathe back life to get things better. I thought gym should be a good resort to press the pause button of my mind and just stop thinking for some time. As I always say, mind is a chatter box and always finds a reason to constantly churn so many unwanted thoughts.
Leaving everything in same state I just dressed up and headed towards my gym. It was 7 pm by the time I could get myself in shoes. With my IPod plugged in I steadily moved to my gym which is hardly 5 minutes walking from my home and still I make it just once in 5 days!Well, music made it a bit better but strangely I noticed my mind was getting immune to music. It was still singing in between and reminded me of my laundry list.Finally I made it to treadmill and got myself moving.
"Aditi, you are too tired to run for more than 5 mins", exclaimed my inner voice. "You have so much to do, how can you spend 15 mins on this!" and it continued.... Oh my! I feel there is a small devil building resistance system in me.
Ignoring all this I could manage to persist for 20 minutes. Could not go further with my legs ringing it's alarm as I had troubled them after weeks or the same resistance system.
I just moved out of gym and found it to be bright and sunny outside even at 7:30 pm. God had started his windmill and there was a wave of cool wind easing me off my sweat.I moved ahead with legs heavy but it felt better with my blood running faster in me trying to pump in some fresh supply to my wearied mind. It was certainly better now but the best was still to come.
While I was heading home, a certain feeling stuck me and I wanted to visit the park behind my home. I had no clue what motivated me to walk the extra miles but I just moved on till I reached there.
It was refreshing and a pleasant scene to view. With sky changing its color to scarlet red, the grass so perfect green and trees dancing as intoxicated with the winds. There were kids playing with their dad's and some teenagers giggling and having fun with the carelessness of youth. I eventually got infected with the fun and peace there and found myself smiling, my mind fresh and my heart happy! I started strolling round and could finally feel my thoughts entangling. It was a moment worth the time I gave it. I suddenly felt the urge of jogging and my legs happily co-operated. As I jogged, it got even better as the wind was making rooms in my hair and washed away all sweat from my face.It was euphoria, feel of mirage or even better, with no better words I can find in my limited vocabulary.
I guess it was one of the best thirty minutes of my life and nature helped me renew back life. I was back home with a quite brain and peace all around. Carefully I lifted my pending TODO's and also managed to wite this blog :).
Now, I know where to go when I start getting out of touch of myself.