The Question... a doodle..

"If I am ... who am I ?"

When do we really know ..who we are?

Do the identities we cling to and fight fiercely for 

in terms of religion,caste ,race ,nationality etc. are 

actually our identities or just a way to cover the ignorance about our true identities that's hard for us to decipher.Science says if broken to the last particle perhaps no living or non living can be differentiated as its just a sum total of energy .... I have heard that argument but it's hard to grasp so  I keep asking puzzling myself all over again...

"If I am .... who am I ?"

Butterfly doodle

                        (Medium: Black ink and colored pens )

(She dozed away all tired and torn

Life was not at all roses,

For her too many thorns....)

She dreamt of a strange  butterfly

A splash of green and a pinch of sky..

As it fluttered  those shadowy wings

She thought it symbolised sad things...

 But then she noticed the lively red and soaring blue...

(Suddenly she  woke up rubbing her eyes

Chanting involuntarily without a clue)

“No matter how hard it gets there is always

A way through....”

                                                        

A displaced caterpillar

Rejuvenation

Dragonfly...

"Memories" "Loved ones" "19th january".....

This one is going to be incoherent and long. Most heartfelt things are. I would try to weave it in a way I felt it and probably all hearts with the natural frequency as mine may experience resonance. My need is to let it out. A plethora of emotions and weird link ups.... memories and some very hard to bear bitter truths of life unfolded compelling me to burst with words as I admire a vague warm aura aptly named to match her qualities as she was in life ...

I came back home today morning after a night long emergency shift at the hospital which went hectic and chaotic ...ended well ... but a little slip of memory made me make a mistake... and a call from the Senior Doctor made me feel crappy. I reached home in a dark dissatisfied mood ... an unintentional goof up that won’t have any major consequences except an annoying delay in an operative procedure.It felt stupid to feel that way after working all night.

As I entered home there was a lot of old stuff strewn all around .We are planning a major change of place in a few months and my mother is clearing up a motley of stuff that has piled up over the years. Old clothes ... books... antiques... letters ... papers... which lay dumped  in the storeroom with no real use.

She was just amused at how my brother never throws away stuff. She shows me a handmade watercolour birthday card he made for mom more than a decade back and a self –created amusing post-card.

“He keeps everything... never throws a thing...”

In my sulky mood I talk in my head “may be 'cos it’s hard to throw away memories...”
 This thought made me recall the face of a patient from last nights duty.As  a routine history taking procedure I came to know that her dad passed away due to lung cancer three years back .I could see her pain while she told me that.

“Oh my ... it must be so hard on her ...” I almost  self-talked. Then she revealed that she got addicted to sleeping pills for more than a year  and was on antidepressants for around two months after her father’s death. I was warm and supportive and just said it was a natural reaction to a personal “catastrophe”. Though calm on the outside I felt a chill pass down my spine.

“It must be scary to lose a loved one specially a parent or a child”...

I shirked the thought instantly 'cos I don’t even have the mental strength to dwell on it.

“Memories”.......”loved ones” ... suddenly both thoughts merged but soon they were overshadowed by the thoughts of the “slip up” that nagged me still.My thought trail was broken by mom's query.

“How was work?” “Did the patient deliver  for whom you left early”.

“Well we tried and she progressed well but then the baby got stuck and we had to do an emergency caesarean (I kept the medical jargon away)....it was tiring ....and the poor patient was so exhausted .” I replied and retired to freshen up.

Another flash from the past night

“Doctor I want my baby to be born today not tomorrow.” The patient in labour had communicated last night while I examined her.

“Why?”

“Cos tomorrow is 20 january and they say number 2 is not good .”

I had smiled at that superstition and said “ Well all numbers are good and it’s really not in our hands ..”

Soon after the patient was in too much pain to worry about numerology.

I had my breakfast and I understood that the sleep deprivation is making my mind flash unrelated stuff but a few words echoed in my head without permission
 “ memories “
 “loved ones”
 “19 january”.




 I felt uneasy and decided to log in check my mail and read some good blogs before I  catch up some sleep.My inbox showed a comment on my blog post "Lajja" by a blogger named "Indian Home Maker (IHM)".I read the comment and decided to read her blog.I was happy to find a very interesting blog to read without much surfing.However the picture on the sidebar which I thought was the blogger's photo had a subtitle that said "Tejaswee rao , My daughter ". The dates beneath the picture made me realise that Tejaswee   was n more .Then I realise that I had read about her demise on an early August morning in 2010.  I had gone very upset while reading about a young teenager and an excellent blogger who succumbed to Dengue.It made me angry and sad at the same time.I still have a vague memory of that article.I guess it said a cake recipe was her last blog post.

By weird coincidene today I was reading Tejaswee’s “Letter to the Future “ ......

I would take the liberty of selecting some words from it which she chose to write at 17 years of age to her future daughter ...so that her daughter  can know what she wanted to say when she was her age.This letter somehow ended up giving me solace .....

“Don’t be scared of making mistakes. I am, but that doesn’t stop me from making them all the time. It just makes me more conscious of every trip and stumble, when I pick myself up again.”

“I want you to have principles, and stick to them. If you believed something once, you had a reason to think that way. Don’t let peer pressure make you forget what you once stood by. But don’t be stubbornly resistant to change either.”

“I want you to know, that everyday is a challenge, but that every time you walk out that door, there will  be someone waiting for you to get home to whom you can proudly display your battle wounds. There will be people who’ll try to change you to suit their needs, but for each of these, know that there are others who’ll help you change to better yourself. Learn to recognise the difference. I took me ages… you won’t always find people exactly like you, but no matter who you are with be yourself "

“Never forget your ambitions, even the ones lost or changed. They have strange ways of cropping up again and fitting into your life. Am I a vet or an editor? Or do I work for the Indian Administrative Service?”

“Never, ever make the mistake of convincing yourself that your instinct is wrong. If something looks or feels wrong, then it most probably is. Trust your instinct. Remember the cat, Puppy? The one I told you about? If I haven’t yet, then ask me… I once saved him with pure instinct. It’s a long story.”

“Do I sound like a teenager to you?

Enjoy each day like it’s the last one you’ll live. Is this saying still a cliché?

One day you’ll meet the guy you’ll love. Maybe you’ve already met him. Wasn’t it the headiest feeling in the world when he said he loved you? It was for me. But, also the scariest. It takes a trust I’m still learning to give.

I dream big, and I watch my dreams fall. Right now, I have the strength to rise.

Listen Kid, I love you. I’ve never seen you, but it’s as if I’m talking to myself all over again.

Is this a selfish letter? In a way, yes, but it’s heartfelt.

Lots of Love,”

I was amazed... impressed ...soothed ...comforted.... and sad all at once. Yesterday was her birthday. If her belief of living a very long long life was granted she would have been 21 now.

I flipped through the pages of her blog ... listened to perfectly lonely.... was taken aback by her blog post “Growing old and dying early” .The sad irony just made my heartache....

Last night even after trying  our best  we could not deliver the patient normally and had to do an emergency caesarean section ..... 19th of January was about to end and I wondered if my patient would reach the OT in time to deliver on the date she wished for.

At one 1:30 am 2011.... I jotted down in the post operative notes ....

“Female baby weighing 3.69 kgs  born  at 11:43 pm  on19^th January 2012”.............





 Dear IHM (Indian Home Maker)

You are  a wonderful mother as reflects in every bit of Tejaswee’s blog that makes her live on. She was aptly name and she shall exude optimism ,warmth and beauty like the  sun even when its distant and melting away .I do not know if 20th january was a bad date  but after going through Tejaswee’s blog through yours ...I am sure of one thing 19 January  is an awesome date .....!!

( With this post I start a featured section on my blog... where I want to acknowledge all those who make a difference by being themselves.... thanks Tejaswee for being “you” ... and lots of love..RIP....)

The sun through my mobile camera

"SAANJH"

Melt away burning desire....

fade away lovely ball of fire...

Here goes a long day now recede..

Let the night usher in on tip toe feet..

As people scurry home so unaware

I bask in your  glow O' lovely sphere..

"SAATH"

Let's go home it's time dear friend...

We played and laughed and now it's day end..

But we will walk steady and slow ...

let us bask in this breathtaking  glow...

Let's promise that we will share joy and sorrow..

Life may fade away  but our friendship shall grow...

"SAMAPAN"

I am the sun sinking in my solitude..

Fading away I still glow with a warm attitude..

Melting away into oblivion ,the sky no more blue..

The silent sculptures longingly bidding  me adieu....

As the "kaynaat" takes a drowsy yawn...

I whisper "I shall be back with a break of dawn!"

LAJJA......

                    

There is a movie by this name though not an adaptation from Taslima Nasreen’s namesake controversial novel. It’s a  movie weaving stories of four women in a common thread of societal oppression . All four characters aptly named after ‘sita’ (Maithali,Vaidhehi,Janaki,Ramdulari) the ‘ego ideal’ of Indian women as renowned psychologist Sudhir Kakkar puts it. I have seen the movie once and love  the wedding scene where actor Mahima Chaoudhary finally breaks her silence and rescues ‘bechara’ ‘father of the bride’ with lingual whip lashes on the greedy ‘groom clan’ making them run for their ‘dignity’.Can   rerun and watch that part  umpteen number of times! Madhuri’s portrayal of a progressive theatre actress impressed me and the refusal to do the ‘agni pareeksha’ made me go Bravo!!!... But what I had extreme trouble in watching was the third part of the story played by Rekha. A brave single mother and a mid-wife ,who fights for the progress of the village and is open to new ideas .She is raped and killed just cos her son eloped with a upper caste influential man’s daughter. It was heart breaking and filled me with anger and disgust even though it was fiction .

But is that really fiction? The Hindu newspaper brought to light a shameful incident that made me recapitulate the heinous part of this movie I was never able watch.  A dalit woman was beaten up stripped and paraded naked in a village in Maharashtra . What was her crime? Her son eloped with an upper caste girl and since the girl’s  family could not trace the ‘lovers’ the boy’s  mother  had to pay the price . The shocking thing was that it was the women who assaulted her with sticks and chappals for two hours before they  stripped her and subjected her to naked humiliation.

 The police dismissed her refusing to lodge her FIR saying such things keep happening..!!!!  ...pause... a moment of painful silence.... and I thought it was hard  for me to watch that part of the movie and a poor woman lived the horror and all she gets instead of protection , reassurance and justice is a smirk and a disgusting phrase “ ye sab to hota rehata hai !!!’

Hota rehata hai !! I ask why????? ‘Cos she a lower caste? ... cos she a powerless woman??... oh no! she is the lowest of all... she is a dalit woman ... so perhaps it’s acceptable to the ‘society’ that she be subjected to the upper caste ‘justice’.....being beaten up and losing  her dignity for no fault of hers should be acceptable ...... I do not know what good it is to blog about it... or even feel bad about it . But all I can say when I read such news which perhaps is just the tip of an iceberg it strips my faith and it stands stark naked bleeding and weeping .... where went humanity ... where went shame ..... I feel the ‘Lajja’...I feel the pain.....

The attire allegation

The DGP Andhra Pradesh made a controversial statement recently which created waves  of disapproval all over the country   and even made Mr P. Chindambram  react saying " Ours is a free country and everyone is free to wear what they wish to."

The controversial statement is nothing new... “Women are raped ‘cos they dress in an inappropriate manner”. We had ‘Slut walks’ all over the world and the Indian version called “Besharmi Morcha “ to refute this argument the past year in India. Perhaps DGP Andhra was oblivious of these developments . It’s not new that colleges and schools have dress code for women .But has it really decreased the rape cases. Prescribing a dress code is like hoping a miraculous development of a backward state of the country by simply changing it’s name.

 Dressing as no correlation with being a rape victim... heck it has no correlation  even with age !! If a women’s way of dressing was the culprit no Burkha clad women would have ever been raped ... and can anyone explain how an old woman or a girl child provokes a rapist. The worst case I had ever heard in my vicinity was a gang rape of a 4 year old when I was a post grad student at medical college. The crime was so brutal that the poor child had to undergo several  life saving and genital reconstructive surgeries.

How conveniently the blame is put on women for provoking a crime against them that not only takes away their dignity but also condemns them to be subjected to allegations like these for the rest of their lives. This argument isn’t new but what was most disheartening was the fact that the topmost officer of the police force, which is supposed to protect women, has such regressive outlook and what more he isn’t gender sensitive. This dismisses completely the hope of finding gender sensitization in the lower rungs of the police force. No wonder rape victims are raped again in police custody. I am sorry to say Mr DGP sir you simply lost the point and have revealed your ignorance . A cancer patient was raped by a hospital employee in a premier cancer institute in Mumbai ... I saw that poor girl deliver a dead baby in our hospital... can DGP Andhra give me a plausible explanation how a terminally ill teenage girl provoke such a ghastly crime against her..chemotherapy definitely didn’t make her attractive ... I am at loss and I am sorry to say that it’s disheartening to see that our senior officers make such outrageously stupid statements instead of rooting out the real cause of the problem.

No woman wants to be raped and it’s not the clothing but the a patriarchal mind set that always works towards suppressing women’s sexuality and bailing out male pervert urges. Until men are sensitized towards women and till they view  them as fellow human beings who deserve respect it will just be a blind blame on attire with no changein the rate of crime against women.