Category: Yesterday

  • Imago

    That I worship Bill Watterson and simply adore Calvin & Hobbes is not a secret. In fact, it mostly irritates people when i quote from that unique mix of humour/sarcasm/wit and profundity. But no, this is not a gushing post. A few days back, when a friend was talking about her kids, I told her to be thankful that they weren’t like Calvin. She said one of them does have imaginary friends. I am not sure about kids these days, but I simply cannot remember any imaginary friends I might have had in my childhood. To be very fair to everyone concerned, I am quite befuddled even when it comes to recognising real friends of that era and erm, a few eras later too.

    But I wonder about the character of these childhood imaginary friends, and why they exist. Is it loneliness? Considering the minimal baggage that we have at that young age, are they confidants of doubts and thoughts that we think we can’t share with others, even if they are of the same age? Calvin has his club, theories about society and education, ‘scientific experiments’ etc which he shared with Hobbes. Is it because he felt that he would be laughed at, if he shared them with others?  Hobbes usually attempts to give him a more mature perspective on all the stuff he discusses. I’d like to ask the kids with imaginary friends about the conversations. 🙂

    Maybe, as we grow up, our baggage grows and as we conform to the norms around us, we figure out that imaginary friends have to go? Or it is perhaps a need that gets filled or forgotten about amongst other priorities, as we acquire new real people – friends, relatives or any other relationships along the way, and maybe figure out that we can share different things with different people, and not have to reveal ourselves totally to everyone? And that takes away the reason for having an imaginary friend to whom we confide all?

    Real people bring their own baggage, they perhaps shield us a bit, and tell us things that we want to hear. They perhaps validate our beliefs and thoughts and inferences, either because they don’t want to be the people who deliver the bad news or they don’t care enough. Of course, I am not taking away anything from the good friends that we manage to get, if we are lucky enough – the conscience keepers. But they’re human too, and their objectivity would waver, they’d have their biases. Perhaps, we should build an imaginary friend all over again, our own objective self, one which can show our own prejudices without fear of retribution.

    until next time, object of my imaginary attention 🙂

  • I feel funny?

    [I wrote this post quite a while back, but the trigger to post is Cyn’s recent post of a similar nature]

    Those of you who read my other blog – brants, know the site by now. When I announced it on twitter at that point of time, Twilight Fairy‘s immediate response was “mubarakein! so finally you use ur real name in the virtual world 😛 :)” I told her, that the real name already existed in the virtual world – Facebook, LinkedIn, but I had an inkling of what she meant, because I felt a twinge when I took ‘brants’ out of the manuscrypts domain. Though I did not dwell on it, it was a defining moment for me in its own way. I did dwell on whether I should write this post, and you now know the result.

    I checked the names on my blogroll and was reassured to find a few handles that are just that – handles, not names. Maybe we’re from a different generation of bloggers. Ones who blogged for reasons that were utterly different from the reasons now. That’s generalising, yes, but there was something then about virtuality that offered a haven from reality.  Some have moved on, some have clung on, and some have just drifted on, like me.

    As a handle, ‘manuscrypts’ has been in existence for more than half a dozen years now. Long before the blog, there were chatrooms. Then came the blog, and while it was a personal one, over a period of time, the persona slowly overshadowed the personality, my picture does not exist on the blogs, the M symbol does. Actually, I think its a bit more complicated. A part of me is vastly different from my overt personality. The blog became an ideal location for this  rarely revealed (only when I’m very comfortable with people)  personality to manifest itself. So its more than just a handle. It was a world in itself.

    This was the only place the persona had, and I realise that I’ve been trying to shield ‘manuscrypts’, but I got carried away. Let me explain. Its to do with what Ideasmith calls the personality of a blog. Thanks to the shielding, the blog has come to dictate what kind of posts appear here – the kind of humour, the kind of seriousness, its all getting stereotyped? Conformity within non conformity. But manuscrypts wasn’t supposed to be constrained. Where once I wrote stuff even if it sounded fun only to myself, these days, I think before I post. I wonder if the jokes sound stale, I wonder if the puns are too subtle. I wonder if I’m being funny enough. I obsess. I’m guarded. I measure.  I even wonder if i play to the gallery, yes, both of you. 🙂 And I’m not sure I like that.

    Meanwhile, six years is a long time, the world and the real personality have been at work too.  In the real world, we  now build personal brands online. 🙂 We don’t have to, but it helps. That partly explains the reason that I shifted the ‘work’ content to a different domain altogether. It was a significant step – a giving in to reality.  The real and the virtual moving towards each other. And while I could have kept the two domains thoroughly apart,  without the person connecting them, I didn’t see a point. Both are facets of my personality.

    And while that was happening, a life has also been evolving. New interests, old interests rekindled, new people, new experiences, new avenues to be explored, all of it to be done in reality. Many times, a post has come up here only thanks to self discipline. For something like blogging, i don’t know if that’s a good thing. There is a power struggle between my own evolution and the expectations I have set for myself on this blog. I think that is pretty dumb and pompous for a little blog. There, i make it all easy for you – you just have to agree. 🙂

    So I saw it coming, actually even before I wrote this. But sometimes, something becomes so much of a focal point, that you stop thinking about it objectively. For me, it was the blog/s. But these days, I wonder if you have as much fun here as you used to earlier. And I have to confess, it does make me feel inadequate, helpless, and strangely, old. Not old enough to quit blogging, but old enough to wonder whether churning out 5 posts a week (both domains included) was the best way, for everyone concerned. And that’s not including the microblogging. (self hosted, so you can comment)

    So erm, that was what all this was about. To tell you in the only rambling fashion I know, that I am going to reduce the frequency here,  maybe once a week, so that I free up a little more time for myself, to do things that I don’t want to postpone and regret later, to figure out things for myself, to let myself roam a bit, to see if i can reach a state which the persona and the person will be happy about, all without having to worry if the blog will be updated.

    And for those kind people have been reading manuscrypts from the time he was only a little handle, he  still lives, at least for now, and thinks there’s no page like home. 🙂

    until next time, handling it 🙂

  • Characteristics

    There are nearly seven billion people on this planet. Each one unique, different. What are the chances of that? And why? Is it simply biology, physiology that determines this diversity? A collection of thoughts, memories, experiences that carve out our own special place? Or is it something more than this? Perhaps there’s a master plan that drives the randomness of creation, something unknowable that dwells in the soul, and presents each one of us with a unique set of challenges, that will help us discover who we really are.

    We are all connected, joined together by an invisible thread, infinite in its potential and fragile in its design. Yet while connected, we are also merely individuals, empty vessels to be filled with infinite possibilities, an assortment of thoughts, beliefs, a collection of disjointed memories and experiences… Can I be me without these? Can you be you?

    And if this invisible thread that holds us together were to sever, to cease, what then? What would become of billions of lone, disconnected souls? Therein lies the great quest of our lives, to find, to connect, to hold on. For when our hearts are pure, and our thoughts in line, we are all truly one, capable of repairing our fragile world, and creating a universe of infinite possibilities.

    Thus spake Mohinder Suresh in”An Invisible Thread”, the season finale of ‘Heroes’.

    And as if on cue, a large number of conversations and experiences popped up as conversations inside my head. Yes, those nice voices in the head. 🙂

    I remembered the conversations that Mo and i keep having on the subject of identity, purpose, character and other stuff that she completely gets. Okay i get too, but muddled up. 🙂 I remembered how, when I was reading Archer’s ‘Sons of Fortune’..again, I suddenly figured out why he is my favourite author. In addition to that amazing gift of story telling he has got, its his characters, and their character. Good or bad, they seem to have a moral code. They are noble – noble heroes and noble villains. (remember that word, shall come back to it in a while) Even when they come in contact with their character’s grey areas, they have a rationale they can apply to the situation. They make you aspire for such clarity in thought and deed, in being true to themselves and their character.

    Meanwhile, I see around me, a lot of young people eager to emulate – even things that I hoped would question and better. And as i keep a watch on that, I sense that they do it to belong, at any cost. They are willing to take their lessons from second hand accounts – not accounts of mistakes, which could be argued as a good thing, but enriching experiences that would shape their character. Of course, not every young person I know is like that. I also come across quite a few who have more character and maturity than many people double their age. But I do see more of the first kind. It is a different kind of conforming than what i was have seen earlier – a  need to fit into their peer group’s collective terms.

    On twitter and Facebook and all the services which connect us, I see this set, and more coming in every day to add to their number. And in this collective consciousness, I glimpse the desperation in the need to belong at any cost – even  at the cost of a character that is still being formed. A shared identity and a strong character, can it co exist? I wonder, if in this age of possibilities, they will be satisfied with this belonging, I also hope that they will not wake up, one day, years later and rue this conformity that they created for themselves.

    And then, I remember what a smart young lady from that age group once told me “Manu, this is so archaic. Only you could use the word ‘noble’ in conversation”. So, I wonder whether there is something in this connectedness that I don’t understand, whether the ‘plan’ requires all kinds of characters – with or without a strong character, to maintain the balance,  or whether the kind of disconnectedness that I’m feeling now is one that characterises that thing we all do – ageing. 🙂

    until next time, time for adages?

  • The foreign object

    A search for a sticker – part of the memorabilia of a concert from about 4 years back – ended up taking me over a couple of decades back. I wonder if this is a coincidence – a lot of writing about memories these days, or am i consciously watching out for these trips so i can chronicle them?

    The sticker turned up many interesting things, some of which I knew existed, and some whose existence I had forgotten – my old carnatic music books, letters and cards from almost a decade back, an autograph of Nonie – a favourite VJ from a long time back, some of you oldies might remember her :p , a few old board games – Scrabble, Monopoly, stickers used to label video cassettes!! And journals 1.0 – the stuff i used to pen down regularly, fun to read the stuff from half a lifetime away – seems more like a lifetime!! Each of these have several stories around themselves, and then some that I perhaps have forgotten.

    It sits in the corner of a room in Bangalore housing these nostalgis triggers – a 25 year old massive veteran, not even Indian in origin – a Samsonite.

    It came from the US in 1985, when my dad came back after a year long trip. We became friends immediately – no, not my dad, that would take more time – because in it were Lego – the soldier set I had specifically asked for after seeing a catalog, the View-master – with Superman disks, little robots that turned into cars, chocolates, remote controlled cars – one with a  wire which was chucked only years later for a wirefree one, and assorted things that mean so much in childhood – pencils and rubbers (yes, we were innocent enough to call them that then) and fluorescent colored marker pens with the ‘Made in USA’ inscriptions, battery operated pencil sharpeners – all you had to do was dip the pencil and it came out sharpened. As Arthur C Clarke has rightly said, “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic”, and magic is anyway an acceptable commodity for seven year olds. The friendship came to an abrupt end, as soon as the above items were taken out.

    We then got separated – mostly thanks to the distances – at home, it was kept on the top of a large almirah. Several attempts were made to reconnect – primarily because it was suspected of housing more booty. These suspicions arose from the fact that a lot of ‘Made in USA’ gifts were given to self and others on special occasions long after Dad came back. But we were kept apart, scraped knees, beseeching innocent expressions and bruised ego notwithstanding.

    It took a decade for the ownership to be transferred, albeit without any words being exchanged. There were only a few remains of the treasure by then, and i wondered aloud who would be interested in such junk now!! I think it started coming down in the world from then on.

    It moved to the less homely, and usually less cleaner habitats – the engineering college hostels, and played host to everything from the T Scale and other engineering drawing set paraphernalia to my favourite sliced green chillies pickle that was stocked and used with bread to survive the toxic waste that was regularly served in the hostel canteen. College mates used to eye it lustily because it was also suspected of containing quite a few literary works that kids at that age read for erm, pleasure.

    Conditions seemed to be improving as it hopped on to a train and reached that paradise – Goa and spent two years there. However, its contents were nothing more interesting than sets of clothes, sometimes unwashed at that. To be noted that the lusty looks continued, as the literature was suspected to be growing in quantity and quality, and even to be technologically updated – floppy disks!!

    It might have been happy to be home, but that was to be only for a year, and it soon traveled with me to Bangalore. And that’s where I stare at it now, a proud, dignified brown giant of a travel case, with the scars and keepsakes of its old journeys – the ancient tag of its first flight, Lufthansa, the light discoloration that happened when it served as a dining table, the scratch marks courtesy Indian Railways, and inside, the books, the board games and the posters that I used to stick on the walls of my college room……

    I look at it and think absurdly how wonderful it would be if i could have  a conversation with it. It has seen how I have changed, and not changed. We could sit and laugh at the suspected literature and sigh wistfully at the loneliness of places away from home. We share memories. I realise that in many ways, it is like the room, but in many ways, its different – it has changed too, with me, as only a traveling companion in the journey of life can.

    until next time, traveling baggage, literally 🙂

  • Head Trips

    Sometime back, a friend and I were discussing Bollywood in general and then we somehow landed up on the subject of Aditya Pancholi. Oh, okay, if you’ve forgotten him already, refresh your memory with Wikipedia.  The last I heard of him was when he tried to give Kangana Ranaut a lift, the story was she didn’t want it. During the discussion, I was able to ‘regurgitate’ information about him, stuff I’m guessing few track, since she is also a Bollywood buff , but wasn’t able to recollect. No, don’t go away, this post is not about him.

    This is about the place that gave me different kinds of education at different stages of my life. A couple of years after I started going to school, I was also deemed responsible enough to go to the nearby barber shop and get myself a haircut. After a few months, it was noticed that the time I took was way longer than warranted. I tried to get away by saying that there was a crowd before me, but my mother had a sneaking suspicion that I was playing cricket for a while before I came home. I wasn’t lying, but she was close to being right too. The barber had realised that I could easily be persuaded to wait, while he dealt even with those who came after me, if he gave me the video games he had. The complete version of the truth was discovered after a few months, when a rather long gaming session caused quite a stir at home, and my gaming education lost its continuity.

    In later years, after my childhood faults were forgotten/forgiven and the time I spent outside wasn’t so strictly regulated, it was noticed that  my haircut trips had suddenly regained their lost long duration. Though I claimed I was spending time with guys i knew, my mother had a sneaking suspicion that I was with friends of the opposite gender. I wasn’t lying, but she was again, close. For these trips was also when I caught up with Sridevi, Juhi, Madhuri, Kimi, and later, Raveena, Karishma, Urmila, Manisha etc, in addition to Big B, Mithunda, Jackie Shroff , and later Govinda,  Anil Kapoor, Sanjay Dutt, Chunky Pandey etc –  Filmfare and Stardust were read from cover to cover diligently, and random bits of information about actors and actresses were stored. They were always surprised at home, when I expounded on actors’ and actresses’ lives and the gossip surrounding them, since we never got the magazines at home. Some of the Bollywood education has obviously been retained in the memory bank even after more than a decade.

    This magazine habit still continues, despite getting a daily fill thanks to newspapers, TV and the web, who consider Big B catching a cold breaking news. When we move to a new location, and I have to go to a new salon, I make sure that the place is well stacked with magazines. There are so many more sources, and so much more content these days, but reading the magazines is a way of being in touch – with the past.

    Meanwhile, my paternal genes attack me from the temples and my maternal genes attack me from the vertex. When it happens, I’ll miss the hair, and the heady education, the haircuts provide. 🙂

    until next time, fountainhead 🙂