Taking a step back

Hello to you.

It’s nice having you here. I can’t tell you enough how much your reading this matters to me.

This November, I decided to take on both NaNoWriMo and NaBloPoMo at once by rewriting one chapter of my two-year-old first draft of a novel.

7 days; 7 posts; 7 chapters later, I’d like to make take a pause and reflect.

What you think of my novel so far?

I’ve been getting a few views and a few likes on all of my chapters, so I’m assuming someone’s been reading them.

And I’d like it if you could share your honest opinions in the comments below. If you think I’m good — let me know. If you think I’m great– please let me know. If you perhaps think I’m so bad that I should stop writing altogether and go live under a rock, then by all means let me know that as well. I might not promise anything, but I’d appreciate your saying that.

Thanks all. Hope the rest of your weekend goes well.

History is Mere Gossip

Oh yes!

I revere History as a subject. That’s also why I hate that it’s become so subjective. No one knows what the truth is anymore, we’re all so engrossed in stories that interest us so much that we often forget that the words “story” and “history” don’t even belong in the same sentence.

It hurt so bad when I came across in my text book that Queen Elizabeth the second took the throne in 1963 when the very next page claimed that it was in 1953. Though that is more of a valuation of our education system than History, it still put a thorn on my head.

That’s when it all came crashing down. We don’t care what happened all those years ago, we only care for what’s more sensational. The more interesting story goes into school books — to become history. The more interesting a story, the more it’s spoken about. And we all know the more we talk of something — especially in schools — the more the chances are of it becoming a fact.

It’s quite sad that people are so used to telling and retelling facts as stories. Besides, how much of a difference would it make if the Queen wore a tiara instead of a crown; the tiara is the fancier word isn’t it?

What starts with a tiara grows on to elephant rides becoming horse rides, corn becoming cotton, and eventually Pakistan becoming India. It’s just a matter of time.

Is it the human craving for adrenaline that makes us morph the truth — or what’s commonly accepted as the truth — into something a bit more… racy?

What’s wrong with calling an execution an execution? Must we make it a chase and kill?

It’s all subjective; we’re are so used to talking about heroics and racing cars that we like to incorporate them in our narratives. The sad part of it all: we do it instinctively, we do it without care, we are so offhanded that in a way, we kill the essence of our History.

Sometimes, we just have to accept our forefathers for what they were — cowards. Sometimes we have to live with knowing they lived bad lives, and that they had priorities we deem unworthy. Because only when we accept history for what it is, can we learn and not duplicate the very lifestyles we mask with gossip.

Happy Place?

Well, Daily Post has asked a question that’s both tough and simple at the same time.

My happy place? There’s no one place. I’m happy any time, every time.

But I’m most happy when I’m nowhere.

Happy is go. Happy is getting lost, and enjoying it.

It Doesn’t Matter

Because in the end, nothing matters.

Feels awkward, to start the day with a thought like that. But it’s a bitter fact. Nothing matters. In the end. Not the people we choose to hold hands in church with, not the kind of soup we pick at the supermarket, or the lifestyle that we adopt.

But, sad enough, it all matters. Now.

And like it or not, we live in the now. We think ahead — humans are weird that way — and save for the future. Save money, save the journeys we’d like to make, save everything. We save ourselves now, hoping to take up life later on— in future.

But in the end, nothing matters. In future, once I’m dead and gone, it doesn’t matter that I had once smoked pot in school. But oh, it matters so much when I’m in school.

But, which matters to us more; the future, or this moment?

Sometimes, even thinking about it is meaningless. Because it won’t matter to me at the end of this post. But mid-way, it matters a lot. Not only because it’s giving me something to ramble about, but also because my decision now affects the course of my life.

This moment matters to me. The small choices matter. Like choosing to read alone, instead of throwing myself into a crowd of college kids drunk on their parents’ money. I know it won’t matter later. That’s why it matters now. Because it’s trivial. And short-lived. Because I’ll never get to make these choices again. I hold on to the things that matter to me now, because when I get to a point when nothing would matter anymore, I would remember these little choices.

Because, after all, even the death bed is just a moment. And then, it would be the now.

The Big Bang Theory. Before and After Star Trek

Narmadhaa’s log. Stardate: I don’t know when.

It’s funny how after you watch and re-watch a television series you still can’t figure why you don’t understand it completely. Happened with The Big Bang Theory.

I had watched (over and over) the series up to season 8 long before I decided to watch the Star Trek movies.

And now, after watching the movies and starting on the Star Trek original series, I’m looking at The Big Bang Theory in a whole new light. Or to be more specific, I’m seeing my favourite character, Sheldon in a new light.

There’s nothing unlovable about Sheldon. His oddities, his ignorance and his persistent denial of ignorance — everything that makes him the most attractive character on the show. Sometimes I agree so much with the way Amy speaks of him that even I don’t understand why the other characters tend to make fun of him.

But after Star Trek, I’m not sure whether I’m attracted to Sheldon. Or Spock. There I said it.

When I first watched The Big Bang Theory, I was amazed at Sheldon’s behaviour. Him not being able to understand sarcasm, his obsession for cleanliness, his un-understandable lust for logic and his complete ignorance of emotions. Try to hug him and he’ll look at you as if you’re crazy. Because you can only try. Say something (anything) and he’ll look at you as if you’re a babbling monkey. So annoying, so intimidating, so inhuman. Yet so humane.

I loved everything about Sheldon Cooper, the awkward genius.

And then I realized that Sheldon was a caricature of the one person he adored: Mr. Spock.

So now I’m torn. Do I love the original, or the caricature, which I saw first?

Or still, is it Jim Parsons who’s given new life to two great fictional characters?

This needs some logical reasoning, and I’m incapable of it.

Long live and prosper.

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