Is it real?

Reflection of trees on a puddle of water - Markus Spiske on Unsplash

I write quite a lot of non-fiction. Stuff that’s based on people I meet, places I visit, personal experiences and opinions, and such. So often, I also use my own life incidents to fuel my fiction pieces.

After all, it’s easy to write a story calling upon your own emotions. There’s even a word for it in literature: ethos.

Not only do such pieces flow easily, but they’re also genuine and factual. They need minimal research—just a Wikipedia entry to cross-verify dates or an opinion blog to confirm that you’re indeed talking about what you think you’re talking about.

Except, there’s a problem with using too much ethos.

It’s a strange thought, but it hit me when I was in the bus one day. I found myself thinking about a topic to write about and realised I’ve written about almost everything that I ever thought mattered in my life. About moving to Australia, being an insecure teenager, exams and stress, growing up in India, and even about my absolute disregard for the useless education system I had the misfortune to follow.

I’ve written about my family’s challenges as well—about all the stories I grew up listening to when my mother didn’t know how else shut me up.

Now, it’s as if extracted so much from myself and incorporated into my writing that I’m short of life experiences to write about. It’s ironic too, because I still have a lot of time (hopefully!) to accumulate memories, thoughts, and opinions. There’s still so much of the world that I haven’t seen, and I want to. There’s so much left for me to do, and yet I can’t write about any of those until after I’ve done them all.

That’s the problem with using reality as a reference. You can also run out of reality.

Good challenge for imagination, though.

Image credit: Markus Spike on Unsplash.

Joy, unexpected

“Happy Wednesday!”

She called out to me, clicking her mobile phone off. We passed each other outside the shopping mall—I was going in, and she out. Her leggings, shirt, braid, and hat mostly comprised of pink—which often is an immediate turnoff for me. However, that bubblegum look did catch my eye, and she caught my eye for a quick second, enough to smile widely and wish me a great day.

Instinctively, my face broke into a wide smile, and I responded with an enthusiastic “You too!”

This was new to me. And as I turned back to face my path, the smile on my face was fixed, ecstatic for no good reason. Perhaps she sensed it, for “Pass it on!” she waved after me.

“I will!” I meant to say, but it came out as “Thanks!” instead.

Regardless of what I said, for the next few moments I felt elated, as if I’d won a competition and nothing could bring me down. All of a sudden, I wanted to yell at the couple and their two children walking ahead to have a great day. I didn’t, though, because a lot of folks I’ve seen in my neighbourhood aren’t too receptive to strangers addressing them.

That said, my good mood continued throughout the day. I remembered that woman and her flip phone, and imagined her wheeling her travelling bag down the street, cheering up many other people’s lives.

It was a small gesture, negligible some might say—a smile and a greeting. But it made such a difference to me. And it made me think.

It costs us nothing to be friendly, and yet so many of us walk the streets with impassive expressions, eyes cast down, afraid to look at the person walking past us. We meet new people and mechanically say “hello” and “how are you,” not even looking at them. As they speak, we nod but don’t listen. We converse and co-exist without knowing or understanding the other person.

Not everyone’s like this, I admit. However, I have come across a lot of such people. Enough to know that that’s what makes the lady in pink so special. She stood out from the masses—she was bold, and became an encounter I cherish.

It’s nice to be nice. It’s contagious.

What should poetry be?

Art, creativity, rhyme, rhythm, rule breaking?

Or perhaps… starving artists, writing blocks, free verse, and prose poetry.

When I think of poetry, I think of moments.

Instances and distances, captured in crisp clean words, sharp as a sword, slicing through inhibitions. Swerving around discomfort, sliding into its oil-smeared language sheath.

Poetry resounds.

Echoes through chambers, giving voice to gassed creatures, tongueless beings, tortured souls.

Poetry nurtures.

Comforts the pained, strained, and the maimed. Speaks to innermost feelings, gently, as lathering lotion on sun-scorched skins.

Poetry heals.

Remembers the forgotten, acknowledges slaps and punches that broke the bones. Respects with solemnity—a bandaid for moving on.

Poetry lives.

Smiles at similes, accidental puns, and misheard metaphors. Thrives in you and me, in sharing of friendship even in darkest of times.

Poetry loves.

Gives a piece of one to another, faithful, unfailing. Opens doors and arms to worlds only believers can imagine.

Poetry… is.

Over the weekend, I attended a poetry festival called Poetry on the Move. One of the panel discussions was what poetry is and what it should be. This is my response, inspired by many interesting thoughts. Some more of my musings from the festival: What’s the value of poetry? and Labels.

What’s the value of poetry?

Ah, that primal instinct to put a price tag on everything. As a product on painted, plastic shelves with curved edges that emit fringes of varnish smell from last year’s spring cleaning, and yet, not quite strong enough to mask the sweat of high-vis employees who’ve rested many a heavy heads and brushed uniformed shoulders against.

As if what doesn’t give material back doesn’t warrant time or effort. As though without return on investment—solid pieces of paper and clinking disks you can trade for something else, you shouldn’t bother at all. For what brings you only joy strips away precious time you can manage in other ways. Creeping seconds on a grandmother clock, hands inching from a number to another—time, that you can do more things with, other things. Time, that you can manage efficiently, effectively in order to make something of it, of yourself, of your time on this what’s left of this round, blue pool that’s melting away in its own time.

As if poetry is another supermarket commodity. As if you can valuate bliss.

Note: I was at a poetry festival, and the value of poetry was one of the panel discussions. This is my response, inspired by intriguing opinions.

Of sinks

One of the most important things to me in a home is having a big sink. When I say that to any of my friends in Canberra, I get rolling eyes and raised brows in return.

The reason: they can’t fathom why I’d want a bigger sink when the one in the kitchen is as wide as a trash bin.

As for my unaccustomed-to-the-first-world self, I can’t—for the life of me—comprehend how people live with tiny sinks in which you can’t even rinse a wok without whacking your elbows in the sides.

Over the last six months, I’ve seen many kitchens and sinks. When I learnt I’d be travelling for over a week, I moved out of the expensive place I was staying in. And so, for almost two months, I’ve been house hunting, walking all over the beautiful suburbs of Canberra, peering through overgrown bushes to find door numbers, lighting my way at night with my iPhone, desperately hoping the flashlight’s battery wouldn’t run out, and stopping every now and then during the day to gawk at and photograph early spring blossoms breaking away from their tree houses.

Every place I saw—from old, creaking, leaking buildings to new, renovated, refurbished townhouses—had small, impractical kitchen sinks.

When I mused about this phenomenon, one of friends pointed out people nowadays use dishwashers. (Don’t even get me started on the prices of dishwasher tablets.)

Oh, sure. But what about things that can’t go in a dishwasher—like an expensive bamboo chopping board?

Some of the older houses don’t even have a dishwasher, rendering the argument moot. It makes sense, too—the dishwasher is a modern, economically well-off person’s fancy house appliance. However, it still didn’t explain the economy in sink size.

When I lived in a fancy house, I never used the dishwasher once. It was useless to turn on the machine when I cooked (meal prepped) only for myself. It’d take me weeks of cooking to fill up the dishwasher.

Hand washing is easier and more sensible. If only the sink designers were as sensible as I.