A little, big thing

Why am I writing this, writing here? That’s the question I’ve asked the umpteen times I’ve tried blogging and haven’t. Each time I haven’t been certain of the answer and so haven’t bothered to write. I’ve sat and played game after game of online monopoly (pogo.com), tried the same campaign on Age of Empires at various difficulty levels, surfed through various websites…Done everything but blog.

Either I’ve not known why I want to write – not what, never what – or someone else has said it better than I would, could. There’s no dearth of opinions, I’ve always had them by the truckloads, there’s just a sense of… Can’t-be-bothered.

There’s so much that’s happened. It made the last year go by so fast, it seems I went straight from 2008 to 2010. Perhaps my not wanting to write was a way of dealing with so many new things, adjustments, changes. Perhaps.

So many remember-it-lifelong events, moments. So many that at times you (and I) forgot them in an instant unless it had a Facebook album dedicated to it.

The desperation of unemployment. While living an all-paid-for life. The consequent, complete loss of identity, or feeling thereof. It’s not money if it’s not my money, joint account be damned.

The jealousy (and anger) I felt…towards my own Partner because he was doing so well while I languished in self pity. You are someone and I am that someone’s girlfriend. The intense guilt because some times I really wished it was the other way round. And because I was never denied anything.

The acute realisation that I have different coloured skin. And that it’s supposed to be inferior. Not because anyone has been racist towards me. But because the media said they could be. Or that I am supposed to have a “new found sense of superiority”. A polite way of saying “Indians are getting cocky”. Apparently I belong to the “rising Indian middle class” with more “spending power”. I swear I didn’t notice.

A year – well couple of months at least – of travelling, where “travelling” did not mean an 18-hour train journey to see the parents or a road trip to Manali. International travel dudes, spending power and all that. (But it’s not your money said that thought at the back of my head, sometimes at the front of my head too).

The realisation people more qualified than me are walking around jobless. Like the Masters in Accounts waitress at the local restaurant… and feeling guilty that I got a job at one of the community newspapers. It’s a casual position – I have a job if someone resigns or goes on leave – it could go any day. Community reporting, it’s something I did when I started out as a journalist. BUT, it beats making sandwiches and cleaning tables any day. So I lied when she recently asked if I had a job.

It was a year of scoring really well in my Masters final semester. Being “awarded” (it was a book) by this high flying, resident-author-at-uni…and wondering if I deserved it or if it was international student appeasement. Of getting really good feedback from two well-respected industry sources on my novel draft… and wondering if it was because I was selling a West-accepted image of India.

Umm, what is the India-accepted image of India?

Then of course was the grand finale: Finding out that I am pregnant. And realising that I really didn’t ¬– and don’t – have an answer to, “Are you ready for it?” I don’t know, but I know I am having a baby. I know am excited. I know I am bloody petrified.

And I know that no matter how much I am paid, I don't think I can pose nude when pregnant. Nope.

PS: Will this blog now become a "mommy" blog. I don't know. Is it allowed?

Oook.

Groan. Moan. Gah.

I have had two job rejections in the last two days. One from a bookstore saying they don't have any vacancies and if I'd like to be in their looking-for-opening list for the next 3 months. I am back on the list. Again.

The second was from a media house saying they couldn't hire me because I need to be a permanent resident. Sigh.

If that wasn't bad enough, the latest -- book 37 -- in Terry Pratchett's Discworld series is out. And it's bloody AUD 49.50!!!! :(

And I've just spent AUD 400 -- again -- on bras and such. I need a job. I can cook. I need that book. Please.

Sizzling hot. Oof!

Scorching. Sweltering. Sizzling. Stifling.

That's exactly what the weather report here reads like for this week. Yesterday was my first experience of the heat of the Australian summer. Despite it being only 41 degrees -- I am from India, seen much worse, ahem -- the sun seems to sear through the skin. I could feel my scalp burning and my skin turning from the hue of milk chocolate to dark cooking chocolate in a mere five minutes. In Delhi, the heat radiates off everything... in Melbourne it does not radiate because everything starts melting way before that.

In 2008, I had pretty much managed to skip the Delhi summer. April-May 2008 had seen Partner and me travelling to the beautiful Leh-Ladakh (-->) and then to Kuala Lumpur for Partner's (<--) cousin's a wedding with a short, five-day stint in Melbourne. While KL had been pleasant, Melbourne had its winter then. Subsequently, once we moved here in July 2008, I had altogether managed to skip the Delhi summer. The last year also saw Melbourne having a freak summer where instead of it warming up in December, most of that month and January fluctuated between pleasant and wearing sweaters ('jumpers' here). Now apparently the state of Victoria is suffering a heat wave, the likes of which haven't been since 1908. At least 20 localities lost power supply, newspapers suggested that people without airconditioners move to shopping malls (er, with sleeping bags?!) and people walking on the roads seemed to be steaming, me included.

Funny that power cuts, heat waves, no water and no airconditioner was pretty much the way of life for me for a long while.

In June 2002, after three months of sleeping under the office table at the India Today Group Online office -- didn't have a house and was young and fool-hardy enough to think I could live like a nomad -- I had rented a one room hole in Lajpat Nagar. This hole was bang in the centre of Gupta Market, best known for salwar-kameez materials and mannequins. At night when I'd come back from work, the streets would be deserted. The only inhabitants were stray dogs hiding under cars and behind dustbins and hundreds and hundreds of naked mannequins -- stripped off their glittering finery for the night -- lining up the street that housed my hole. It was one of the most bizarre experiences. I would return from covering a fashion show or some party to be greeted by naked plastic men and women, staring dead ahead, oblivious of me or the dogs.

The hole was on the first floor. To get up to it you had to cross huge mounds of plastic wrapping, discarded cloth strips from the many local tailoring shops, dog poo hidden like land mines amongst the piles and paan (betel leaves) stains on every bit of vacant wall that wasn't already covered with posters of paan-chewing local politicians. Sometimes the paan was spat out on the politicians' faces, it really didn't make a difference though. Their sinister smiles and hollow promises seemed to overpower even the stains...

Adjacent to my hole were seven other holes, three on each side. Each of those holes had families of at least six living inside. All holes were basically one room. I didn't have anything other than a rucksack with my clothes, a Rs 300 moulding mattress and Papa's old Philips tape recorder. At any given time, you could hear at least three different channels from the neighbouring holes. It usually meant listening to a medley of Sa Re Ga Ma ( the antakshari show, Anu Kapoor used to anchor it back then), Hindi news channel with cheap ads Aaj Tak (remember PP Jewellers?) and some obscure soap opera at the same time. The only other sounds were those of husbands shouting for food, babies crying and old people coughing.

And I would lie there in the sweltering heat with only a ceiling fan. Rather a tired ceiling fan that was bored of circulating the stifling, non-existent breeze and refused to move at anything faster than the speed of 1. I earned a mere Rs 8000 then (without taxes) and was paying Rs 3,500 for rent. Before going to bed, I'd pour two mugs of water on me -- a borrowed bucket of water, there was none in the taps, landlord said it wasn't part of the deal -- and then lie under the tired fan. I could only sleep till my sweat-mingled-with-water dried off.

I didn't cook back then... had only saucepan and a plate and no money for anything else. Also the fact that the 'terrace' had bats hanging from the awning and the kitchen was on the terrace wasn't much encouragement. There was a charpai/ charpoy (literally 'four legs', a basic cot with criss-crossing hemp ropes) that I used as a walk-in almirah. Hah, it rested on its sides and my clothes hung on it... I was buying drinking water and the kitchen was full of empty bottles. When Ma came visiting and opened the kitchen door, 250 empty bottles of water had tumbled out. Ma had just sat down and started crying. I had still refused monetary help. The stupid resilience and even stupider pride of being 21-years-old...

Then and now. Friends had laughed at me when I had marvelled at the amazing shower heads in the Kuala Lumpur hotel room. But kya kare, I was amazed. (smiles) Either I am getting soft now or I'm getting old because I have borne much worse, without any or much lesser complaint.

Now I wonder if the basics of life -- considered a right here, how different from Delhi -- available at the push of a button provide enough impetus to start all over again. I have uprooted myself, but will I be able to re-establish myself?

Back in India, holiday withdrawal

Thank god that Delhi has rains, though was much surprised as we flew into the capital on Tuesday night to find clouds hovering and lightning outside. While we had been telling all and sundry that Delhi was boiling at 42 degrees -- the temperature when we left for Malaysia-Melbourne on May 8th and given that Malaysia was not more than 28 degrees while Melbourne was 10 degrees -- it was quite a pleasant change to find Delhi much, much cooler. And to think that Victoria, Melbourne almost has it's third consecutive year of drought (it rained a bit, but nothing like what we get here). Now it's been two days since I've been back and it's taking me some time to get used to. NOT because of any time difference or such but just because I STILL want to holiday... So am moping.

<--- first look at the Himalayas from the plane
Till as such time as I get the Delhi-Malaysia-Melbourne-St Arnaud posts ready, you guys have a look at the rest of the pics from Leh. For those who didn't know or missed, was in Leh-Ladakh for the weekend of April 18-21, 2008. For those who look at the picture and think they want to get to Leh, PLEASE DO SO. The tickets are bloody cheap as we paid Rs 12,000 return for two people and without any prior booking. We flew Jet Airways and came back on Deccan.

<--- Atop the Leh Palace, even today, most constructions are made of sun-dried, mud bricks

Since we were there for the last of the off-season weekends, we got a discount on the hotel room. We paid Rs 1,990 a night for the hotel room and stayed at Omasila Hotel, one of the best in Leh and apparently the one where Brad Pitt stayed during the shooting of Seven Years in Tibet. Amitabh Bachchan has also stayed there and well, now there's me on the list. Bwahahaha.

For those who might decide to stay at Omasila, be sure to ask for the ground floor rooms as those are centrally heated and the upper floors are not. The hotel however has these LPG heaters and you should ask for one if you plan your trip in the colder season. In the tourist season -- which is now to about end October -- accommodation is available starting from Rs 500.

Food is not an issue as there are restaurants and smaller hotels that sell everything from croissants, dal-roti to thukpa and manchurian. However, in the season when it snows, you might not get meat and chicken products -- as was the case with us for a day -- because land slides and snowing might block the road ways.

<-- Etched on stones by the lamas, these messages are either prayers or directions

The most money we spent in Leh was on transport. You can hire a jeep, Innova, Sumo or Qualis, or two wheels are more your style, you can hire an Enfield. However, from the view of fuel consumption and comfort, go for a four-wheeler.

The best way to go around Leh and to chalk out what you want to see would be either a good guide book or asking someone at your hotel. However, it would be better still to ask someone who's been there. Like another day and we would have managed to see the Nubra Valley too, which we missed out.

\

<--- shot at the Hemis monastery

We visited: The monasteries of Shey, Thiksay, Hemis and Alchi; walked up to the Leh Palace that's in the city, drove up to Pangogtso Lake, which is in a valley after you cross the second-highest motorable pass in the world. Don't be fooled by the monasteries, i.e. don't think that if you have seen one, you've seen all because pretty much all the monasteries have something unique to offer.

One of the smaller monasteries located right below the Leh Palace--->

If you can catch a prayer session, it would be great -- more monks (lamas), the merrier -- it's a simple ceremony but the drums, incense and chanting have a way of entrancing you. Shoes are not allowed inside the monastery, so it's a good idea not to wear footwear with intricate laces etc. While a head-covering is not required, hot pants, backless tops etc are not appreciated. If you're wearing those -- can get warm in the sun during summers -- it's advisable to carry a shawl you can cover up with.

And yes, please carry extra camera battery, an extra storage card (or laptop), don't forget the camera transfer cable, lenses AND the camera charger. It would be absolutely criminal to go there and NOT take pictures or forget some vital camera part at home.

Pangongtso lake, frozen-->

Camera apart, aclimatisation is very important: With far less amounts of oxygen up there, it would be silly to run around without proper rest, particularly if you are flying up. Usually, bedrest is not needed for those who drive up. We crashed out for 6 hours before venturing out.

Confluence of the Indus and Zanskar rivers --->

Have heard horror stories about army officers' wives who go to Leh to shop -- known for cultured pearls -- dont take adequate bed rest and drop dead in two hours due to pulmonary edema (lungs flood with fluid). So for those who decide to fly up there, please take rest. You really can't enjoy the place if dead. And again, DO give Leh a visit. "Starkly beautiful" will make perfect sense...

Quick note from Melbourne

Pic = St Arnaud, town hall

Hello Everyone,
Apologies for the silence, have been travelling and while I've taken copious notes, haven't really had the opportunity to sit down and put out a post. This is being written from Melbourne, Australia while Partner has gone down to meet his new office people. It was a better idea sitting out here and typing than entering every second store with a sale on and blowing money. Sigh, I can be SUCH a woman at times.

For those who know and those who don't, this is my virgin foray outside India and while I am superstitious about discussing plans before there is a finality to them, I can perhaps say that this won't definitely be the only one. Unless I cop it or something. It's like I've tasted blood. It's like I am craving for more. It's like suddenly, literally, 'clichedly', the entire world is open to me. Of course THAT would require shit loads of money and I don't have any... BUT. I will have money. I need to have money. Money makes the world go round. It can't buy you love - perhaps - but it can bloody well ensure you get to travel a lot.

My first trip outside India included a 4-day stay in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia and then another 5 days in Australia. Am gonna be here in Melbourne till May 13th and then drive down to a farm in this village called St. Arnaud (Partner's home town). We were in KL for Partner's cousin's wedding -- an Aussie bloke marrying a very beautiful Malaysian-Indian girl -- and it was super. I have been bloody lucky and both God and Partner have been kind. While perhaps a non-moneyed person's first trip usually involves back-packing and the lot, I'm getting to holiday in luxury. We stayed at a five-star in KL - called Renaissance, faces the Two Towers -- then moved to this resort (called Cyberview) in KL's cyber city (called Cyberjaya), which was opulence all the way. In Melbourne we are staying at Partner's aunt's place and will move to his parents' place in the weekend.

I've never been one to run after money and have been happy earning just about enough that keeps me going. HOWEVER, I am beginning to realise that wanting money does not always have to equate with greed. Money opens doors, money provides a comfortable holiday, hell money makes a holiday possible, money lets you take a break and money lets you buy gifts for your family back home. I've neither been greedy nor materialistic... But my perspective on money is changing. For one, I am beginning to admire it more. I don't necessarily believe in getting it by whatever means, but yes, I am going to lose my hitherto live-on-what-you-have attitude and strive to earn it, earnestly. I've always wanted to do and achieve a whole lot of things -- both for me and those around -- and perhaps money will be the way to get those done.... Hmm, interesting development the way I see it. Let's see where it takes me.

As I said earlier in the post, have taken copious notes and will write those down as posts. Till then, let me get out of here -- my sense of dollar conversion to rupee sucks and I NEED to understand that 5 AUD and Rs 5 DON'T mean the same thing since am still earning in Rupees -- so before I blow the change in my pocket here.... More later!!!
PS: I LOVE Melbourne. No one stares, NO one.

Why ugly men get to shag pretty women...

Has anyone noticed how weddings and common cold are similar? Both are contagious and seem to be affected by weather change. Nothing else explains how suddenly most people one knows are either sniffling or sending out wedding invites. Perhaps it's the biological clock.

The first announcement was sitting in my inbox with the subject line jubilantly declaring, “I am getting married people!” A week back the same friend was single and mingling. Before one could react to that news, another friend called and declared she had a marriage proposal and was “seriously thinking” about it. Again, in a week from having no suitors she was suddenly thinking matrimony.

In the course of describing how their sudden decision to tie the knot had come about, both friends declared, “I am very happy. But the guy is not very good looking,” and then somewhat defensively, “but he’s a sweetheart.” Congratulations later and having seen their to-be spouse’s pictures, one realized that both girls – despite being downright stunning to look at – were marrying men who were rather plain. It reminded one of an old adage, “Langoor ke moonh mein angoor.” (not literal, but hints at the monkey eating the caviar!)

Now a recent study by Columbia University suggested that good-looking people prefer to date equally good-looking people, at times even people who are better looking than themselves. Yet here were two of my very good-looking friends settling for rather plain men.
It’s not just my friends either. Many celeb couples too seem to follow the norm of pretty-woman-average-bloke: Ajay Devgan-Kajol, Azharuddin-Sangeeta Bijlani, Priyanka Gandhi-Robert Vadra, SRK-Gauri Khan (he wasn’t a superstar then!), Juhi Chawla-Jai Mehta, or for that matter Dennis Rodman-Madonna (those two would have hideous kids)… Since these were all love marriages one could perhaps say love perhaps is blind. Both my friends however are going in for arranged marriages and love is nowhere in the picture.

Jog your memories dear readers and tell me, how many times have you heard someone comment, “She is not pretty at all, how did she manage such a hot husband?” Or the other way round, “Look at him, he’s not good looking at all, how did he get himself such a beautiful wife?”
Several conversations and some research later one found that indeed the popularly held belief was: Ugly (or not-so-good-looking) men bag the prettiest girls. But is it really true?

Before you read further, tell me what you think:
1. How important are looks when it comes to finding a suitable partner?
2. Do good-looking people have better chances of finding love or a spouse?
3. ‘Plain’ people have good-looking partners: Myth or reality?
read further: What's he got that I ain't got?

Fairy Tale aka What I Want List

Performance anxiety and the Fairy Tale

“Just watch that it doesn’t thus happen that you are left without anything.”
“So what is it that you want? Do you know exactly what you want?”
“What the fuck is your Fairy Tale?”
“The one I am looking for, she’s not here in this city. Yahan nahi milegi.”
“I think you are looking for Mr Perfect. Why don’t you stop thinking for once and just go and have a good time?”

So, what do we want? What do I want? What is the fucking Fairy Tale, and let’s not call it a ‘fairy tale’ because then, it becomes fiction. Funny, that subconsciously, a fairy tale it is that I have called Him/ It/ Us/ Whatever. It cannot also be a fairy tale because I am 28. You are a clinically delusional idiot if you believe in fairy tales at 28. And since am neither clinical nor an idiot, this is not a fairy tale. By now, my mom had a four-year-old and would conceive another in six months… And me? Hah-ha, let’s not even go there. I used to have a recurring dream – not too sure whether it was a bona fide ‘dream’ or a vision of wishful-thinking – this picture of me and my, well, daughter, driving down the curves of Kalimpong in an open car. Dangris, cap, music, laugher, talking and the two of us going for a drive, little freezer with chocolates, laptop, books, stopping and clicking pictures and I will take her through all the places I really enjoyed. Big eyes, long hair, killer smile. Now I look at that ‘dream’ and think that it was very clichéd. I am also smoking a doobie in the dream, but I am not too sure if that’s advisable around a kid of four. And she’d have her own small camera and can join every fucking hobby class she wants to and we shall see about the marks. But anyway. It’s June 21st, five days away from June 26th. A year. A simple thing as a decision can be the difference between dreams and reality and cowardice and having the balls to carry your own dream through. Now, the dream’s barren. Now I can’t handle children, particularly babies. I can’t breathe around infants and there’s an intense sense of being choked.

So, the fairy tale. Ah, the What I Want list… I want to laugh a lot, clap my hands, wink, throw my head back and let out laughter from deep within me. Since childhood my laughter has well, sort of been heard above all. I am small in size, but you don’t know the laugh that can come out of me. So whenever I had to accompany my parents to official parties, I was warned at home: “You will control your laughter.” I don’t blame my parents. An Army major’s daughter laughing “like a rickshaw wala” as my dad said it, was indeed improper behavior. I have never been able to laugh ‘like a girl’. It’s definitely not a laughter anyone will write poetry to. And then my laughter has been called the Pirate Laugh by a love interest in adult life, which was quite damaging to the self esteem etc. He also called it ugly. To be honest, on clicking myself laughing I have realized that perhaps my smile doesn’t even look perfect, can’t help it though, it’s 100 per cent natural! And I didn’t start thinking about HOW my smile looked till that comment. I had learnt how to moderate the volume since childhood though.

If I start explaining each “want” -- like above -- it’s going to get very boring writing it. I really want to travel, within my country, outside. I want to stop looking for motives each time someone is being nice to me. I want someone(s) to be nice to me without any motive. I want to create and grow and build and collaborate and develop… I want to make friends. I want to have friends! And no, given the platform where I am writing, that does not mean friend requests. I don’t want my parents to take any more loans…because I am there. I want to be sure of my health. I want to understand taxation, shares, bonds, whatever, etc so that I can save money and make it ‘grow’. I want to stop feeling hollow. I want to care for someone, look after someone, cook for someone, have people depend on me, want me around, worry about me being around… I want my family. It’s not about independence, feminism, etc. I want my family, even if it has a dysfunctional before it. A family to do things with, share things with, talk to… Yes, it does mean a man, but I don’t want to talk about that yet. And sorry to disappoint those who were expecting to read “I want to attain nirvana.” I don’t know it, my nirvana won’t help my parents or anyone else. I am sorry I am not very spiritually bright or intellectually inclined etc, but that’s the way it is. I want to do good work, different work, be able to LIVE my ideas, because what’s the point of having ideas if you cannot do something with them. I want people to stop coming in my way (wishful). I want to utilize my time better. I want to eat better. I sincerely don’t want anything to happen to anyone I love. I don’t want to be fired

I want to be held close my a pair of strong arms that engulf me, and he stands straight and has beautiful eyes (I always respond to men to have a confident body language, alpha to alpha), has to be able to handle attention, both that comes to him and to me, we should be able to talk without boring either, or keep silent without either wondering, be possessive yet not the clinger type, should be able to keep me on my toes, should not be embarrassed by the fact that I can be confrontational, should have the spine and the balls to stand by me, should not be a bitch, should love his body, educated abuse is fine… more than anything else, someone who can prevent me getting bored..

And once he wraps his arms around me, he kisses me and when I get a little, erm, squirmy, he leaves me gently, smiles and goes to the loo, he knows he cant give in to my whims each time or I will wrap him around my li’l finger. But then, when hurt, I follow him into the room and try and kiss him, he does kiss me back…else he knows I would brood over why-didn’t-he-want-to-kiss-me for hours. Then he would demand coffee and shove me out and while I make the coffee would come into the kitchen to make the sandwiches. We’d chill together for a while, perhaps make out. Then he’d go watch the F1 followed by an X-box night with the guys… where some of the guys will get some girls – someone’s girlfriend and friends – and he would flirt with one of them or all. And I would go out to a party where I am meeting my friends… who’d have some interesting guy friends, and I’d flirt with one of them or all. And we’d come back home, sloshed, make out, sleep. In our respective rooms if we want to. Go to work, crack respective projects, plan the vacation…together, separately, who knows. Etc. I want to KNOW what love is and not doubt it. I want to believe that perhaps, some men don't cheat on their women. And I want to trust.

Hmmmm. Too many things. Hmm. All the above things are there in me, but then, I am thinking from ‘my’ point of view. Maybe men don’t hold those things dear?
PS: 'He' is not nice, but he is not nasty with me. I dont like good boys. I am not a good girl either, but am I bad to you?

Two years down memory's blind lane

(End of year 2004…this is what I was writing. Did I find it… Life?)
The little things that make life.
The early morning alarm on your cellphone that you can so easily avoid by forgetting to keep the phone next to you. Feeding the fish, which refuses to recognise you no matter how many times you say "here, fishy fishy fishy". The maid who comes in late despite daily screamings and daily apologies. And then there is office.

Leaves me quite bewildered at times -- where do I figure?

Am I the homemaker who has to keep everything in working order -- I fail desperately at keeping the rooms clean, no matter how hard I try, whenever anyone comes home, the standard line, a remnant of my wild-er child days, is still , "Sorry the room's in a mess."

Or the professional who has her work filed neatly into separate folders and can rattle ideas and stories and numbers without a moment's notice? The state of the desk does not hamper efficiency at work (or at home).

There are days when after a hard day's work at office, a hard evening's work at home — I either don’t want to go to work or don’t want to come back home and work. And that’s when I wonder if life was not much better when our mothers and aunts were considered extremely efficient if they had given birth to a couple of kids and brought them up well.

And then there are the (supposed?) big things in life.

The ambition. Do I regret it? Wanting to be a home maker and a good worker at the same time? Not one bit, just that it can be tiring at times. I want to run a smooth house and I want to be darned good at my work. I want that spotlight to be on me, I want to earn it. I want people to say that my brownies are the gooiest they have ever had and I want people to know that my work cannot be duplicated. I want it all.

I hunger for my place in the sun. I have nothing against those who just want to lead a decent life and be happy. But I want to lead a decent life, be happy, get famous, go places, be someone. I am very aware that without winning any award too, all of us have our designated niches in life.... but hell, I want to carve my niche... in stone.....

Why am I rambling about niche and a place under the spotlight? Because now I have been given the opportunity... and it is scaring me. What if I cannot? Will this opportunity — like my attempts at keeping a "neat" living room -- be a failure? Hell, my living room is messy because i like a place to look "lived in" (my favourite reasoning). But this is the Big O. I NEED it. I WANT it. I will GET it. Someone close says she can’t understand me at times — how I can love pottering away with my plants and burn with a desire to be someone at the same time. "How do you manage to think of owning the world when you are romping in your dangris?"

Because that is just me. Perhaps it is unreal to want it all. Sometimes it scares me too (like now) --- will I be on my deathbed and think, oh but I could have done that? Or will it be the other way round -- "I wish I had not wanted it all and concentrated on one small thing." But then who says you cant do it all -- or almost all? And who decides what is the small thing or the big thing in life? I want life!