Carpe diem

“Today is the day the comes only once in four years”, read the Facebook status updates of so many of my friends. “Do something special today.”

One attempted to run 29 kilometers, and was disappointed at having to give up after 20. Another cooked an elaborate three course lunch, which did not come out the way it was meant to.

Me? I chose to keep it as just another day, with normal pleasures. Swimming in an empty pool, making a fruit-salad with the kids, seeing how far paper planes can go.

 Carpe diem. Seize the day, but do it everyday.

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A drabble is a story told in exactly 100 words.

Missing the real story

It was the old-fashioned porch that caught my eye. The rosewood blinds, the wrought-iron latticework, the window panes in primary colours. The house, unlike many others in the locality, looked in good repair- clearly the family hadn’t yet fallen into bad days.

‘Saba Heritage’, I mused. The name sounds Persian, but the locality has been almost entirely Catholic for generations. Why would a well-to-do Islamic family have settled there?

It was only when I looked at the picture at home that I noticed the coffin popped up against the wall. How many other big stories do we end up missing?
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A drabble is a story told in exactly 100 words.

The most difficult job

My first grader got into a fight with one of his classmates.  They called each other names, threatened to hit each other, and finally my son threw the other child’s water-bottle out the window. After patiently hearing him out, I started telling him how he shouldn’t resort to violence, when he interrupted.

“But what about Anita”, he said, naming a fifth grader.

“What about her?”

“She scolded me and threw out my water-bottle. First scold her.”

He did have a point, but I was powerless to do anything.

Is there any job more difficult than that of being a parent?

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A drabble is a story told in exactly 100 words.

Confusing operations

Yes, division is repeated subtraction, and multiplication repeated addition. If you add five to five, five times, you get the same answer as if you multiply five by five. I know it, as would anybody who has been adding, subtracting, multiplying and dividing as long as I have. But is it absolutely necessary to confuse my eight-year old by teaching him so?

Yes, in principle, I agree the idea of teaching kids different ways of performing the mathematical operations and letting them choose the one that works best for them. But after they do learn, can’t they be left alone?

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A drabble is a story told in exactly 100 words.

Glad to be me

At my sons’ school the other day, I ran into this perfectly gorgeous woman. Gorgeous as in drop-dead gorgeous. The kind of gorgeous that comes only with physical perfection.

With nothing else to do, I stole covert glances at her. And started noticing the details- the carefully applied make-up, the deliberately mismatched but frightfully expensive clothes, the way she kept smoothening her perfect hair. Was all that really necessary for a routine visit to school?

With a start, I realised, she’d never once smiled; didn’t seem to know how to. She is gorgeous, but I am glad to be me.

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A drabble is a story told in exactly 100 words.

Once you let go

Many months back, I had been hurt badly by someone I considered a friend. She was not willing to admit she was wrong. “Forgive them for they know not what they do”, I said, and moved on. Life is too short to carry negativity with you.

Two days back, she called me. Tried to justify what she had done. Wanted a reconciliation. But I didn’t even want to revisit the past. Found I no longer cared. I had forgotten what had happened and remembered only the good parts of our friendship.

Life is so much easier once you let go.

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A drabble is a story told in exactly 100 words.

Doesn't seem to have done much for her

On a cold, winter morning, long before dawn-break, she was huddled on a park bench. Matted hair, clothes that had seen better days, filthy toe nails. Destitute, and seemingly not in possession of her mental faculties, it was obvious the streets were her home.


One would have expected her to be staring vacantly into space- watching the world through unseeing eyes. Instead, she was hunched over a book, pen in hand, writing something in a neat, if childish hand.

Literate, and interested in words- a rarity in this country. But it doesn’t seem to have done too much for her.

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A drabble is a story told in exactly 100 words.

Our One True Love

Know what day today is?

It’s International Book Giving Day.

While the rest of the world celebrates Valentine’s Day with candies, chocolates and roses, it is not much more meaningful to use the day to introduce people to our One True Love- the Love of Books and Reading.

You can gift a book or two to a loved one, donate used books to people who do not have any of their own, or simply leave a few books in a waiting room where there is nothing else to keep people occupied.

Single or attached. Young or old. Everyone loves Books!
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If you can't physically go out and hand over a book, you can also make an online donation to provide a book to a child in remote villages in the highlands of Gautamala.

Who says kids no longer read?

“It is refreshing to see today’s kids reading”, exclaimed a retired schoolteacher when she saw my eight year old engrossed in a book.

I found nothing strange about it- my son reads, his entire class reads, and even my younger son struggles to make sense of Tintin comics despite not being able to read most of the words. In fact, despite the “kids don’t read anymore” myth being perpetuated, I think many kids read much more than their parents do.

Sure, kids have their video games, and their TV serials. But reading is in no immediate danger of becoming extinct.

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A drabble is a story told in exactly 100 words.

Shouldn't books be read???

The other day, someone was holding forth on a recent bestseller, and his views were so opposed to mine that I chose to interject. Soon, however, it became apparent that the parts that I reacted to most strongly, didn’t seem to have registered with him. A little bit of prodding, and the person was forced to admit that all he had actually downloaded and read was the synopsis and a review of the book.

I can never understand what drives a person to do that. Shouldn’t reading a book be an experience, beyond just knowing the plot of the story?

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And yesterday, Google celebrated the 200th Birth Anniversary of Charles Dickens 

with this awesome google-doodle. Happy Birthday, and thank you for giving us hours of enjoyment!!!!

"A Classic is a book everyone has heard of, and nobody has read."

"My Pretty Peacock"

“You are my Pretty Peacock”, my six-year old told me.

“That’s so sweet of you to say that”, I said, hugging him back. “But you know, a peacock is a boy, not a girl. I can’t be a peacock.”

“But peacocks are so pretty”, he insisted. “They have to be girls.”

“Yes, peacocks are pretty. But peacocks are boys. A girl peacock is called a peahen.”

“How do you know?”

“Because peacocks do not lay eggs, only peahens do.”

“Maybe peacocks hide somewhere and lay eggs?”

I had no answer to that. Sometimes, it is best to let things be.

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A drabble is a story told in exactly 100 words.

Excuses

“I’m late for work, because just as I was leaving home, some guests turned up, and I had to stay back till they left.”

“I was set to run the marathon in 4 hours, but got hit by cramps and finished in 5:27.”

Practically everyone seems to have an excuse for everything, even if the excuse is something that could have been predicted easily. There are times when you can almost see the excuses being formed and polished, even before things actually go wrong.

Why can’t people take responsibility for what they are supposed to do, instead of making excuses? 

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A drabble is a story told in exactly 100 words.

The Right to Life

There are only two things that I fear- one of them is Cancer. All it takes is one rogue cell. Even after you have been in remission for years, that one little cell can strike back. Once you have tested positive, you can never be certain you have put it behind you.

Which is why it pains me to see people confusing issues.

The Komen Foundation cancelling its grant to Planned Parenthood. Livestrong coming out strongly in support. People taking off their Livestrong bracelets in protest.

Some things should be above politics. The Right to Life is one of them.

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Today is World Cancer Day- do something to show your support.

A drabble is a story told in exactly 100 words.

Why compete????

“I am sure I can lift heavier weights than you”, a random lady told me at the gym.

“I am sure you can”, I replied, and proceeded with my workout.

“And I am not even a marathoner like you”, she added unnecessarily.

Lady, when will you realize, if realize you ever will, that neither of us is in competition with the other. And if my presence inspires you to lift weights heavier than I do myself, nobody will be happier than I. Because few things give me as much pleasure as seeing women taking care of their fitness and health.

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A drabble is a story told in exactly 100 words.

The Pink Ribbon coming undone

To someone who often sports the Pink Ribbon to express solidarity with the cause, it came as a shock to hear that the Susan G. Komen Foundation was stopping its funding to Planned Parenthood for breast cancer examinations. How could an organization that has become virtually synonymous with breast cancer deny women the right to be screened? Shouldn’t that be a basic right, overriding political compulsions?

And while I am glad that donations to Planned Parenthood have spiked after the news of Komen’s decision, I am not too surprised. People are not as dumb as they are credited to be.
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I sported a Pink Ribbon when I ran my last marathon-
not sure if I will ever do that again. Or maybe I will-
the Cause is bigger than any Organization

What is the Olympics?

I was talking about the Olympics the other day, when the eight-year old piped up, “What is the Olympics?”

“It’s something like your Sports Day in school, but instead of houses taking part, it is countries.”

“They run races? I can do that but I am not very fast.”

“Yes, there is running, but there are also many other sports.”

 “You mean like ‘cops and robbers’, and ‘hide and seek’?”, he asked. “I am sure I could play them well. Let me make my team.”

I really didn’t have the heart to tell him how off the mark he was.

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A drabble is a story told in exactly 100 words.